Favourite Film Gauge .

[Dominique De Bast]

Indeed, Janice. For me, each gauge has something special. Standard (regular) 8 is the gauge I started with. Although the cameras are not as practical as the super 8 ones I like the fact that you handle the filmstock (like in 9.5 and 16 mm). With a good standard 8 projector, you can get a sharp picture. I may be wrong but I have the feeling that at the time of standard 8, companies tended to provide quality. Super 8 has the advantage of taking less room to stock the films and the material and that's important when your collection grows. Quality can be very good in super 8 but also poor (this applies for films and for material) so knowledge and luck is needed to choose what to buy. 16 mm is a semi-professional gauge so projectors are usually reliable but you need to invest in a good lens as the standard ones are most of the time 50 mm which gives you a small picture size in an average living room. Films are sharp in general but most of the colour ones are now pink or red (I would say, but I may be wrong, more than in super 8). 9.5 is certainly the most interesting gauge for those intersted in history. Born when the cinema was silent, there are many rarities available. Projectors and cameras have for many models beautiful shapes. The quality of the picture is close to 16 mm and the films take less room. Choice in sound films is limited but imagine than when you project a 9.5 film, you continue what started almost 100 years ago (1922, to be precise). Why limit yourself to one gauge ?

[Michael O’Regan]

16mm projectors are reliable as long as they’re maintained. I think that owners should know how to carry out simple maintenance such as lubricating and greasing their machines. Unfortunately, I don’t always practice what I preach. As for print availability, there are many prints around with good colour.

[Maurice Leakey]

Yes indeed, Dominique.
I heartily agree with everything you said so clearly.
I too have all gauges on my shelves. Standard 8 sound, Super 8 sound, 9.5mm silent and sound, and 16mm sound. But, I do not collect 16mm silent.

Maurice

[Paul Adsett]

99% of my printed film collection is super 8mm, which is fine for the home. The equipment is very high quality and does the best possible job with the limited picture area. I have a sprinkling of 9.5mm equipment and films which gives almost 16mm quality in half the size. 90% of my old home movies are Standard 8mm. I love the quality of the metal standard 8 cameras and the use of prime (non-zoom) lenses. I have shot some super 8 films but I am not a fan of plastic cameras and the Kodak super 8 cartridge
I do not use 16mm. I once hired a 16mm projector to show a film at home and found out how noisy and intrusive it was in the room.

[Steve Klare]

Somewhere on this planet some dedicated film collector is showing 35MM in a studio apartment!

(You have to feel bad for his neighbors!)

I'd really like to push the limits of 16mm some day: in the space I have I'm not even close.

I was in a really huge back yard last weekend. I thought "Given a couple of sheets of plywood, some two by fours and a gallon of white paint, I could enjoy myself here!"

[Panayotis A. Carayannis]

8 mm only ! Standard and Super, Flat and Scope and 3 D !!

[Paul Barker]

16mm only. used to do 8mm and super 8. but once i used 16mm i was smitten. great choice of titles. great light output etc. just my personal choice.

[David Skillern]

Super 8mm and for the past 2/3 years 16mm - super 8 for the cracking titles that were released in the 70's and 80's and 16mm for the cracking ex rental prints from places like FDA

[Antoine Orsero]

I like 9.5mm, super8 and 16mm. But especially in black and white because often the colors become red over time

[John Burgess]

Dabbled in all gauges , settled finally about 20 years on Standard 8 , I collect mainly sound features, such a massive amount of amazing titles were printed in the day . I love the older B/W titles and have a good selection of mag sound machines to show them on. Love the chase , getting harder now to find titles. Nearly all my features are mounted on 2000/ 1600 foot converted Tuscan spools,so easy to store,never use the projector to rewind, always put them on rewind arms. We are so lucky to share such a wonderful hobby and lockdown has given us loads of projection time!
John

[Joe Caruso]

9.5....28mm...and, oh yes...Std 8/Super 8/16....I enjoy 35 and 70....have no room for them...Shorty

[Osi Osgood]

Super 8, hands down. Love to work with it.

[Mitchell Dvoskin]

35mm.

[Ali Hipperson]

A truly fascinating thread!

Steve's comments about the large backyard and the 'notional' guy in an apartment with a 35mm Projector had me laughing out loud 😆

And I agree with you Dom, if possible, why indeed limit one self to one gauge.

As the past few weeks have seen me finally and properly re-enter this wonderful hobby of ours, I have at first started with my familiar Standard and Super 8mm sound and silent films.

But I got into 16mm only a couple of years ago when I suddenly realised the far greater variety of titles available and as FULL unedited features too! So I have some 40 features (including many of the old Classic titles) in my collection plus a few projectors too.

Finally, and for the exact same reason as Dom stated, I was able to buy a 9.5mm Pathescope with a fairly good selection of titles that appealed to me the other year, as this is truly where the 'home-cinema' experience was born!

So as John rightly points out, at least this continuing lockdown will allow me to soon get on to showing all three of these wonderful gauges 😊

[Osi Osgood]

Super 8, hands down. Probably more due to family history, but I had forgotten about my short lived "jaunt" into 16mm. When I was in "media" class in the very early 80's, our teacher got boxes and boxes of leftover trailers and shorts from the local movie theater, I had hours and hours of fun splicing them together. This was during that time when schools still primarily used 16mm educational and other films. The best memories of high school!