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Steven my son sent me some photos taken last year with his phone while he was down south on a building contract. The company paid for everything, he says getting up in the morning and looking out across the lakes was really something
Although not taken today I think they look great .
So, late last week I won an eBay auction for a small lot of Super-8 films. The seller showed the labels on the boxes. Among them, there were five Sunday River Productions railroad films. I've been collecting these since I was in my teens and they'd be a guilty pleasure if I felt at all guilty about it. Two titles I had, but two were titles I didn't and one was a sound print of a film I have as a silent, but never even knew was available with sound,
This was "buy it now" for about $25, so it seemed a sensible gamble to make, and gambling it really is! When We buy films at auction like this, we depend on both the information the seller provides and their honestly. In this particular case, the seller had no word to give: all he said was the boxes looked in good condition. He had no means to look at the films, so he had no promises to keep.
So the days passed until they showed up. Had they baked for 30 years in some attic, were they full of spider eggs (-and spiders?). Were they a quarter mile of tramlines and torn sprocket holes?
The 25 bucks wouldn't ruin me and maybe I could even get a refund, but if nothing else I wanted those films and this could be my only chance to ever have them!
-only time would tell!
This is where film collecting starts to have common ground with betting on horses and casino gambling: you lay your money down and hope the payoff is great! When we've done this long enough, we win and few and lose a few.
Now, you'll notice that each of 'em has a "$1" or "$3" sticker on it, and the total was about $12. My feeling is the seller found these at some thrift shop and decided to turn them around on eBay. The seller doubled his money: he certainly "won".
The fact of the matter is the films are in really great shape, and since I would gladly have paid that $25 for any of the three I was really after: I "won" too! (If nothing else, The Royal Hudson with sound puts on quite a show!)
BTW: That "film" over on the left was never meant for a projector, but is a 5 inch reel of audiotape. (Widest sound-stripe I've ever seen!). We'll chalk that up to buying "film" from people outside the fraternity!
Hi!
Sounds like you have made a bargain. Is there sound on the audiotape (sepmag soundtrack for one of the railroad films)? Or is it a „fresh“ one?
BTW: On your photos, the stickers with the reduced prices (1 or 3$) don’t look like new. (At least on my phone.) They might have been put their in the 1980s or 1990s when a photoshop closed its S8-department.
I don't think the tape is blank, there is handwriting on the box but I can't read it. (-fair enough: there are days I can't read my own, either! Some people were just born to write with a keyboard!).
The spindle-hole is much smaller than Super-8's, and fits just fine on my film editor with the Super-8 collar removed, so I'd say it's Regular-8 compatible.
I don't know the histories of the two formats well enough: is reel to reel audiotape operating to Regular-8 standards or is Regular-8 operating to audiotape standards?
I think Regular-8 came in the 1930s and tape recording in general came later.
I'm sure 1/4 in recording tape went into popular use in the early 1950's here in the UK. I have a feeling it started in Germany (agfa) in th latter stages of WWII possibly for military/radio use.
I compared the width of the reel, and it definitely lines up with an 8mm reel. What's interesting is 1/4" tape is only 6.35mm wide, so there is more slop from side to side when it's audio tape on the reel as opposed to 8mm film.
This reel has "side 1" and "side 2" on it, so it was at least intended for audio recording. .
It's quite comfortable on an 8mm spindle...just don't try to thread it!
This isn't the only place I've seen where a motion picture standard is borrowed. There is a process in electronic circuit manufacturing called Surface Mount Technology where components are made without wire leads are placed on a printed circuit board with solder suspended in a paste between the part's contacts and their place on the PCB. The board is then run through an infrared oven, the solder paste melts and the board is ready for testing.
These are tiny, tiny components, placed very densely on the board, and they can be placed double-sided too since there are no wires poking through.
Component placement on the board is robotic, and the parts are supplied to the machine on reels: Super-8, 16mm and sometimes 35mm for the big stuff.
When I worked in electronic manufacturing, there were always piles of empty reels awaiting disposal, but I never took any: they were spectacular cheapies! I've never been that hard up for reels.
There was something called „8mm fullcoat“ and „S8 fullcoat“ (8mm wide audiotape with regular8/super8 perforations). It was mainly used for editing the sound in sync on flatbed editors. The same existed at least for 16mm and 35mm, too. For 16mm, there had even been special projectors that had the reels with the film on one side and the reels with the fullcoat 16mm audiotape on the other.
But when it’s „standard width“ audiotape without any holes, then it’s either sync-sound (with beeps) or it’s completely unrelated to the films or „non-synced sound“.
A few pics from Bonny Scotland on a filmic theme. This is Culross, which is regularly used as a shooting location for the Outlander TV series. It was also used in the Michael Caine version of 'Kidnapped' back in the 70's and the Kenneth More version of 'The 39 Steps'.
I took this photo a couple of weeks ago across the road at the park, no games played on that field on that day, Steven sent me this photo of Connor with the ball from his phone just the other day taken during this winter session. Now if you wonder how quickly you can bring some one down "to hit the dirt that is" well this is the way to do it. It does not matter if you are an adult or not, a tackle like this, around the legs and, possibly an extra nudge from a team mate can or should I say will seal your fate.
Temp today is 3-6 degrees Centigrade with sleet, not complaining though, much better than a 30-40 degree heatwave that you folk are going through.
Spent the day at Springston end of session prize giving plus Connor along with every one else getting there U13 team photos, quite a long day but its worth it. All but one can return next year, so that's nice most will be back. I thanked his coach afterwards for everything he had done, he in turn thanked us for turning up and supporting them every Saturday. The main thing is that everyone enjoys themselves its not always about winning, but "working together" as a team can make it happen.
Last edited by Graham Ritchie; August 18, 2023, 11:38 PM.
Yesterday I thought I better show Steven and Connor what I have been getting up to at Ferrymead. The Westar is all done, I just need to plug it into an amp did more painting the other week and added another movie poster "The Golden Compass" another left over from my Movieland days. Later this week I should finish up with the wooden frame at back of the projector, then pull the tarpaulin its "black on the inside, silver on the outside" down hooking it onto the sides etc to meet it. Both Super 8 and Std 8 plus 16mm will be added, but I need to spend time on those donated projectors first, to make sure they are up to it. While we were there yesterday, Steven suggested we call into the aviation side of things as he remembers seeing an old Mt Cook ground power unit, so we did, got talking to a person there as you do, gave me his card for a proper look around after telling him I used to work for Mt Cook and the aero club many moons ago, so that should be interesting, funny seeing things in a museum that I once used to work on
Is there sound on the audiotape (sepmag soundtrack for one of the railroad films)? Or is it a „fresh“ one?
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