A Labour of Love!

[Ali Hipperson]

Hi everyone.

I'm starting this new thread so as to detail my journey going forward from this point on as I am now ready (and free) to fully resume this most wonderful hobby of ours that I first began in the Christmas of 1978, before selling off my collection in 1992 due to marriage and all that...

I detailed my 'first-coming' to the hobby when I first joined the GOF back in October 2016 entitled 'My First Love' - so I won't go over old ground in this new thread.

This month marks 5 years from when I first discovered eBay (by accident!) which then started my 'second-coming' to the hobby and in turn, my second collection 😊

Due to personal circumstances (as we all have to endure at various times in our lives) it has taken me a long five years to get to this point - but now I'm finally ready to properly begin again!

As a 'systems' type guy, I have given a lot of thought to how I wanted to go about the hobby this time around, knowing now more than I did back in 1978, and still needing (and willing) to learn a lot more going forward.

So my subsequent posts in this thread will explain my rational for the way I am going about certain aspects of the hobby and I welcome any comments/advice anyone cares to make - especially if anyone spots any mistakes I might be making! 😯

Anyway, that's all for now - more to follow going forward and I hope it proves interesting to some of you 🤞

Ali.

[Graham Ritchie]

Hi Ali

Its always interesting to hear from others, and look forward to read more from your follow up.

[Ali Hipperson]

Thanks for the interest Graham ☺️

[Osi Osgood]

I remember how happy I was when I came back to the hobby, and I have never looked back!

[Ali Hipperson]

To continue....

When I started back collecting again in February 2016 I initially only bought a few Collectors Club 200 footers that I saw listed on eBay which weren't very expensive. I thought I'd just buy these few reels for posterity as I still had my very first projector that I bought for my 16th birthday back at Christmas 1978, a Voigtlander Dynalux Super8 - a very good (budget) machine for the time which cost me every penny I had scrimped and saved for over a year, £130.00 - even though it no longer worked!

However, as I then delved ever deeper back into 'my first love', I discovered the further joys that are: CHC; Independent 8; Foster Films; Super8 Warehouse; BFCC; and then culminating in this wonderful Forum 😊

So needless to say that it wasn't long before I was truly bitten by the bug for a second time, and at the age of 53!

During this time and despite living in a room in a shared-house where it wasn't possible to show my new acquisitions properly, I clung to the hope that some day my circumstances would change and that I would once again have my 'own pad' where I could show films to my heart's content. In the meantime I didn't want to miss out on any 'titles' that I came across (as I monitored the various sources of supply that I had now discovered) just because I couldn't view them until my circumstances, hopefully, changed 🤞

So with that in mind, a lot of my initial purchases were to buy any titles (Super or Standard 8mm) that I had bought in my first collection, from 1978-1982. I have developed a pretty good memory over the years (due to my chosen profession) so it wasn't difficult to recognise most of the titles as they became available. Although the typed-list of my entire collection that I had compiled (prior to selling the collection to Ian at Perry's in the fall of 1992 having recently got married) would have come in handy for those titles that even my memory couldn't recall after nearly 40 years - but that list was long gone!

However, I soon realized that there were now titles 'out there' that certainly weren't available during my previous collecting days - for example my all time favourite film, Casablanca, and as a feature version too 😯

So it wasn't too long before I knew that I had re-bought a very large percentage of the films in my original collection and over these last five years I have been able to buy so many more titles that weren't available to me back then. I had boxes and boxes of films in my one room and at my mum's house too - not to mention: several projectors; editors; accessories etc that I will refer to in a later post.

That's all for now - but I just wanted to put in a bit of context to explain what comes next....

[Lee Mannering]

Off topic. In the 70s we made a S8 drama film called A labour of love.

Collectors club in the early 70's were lifes blood for the home projectionist. I absolutely loved them with my little Eumig bringing the films I wanted to see.

Ok they were never going to be Derann but the films were just over £1 back then for a 200ft film amazing value and some today command hundreds.

Perry's also did some special Pathe stencil colour films which I found fascinating as well. I think it fair to say each business had something to offer.
21st century releases are happening and the market for the new print market is growing thankfully.

The 70s were a magical time for me, more than the 80s even. Returning from working as Pinewood Studios then getting the Eumig sound projector out to watch some films. It was like having a film set in the lounge.
Pure magic

Some leave 8 but most eventually return .... No other film format is seeing brand new films printed for screening on your home screen!

[Ali Hipperson]

.... finally, fast forward to October 2019.

As the state-registered Carer for my late mother for the previous six years, who had now passed-away, and having cleared-out and sold her house, I was able (through her kind gift to me in her Will) relocate out of London to up here off of the west-coast of Scotland to the Isle of Bute and finally buy the exact type of 'pad' which would suit perfectly my strong desire to immerse myself properly back into this hobby.

One of the main criteria when looking for the apartment was that the living-room would be large enough and give me a decent size throw for projection. I have about an 18ft throw which is plenty for my needs and there are pictures of my set-up in that specific thread started by Janice.

Although I moved up here some 16 months ago I started work immediately which left me little time to sort out the apartment after such a big move which I did completely on my own covering some 5000miles going up and down a large length of the UK several times(Chip did similar I believe!)

However, I was laid-off last summer and that gave me unexpected time to start the long job of slowly starting the big 'sort-out' of everything else that needed doing BEFORE I could spend the much more pleasurable time in sorting out all of the films etc... from the number of boxes they were inside in the spare room.

I disciplined myself to sort everything else out first before I would allow myself to 'indulge'! 😉

I had a problem as to how was I going to store all of these films??

I'll post some pictures next of the solution I designed for the very purpose....

[Ali Hipperson]

[Ali Hipperson]

That orange wall became.....

[Ali Hipperson]

[Ali Hipperson]

....that 🙂

[Ali Hipperson]

It's a bespoke Film Storage-Unit 8' tall and 5' wide with 10 fixed shelves including a plinth at the bottom and an over-sized top. Each shelf can hold up to 70 x 400' reels in their display cases - but will it be enough to hold all of these??.....

[Ali Hipperson]

[Ali Hipperson]

....and this is not all the boxes of films! Anyway, it has already been very enjoyable starting to unpack them, devise a layout as to what will go where and then to start putting them up on the shelves 🙂

More to follow in a few days....

[Ali Hipperson]

.....to continue.....

I decided to have a bigger gap between the bottom plinth which is in effect 'shelf # 1' so as to be able to store some projectors and an editor or if necessary some features on 1200' reels etc.

Photo to follow....