SUBTITLED KODAK 1958 film "How film is made"

Marco B · 03-01-2009, 04:20 PM

Hi all,

You probably have not been aware of it, but after Sal Santamaura originally announced in this thread he had discovered the fascinating historic Kodak 1958 documentary titled "How film is made" on the internet, showing the production process of film in a Kodak plant as it happened 50 years ago, Ray Rogers, Denise and Louis Ross and others have been working hard on making an English subtitled version of the film available for all APUG members and visitors to enjoy.

The originally English language film was dubbed in Dutch here in the Netherlands, where it was uncovered as part of a heritage and finally digitized by Frank Bruinsma of the Super 8 Reversal Lab in the Netherlands. He put it on his website, where Sal found it.

Many thanks to Frank Bruinsma for allowing us to use his film and add subtitles to it. And thanks to everyone else who cooperated in the project or gave useful comments and background about the film in Sal's original thread.

So now I can officially announce the English subtitled version.

You can view it from two websites: Denise's Light Farm website dedicated to all things related to emulsions and emulsion making, and from my personal website.

To spread the load a bit and to prevent to much traffic clogging up one or another web page:

My suggestion: throw a coin!

Head is Denise's website, Reverse site is my website!

Denise's Light Farm film link:
http://www.thelightfarm.com/cgi-bin/showvideo.py

My website's film link:
http://www.boeringa.demon.nl/menu_technic_kodakfilm.htm

Enjoy and best to you all!,

Marco

mooseontheloose · 03-01-2009, 05:07 PM

Fantastic Marco! Thanks for posting it - I really enjoyed it.

Photo Engineer · 03-01-2009, 05:30 PM

Marco;

I used your web site and the video stopped at about 10 minutes with the progress bar at the far right. It could go no further.

A comment about the red solution that I just noticed. Next to the reddish solution, to the left, are bottles of a cyanish colored liquid. That would rule out most everything but sensitizing dyes.

PE

Marco B · 03-01-2009, 05:36 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Photo Engineer

Marco;

I used your web site and the video stopped at about 10 minutes with the progress bar at the far right. It could go no further.

A comment about the red solution that I just noticed. Next to the reddish solution, to the left, are bottles of a cyanish colored liquid. That would rule out most everything but sensitizing dyes.

PE

That thing about the progress bar being on the far right and the video stopping, I can't explain. Probably some traffic issue as everyone is jumping on it. Try it again later.

Send your remark about the bottles and the KBr issue (discussed before in the original thread by Sal) to Ray Rogers in a PM, so that he can add your remark about sensitizing dyes to a document with comments that he is compiling.

Ektagraphic · 03-01-2009, 05:37 PM

Thanks soooo much!!! I have always wanted to be able to see that with English!

BetterSense · 03-02-2009, 10:22 AM

A fascinating movie! It must have been hard to work in the dark. The ending line of the movie was so appropriate: "shoot it while you have the chance"!

I calculated that each one of those silver bars would cost about $15,000 at current silver prices!

Sal Santamaura · 03-02-2009, 10:32 AM

Thanks to everyone for all that work! A first quick viewing with subtitles pointed out one thing not otherwise apparent to me. The spools were steel, not plastic, since they were placed by a magnetic carrier. Perhaps backing paper edge beveling became superfluous when plastic spools were introduced.

Thank you again.

BetterSense · 03-02-2009, 11:04 AM

I don't shoot medium format, so maybe that's why I don't understand about the edge-beveling bit anyway. What is this "edge beveling", and what purpose does it serve, and why would the spool material make a difference?

tiberiustibz · 03-02-2009, 12:52 PM

I can't stop thinking how much film they wasted for that movie. Could it have been some test run or something?

I think it's just careful alignment of the edges of the backing paper.

Photo Engineer · 03-02-2009, 01:06 PM

The edges of the paper are "feathered" to make them thinner and the paper is wider than the inner width of the spool. Therefore, on winding the paper forms a black barrier against the edge of the spool to prevent light leaks from the edge inward. It also tends to keep the paper wound more tightly to prevent unwinding when you break the seal or when you take out a used roll.

That is as much explanation as I have been able to dig up. I have no idea how it is done or what the extra width is, nor do I know the thickness at the edge compared to the middle.

PE