8mm Forum: Color Universal 8 Logo

This is topic Color Universal 8 Logo in forum 8mm Forum at 8mm Forum.

To visit this topic, use this URL:
https://8mmforum.film-tech.com/cgi-bin/ubb/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=1;t=011386

Posted by Brad Kimball (Member # 5) on March 28, 2017, 10:44 PM:

Has anyone else observed that on U/8 color prints that have severely faded to practically all red that the blue in the U/8 logo at the very beginning of the prints is still bold and un-faded? I wonder why. If the movie portion of the print(s) has faded you'ld think the logos would also be affected.

Posted by Bill Phelps (Member # 1431) on March 28, 2017, 11:08 PM:

Yes I have wondered the same thing. I have some like that. The logo comes on and you think "this looks good" then the movie starts and......that just tells me the films were faded when new...right?

Posted by Winbert Hutahaean (Member # 58) on March 29, 2017, 12:10 AM:

So I guess the negative has faded since the beginning.

Posted by Douglas Meltzer (Member # 28) on March 29, 2017, 09:55 AM:

I watch my U-8 prints that I bought new in the late 70's and wonder exactly the same thing. The logo colors and often the black background contrast look fine and then the poor faded film starts. These were definitely not faded when first obtained.

Doug

Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on March 29, 2017, 10:56 AM:

This is so funny ( hoho .. haha, tee hee, Hyuk Hyuk!)

(well, not that funny) ...

... as i have found, on every single very GOOD color 2X400ft Universal 8 digest that, while the actual digest itself still has awesome color, the actual Universal 8 logo itself will almost never have perfect blacks and actually look like it has reddish fade to it and mind you, the rest of the digest will look fine.

Well, actually, that tends to be a real hit or miss with Universal 8. others have noticed this as well. Take "The Blues Brothers", for instance. There are sequences in the film that the color is spot on the the letterbox black bars on the top and bottom are a perfect jet black, and then the next sequence, gone are the perfect blacks to the letterbox and the image clearly is suffering from a reddish hue.

This means, of course, Universal 8's quality control could be a real hit and miss situation. mind you, the great color versus poor color are all on the same print, nothing outside being spliced in by the collector.

It seems that this was also more of a problem with the later 2X400ft releases than the earlier ones. "JAWS" has perfect color from beginning to end, (faded Universal 8 logo, however), but others, like the previously mentioned "Blues" are, well, not so great.

Posted by Bill Phelps (Member # 1431) on March 29, 2017, 08:03 PM:

Well it sounds like if the logo looks good, the digest will be faded and if the logo is faded then the digest will look good! Makes it easy to check just pull out a few feet and look at the logo...it will tell all! [Smile]

Posted by Brad Kimball (Member # 5) on March 30, 2017, 09:08 AM:

It's so diriculously bass-akward. It's just typical for U/8. Must have been a great place to work... I envision the office being similar to the show "Moonlighting" where nobody worked and just fun and games all day long. David Addison trying to convince Maddy Hayes "Don't worry about the quality or how good the editing is or what the color even looks like. Maddy, Maddy, Maddy... All collectors care about is getting 18-minutes of their favorite classics. It doesn't matter what scenes they get or even what order there in. Collectors will be happy with anything. I've got Miss Dipesto and Herbert Viola in the editing room now hacking up a nice old ex-rental faded 16mm print of "Dr. Cyclops" right now".

Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on March 30, 2017, 12:05 PM:

"Moon-lighting" great 80's show there, Brad!

The funny thing is that, a few of the Universal 8 2X400ft digests DID get re-printed by someone else. "XANADU", for instance, got re-printed (by who, I don't know), on L.P.P. film stock. I don't know how many lucked out in that regard.

One digest in-particular, "Slapshot' seemed to luck out on some very good wastman film-stock, but it was before L.P.P., so, either it was experimental low fade film-stock un-marked, or just an incredibly good batch of rep-L.P.P. eastman, as it has spot on color, (and yes, the Universal 8 logo is terribly red!)

Posted by Brad Kimball (Member # 5) on March 30, 2017, 02:41 PM:

Same thing with Castle titles... The blue sky background in the logo at the beginning and at the end is BLUE. Everything in between is tomato-red.

Posted by Joe Caruso (Member # 11) on March 30, 2017, 03:35 PM:

logo is fuji, prints are eastman

UBB.classic^TM 6.3.1.2