8mm Forum: Optical sound Supers 8, where they came from. The facts

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Posted by Tom Photiou (Member # 130) on November 11, 2017, 02:08 PM:

Now this is the article that sprang to life 19 years ago, (i cannot believe where the time has gone). I wrote to Derek Simmons to ask a few questions and one of them was, Where did super 8 optical prints actually come from, how did they originate,
Here, from an early FFTC magazine in 1998 is the answer, and it is a very good & interesting read.
I Hope you can read them as obviously i had to reduce them to put it up.
The optical item starts on page 1, (obviously) Row 3
If you cant read it and would like it emailed full size let me know but hopefully there will be a way you can see it.

SEE BELOW (Read down the thread to get the article, thank you Doug)

[ November 12, 2017, 12:17 PM: Message edited by: Tom Photiou ]

Posted by Douglas Meltzer (Member # 28) on November 12, 2017, 11:51 AM:

I resized Tom's article to make it more legible.

The next part continues from "At any one time there were twenty projectors running, checking...."

Posted by Tom Photiou (Member # 130) on November 12, 2017, 12:16 PM:

Thanks Doug, thats better. [Wink]

Posted by Graham Ritchie (Member # 559) on November 12, 2017, 12:21 PM:

Excellent article...very interesting.

Posted by Tom Photiou (Member # 130) on November 13, 2017, 01:55 PM:

Thank you Graham, i think so to, to think of all those titles that had to be destroyed. Just about every film must have had an 8mm print back then as the airlines would have had all the up to date movies for their passengers. (just like they do now on the cheapy format, and the headphones are still hopeless today as they were then) [Big Grin]

Posted by Dominique De Bast (Member # 3798) on November 13, 2017, 02:33 PM:

Interesting article, indeed. To complete the informations provided, not all optical films were printed for airlines companies. Les Grands Films Classiques (in France of course) released several classical features (in black and white) for individuals.

[ November 14, 2017, 08:34 AM: Message edited by: Dominique De Bast ]

Posted by Tom Photiou (Member # 130) on November 14, 2017, 06:33 AM:

I never knew that,

Posted by Kenneth DePriest Jr (Member # 3212) on November 14, 2017, 08:30 AM:

anybody know where you can find a Pic of the projectors the airline used?

Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on November 14, 2017, 11:35 AM:

... and, there were quite a few super 8 optical sound feature prints made exclusively for "libraries" where you could check them out for home use. This occured specifically (from my research), in South Africa, which is where I secured my "Charlie Brown" features as well as other optical sound prints. One of the very wonderful things about these prints from South Africa is that they were printed and distributed along with extras. For instance, there were original 1940's and 50's B/W MGM short subjects that were released and on the front of current (at that time) 70's MGM releases). They;re are/were many feature releases in optical sound that were there in South Africa which, to my knowledge, were not anywhere else.

Posted by Brian Fretwell (Member # 4302) on November 15, 2017, 02:20 AM:

Another article states where the shorts for Derann and PM Films were printed Derann's were by Technicolor but at their Italian labs, PM (I think) were done by Buck Labs.
I'll look up the article in Film for the Collector after Blackpool.

Posted by Allan Broadfield (Member # 2298) on November 15, 2017, 03:37 AM:

Re. Uncoated super8 optical tracks;
Before the introduction of cyan optical tracks on 35mm, that could be read with red readers on projectors, the track would be coated with a bead of 'applicator' which would redevelop the sound to give a hard black image that would respond well when using the old photo electric cell reader. The reason for the change to cyan was that the applicator fluid was deemed unsafe to be drained into the sewers, though this had been the practice for many years.
Kodak apparently had no plans for this with 16mm, and at Soho lab we had to devise a printing technique to make up for the loss of the applicated image.
That's a long winded way of going back to the british super8 optical tracks not being coated, therefore lacking in volume etc.
If that was the case with british super8 I'm surprised that the quality was as good as sometimes reported.

[ November 15, 2017, 05:56 AM: Message edited by: Allan Broadfield ]

Posted by Melvin England (Member # 5270) on December 10, 2017, 04:04 AM:

Would it be right to assume that, as the vast majority of optical prints were for airline use, they would prefer "flat" versions of films to fill a larger screen and that no anamorphic optical prints were ever made?

Posted by Maurice Leakey (Member # 916) on December 10, 2017, 04:17 AM:

Other than airlines, I believe that Japan was a great advocate of Super 8 optical prints.

Posted by Melvin England (Member # 5270) on December 10, 2017, 04:29 AM:

I am sure Jason could add a few comments, Maurice, but were any of them made in cinemascope ?

Posted by Jason Smith (Member # 5055) on December 10, 2017, 06:25 AM:

Most Super 8 digests and features released in Japan were optical films. I know at least one company in Japan who released digests in magnetic and optical.

There are optical films here in Japan that were released in Scope.

The movie studio Toei released quite a few of their features in optical scope on Super 8 in Japan on Fujifilm.

Posted by Melvin England (Member # 5270) on December 10, 2017, 06:32 AM:

Thank you for that info. Jason.

My super 8 knowledge has just increased. Am very grateful.

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