Tuesday, November 2, 2010

The Problem with Film for the Ektasound 130

After I knew I would be getting my Kodak Ektasound 130, I began to look at film stock to determine what I would need to begin my amazing cinematography career.   It quickly became apparent that the reason the GAF camera went for approximately forty dollars and the camera I bought for approximately nothing was not because one lacked the super awesome zoom feature.

Apparently, Kodak has discontinued the old standard types of Super 8 film that many of the older home movie style cameras were designed to use.  They had indeed taken the Kodachrome away. (I know. I'm sorry.) The new types of film can be easily used by some cameras and not very well at all by others.  Which one did I have?  Guess.

These two pages on the internet confirmed the troubles.
1.  http://super8wiki.com/index.php/Super_8_EKTACHROME_64T_motion_picture_film_exposed_in_old_cameras

2.  http://super8wiki.com/index.php/Super_8_EKTACHROME_100D_motion_picture_film_exposed_in_old_cameras

Now, the thing is, the Ektasound 130 doesn't appear on either of these lists by name so it's hard to know what is going on with it.  I found out my camera is "auto-exposure (non TTL)."  For the 64T film that means the Ektasound 130 "cannot meter accurately with the Ektachrome 64T film but have non-reflex (non TTL) external light meters. If the camera reads the notch as 40ASA, use a ND 0.2 neutral density filter on the lens. If it reads the notch as 160ASA, use a ND 0.4 neutral density filter on the electric eye."  The 100D page doesn't say what an auto-exposure nonTTL camera will do.

So I knew I had a problem.  My camera doesn't appear to work properly with any film, but the lack of definitive information about my specific device had me holding out hope that I would somewhere find someone on the internet who had one and a blog on what to get and how to use it, etc.

No such luck, but I eventually did find a specific reference to the Ektasound 130, in an article from 2006.  The news was not good.

http://breakoutbox.files.wordpress.com/2007/05/64t.pdf

This article has a chart which rates cameras based on how they will handle the new Kodak Super 8mm film.
Unfortunately, the Ektasound 130 gets a rating of 6.  According to the article, "the useful life of these models is finished if you wish to use Ektachrome 64T (T stands for Tungsten;  artificial light) or Ektachrome 100D (D stands for daylight).  These movie cameras are either unable to read ASA 64 or 100 with little or no way to correct overexposure, or they work with external metering that cannot be modified."

So, is "the useful life" of my camera truly "finished?"

That's what I aim to find out.

No comments:

Post a Comment