8mm Forum: Duplicating Home 8mm Movies back in the 60s

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Topic: Duplicating Home 8mm Movies back in the 60s

Dan Esmond
Junior
Posts: 16
From: Lawrence, KS, USA
Registered: Oct 2013

posted March 12, 2018 03:27 PM

Hi all,

Wondering if any of you who were around for 8mm's glory days can tell me if it was a commonly-available service to have a copy made of a 50 foot 8mm film reel. I know it was for slides but wasn't sure about movie film.

Reason I ask is that one of my long-deceased grandfathers has a couple of films I think may have been duplicates. As part of my transfer project I tried to note the Edge code (if present) on each film. The vast majority were Kodachrome/Kodachrome II of course, along with a few Ektachrome and some which must have been cheap drugstore brand films with no code whatsoever.

But there are these two from 1964 which have the edge code "Eastman Rev Color". The one page I was able to find on that code via google said that Eastman Reversal was print stock. But I'm not sure if it was also ever available for use in-camera. Does anyone know?

Also, if duplication was a common service, did it reduce the picture quality much? The image in these two films is pretty bad (not sharp and extremely contrasty), but that could of course have been the fault of the camera that shot it.

Was just curious about this. Much appreciate any input. I tried googling for info on this but literally every result was about digitizing it, not duplicating it.

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Maurice Leakey
Film God

Posts: 5895
From: Bristol. United Kingdom
Registered: Oct 2007

posted March 12, 2018 03:51 PM

There were companies who offered to duplicate 8mm home movie films in the UK. Back in the early fifties the charge was £5 for a 50ft colour copy.

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Maurice

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Winbert Hutahaean
Film God

Posts: 5468
From: Nouméa, New Caledonia
Registered: Jun 2003

posted March 12, 2018 03:56 PM

Maurice, do you know how they duplicate positive to positive print at that time?

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Winbert

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Maurice Leakey
Film God

Posts: 5895
From: Bristol. United Kingdom
Registered: Oct 2007

posted March 12, 2018 04:04 PM

They probably used a reversal film. However, I am not sure as I never used the service,

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Maurice

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Ty Reynolds
Film Handler

Posts: 93
From: Calgary, Alberta, Canada
Registered: Nov 2015

posted March 12, 2018 05:10 PM

Based on what I've seen come through the shop, duplicate prints of home movies were made with reversal film, positive to positive. One give-away clue (sometimes) that a reel of film was a duplicate was the white leader, which was also film, not the actual white leader material on an original film. Duplicate films that I've seen are very contrasty compared to an original.

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Buck Bito
Junior
Posts: 18
From: San Francisco, CA, USA
Registered: Aug 2011

posted March 12, 2018 08:00 PM

I'll support Maurice and Ty on this. We see occasional reversal dupe material. The service was offered by Kodak labs among others in the U.S.A. and it was most often a contact print so you'll find the B-wind camera original was run emulsion-to-emulsion to an A-wind duplicate. For best results scan it tails-to-head so the emulsion is facing the digital imager to get a slightly sharper image and then reverse the motion and flip horizontally and vertically to correct orientation digitally. It always shows a significant contrast build-up and loss of sharpness, but scanning the emulsion rather than through the base helps a little.

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movettefilm.com

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Maurizio Di Cintio
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 977
From: Ortona, Italy
Registered: Jan 2004

posted March 12, 2018 08:24 PM

I once came across ayellow box the usual size of a regular 50' reel, with the usual Kodak graphics: that was a dupe made by Kodak, the box itself, if I recall properly, bore such a nomenclature. And yes there was a slight increas ein contrast and grain although nothing terrible - I guess that stock was optimized for such type of work (positive to positive).

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Maurizio

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Dan Esmond
Junior
Posts: 16
From: Lawrence, KS, USA
Registered: Oct 2013

posted March 12, 2018 09:43 PM

Thanks everyone. I'll call this little mystery solved. May try scanning it again back to front to see if that improves it at all.

I'd never have thought to suspect it was a duplicate without that "Eastman Rev Color" edge code. Kind of surprised there isn't more info here and on the web about edge codes--they can reveal quite a bit of useful info!

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Brian Fretwell
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1785
From: London, UK
Registered: Jun 2014

posted March 13, 2018 03:52 AM

I had a 50 ft reel duplicated by Kodak in the 1970s. It was on Kodachrome but as it was a contact copy the emulsion was on the other side so could not be cut into or put on the same reel as a camera film due to the change of focus.

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Maurice Leakey
Film God

Posts: 5895
From: Bristol. United Kingdom
Registered: Oct 2007

posted March 13, 2018 06:16 AM

Just been looking at Pathescope's April 1953 price list wherein they advertised their copying service for 9.5mm home movies.
Positive prints from positive prints could be supplied at a cost of 10/- per 30ft length.
To those unfamiliar with 10/- (ten shillings) this equates to £0.50.

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Maurice

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Joe Taffis
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1592
From: United States
Registered: Jun 2003

posted March 13, 2018 10:10 AM

I had a few of my super 8 edited films duplicated back around 1980. I believe the work was done by Superior Bulk Film Co. The results weren't bad, but not as good as the originals. On the plus side, the copies were free of the many original splices...

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Joe Taffis

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Maurice Leakey
Film God

Posts: 5895
From: Bristol. United Kingdom
Registered: Oct 2007

posted March 13, 2018 11:55 AM

Yes. The Pathescope price list said that additional charges might be made to renew defective splices before copying.

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Maurice

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