Warped sound?

[Lee Hardcastle]

Hi,
I have a Night of the Living Dead super8,
the picture is great and plays good - all except for the sound, it has moments where it seems to struggle. Best way I can describe it is 'warped'.

I was wondering if this is a common problem with sound/film. Or what causes it?

Thanks,
Lee

[Ken Finch]

Hi Lee. Welcome to the forum. Your problem could be caused by a number of reasons but is more often a problem with the projector than the film in my experience. Do you have the same problem with any other films? If so this would indicate a projector problem. If not have a good look at the film to see if there is any damage that may cause it to slip. There are two common terms for faulty sound, wow, where the pitch fluctuates and flutter which is
like stuttering. The former is caused by fluctuating speed and the latter normally by lost loop caused by damaged sprocket holes. Hope l am not “teaching grandma to suck eggs”.
Ken Finch😊

[Lee Hardcastle]

Thank you!
No eggs at all, hah! I'm completely new to this. I suspect it's damaged sprocket hole because I didn't have this problem with the other films I've played.
I will investigate and report back if I can see any damage.

Bit of a shame with the sound because it looks great and seems intact otherwise.

[Joerg Polzfusz]

Hi and welcome!

At the film gate (=lens), the film is stopped. Then the image gets projected. Now, the film gets advanced to the next image. So, for the image, there’s a permanent advance-stop-advance-stop-advance-stop….
But for the sound, the film needs to pass the soundhead in a continuous movement. When it doesn’t do this (at the correct speed), then you’ll have all kinds of sound-problems.
The problem might have already occurred in the lab when the sound got recorded. (That’s a rare case, but it happens. Sometimes a previous owner caused the problem.)
When it only happens during playback (=projection), then either the film is damaged (perforation damage, soundtrack damaged) or the projector is damaged (oil/grease that turned to stone due to the age, rubber belts that became slippery or brittle, problems with the electronics,…).
When all other films get played back fine, then either the recording is the problem or the film is damaged.

[Nantawat Kittiwarakul]

I once had a 16mm print with momentary "flutter" sound. Took a close look while running and can verify that it runs smoothly through the sound drum, and all of those "flutter" would occur exactly at the same spot - every time. Therefore I came to the conclusion that it's probably lab's fault hence there's nothing can be done with it.

A pretty rare occurrence, but definitely possible.

[Kevin Faulkner]

I have seen problems like this where a previous owner has used far too much film cleaner on a film causing it to slip through the capstan. This is particularly noticeable on the Sankyo machines but I've seen it on the Elmo machines too so it's worth checking. If the film is covered in lube like that then its a good idea to run the film through a dry lint free cloth to remove the excess fluid.

[Lee Hardcastle]

I have seen problems like this where a previous owner has used far too much film cleaner on a film causing it to slip through the capstan. This is particularly noticeable on the Sankyo machines but I've seen it on the Elmo machines too so it's worth checking. If the film is covered in lube like that then its a good idea to run the film through a dry lint free cloth to remove the excess fluid.

Hi kevin,
long time to reply back but- yeah it appears that the print is covered in a lube or grease? I'm ordering some dry lint free cloth right now.

[Joseph Banfield]

I don't know if it is this or not but I've had a couple of films that were, for a better lack of a term, shedding oxide from the sound stripe and clogging my soundheads sounding from muffled to clear all through the films. Of course these were both standard 8mm sound films from eons ago. A film cleaning solved that problem and now the sound is nice and crisp on both of them!

[Lee Hardcastle]

Alllllright.. the end result on my lint free cloth. I ran the whole movie through it.
I suppose this looks bad?
Or is it normal to deal with this sort of thing when buying films?
If this happened to you, would you return the film to the seller?
I bought it way back in April, only just dealing with it now. Slightly annoyed at myself for not solving the problem sooner. Learning lessons here.

[Joseph Banfield]

I've seen that before but it usually clears up after a few passes of being cleaned. If the sound does not rectify itself after cleaning then I would probably return it.

[Ken Finch]

From your picture, the film was indeed quite dirty. I have come across this brown sticky gunge before and it was actually nicotine deposits resulting from the owner being a heavy smoker. It gets sucked into the projector by the cooling fan and and gets deposited onto the film as a sticky gunge. Film cleaner eventually clears it but you should also check that all the projector film guides and the film gate are clean. However, torn or damaged sprocket holes are more often the cause of your problem.