Home Movies (1951)

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FILMING ABUSES Be good to your camera now and avoid trouble later on. There are so many "little" abuses to expensive movie-making equipment towards which many amateurs are heedlessly inclined, that to enumerate all would take too much space here. However, here are a few of the most common ones. About the worst, is to leave your camera where kids can get at it. What they can't do to it is something to think about. Keep your camera on a shelf out of their reach or lock it up in a cabinet or bag. The thing is to keep it out of their sight. All kids are not alike but it's safest to keep temptation away! Use care in cleaning camera lenses. That necktie can be so handy, but don't use it. Don't use a coarse or dirty handkerchief either. The lens should be kept clean — dusting with a camel's hair brush kept for this purpose alone, then using an ear syringe for blowing is usually enough. If it is needed, use a lens tissue GENTLY. Modern coated lenses should not be cleaned too often. Generally a dusting and blowing is enough for a long time. Most advice is against cleaning chemicals or solutions for coated lenses. The instruction booklet with your camera will put special stress on not cleaning the film gate with any sharp instrument and means what it states. Never use any metal in cleaning the aperture or film gate because of the danger of scratching. It should be kept clean, however, and generally by blowing with the handy little ear syringe every time you load and unload your camera, to put it away, will keep the gate free from damaging film particles accumulating there. If it is ever needed, then use a match stick or toothpick moistened with alcohol to remove the dirt— then BLOW! Speaking of loading and unloading your camera, if it's the spool type, take special care of the spools to see that they are not bent. This can happen by hard bumping, dropping on a hard surface or accidentally stepping on them. Even a slight bend inwards can prevent film from being automatically wound up and any outward bend cause edge flare or fog on the film. If Don't do this. you are at all suspicious of a spool, check it by moving a coiled turn of scrap film between the flanges all around. Magazine film users need to take care too — but may be not as much. Never monkey with the camera mechanism at any time and surely don't try to do any oiling. Let your photo dealer take care of any servicing you might need. If you occasionally hear a low thumping in the camera as it operates, it's most likely because the spring was left wound up for too long a time. This, incidentally, is a common practice to be discouraged too because a spring left wound for several weeks can possibly lose tension and become weaker. When lenses must be removed for cleaning or changing to another camera, use care in re-seating them and • See "ABUSES" on Page 174 Home Movie fans can have lots of fun bringing inanimate table-top subjects to life-like motion. All it takes is a little ingenuity and lots of patience. Of course there are many elaborate methods that could be employed which would require the use of more pretentious equipment and materials than are available to most of us, so I feel that something a little less ostentatious is better to start with. For this particular project, I used an ordinary cardboard box, salvaged from old Christmas gift wrappings, a small cold-tablet box, National Geographic photos of a Yugoslavian waterfront, a sailboat clipped from a colorful Southern California travel folder, a plain pin, a piece of string and a toothpick (see \ / 5°* NBOX LIP travelogue tips Anywhere in the world with a few background props. illustration) and, of course, a camera, film and lights. This surprising array of materials is used in combination in the following manner to develop our Table Top Travelogue. First, lay the cover of the larger box upside down on the table so that the rim projects upward. This rim acts as a shield to hide the unwanted floor space from the camera lens and should be colored to blend with the back drop. Next, place the large box on end across the cover so that the flat underside faces the camera and is far enough back from the front rim of the cover, to accommodate the actors and props, as a stage area. Now, pin the backdrop picture to the flat under-side of the larger box just high enough so that the lower edge of the picture is concealed by the rim of the cover. Fasten the toothpick to the back of the sailboat cut-out with paste or scotch tape. This serves as a strengthening rib to prevent the picture from curling. Now, insert the bottom end of the toothpick into the small cold-tablet box to form a base to keep the sailboat in an upright position. Next, attach the string to the small box so that it may be used to draw the sailboat over the stage. The ends of the string may be fed through small holes in either side of the base rim to keep the sailboat on a true course across the stage. When this has been done you are in the travelogue business and by simply changing the backdrop to waterfront or ocean scenes from other places and countries, running in the same little sailboat and dubbing in appropriate titles and comments, your table-top trip is accomplished. Be sure that you choose cut-outs in the proper proportion to the backdrops you use. The very simplicity of this particular project might lead you to believe • See "TIPS" on Page 177 162