Super 8 Fashionfilm with Kodak Tri-X

J

jlv

Member
This is a fashionfilm I've shot on super 8 with Kodak Tri-x. The cameras used are Canon Beaulieu 4008 and 1014 xls ZM2. Beaulieu shot with the sharpest look, I think it's the lens.
The telecine has been done by Ochoypico.

https://vimeo.com/69642459
 
Looking good, but using a tripod would have made it even better.
I'm so fed up with that artsy-fartsy shaky hand held camera.
 
Wow, I really like it. The transfer is great. I cut my teeth coming up shooting Super 8 but we had to contend with pretty primitive film chain transfers, to analog video, and they never looked anywhere near that good. Good job. I can see the complaints about the hand held, but that is pretty much the aesthetic of Super 8. There are some things that you can do to alleviate some of that. What I found to be annoying is the micro jitter shakiness. Watch your focal length. The longer the focal length the shakier it will be. How you hold the camera is also important. What you want to do is is bring both of your arms close together and brace them against your chest. It takes practice, but you can hold a Super 8 camera much smoother. In a piece like that, using the slo-mo more would have also really help. Other than that, I would have cropped the sides a bit in post as the film perforations are noticeable on the left and an uneven frame line is noticeable on the right.

Besides the nit-picky stuff, Great Job. I really like the piece. It is good to see folks still using the small gauge film.
 
Wow! I still can not believe this is supper 8! Makes me want to spend tons of money and shoot all the stock I have in the freezer :p
 
I like it as is. The hand held aesthetic works well for the style of the piece. The texture and imperfections of the film are a nice change too.
 
jlv said:
This is a fashionfilm I've shot on super 8 with Kodak Tri-x.
Click to expand...

Interesting. I'm not a fan of the shakey-cam look, but don't find this excessive. Don't know why.

The only thing you have to communicate with in B&W is luminance, so you have to make the most of your range from black to white. As a result, B&W for me really needs a solid black, and I really like to have something in the frame be quite bright as well -- to establish the contrast range. Inside this range, there are luminance values that I try to steer away from. These are sometime known as the "ugly grays" that perversely tend to occur right were you don't want them -- just above and below the 50 IRE range. So with B&W I tend to drive skin tones a bit higher or lower than I would with color. This tends to support the idea of higher contrast without having to actually have higher contrast. An odd thing to say, I know, but play around with it some and see what you think. I think you'll find with this particular model, that her skin tones respond better to higher luminance values. That and some solid black will make this thing more striking, which is perhaps a good thing in a fashion shoot.

But clearly, YMMV.
 
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