Quality service at Italys MOVIE MAGNETIC

[Lee Mannering]

I had to post something about my recent experiences using the services of the great Alberto at Movie Magnetic Italy.

I started out trying the colour treatment of red/pink Super 8 films and sent around 1600ft for treatment trying to recover at least some of the colour I remember from near 40 year old super 8 film prints. Some of these were already buckling from shrinkage but worth giving it a go even in these darkening times.

Movie Magnetic i.e. Alberto is incredibly professional to the letter and my first parcel arrived UPS in a few days. After a week or two my films returned OK with mixed results as films stocks react in different ways but I was prepared for that. Some films great results others more sepia although the red had very much gone. It was nice to see some of the emulsions return to similar colours and pretty much worth having done all in all.

Batch 2. I had something like 3600ft of Super 8 films needing Magnetic Stereo striping. Those of you not knowing what Striping is it is the magnetic sound track to your Super 8 films. These where part unfinished projects from media students I've helped over the years and some commercial films I wanted to get into sound. Film types were Kodachrome 40, 160, 200d, 100d, Fuji you could just about name the all.

Results. I did some serious test recordings on various projectors checking levels across various sound heads including a Eumig Stereo machine which can really pick up on worn or poor quality striping. I also compared it with a blanker reel of AGFA clear film mag striped from Derann and LPP so hear are the results.

The light grey striping from Derann god bless them all was only reasonable.
LPP a little low.
Movie Magnetic Full level and excellent clarity.

Conclusion. It made me realise that many used Super 8 sound films have done the rounds and the mag stripe is become quite this/worn. From the minute I loaded Movie Magnetic NEW sound stripe the quality I remember from the 1970's was back again. Make no mistake this new striping service is a revelation the like we have not seen in the Super 8 movement in well over 20 years. Here the best mag striping used to be CRESTA ELECTRONICS which sadly closed many years ago but was excellent. I'm pleased to report the same professional service is now available once again and as you can guess I am very happy with it.

One of the films I had striped was Horror of Dracula quite a rarity over here with that USA title and I have now completed the dubbing. Sound levels were high and crisp.

Thank you Alberto for a 'top job' and I can only admire your dedication to supplying such a excellent service.

[Paul Adsett]

That's great news Lee. How about a link to Alberto's web site?

[Lee Mannering]

Hi. Email Alberto Vangalisti at Movie Magnetic and he will be pleased I am sure to email all his list of services and prices.

I highly recommend his service. moviemagnetic@gmail.com

PS If you are sending in films for either treatment or mag stripe he offers two options. Under 1600ft or above. I had been sending in a 1600ft reel with about 1550ft on which worked out very well.

[Osi Osgood]

Lee, could you please give us some screenshots of you're treated films? I was curious to send one print to him, (yep, you guessed it, Grizzly Adams), but I was hoping for some screenshots of recently treated films. Also, is he requiring that if you get the color treatment process, that you have to get the mag striping process as well?

[Dominique De Bast]

Paul and Osi, you can see some examples here : https://mimundoensuper-8.blogspot.co...o-red.html?m=1

[Lee Mannering]

Osi as a rough guide effectiveness it will largely depend on the film stock. Some of mine such as my original print of Star Wars was very pink/red and as with my age I wanted to relive it just a little as I remembered it back then in the 70's. I have no idea of the actual process but Alberto did tell me it involved a long soak so I needed to make long many frame coverage tape joins. VERY IMPORTANT AS THE JOINS WILL SEPARATE IN THE DIP OTHERWISE. I'm sure Alberto wont mind me mentioning making top quality splices. I used 16mm PEC tape in length to cover 8 frames.
I spooled up as mentioned 1550ft of film for each order to keep it economical and if you send just 200ft for instance you will still pay the same rate as 1550ft.

I would say my 1970's/early 80's Derann colour prints=RED turned out the best particularly my Hammer Films material. Dracula A.D.1972 and Horror of Drac trailer probably came out the finest and pretty amazing if I'm honest.

Alberto is very much professional, precise and I think its worth doing the colour treatment to films you want to improve. It's not a miracle cure but very much improved in most cases at least on mine. I will take some screen shots in a few days as we will be rolling the Hammer films and post on here.

For those looking for a perfect Stereo magnetic Super 8 film striping service he has that as well. Mine forwarded were Acetate and a mixture of Polyester including old Single 8. Every single film has perfect stripe thanks to his service.

Anyone who has worn stripe on precious prints will be pleased to know he can also replace your stripe as well. We are so fortunate to have a pro offering this service!

[Osi Osgood]

That website is the original ones I had seen before, but at that time, even from Alberto, they (or he) were working out some of the "bugs" so to speak, with the color reproduction procedure. That is why I am hoping to see screenshots, (or even better, perhaps, a bit of yours projected and put up on youtube!), to really make a really good assessment of the hopefully improved service.

P{lease don't get me wrong,folks, Alberto is a really decent, honest guy, to be sure. I just want to see if there has been any improvements. Lee probably has a lot more money, apparantly, to invest in this procedure. While we are doing better these days, shelling out this kind of money for me is more of a stretch.

