[MacDV] transfer film 2 video?

[Randy Wilson]

I bought a variable-speed regular-8/super-8 movie projector on eBay for
$70 (they range from $50-$100+$20 shipping).  As I've done transfers,
I've done the following:

1. Aim the projector at the inside of a white binder.  You can also use
a video transfer box (i.e., a mirror and piece of ground glass), but I
found the binder had less "glow" around bright objects.  Some people
also use a clean whiteboard, spray-painted piece of foam, etc.  You
could also use a movie screen, but the contrast goes down the further
away you put the image, and the texture starts to show if it's too bumpy
and too close to the projector.

2. Aim the camcorder at the image.  In the case of the transfer box,
the light bounces off of the mirror and goes through the ground glass
directly into the camcorder.  In the reflective methods, you just point
the camera at whatever you're projecting the image on, and try to get
the camera as close to the lens of the projector as you can so that
you're not getting too much of an angle.  As long as you're pretty
close, there isn't any noticable "trapezoid" effect.

3. Plug the camcorder into an external TV to use as a monitor (angled
away from the movie screen so as not to cast light on it).  I do this so
that I can adjust the focus, zoom, brightness, etc., with more precision
that I would be able to do if I had to use the tiny fold-out screen of
my camcorder.  Also, on a more practical note, the projector's controls
are on the right and the fold-out screen is on the left, so I can't put
them close together if I open the fold-out screen of the camcorder.

4. Adjust everything.  
  a. Start playing a movie, and get the projector into focus.
  b. Adjust the position of the camcorder so that the image is centered
(might require adjusting various tripod legs, twisting the camcorder on
the tripod, raising & lowering the camera, etc). 
  c. Adjust the zoom so that the TV (camcorder) can't see any of the
dark edges.  miniDV will actually capture slightly around that anyway,
so you don't have to feel like you're "losing" anything on the edges. 
Once I think I have the position and zoom right, I nudge my camcorder
slightly up, down, left and right, and make sure the blackness is just
beyond the borders of what I'm zoomed into.
  d. Adjust the focus on the camcorder.  You can stop the projector for
a moment, turn on the light, and carefully hold a piece of paper with
some printing on it while you manually adjust the focus if you want.  Or
you can just let the camcorder auto-focus, which I've found is just as
good.  I do like to lock the focus once it is right, though, because
sometimes in dark conditions the camcorder can get confused.
  e. Adjust the variable-speed knob on the projector until the movie
doesn't flicker or pulsate on the TV screen.
  f. You might want to set the exposure to manual and adjust it as you
record, or you might just let the camcorder to its best.

5. Rewind the movie, and start recording.  Don't forget to make shadows
on the screen when the movie's over! ("Yeay! Shadow time!" as my
2-year-old says).

I've found that the movie certainly looks better on the screen than it
does on video.  Camcorders just don't have the dynamic range to handle
the high contrast between the bright scenes and the dark ones.  On the
film, you can see the bricks in the shadow at the same time as the sun
reflecting off of the lake, but on the camcorder you have to choose one
or the other.  On the camcorder, you have a narrower range, which you
can slide around with the "exposure" dial, but which ultimately you can
only use to decide which part of the dark-to-light spectrum you want to
capture.  I also notice that the colors are much less colorful when
captured onto the camcorder.  Bright red flowers come out as slightly
red.  Bummer.  On the other hand, once I realized that it wasn't going
to be as good as the original, I started to relax a little bit about
making sure this was completely archival quality, and decided to just
capture the stuff that would be interesting to watch just to make it
more convenient to do so.

Eventually someone will come up with an inexpensive attachment to a
slide scanner that will allow consumers to scan their own 8mm film and
create digital movies directly from the scans.  At that point the
mismatch in frame rate will also not matter--you will be able to just
set your computer to play the movie back at the original 18fps.

Good luck!

--Randy Wilson


>>> donhinkle at att.net 05/23/03 09:54AM >>>
A local film store offers to transfer 8 & 16mm films to video--but
only
to VHS. Another transfer will be necessary to make the video digital.
I'm concerned that this intermediate step may lose too much
resolution,
and would prefer a straight film-2-digital solution.

Is that possible? Any good references in New Jersey or Manhattan? or
on
the web?

—don hinkle