Canon Auto Zoom 318M Super 8mm Cine Camera Overview - Kodak Ektachrome 100D

I hope everyone had a great Christmas, I certainly did and received some fantastic presents. One of my presents was a vintage Super 8mm camera. I asked for a Super 8 camera because I am a big fan of the style of film that they shoot, with scenes in films such as Paranoid Park and Somers Town inspiring me to shoot on this small format. I received the Canon Auto Zoom 318M Super 8 Camera, in very good condition, I would say almost brand new with all the original packaging inserts, and even a leather case. In this post I just want to do a quick overview of the camera, I will be sharing digitally processed footage as soon as possible. 

The Canon 318M has a zoom lens that can be altered automatically with the Wide or Tele switch, or manually with the zoom ring. It has a focal length of 10mm wide and 30mm tele, with an f stop of f/1.8, I am excited to see how it performs in low light situations. The lens does have an optional macro mode, with an orange switch on the left hand side of the camera triggering focus for anything below 22.5cm. 

A fairly large dial is located on the right hand side of the camera, this is for the focus. It goes from infinity which is 15 metres/50 feet, down to 1.5 metres/ 5 feet. I have found that this focus dial isn't the smoothest, I am not focus pulls are something people do with Super 8 cameras though, I think I will have to set the focus, and then film without changing the focus.

A switch opens up the battery and cartridge compartment on the rear of the camera. It takes 3 AA batteries to run this camera. I also received Kodak Ektachrome 100D Colour Reversal Film 7285 to use with this camera. I will use it wisely though, as it is limited to under 5 minutes of film. I am aware that Kodak have recently discontinued the Ektachrome 100D film, so I was very lucky to get a reel before they ran out, as they are currently not even available on eBay. I predict that limited supplies of the reels will result in much higher prices, I definitely need to think twice before filming anything with my reel. I am aware that Gauge Film currently have Ektachrome 100D in stock, I think I will be stocking up on some more reels. 

I am extremely excited about learning this new format, and you can follow my process with Super 8mm on my photography and filmmaking related facebook page.

I found a short film that was shot on the Canon 318M Super 8mm Camera, I hope to create similar edits to this one. This video seems to have been cropped from 4:3 to 16:9 aspect ratio, doing this means the top or bottom of the image has been cut off.



Below is one of the skateboarding sequence's in the film Paranoid Park, directed by Gus Van Sant and cinematography by Christopher Doyle, one of my biggest inspirations in filmmaking and photography.

Starscape Timelapse Test Canon DSLR

This is a short starscape time lapse that I produced for a college music video project. I wanted to produce a much longer time lapse to share on my channel, however I liked how this version turned out. We used this 4 second time lapse in our music video. Also it isn't a shooting star going through the sky, it was actually an airplane.

I really did want to produce a longer time lapse to share on the channel, however after a week of attempting most nights, I just couldn't produce it. It was either too cloudy to see the stars, too foggy, or once it was okay, and 20 minutes into the time lapse the clouds appeared ruining the video. I decided that this version worked the best, with the airplane.

I shot this on my Canon 600D/T3i HDSLR with the EF 50mm f/1.8 II prime lens. I shot with a 20 second exposure, with 25 second intervals using Magic Lantern on a 32gb SD card. Auto white balance, and ISO. I left the camera shooting for around 16 minutes.

Equipment used in this video -
Canon 600D / T3i HDSLR
EF 50mm f/1.8 II
Integral ultima pro 32gb SD card
Magic Lantern firmware hack with the built in intervalometer

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Spanish Salt Lake Flamingos - Vintage Lens DSLR Video

Sorry about the lack of posting on my blog recently, I have been fairly busy with filming projects. I promise to start posting at least a few times a week from now on, maybe until I start getting into exam season at college. For the last two weeks, I have been in Spain on holiday. I managed to get a few videos filmed, and I recently uploaded to YouTube the first one. I went to the famous La Marina salt lake nature reserve near Santa Pola and Alicante and filmed some pink flamingos in the water. The area is very enclosed, so the only way to see the flamingos was within the bird hides, which ended up being quite far away from the actual birds. So I picked out of my camera bag my longest lens, which was my Chinon 200mm f/3.5 prime lens, M42 mount with the M42 to EOS adapter so it can connect to my Canon 600D DSLR. The first shot within this video is my favourite, I will be using this as part of my wildlife cinematography portfolio for university.