[Alan Rik]

If you are going to send some films to have the process done its good to always remember as Lee pointed out that results may vary. I sent my optical print of "Superman" to have the reds taken out but also to have it striped with magnetic tracks. The emulsion on my print was very unstable due to many projections (very well used!) so that the striping might not have adhered to it. So we decided to not have it striped.
One thing I did not know was that because the emulsion had worn down in some parts the result was tiny little flecks of red that showed up during projection. These could not be removed so were left in individual frames.
Here is an example: https://youtu.be/khyz3XMiK-w
First reel was the most worn so the red flecks looks worse there, but as the film progresses the 2nd 1200ft reel looks better. In some scenes from the first reel and in the Daily Planet scenes the color looks almost sepia as well.
For us on this side of the pond shipping really is the the most expensive factor. The price of the process is very reasonable and I have seen some great results. But just shipping the items to Italy was cost prohibitive/time prohibitive. It took more than a month to get there and this was pre-corona virus, and the cheapest cost to send 2 features and some small shorts was $75. And about $115 back. So figure that cost in from NYC to Italy about $200 before any work is done. And also since there is no way to find out how worn your print may be...its a gamble.
Thankfully I only have a few faded prints but in this day and age that someone is keeping this hobby alive by offering this service - really its a great thing to have so my hats off to Alberto!

[Lee Mannering]

Osi. Its perhaps a little bit different for me having had my share of I'll health the last few years. I just wanted to relive those 70s films as near I remembered them and for me was worth possible.
Same thing with the mag striping of my home movies unfinished projects some going back to the 80s ouch.
Dont have the invoices in front of me but I think colour treatment and return shipping tracked of 1550ft of super 8 was £90 and excellent value. Some are paying £1000 for a print of star wars or was it £3000.

Memories are getting short but it wasnt many years ago even Derann couldn't get stereo stripe to stick to a film base. My newly ordered print of carry on screaming although beautiful image after its first projection my sound head was fully clogged with waxy stripe leaving the new film.

I say again. This is a new dawn for professional S8 services and magnetic sound stripe has never been so good. The jumpy bumpy grey sound stripe is no more Movie Magnetics stripe is perfecto.

It's quite wonderful to see some of my 40 odd year old S8 films no longer red and viewable once again. Yes the colour will never be as perfect as they were decades ago but it never the less is a great improvement.

My own S8 film collecting days go back to the 60s and if anyone can show me MM dedication to S8 today please tell me., other than the great Steve'O and Reel Image. How lucky we are particularly now.

On a more personal note. I tend mainly to support Reel Image releases rather than buying well circulated worn films. My more recent experiments looking at the wear to magnetic sound tracks even under a microscope show very shallow oxide. The new prints enjoy magnificent audio quality and sound levels and as historically proven titles are varied.
21st century Super 8.

[Brian Fretwell]

From what Ii heard later at one time Derann couldn't get any stripe to stick at all and it was so bad Derek almost gave up completely. Also that Kodak gave up producing pre-striped print stock due to the high proportion of wastage due to incorrect application. So this may years later and with little striping or even magnetic tape production happening this is very good news.

[Dominique De Bast]

Osi, I can only guess that you will have the same différences in the results as with a blue filter. In some cases, it improves the picture only little and in other cases the results are impressive. I will certainly try this service.

[Lee Mannering]

Yes Brian I think we all felt for Derek struggling to get a good mix of liquid stripe. I also lost count of how many new prints i sent back to CHC in recent years with laminate stripe falling away, essentially I gave up buying new films over here a expensive experience.

The new prints available from the states are perfect and of course new, I try to support the efforts of Steve'O when I can.

Yes Dom I have various blue filters they do help but of course reduce screen illumination whereas the colour treatment works the other way

[Dominique De Bast]

Lee, I contacted Alberto and will send him a film in the coming days

[Lee Mannering]

Champion! I sent my 1550ft UPS under guidance of another collector around £15 tracked and turnaround with mail now is much better than it was a few weeks ago thankfully. My parcel made it back from Italy in 3 days!
Return tracked shipping including handling is £26.55

Al Interesting to read your own experiences which we can only learn from so thank you for that. Yes these films are old and will probably be open to many a anomaly but as mentioned above my 70's precious memory films I just wanted back to some sort of normality for this nostalgic old fool. I'm grateful to MM for the treatment service and of course the striping.

Take care everyone and keep well

[Lee Mannering]

I'm just prepping the films for my microscope Hammer Film Festival here and just for you Osi here are a few snaps off screen so you can see the difference Movie Magnetic made to a good number of my films.

This is from what was a totally red print I must have projected on a Eumig dozens of times over 40 odd years as a much younger lad and will give those interested an idea what might be possible. But I would mention again, different films types react in different ways some better than others. Speaking for myself it was worth the money for this print to look wonderful again holding many memories for me. Long story but another time.

The making of Dacula A.D.1972 Derann. After Movie Magnetic colour treatment.






This is one of the Betty Boops printed on colour stock that developed a tint and after the treatment.




Can I just say Thank you Alberto for bringing many of my red films back to viewable life I really appreciate it.

More screen shots will appear of treated films on the other What did you watch last night thread as it saves doubling up posts.