Quick Question about 16mm Film....

S

SE7

Well-known member
Hey everyone, I'm pretty sure the answer is yes, but you can use a roll of 50ft. film (16mm) inside of a 100ft. daylight spool without any problems, right?

Sounds dumb, but I'm just checking before I buy some film. There is a good deal on 50ft. rolls, but this is possible to use on a 100ft. spool, right?

Thanks...
 
I don't think it should be a problem. Maybe it could depend on the camera you're using. You've got the K-3 right? I have it too and I think it would be worth a try.

davide
 
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Where'd you get a 50' roll of film? The smallest size of 16mm film sold is 100'.

If you're talking about a 50' "short end" (i.e., a leftover 50 feet) then yes that could work on a camera that uses 100' daylight spools, but you'd have to load that film onto a daylight spool first. If it's on a core, that won't work in a daylight-load camera. You'd have to get a set of film rewinds and a darkroom, and a split reel, and then spool the film off of the core and onto a daylight spool.
 
Okay, yeah, I have the K-3.... but I'm a little confused about one thing. When taking film out of it's container (when you first buy it), does it come already on a spool? Or do you have to take the film and sit there, rolling it up onto a spool?

If you have to roll it up onto a spool, do you need a darkroom, or can you just do this in some shade?

Also, when loading (and unloading) the spool into the camera, do you need to do this in a darkroom, or would under some shade be fine? (I'm confused because someone told me you would be okay loading it under some shade, and someone else said you need to do it in a darkroom..

By the way, this is a pic of the can of 50ft. 16mm film.

http://i5.ebayimg.com/06/i/000/b0/6f/53ea_1.JPG

And, what's a "core", "film rewind", and "split reel" ? Sorry, I'm pretty new to film, although I know the basics of operating a camera, still learning everything else though...

Thanks.
 
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Some say that it's OK to change daylight film as long as you do it away from any direct light--ex. in a room with the lights off and no light streaming in from the windows or under the door. But the safest is to do it in a chanigng bag or dark room. Just doing it in the shade sounds way too risky.
 
All right, thanks guys. This place is flowing with knowledge... it's like an online film school :)
 
What the ? 50' spools of 16mm? Never heard of that one...

... I downloaded the Kodak reference catalog, and it looks like the 50' spools only exist in that particular stock (7218). And it's double-perf. So -- er, have you already bought it? It's not designed for regular camera use, it's double-perf film with a .30000 pitch for use in high-speed cameras. Normal camera film uses a .2994 pitch.

Might work in a K-3, heck, the K-3 is a tank that can handle just about anything. But this particular film SKU is not for regular cameras, it's designed for high-speed cameras.

Well, if you've already got it, you could always try it. (If you don't already have it, just forget it and get the right stuff -- 100' daylight spools).

But assuming you've got it, it's on daylight load spools (which is good, it means no darkroom or film rewinds or any of that stuff).Check the spindle hole; if it looks like it'll fit on your K3's feed spool shaft, then you can probably use it. You'll also have to make sure that it's emulsion-in (i.e., the lighter side of the film is on the inside, and the darker side is facing outward). If so, you should be able to use it like a 100' daylight-load spool, and you won't need a darkroom or cores or empty spools or film rewinds or any of that.

If the film's emulsion-side-out (can't fathom why it would be, but I'm just sayin') then ideally you'd have to spool it down in a darkroom, using film rewinds. You'd load the full spool on one rewind, and the empty on another rewind, and then crank it over from the full spool to the empty, in the opposite way (so the emulsion is facing inward when you're done). Now, this'll mess up the order of your KeyKode, if you're planning on using KeyKode; if you're not planning on using KeyKode then it doesn't matter. But if you are planning on using it, you may need to transfer the film back from the full spool to another empty spool -- that'll reverse the order from front to back and get it back in the right direction.

So let's pretend it's the best-case scenario: the film is on daylight-load spools and facing emulsion-in, and the 50' spools are compatible with 100' spools so they fit right on the K3's feed spool shaft. That'd be ideal. Then you should be able to just load it in, feed off a couple of feet and thread it through the camera. You can do this outside of a darkroom, but it's certainly recommended that you do it in lower light conditions -- direct sunlight would be a bad idea!

50' is not going to give you a lot of runtime; once you subtract off the head and the tail (the "head" is lost footage due to threading the camera, the tail will be lost when you open the camera because it gets exposed to the light) then you'll have somewhere around 70 seconds of shootable film there per roll.

Now, this is making it all sound much harder than it probably will be. My advice would be to stick with standard 100' loads whenever possible. You can probably make the 50's work for you, but whenever you deviate from the norm you make more work for yourself. 100's are the norm with the K-3. If you haven't bought it yet, skip it and get the normal stuff.
 
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