8mm Forum: Standard 8mm optical sound.

This is topic Standard 8mm optical sound. in forum 8mm films for sale/trade/wanted at 8mm Forum.

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Posted by David Whistler (Member # 765) on June 03, 2009, 09:47 AM:

Hi, this is my first posting, so please all be kind.
I am a Toei Talkie 8mm enthusiast, and I have 4 working machines plus 2 recording units. I have recreated the instruction manual, and can provide individual copies if anyone needs one (printed to order).

Does anyone have ANY standard 8mm optical track film for sale? I do not care about subject or completeness, I just need enough to run as demo.

Many Thanks
DaveW

Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on June 03, 2009, 03:30 PM:

David,

I don't have any to offer you, (don't have any period, as I just collect the Super 8 optical sound), but i can verify that they were produced. "Futureworld" (1976) was an actual optical sound feature, and from what I heard from a forum member in the past, it was a VERY sharp print. I can't vouch for the sound quality, though.

Posted by Jean-Marc Toussaint (Member # 270) on June 03, 2009, 04:09 PM:

Oops... wrong button. Sorry lads. Kev or Doug, can you please delete this useless post? Thanks.

Posted by David Pannell (Member # 300) on June 04, 2009, 05:13 AM:

Hi David,

How excellent to see you on the Forum at last. Welcome! [Big Grin]

You will be encouraged to contribute as much or as little as you wish, and please note that there is a 16mm section here too!!

I hope you will enjoy your sojurn here, and I know you have a wealth of knowledge to share, as do many of the other members.

Please make use of the friendship and camaraderie - lots of fun to be had too! [Big Grin]

I know the Forum will benefit from having you on board.

By-the-way, did you get my recent e-mail? Working towards a trip down to Wiltshire in the not too distant future.

With best regards,

Posted by Kevin Faulkner (Member # 6) on June 04, 2009, 06:47 AM:

Hi David,

Welocome to the forum. David P has said all that I would say so have a good time on here and I'm sure you will make some more friends.

JM, unfortunately we humble mods can only delete complete threads not individual posts. Sorry.

Kev.

Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on June 04, 2009, 09:35 AM:

David!

I hadn't realized that this was your first post! Welcome welcome welcome to this "Mad hatters Tea Party". WE're all mad here.

Well, I am.

Getting back to standard 8mm optical sound, I really wish that I had bought that print of "Futureworld" that was standard 8mm optical sound. I have heard rumors of other features released in standard 8mm optical sound, but I think it was something tried briefly and it didn't take off.

That's too bad, as it seems like the quality control for stadard 8mm tended to be better than Super 8, and the optical sound Super 8 features, (which I am, probably, the top collector of, with over fifty features), have an incredible sharpness and quality control to them. My Super 8 optical sound print of "Futureworld" is a VERY good print, which still has vintage, perfect color.

I've always been curious about your specific projector, having only seen photo's of them. How has it held up?

Posted by David Whistler (Member # 765) on June 04, 2009, 06:20 PM:

Hi Osi
Thanks for your reply, and thanks to all for the welcome.

The Toei was only sold for four years in the UK by Dixons, a high street photograghic and electronics store. It appeared in 1961 at £99 10s for the complete kit with recording unit.
The first machines had a two piece metal case of aluminium, which quickly changed to mild steel.
The machines I have cover the whole 4 years, and all show slightly different development mods, but there are two main problems which seem to be common: The playback mag head is very susceptible to shock, and is often open circuit: The nylon gear at the rewind arm has a brass hub that acts with a simple coil spring clutch. The nylon splits with age (like 16mm B&H worms) and causes lack of action. There is a safety clutch in the drive gear train that prevents real damage.
I have solved the mag head problem by using heads from the Elmo type of sound monitor that fitted the shoe on the editors. These heads have the correct profile for contacting the mag stripe, and only need slight mod to fit well. They tend to be slightly bigger than the originals.
The nylon gears cannot be repaired, so I have had them remade in brass, complete with clutch hub. These gears are angle cut and mesh with another nylon gear off the clutched metal drive, so there is no extra noise from the original design.

The amp is a hybrid of transistor first stages and two high voltage filament valve (tube) audio output. This gives decent undistorted o/p of a stated 6watts.

