Thursday, January 15, 2026

Faking a Super-8mm film look with digital video

This is my response to a Facebook post but it is also a response to all footage of this kind.

"Super 8 filming is about making a human handcraft statement. It is the fact of filming on emulsion film with a Super 8mm camera that brings the special Super 8mm quality to a production. If you want to contribute digital skills to Super 8mm I suggest you put your kind of energy and talent into digital enhancement of authentic Super 8mm footage. I would be more interested in a discussion on what is valid and useful with color grading, grain reduction and upscaling. In other words upgrading Super 8mm rather than downgrading the digital image."

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Music - my fave Kevin MacLeod compositions

 From a discussion on reddit:

The question was about finding "copyright free" music for a short film.

My response:

Copyright free gives you restricted options and it may be hard to find. Consider copyrighted music with filmmaker-friendly licensing. incompetech.com is Kevin MacLeod's library with Creative Commons Attribution. Use his music for free on condition of giving the appropriate credit which would work for a short film. For some of my indie projects I pay Kevin USD 30 per song for an even more flexible license. Kevin explains this very well at:

https://incompetech.com/music/royalty-free/faq.html

Recent example (August 2025) of my 48 Hours Competition short film with free use by attribution:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DkSVFcNHuqY 
Attribution credit at 2min 02sec

My Kevin MacLeod faves - from this search form:
https://incompetech.com/music/royalty-free/music.html

Intrepid (Eerie, Mysterious, Somber, Dark)

Grim Idol (Action, Dark, Grooving)

Misuse (Dark, Driving, Mysterious)

Professor Umlaut (Driving, Humorous, Suspenseful)

Black Vortex (Action, Aggressive, Dark, Driving, Epic, Intense, Suspenseful)

The Snow Queen (Mysterious, Mystical)

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Tuesday, January 6, 2026

Mod-8mm Film - film transport experiment looks promising

Practical work on the idea of 8mm wide film without sprocket holes to make more room for the frame images. Diagram attached. Here my dead old Sankyo 620 Super-8 camera moves film again with a stepper motor drive repurposing the pinch roller sound drive. Testing here using outdated film with sprocket holes which gives a measuring standard to check out the movement. The “drift” effect is expected. What we are looking for is a smooth steady drift.



There are 2 test cartridges. The other one gives “rough drift” and from that I learn that the Nema 11 stepper motor is running with only just enough torque. I need to evaluate Nema 17 or the physically longer higher torque version of Nema 11. “Rough drift” video:


Photos:

About Mod-8mm





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