Old Super8 home movies

[Graham Ritchie]

Looking forward to getting to the end of all this stuff. Spending a few hours every day on the editor. In saying that, every so often something catches my eye like a certain parade that type of thing, however the more personal family films they are going back to Ferrymead for storage. I will leave it up to those folk to decide what they want to do with them. Up to now eight full large boxes have now gone back.

Its a shame no record was ever kept as to how those films came about getting donated or why?

[Graham Ritchie]

Ever heard of "The Bluecap gang" well I never did until I watched some of this old home movie film, I assume shot by a teacher at this school camp doing a recount of a actual Australian bushman. This footage plus other stuff I have sent back to the school for there archive. Once again I have no idea who took it or why those films were given to the Ferrymead Heritage Society. The school did get back to me with a thanks, hopefully one day, someone who appeared in those films will see them, and say this is me!

I can only guess that the person that took these films are no longer with us, with the possibility his family did not want to throw them out, thus the donation to the society. The one thing that has stood out from day one going through these films, is the outstanding color film Kodachrome K40 was, and still after all these years looks great.

I have been using a Elmo ST180 this time around and for a old projector it ran like a charm. I used a Elmo 1.1 lens.

Here are some screen shots from that reel including some footage from one other school.








Another school outing

[Graham Ritchie]

All done at last

I had to give up using a cement splicer on the Super 8 film, as I was still having the odd splice going through the Elmo, lose its loop no matter how careful I did them, there was just the odd one that would play up.

Also time wise I had enough of scraping films, so it was back to using the Agfa F8S Automatic tape splicer. I have to say the F8S can splice quickly and the Elmo never has a problem with it.

Time was also a factor, as I wanted to be done with this project. The end result though, has been some very good historical color footage. The below photo are now the completed Standard and Super8 film reels that are now all spliced in proper order of content and cleaned.

Da Da....

[Melvin England]

Graham - I think I can speak on behalf of your forum colleagues when I say that you are an absolute credit to the Super 8 movement.

[Douglas Meltzer]

I completely agree with Melvin. This is a great project and a fascinating thread!

[Graham Ritchie]

Thanks Melvin and Doug

I hope to put more footage from just some of it later on

[Graham Ritchie]

Put some more home movies up on you-tube today mostly from the 1970s

[Graham Ritchie]

Well that was a surprise, to find tonight that last video of Super 8 home movies clocked up 1.6K views since I posted it last night on a local Facebook page.

Nice to see that kind of positive interest in old home movies. It makes the effort in sorting them out on the editor worthwhile

[Graham Ritchie]

It was a pleasant surprise the other day that some of the latest old home movies, included about 35 minutes of the airport, when a lady replied back to thank me, as her late husband had worked there for both NAC and later Air New Zealand for 34 years. The footage had bought back memories of those days.

I feel the transfers to video could be better. To watch the actual film on a projector is "still" the best way to view them, as there is much more detail shown, however I am very pleased others can get something from them, its certainly been worth the effort.

[Graham Ritchie]

Just managed to up-load 40 odd minutes of the above Super 8 films of the airport since the very early 1970s, however some of the shots of the DC10 are not to bad .

[Graham Ritchie]

A couple of weeks ago I got the grandkids to sit down and watch a 600 feet reel of Super 8 of our own home movies all shot on K40 long long ago. I told them that this was film I had taken with a film camera of there "great grandparents" who they had never met. The reaction was very interesting, there attention locked onto the film which really looked like it had been taken just yesterday, the colors and detail was amazing but it was there reaction that got me.

It was a chance for them to really take in, there own background and comments included to Yvonne, like "you look so young there" that kind of thing. I don't think anything else can beat Super8 or Std8 home movies that are projected, using a Super 8 projector in a dark room onto a large screen. It really did bring our past alive.

[Steve Klare]

I know exactly what you mean, Graham!

I started shooting film in the late 1970s and I have a lot of my memories going back into my teens on film. My son was born in 2002 and for a kid of this century, he has a lot of 8mm coverage. He's coming home from college for Spring Break today. There will be a lot of commercial sound footage, but I can guarantee it will be punctuated with reels of home movies.

One of our friends found a bunch of 400 foot compilations of Kodachrome family movies from the 1960s at her aunt's house. She brought her aunt out "to see some movies" and when we were ready to start we let her know that this time it was her show. Our friend and her aunt had a great time narrating the films. There were a lot of people there long gone, healthy and happy. (Personally, I didn't know the people on screen, but I really enjoyed the cars!)

[Graham Ritchie]

Well folks I thought I was at the end of sorting out both Super 8 and Standard 8 films for the photographic society at the "Ferrymead Heritage Park" until the other day. They handed me another box of films that was dropped off, once again no paper work as to who and why. In truth I have been putting it off until the last couple of days, mainly because I want to put the time into the 35mm display at the park.

Anyway back to those films, mostly Standard 8 and all seem to be on Kodachrome which is really an outstanding film. I did take a couple of stills of Kodachrome Std8 mm from I guess sometime during the 1960s. One being mentioned as Christmas holidays, taken in the late 1960s. One very interesting segment though, was the making of the "Vim" tubular containers. I will have to do a bit of research on that one, and find out where locally it was done. Its not until you go through those old films, that you discover this kind of thing. I have been using once again the cement splicer and editor on all Standard 8 film. Its a must to have to get through it quickly.

Although I have taken a couple of Kodachrome stills from Standard 8 below, those photos are no where as good as what you would see going through a film projector to really appreciate the true color of Kodachrome, however its gives you an idea. I am guessing the below stills from the Std 8mm films are close to 60years old.

[Brian Fretwell]

I think the colour looks great even in those photos that you don't think do them justice. The originals must be super.

One story a local pub chain took over a microbrewry and called their basic bitter "Vim" - it didn't sell to well until they changed the name.

[Graham Ritchie]

I will have to ask the old timers about "Vim" down at the park and see what they say. Its been a very long time since I heard that name, one interesting segment was wood chopping competitions. The person on the left was really giving the axe the full swing, great to watch. I am using the Kodak projector for final projecting. I intend to do something regarding home movies down at the park in the future, to show folk a bit of there past.