The projectors are tricky to lace. There is a very low pressure gate system that hardly touches the film. The sound path is quick to adjust to give the correct sound sep, but the film can tend to ride off the sound drum roller. The pressure roller must be very clean, and as it was shaped on the later machines to miss the stripe, can be mounted back to front, which holds the film better.

The optical system is activated by moving the mag head assembly, which is rotary switch mounted. There is a sliding gate plate which makes the picture slightly smaller when used for optical tracks. All four of my machines are working extremely well, although each has its own little ways, like all elderly machines. This is what makes us love them so!

I hope this has not been too boring, and if anyone would like some pics of the works, I'll try to oblige.

Best Wishes
DaveW

Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on June 05, 2009, 07:03 PM:

Not boring at all, in fact, very informative! Is there anyway you can post a photo of that optical sound standard 8mm projector for us?

Posted by David Whistler (Member # 765) on June 06, 2009, 08:04 AM:

Hi Osi,
I hope these pics work OK.
The close-up shows the mag head and optical section.
I'll take more of the inside when next in bits.
DaveW

Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on June 06, 2009, 10:08 AM:

Magnificent David!

It's interesting to see such an advanced projector at that time, especially since we're talking about standard 8mm. By the time this projector came out, standard 8mm was already on the decline, (having been over-shadowed by Super 8), but it's interesting that standard 8mm held the market for, what? About 35 years on it's own as the small guage of choice. Not much choice, except for 9MM, and that, as far as I know, never really caught on in america.

Standard 8mm had such great quality control as well. I have rarely ran into a poor standard 8mm print, but countless poor Super 8 prints.

That, and, except for the later Eastman pinky stock of the sixties on, (which afflict Super 8 as well), the color stocks used for most standard 8mm prints were primo. I have many pristine color standard 8mm prints on a variety of stocks. Of course, the standard kodak color stocks, but then there's the original cine-color stocks, (still perfect color) as well as that great ansco color stock.

You know, David, this area of small gauge film is almost unknown.
I pride myself with a pretty good understanding of Super 8 optical sound prints and the different film labs that processed it, but I know little at all about these Standard 8mm optical sound prints.

As mentioned before, "Futureworld" was a standard 8mm optical sound feature, so we know for a fact that standard 8mm optical sound was being manufactured, at least up to that year, but does anybody (perhaps you) know how long standard 8mm optical sound prints were being manufactured?

We do know that, except for some studio's that kind of experimented with releasing Super 8 optical sound prints for retail, (I have a few of these) as well as educational films (a few of these as well); Super 8 optical sound was almost exclusively limited to airline in-flight movie production and, at first, never supposed to be for retail. The very fact that I own as many prints as I have on optical super 8 is more limited to blind luck than anything else.

I wouldn't be surprised if these optical sound standard 8mm film prints would've been limited to airline in-flight movies. There was the potential that they could fit slightly more running time with standard 8mm film than Super 8, (with the slightly smaller image size), but, obviously, it was never pursued very far ...

or was it?

This topic might be better moved to the main section on Super 8 at this time.

Anybody else have any information about these Standard 8mm optical sound feature (or otherwise) prints? Any shorts?
Were any camera's for filming in standard 8mm with an optical soundtrack printed ... exist? You would think that perhaps, there would be at least some experimental models out there.

A most enjoyable series of posts here!

Once again, nice photo's David. We hope to see many a post from ya!

OSI

Posted by Fabrizio Mosca (Member # 142) on June 06, 2009, 11:03 AM:

Standard 8 optical films were released in Italy by Sanpaolo Films (the format was knokn as "8mauer").
They printed more or less 50 different titles both in color and b/w (some of them were 'scope prints) and all of them were in 800' spool. Unfortunately all the color prints are red know, but in b/w there are some rare titles that were never printed in super 8 (for example the Don Camillo & Peppone saga).

Projectors were produced by Fumeo and Microcine (2000' spool both of them) and were available both with opt sound only and in opt/mag sound.

Dave, on the italian super8 forum there's an old ad of some 8mm optical films for sale, but I don't know if they're still available or if the seller ships outside Italy.
Anyway, here's the link:
http://freeforumzone.leonardo.it/discussione.aspx?idd=8476746

Posted by David Whistler (Member # 765) on June 06, 2009, 11:16 AM:

Thanks Fabrizio - I'll try to check that out. My Italian begins and ends with ciao, so it'll be interesting.
DaveW

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