This is topic Super 8mm private printing, when was the time? in forum 8mm Forum at 8mm Forum.


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Posted by Winbert Hutahaean (Member # 58) on May 12, 2017, 02:05 AM:
 
I was caught on surpise finding this Ebay listing:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Jason-and-the-Argonauts-1963-FEATURE-Super-8-Color-SOUND-private-made-/282466590591?hash=item41c4521f7f:g:uDoAAOSwlndZEvJV

The description says:

quote:
The movie has been made private in Hollywood studio by some One as the Previous Owner said.
Having seen the pictures, I can see this is not from commercially printing as the corner look so black like made by Kodachrome (instead of AGFA or LPP)

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However the result was not amazed since the colors look pale to me.

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- So when is this kind of printing available?

- Were they printed on Kodachrome (I was not surprised this would be really expensive job), meaning using positive 35mm for positive 8mm.

- Would the color be pale like that, compared using negative ?

- Any idea about the price at that time?

cheers,
 
Posted by Brian Fretwell (Member # 4302) on May 13, 2017, 04:50 AM:
 
I believe the first Derann features made for hire only were reversal prints on Kodachrome, so this has been done in the past. Later Colour Technique in England offered such services 35mm to Super 8 and Super 8 to 35mm, Super 8 to Super 8 etc, every combination using custom made printers. It was run by John Hall and featured in adverts in Movie Maker.

I assume the colour would be bad only if the print the copy had been made from was not of the best quality. That print might be an accurate version of a colour faded original.
 
Posted by Adrian Winchester (Member # 248) on May 14, 2017, 08:57 AM:
 
In fact around the mid 1980s I was told about a very obscure place in London offering photographic services, and they could actually print Super 8 reductions from 35mm, which included recording the sound and adding it to the stripe. I got a few trailers printed by them and the result was acceptable, albeit a bit softer than a typical 8mm release. So it's credible that such a print was produced by a lab with the same sort of printer. The price wasn't too bad considering the work involved - I think roughly about 50% more than what a trailer of similar length would have cost from Derann at the time.
 
Posted by David Ollerearnshaw (Member # 3296) on May 15, 2017, 03:41 AM:
 
In my old Rank hire catalogue some colour prints are marked as Printed on Kodachrome.
 
Posted by Timothy Brown (Member # 495) on May 16, 2017, 12:33 AM:
 
I had a complete super 8 sound reversal print of VAMPIRE LOVERS at one time that someone home-cooked. God only knows how they did it. Because they must have used 50ft Kodak cartridges there was a splice every 2.5 minutes!

The color on those Jason & The Argonauts frame-grabs actually don't look all that bad to, I just figured it was a limitation of how they were captured.
 
Posted by Winbert Hutahaean (Member # 58) on May 16, 2017, 01:01 AM:
 
Timothy, thanks for the info.

Say it is 80 minutes film divided by 2.5 (24 fps) giving 32 carts of Kodachrome.

I do remember in 1980s the price of 1 sound cart Kodachrome is $13. So the material cost only was already $416. Labour cost will be enormous, because it will be frame to frame copy [Eek!] .

What was on earth people spending that much money, while the cost of packed film F/L at that time ranging for $250-350 ???
 
Posted by Brian Fretwell (Member # 4302) on May 16, 2017, 03:31 AM:
 
I also remember that you could get Kodachrome copies of your Super 8 home movies made by Kodak. I suppose for them they made reels of it for that and may have supplied other companies for this so it could have been made by a company set up primarily for copying those films. After all some people shot 16mm at home and may have wanted Super 8 copies of holiday films for other family members.
 
Posted by Jason Smith (Member # 5055) on May 16, 2017, 08:17 AM:
 
When I first saw the pictures on the ebay auction, I thought how similiar it looked to my own copy. I have the Derann feature of Jason and the Argonauts.

To me it seems like Derann's master material may have had some fade(correct me if I am wrong). Some parts of the movie have perfect colors and other parts seem to look faded. If anyone else has the Derann feature, perhaps they could chime in about the color.

Here are a few pictures below from my print. As you can see in the first picture, the colors look great. But after that...

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For the picture below, I took the exact same picture of my print that was in the Ebay auction and the colors look similiar.

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The picture below makes me think the master material was faded. Perhaps the original footage did not look to different? I guess I would need to watch my DVD copy..

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This picture is brought to you by Crimson Vision.

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His face seems a little bit too red to me but the blue background looks perfect...maybe the fade is my imagination?

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This fighting scene seems faded...

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But then this other scene from the same sequence looks great.

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In conclusion, the colors on that print that sold on eBay looks very similiar to my own Derann feature.
 
Posted by Alan Rik (Member # 73) on May 16, 2017, 10:14 AM:
 
I use to own Jason and I thought the print quality was ok. And my copy was like yours. Reasonably sharp, not super sharp, and a little bit of fade on some scenes. Mine was the Derann as well.
 
Posted by Mike Newell (Member # 23) on May 16, 2017, 06:05 PM:
 
My Jason print was Derann very good but variable in quality in places. The best Harryhausen movie when all said and done. Shame it wasn't as good print wise as Jack the Giant Killer.
 
Posted by Alan Rik (Member # 73) on May 16, 2017, 11:11 PM:
 
Jack the Giant Killer is a beautiful print of a terrible cheesy movie. it is the poor poor mans 7th Voyage of Sinbad. Loved the print and hated the movie. But i did like the stop motion animation of the first monster that kept growing. [Smile]
 
Posted by Andrew Woodcock (Member # 3260) on May 18, 2017, 08:43 AM:
 
My own print of Jack The Giant Killer is a very good quality print but it does have some of the usual negative sparkle and printing marks that often can be associated with Red Fox films.

Its got fantastic colour and contrast though that all of their features seem to have and it is a little sharper than some others I have seen. I would put it on parity with The Time Machine for sharpness, judging by my own print.
 
Posted by Mike Newell (Member # 23) on May 18, 2017, 11:24 AM:
 
You must have an inferior Red Fox print. The Derann print was stunning.
 
Posted by Andrew Woodcock (Member # 3260) on May 18, 2017, 11:46 AM:
 
As the Red Fox prints will have been made earlier from the same negatives Derann inherited from them, I'm not sure how this is possible Mike?

All I know is I haven't had any Red Fox print that doesn't have some kind of markings transferred through from the negatives themselves or through the printing process.

It's neither bad or frequent, but it's always present on each film and especially so for negative sparkle close to neg splices.
 
Posted by Mike Newell (Member # 23) on May 18, 2017, 12:26 PM:
 
We seem to have different films Andrew. Derann bought up Red Fox titles and negs but I seem to remember hearing a lot of the negatives were useless. Derann sourced different negatives for a lot of their titles but badged / sold them as Red Fox to avoid copyright costs. Derann printing was far superior to anything Red Fix produced.
 
Posted by Andrew Woodcock (Member # 3260) on May 18, 2017, 12:39 PM:
 
Yes that must be it then Mike in this particular case.
Your flawless print of this film must have derived from a differently sourced negative than those they obtained from Red Fox then I'd say.

As I say, it's not bad by any means, just not flawless either.

I thought the Red Fox and Kempski prints I've ever owned were at least on parity for overall print quality to those that I have from Derann. There are one or two exceptions I can think of in both cases that break the rule, but not too many I'd say.
 


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