I actually like shooting films on a Bolex camera.
Okay. That was weird.
Bolex and Steenbeck wasn’t for me. I mean, it would be if I had more money and a lot more time to get really masterful at it, but I shot 20 hours of video footage before I felt comfortable enough with a video camera to start composing shots and making movies. 20 hours of 16mm isn’t likely to all come out great, would cost a lot of money, and would be worth it for the imagery only after I played with every function of the camera over and over again (and even though the functions are simple, they ultimately are nigh-infinite if you really play with the thing, which I spent an entire semester doing).
Probably because I’m a rebuild-the-wheel kinda filmmaker, though.
—PolarisDiB
that’s brilliant,
“don’t worry we’ll watch persona tonight..” haha
First time with a Bolex we’re shooting around City Hall. Dead of winter. The light just being sucked into darkness. Shooting wide open. Heads shaking woefully. This is a disaster. A week later, show up in class for the rundown. Much of it underexposed. Squinting to make something out. But what we did get I found to be gorgeous. Automobile lights mimicking a flicker across the face of my actor. Buildings illuminated and then perishing. Spectral. I’m thinking, “Fuck narrative. This is truth.” It was pure bliss.
My latest film, Give Me A Dram, (up on Garage) was shot on a Bolex.
http://www.theauteurs.com/garage/projects/2/films/81
I LOVE the Bolex.
Yea, J: I hear you. Bolex lovers… 16mm-35mm purists… unite (that said: much love for the 7D and the Sony F35 from this quartier ).
When you shoot with a Bolex, you hold it somewhere, not exactly where your brain is, a little bit lower, and not exactly where your heart is,— it’s slightly higher….And then, you wind the spring up, you give it an artificial life….You live continuously, within the situation, in one time continuum, but you shoot only in spurts, as much as the spring allows….You interrupt your filmed reality constantly….You resume it again….
[Jonas Mekas, 1972]
Gosh, not sure where to start. Seems like a few lovers and a few dis-likers of the Bolex/Steenbeck process. But, I’m not sure if the point has been made that the Bolex/Steenbeck scenario was part of the evolution—and the transition from analog to digital is just about complete. I was weened on the Bolex (and Beaulieu, and Eclair, and Arriflex). I remember feeling special just being able to hold one. My life, then, was divided into 2 minutes and 47 seconds or 11 minutes chunks. Strangely, the one thing I remember missing when I switched over to digital was the various, unique hums from each of the cameras. Later on, when I was shooting news with a Frezzolini (mag sound on film), the memory of the hum was only trumped by the weight (I once even fought off an attacking dog with the darned thing). But, when I finally decided to make my own films, the only limitation was the cost. Processing raw footage, then an edit copy, then answer print, etc. was too much for my meager means. So, I gave it up for 20+ years… because of cost. Along came digital cams and Final Cut Pro and I feel I’ve been offered a rebirth. Again, I feel lucky to be able to get rowdy in the playground once again. But, it would never occur to me to compare one against the other. When I shot with a cranked camera, and knew that every foot of film cost me big time, I thought differently. I was more thorough.. more conscious. Every decision came out of my wallet. Now, my thinking is often so fast that I have difficulty processing the infinite possibilities. Is one work ethic better than the other? I’m not sure. Like most things in life, both have their up sides. But, I can say I’m grateful that I’ve worked in both.
_Strangely, the one thing I remember missing when I switched over to digital was the various, unique hums from each of the cameras. _
That’s the thing, right there. The tactile sensation is gone. Nothing to thread. Nothing to wind. That little crank spinning was a connection to the apparatus and an admonishing, Don’t waste it. Get it right! It’s like shooting with a dslr now. There isn’t any pressure to get it right the first time, unless you apply that approach yourself (imagine if Henri Cartier-Bresson were stalking the world with a digital Leica. What changes?). Ethics. Has technology made us less rigorous and more cavalier towards process?
I am absolutely for the possibilities of video – but to accept a medium, you don’t have to negate another, or former. It doesn’t have to be one or the other. Just because you paint with acrylics, it doesn’t mean that watercolors have no value …
As people have been saying, there is a heightened pressure when shooting on film, especially with small small budgets. The stakes are raised. Your actors feel it, your crew feels it. The pressure to perform. It creates a atmosphere where rehearsal is crucial – for camera and performance. Fear. Fear that you only have so many takes. Fear from the actors to not screw it up. The pressure to get it right. That, you do not have in digital. It can create a lax environment wherein you opt to shoot the rehearsals. Cuz, why not? Because you can. You roll and roll, but it’s different. You have to come up with other ways to raise to performance level of cast and crew …
Digital Lament — Sackcloth and ashes: there is nothing to touch, nothing that exists, physically. Nothing to develop. No light shining through cells when you hold them up to the window after dark room alchemy, no fingerprint smudges, no scratches. No light to nitrate reaction: the old poetry is mute. No decay. Time loses context.
Meanwhile, the margins of error narrow to the extent that filmmaking becomes factory work: a conveyor belt of audio-visual product marked only by an absence of intention. Flawless repetitive capture means we work now to create glitch, grain, deformation. The happy accident is virtually dead. The limits of control are breached. Film becomes commonplace, disposable, because it’s just a data stream on a drive, square pixels jostling about in nothing space.
I find this thread fascinating! I can only comment in that I feel the parallel problem in the music field…i.e. 2-inch tape as opposed to Pro Tools, etc. Though there is not the issue of “developing” audio tape, some things are mirrored with the film world in that a reel of audio tape is expensive compared to space on a hard drive. With audio the process is further in the direction of microphones and pre-amps as well. Perhaps microphones are to the audio world what lenses are to film? I can honestly say that as a life-long music lover, the sound of digital is almost wholly uninspiring as a listening experience for me personally. To pick a random year, it seems that 1972 was about the high-point in audio fidelity as it relates to recording on tape. I would love to hear more filmmakers comment on tape versus digital, whether it be in relation to Steenbeck tables or Arriflex cameras or whatever…
Last commercial that I cut the director shot 120 to 1 ratio. Just imagine.
I miss film.
120 to 1 ratio? Eat that, Kubrick.
lol
T,
That is the most beautiful way I have seen it expressed. Elegant and right on the money.
T, start that thread, and blog articles and films and theory about green film making.
Then I will discuss!
So does anyone on Garage have connections with a lab? What do we think about creating avenues for film processing and transfer discounts for Garage members??
I have a Bolex collecting dust and I really want to shoot something on it this summer. Perhaps my TEN trailer?
I already have the filmstock – all I need is access to a lab …
Or perhaps, we could start talking about processing at home … I’d like to learn that. I met the filmmaker Bill Brown a few years back and he mentioned doing all his processing in a bucket in his living room. Does anyone here have experience with that?
Yes. Yes. And Yes.
Let’s talk by PM in the first instance. I have a project under wraps that does exactly these things you ask, and more. When it’s ready, I will make it available to Garage as a wider structure.
Picked myself up an old school 8mm Bolex. Can’t wait to try it out. I love film. 35mm still photography, 8mm film, whatever. It’s groovy
Colin Ludvic Racicot
All of those who used 16mm (Bolex) and Steenbeck editing tables will enjoy this parody
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Htb3u_a7OFc
Take a look it’s worth it.