Super8 to HD?

Tom Shortridge

Tom Shortridge

Well-known member
Hey, newbie to film, interested in learning. I've got access to a Canon 1014 XLS, interested in shooting a short on it to try it out.

I've seen that some places transfer Super8 to uncompressed HD/DVCProHD/etc. on a hard drive. But most just go to MiniDV or DVCAM.

Anyone who's done this, or knows more than I do - is getting HD from Super8 worth it? How much of a clearer picture/more information can you get form Super8 over what you'll see from a transfer to MiniDV?

Thanks for the help!
 
You might not get much more resolution than SD but going to a 4:2:2 or 4:4:4 format will get much thicker color than just going to miniDV.
 
Thanks, Hunter.

So if I'm planning on shooting on black & white stock, it would probably make sense to stick with MiniDV, huh?
 
I think at cinelicious.tv you can take super 8mm direct to drive at SD 10 -bit prores for the same price as mini DV. Just do the best transfer you can for your budget.
 
here's a good example of super 8mm transferred to HD (1080p, available for download as well)



(it wasn't shot by me, I just happened to come across this video a few days ago)
 
ropbo said:
here's a good example of super 8mm transferred to HD (1080p, available for download as well)



(it wasn't shot by me, I just happened to come across this video a few days ago)
Click to expand...

Yeah, I saw that video. F**K ME!!! That is outstanding. That is some of the best looking Super footage I have seen in a while.

I love Super 8 and shot a lot of it coming up. The Canon 1014 XLS is also a great camera. I had one for a long time. With the 220 degree shutter and fast zoom, it is also very good in low light. I swear it almost made light. I was able to shoot Kodachrome 40, with an ISO of 40, indoors with just a couple of open face 650's for bounce lighting. Shooting Super 8 is a pretty good way to learn.
 
Realy sorry but that is not HD, SUPER 8 cant go that far in practice, on paper maybe,nice looking film but resolution wise not even Mini DV,i used it myself many moons ago,the resolution does not bother me here it still looks nice.
 
I'm guessing the stock is 50D negative, which is really sharp and minimal grain. I've shot 16mm with it that you'd swear is 35mm. No on a pixel peeping basis super8 probably can't measure up to HD, but if it looks cool who cares. A direct scan to HD will surely look better than an SD scan uprezzed in post if it needs to be delivered in HD.
 
flinty said:
Realy sorry but that is not HD, SUPER 8 cant go that far in practice, on paper maybe,nice looking film but resolution wise not even Mini DV,i used it myself many moons ago,the resolution does not bother me here it still looks nice.
Click to expand...

What are you talking about? Do you propose this would look the SAME if it was scanned on standard def?
 
Probably. Super8 doesn't really have the definition to take advantage of HD's resolution.

Consider that Kodak says a 4K scan is more than enough to capture all the detail of a 35mm cinema film frame. So they're saying 22mm wide = 4096 pixels, or 186 pixels per mm. A Super8 frame size is 5.63mm wide, so at 186 pixels per mm, you should be able to capture all the detail it can possibly handle with a 1024-wide scan (i.e., 1k). As in, 720p would be way more than enough. Now, compound that with the quality of glass you're shooting through, the vagueries of precision of a Super8 film movement, etc., and ... yeah, I bet you wouldn't really see any significant difference in sharpness from an SD scan or an HD scan, because that's about all the little S8 frame can store.

If you go with Max8 then maybe 720p would be justified.

And this is subject to review when shooting Vision3; I don't know if that adds enough to make it worth it.

But I don't think Super8 could ever deliver more than a 720p frame could handle, and I think you'd be hard-pressed to see the difference between a high-quality SD scan and an HD scan.

(note: I'm talking about a professional scan, not pointing a camcorder at a projected image; once you start doing that you're introducing a whole host of variables that would have to be accounted for before a reasonable prediction could be made.)
 
In terms of sharpness, probably. But DV's color sampling is a bit limited; if you transferred to 1080p and then downconverted to standard-def res you'd gain some image fidelity due to increased effective color sampling (it'd end up as 4:4:4, instead of 4:1:1) so if the price is comparable, there's still some merit to the idea of transferring to HD. But a transfer to DVCPRO50 or Digital BetaCam would be about as good, in the end, I would bet.
 
Barry_Green said:
In terms of sharpness, probably. But DV's color sampling is a bit limited; if you transferred to 1080p and then downconverted to standard-def res you'd gain some image fidelity due to increased effective color sampling (it'd end up as 4:4:4, instead of 4:1:1) so if the price is comparable, there's still some merit to the idea of transferring to HD. But a transfer to DVCPRO50 or Digital BetaCam would be about as good, in the end, I would bet.
Click to expand...


MM but a sony 2100 mini dv cam i owned gave as good color as the 4 hd ones i have had ,but not as good as my DSLR.resolution on the 2100 was another story,i know you are going to say technicaly HD has better color sampling i cant argue either as my experiences are probobly due to camcorders make up.
 
For those still looking, we finished our R&D and upgrades.

From all the tests we've done and comparison scans we've done from other transfer houses.... We opted for something with more resolution than HD for our scans. We also found that many transfer houses are scanning in a clamped video color space, which limits the amount of information that can be had from the film. (highlights getting clipped/ shadows getting crunched and low end midtones can lose detail).

We're scanning in RAW data - which gives us the full dynamic range of the film - zero information lost in highlights/shadows during the initial scan. We also scan at 2k (2048 x 1152)- higher than HD.

We're scanning in super 8 / reg 8 / 16 / super 16.

For more details, check the site!


Justin Lovell
cinematographer //
Founder Frame Discreet Collective
www.framediscreet.com
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top