For those who ever shoot film (anyone still left?)

[Alaska_steadicam]

(Willie Phua with his CP-16, image from wikipedia)


Given the economic downturn, freelance in AK has slowed drastically. Especially so for me, because I am a staff photog for a TV station, and freelance tends to first go to those who solely freelance, leaving me drastically down in income this year. So I focused my free time into a side project I will be selling in a few months.

A little less than a year ago I was shooting a short film on a CP-16. The electronics were going out, which would randomly stop the camera in the middle of a take. It was a pain in the ass but we finished the shoot, and moved on. 5 months ago I started designing all new electronics for the CP. the result is the CP-16 Archimedes electronics package.

Basicly it upgrades the camera from one that can only do 24fps xstal sync + 12, 18, 20, 30, 36 fps wild speed to a camera that can do 2-64fps xstal sync, has electronic inching (so you don't have to open the door to check the gate), electronic film counter, odometer, menu selectable magazine lengths (so your CP's film warning light works with short ends) feet or meters selectable, batter alarm threshold selectable, and has an EXT fischer socket so it will be able to interface with a milliframe and intervalometer I am designing to go with it. All in all it turns a $1000 camera (plus $1245 for the upgrade) into a camera on par with a $14,000 SRIII (minus the registration pin of course)

I did my dry run tests, and just recently got my first film test back from Alpha Cine. Things are cruising along, I have a backer to pay for the first run of boards, he is paying for a promotional shoot with the camera and has even set me up with some manufacturers who are getting the back panels made for a song. I have two models signed up for the shoot, two more on the way, Kodak sent me 2000' of vision 3 film, and labs have lined up to do the proccessing. I even have several pre-orders on hand (for anyone who thinks this might be a fools errand.)

Just thought some here would like to see the progress. I know there are some old cats on this board, probably some that even used the CP in day to day news gathering back in the day. Its amazing how people love this camera. I am less than 3 months from market with this thing, and people are lining up (some with 2 or 3 cameras they want upgraded)


Here is the 1st Gen Prototype at work: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7kT_SLbJWvg

And the telecine of the first live film test: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=50BMeBSIwro&feature=response_watch

 

[grinner]

I love the CP16, man.
I haven't shot film in many years but sure rolled my share back in the day. I was fortunate to be the AC on many national 35mm commercials, music videos and feature films in the early 90s. I found myself loading mags sometimes having never touched that particular camera before that day. lol
I use to produce and edit a syndicated music video show and always need bumpers of varying lengths to meet segment times so I wound up keeping a Scoopic in my car everywhere I went. It was awesome to have the freedom to just pull over when I saw something that was cool, grab a shot and be able to use it at my dispense.
Is till have a stash of VisionT500 film in my fridge that has to be a decade old now.
anyone wanna buy some 16mm film?? lol

 

[Alaska cameradude]

Ya, freelance work down here is pretty slow right now too. However, it was even slower at
the end of last year (2009) for me. It is picking up a little bit, but still real slow.....I'm thinking
that 'For the Rights of All' was the last big project I worked on. Then there was US Census
commercials here I guess, Jerry rigged up his Tyler mount on the copter for that one. But
yeah, not much going on.....scrambling for little projects really.

Neat idea you have there. I think you are on to something.....a niche market to be sure,
but that also means not much competition. Very cool.

 

[Terry E. Toller]

I still have my CP16. SE # 0017. I had one while the staffers in sacramento were still using auricon and SSII conversions with lead/acid wet cells... I love my CP! it does a great job of keeping my door open on windy days... :{ I paid $13,500 for it new...

A shooter here in sac converted a CP many years ago (back in the 70's) to shoot 30fps. he would have the film spot scanned onto video and it looked amazing. he made a ton of money selling conversion boards and shooting high end commercials for national companies.

 

[Alaska_steadicam]

SN#0017? No kidding, that is amazing. Is a dogleg or a bowtie? The last film I worked on with my camera before it broke just (finally) got telecined, partly because of a deal the director was able to work with Fotokem.

The deal was through a guy who has worked as a higher up at Alan Gordon in LA. He calls me up to ask me questions about the footage before it went to the lab, and in the process discovered he had suggested the idea to the guy who invented the CPs originally.

Apparently he was an electrical engineer, doing crystal sync mods for Mitchell cameras. The guy at Alan Gordon suggested he look into making a 16mm camera for TV and docs, and later when the cameras were being produced, lobbied to get Alan Gordon to be the exclusive distributor of the camera for a little bit. Very interesting story.

Anyway, I am off on a tangent. If you have access to the broadcast, you can see the 2d gen (Frankenstein) prototype when I take it out to the Iditarod start tomorrow. I have no idea where it broadcasts nationally other than on the website (I think there is a fee involved, not terribly sure)

That's a hopefully thing. I realized last night the amplifier stage on the 2d gen was wired incorrectly, so I have to go home tonight and fix the mistake, and then retune the software to work with the new characteristics. For whatever reason the miss-wired amp still sort of worked, but only if the voltage was within a certain tolerance compared to load (more if there was film, less if it was dry run) but when I re-wired it for the OEM batteries, so I can actually take it out of the house, it free-wheeled (at 62fps no less. I thought anything over 48 would need mains power, boosted above the 20v nominal battery supply (or take more amps than the battery could safely supply) apparently that is not the case.

But the model I will have out tomorrow is very much a Frankenstein. It has the control wires running out of the back (where the fps selector knob used to be) that connects to the logic board, which in turn runs to a switch on the outside, gaffe tapped to the handle and then runs to a battery pack of 3 AAs (which provide power to the logic board) I can't wait until I get the professionally manufactured boards that actually fit inside the camera, run logic off the 20v battery, and will have a 0 percent chance of being miss-wired in the manner the hand built 2d gen did.

there was a 300% markup for having the boards assembly automated and verified in the shop before they ship out to me. Well worth it if you ask me.