For behind the scenes photos and photography that I did during my holiday, please visit my facebook page and like to keep updated with my filming and photography.

Other things that I filmed whilst in Spain include a new GoPro HD Hero video shot on the Alenda golf course that I stay at. I found a way to attach the GoPro underneath the roof of the golf buggy, which turned out to be a cool point of view angle. This video will be released next week on my YouTube channel, so don't forget to subscribe. Photos of the GoPro on the golf buggy are also on my facebook page.

Camera Warfare - Devinsupertramp & FreddieW

One of my top YouTube filmmakers uploaded his newest film recently, 'Camera Warfare', which features a war re-enactment, with cameras instead of guns. I was very sceptical about this idea, it has been done so many times, with CameraStoreTV being an example. However this is definitely the best version of 'Camera War' on YouTube. As filmmaker Devin Graham states in his behind the scenes video to this film, it was the biggest budget he had ever put into a film. He had help from filmmakers Go Film and Freddie and Brandon from FreddieW even star in this video. I have to admit though, I prefer Devins videos which show 'reality', such as the 'Worlds Largest Rope Swing' and 'Trike Drifting', as they really inspire and motivate me to get out and make the most of life. But don't get me wrong, I really enjoyed 'Camera Warefare', Devin is an extremely talented filmmaker.

Which Camera Lens to buy? Zoom, Prime or Cinema? The Basic Filmmaker

In this episode of The Basic Filmmaker, different types of lenses are discussed. The three main types of lenses are Zoom, Prime and Cinema. Zoom lenses are primarily cheaper than prime lenses, this is because the quality of video that is produced is not as sharp as prime lenses. Zoom lenses allow you to move in closer or further away from the subject, without actually moving the camera body or rig. Zoom lenses do not have an aperture that can be opened us as wide as most prime lenses. My first lens for my Canon DSLR was an EF-S 18-135mm f/3.5 zoom lens. The 18-135mm means at the widest angle, the lens is at 18mm and zoomed in all the way is 135mm. Prime lenses are fixed focal length, which means they cannot zoom in or out at all. This generally allows for the optics of the lens to be able to produce much sharper images or video, which means they are usually more expensive than zoom lenses. However this is not the case with the prime lens that I own, the Canon 50mm f/1.8, or the nickname 'nifty fifty' which only cost me £50 on eBay. Prime lenses can have much wider aperture, which makes them more suitable in low light situations, such as when shooting in a city at night time. I also own many other prime lenses, including the Chinon 200mm f/3.5 and the Ensinor 500mm f/8 mirror lens, which are both fairly 'zoomed in', however they are still prime lenses due to their fixed focal lengths of 200mm and 500mm. The final type of lens are cinema lenses, they are used on the big cinema rigs that are used to shoot big budget films. They are usually expensive, however if you can afford the cameras needed to use them, the lenses should be in your budget.

I have included an image of my current lens collection. It currently includes the Canon EF-S 18-135mm zoom lens as mentioned above, the Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 II (Shown on my Canon 600D DSLR Camera), Ensinor 500mm f/8 mirror lens and the Chinon 200mm f/3.5 prime lens. Another addition to my collection is what is called a 'toy' lens. This is the Holga Pinhole lens which cost me around £11 on eBay. It has no optics, basically just a tiny pinhole which lets light into my cameras sensor. You can even make your own pinhole lens with the standard camera body caps, with a hole poked through it.