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Author
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Topic: Is this the first Amateur one?
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Martin Jones
Phenomenal Film Handler
Posts: 1269
From: Thetford , Norfolk,England
Registered: May 2008
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posted October 01, 2009 01:33 PM
Probably more to the point, what is it? I’ve put this post on here because I mentioned this to Rob Koeling during an email exchange recently and he thought it would be of general interest to the Forum... so, although it reveals my age, here goes..
It’s October 1954, just 55years ago, and I’m an Electrical Engineering student in London with a deep interest in everything cinematic. In a few weeks time our College Annual Ball is to be held and the organizing committee decides that we should make a “Commercial” to advertise it. My part, as College Projectionist is to come up with something different for presentation.. and what better than an idea I had been playing with for nearly a year?
Just under a year ago, November 1953, a new cinematic experience had hit London, but I wasn’t to experience it until about March 1954, when I went to a newly converted cinema in Southampton to see “The Robe”. WOW, I was simply blown away! I’d just turned 17, and I wanted to be part of it. So when the opportunity presented itself in October I dug out my notes and sketches and proceeded to build my very own Anamorphic.
It used two lenses I had made to my specifications by the spectacle lens factory behind the hostel where I lodged in Mount Pleasant in London. Their Technical Director was intrigued by what I had in mind and produced them virtually overnight at what I suspected was a substantially reduced price, but it was still a fortune to an impecunious student! I cobbled them together with some cardboard tubes and we made our Commercial on 16 mm using a Kodak B camera belonging to another student. One 50 ft roll of B&W reversal was all we could afford, rushed by hand to a lab in North London and collected the same way 3 days later. A quick edit, and it was shown using the same lens on a B&H 601 in the Student’s Common Room every lunch time for a week.. and it did sell tickets!
Subsequently it was used by a friend to film part of a football match attached to a War Surplus GSAP 16 mm Gun Camera (powered by a car battery!), but the results were very poor (the camera’s fault). And so it got put away and forgotten....
Many years later, I found it in a box and decided to put it to use with our Eumig Mini 3 camera, so the lenses were carefully retrieved and remounted in the form in the photo above, the casing being made mainly from waste water drainage components (never underestimate how useful they can be) and given a simple sliding focus adjustment. In that form we used it for some years until I could afford a Magnarama 1.75X lens, big enough for my Nizo. This one was relegated to projection use, and gave very acceptable results on both standard and super 8 projectors. Despite sustaining a chipped front element (the chip was painted with photographer’s Matt Black to prevent spurious reflections) and having no blooming it still performs creditably.
I now own both a Kowa and a Sankor, both purchased quite recently, but I shall never part with this one..... after all, given it’s history, would you?
Martin
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Retired TV Service Engineer
Ongoing interest in Telecine....
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