Movie Makers (Jan-Dec 1949)

346 SEPTEMBER 1949 Improve your films with titles, sub-titles, and continuity headings. The key to good titling is the kind of letters you use. Knight solid cast metal letters, are perfectly styled, attach to any surface, and photograph with sharp detail for professional, theatrical appearing titles. Only $l—for your choice of any 25 classic style letters, 5/a-inch size; postage paid. A special offer. Order your set now. Money back if not satisfied. Free! Folder on "Titles for Home Movies." H. W. KNIGHT & SON, INC. 23 Lane St. Seneca Falls, N. Y. PHOTOGRAPHY To give your home movies that "professional touch,1' TRAIN in ALL phases of photography. Our Home Study Course includes valuable instruction in 16mm movies. Resident Training in ALL branches of "still" work. WRITE TODAY! NEW YORK INSTITUTE Or PHOTOGRAPHY iDept. 'M05." 10 W. 33 St., New York, N. Y. ACL COLOR LEADER! The new ACL membership leader and trailer — in brilliantly animated Kodachrome— is now ready. See inside back cover of this issue on how *o aet vctur cooies. CKISWOLV FILM SPLICERS for every size and type of film, sound and silent, perforated and non-perforated, write for details GRISWOLD MACHINE WORKS Dep't A, Port Jefferson, N. Y. MOVIE AND SLIDE TITLES STILL AT SAME LOW PRICES! Same titles formerly distributed by Bell & Howell — now sold direct. Large variety backgrounds available. No charge lor tinting film Amber I WRITE FOR free illustrated brochure and samples TITLE-CRAFT, 1022 Argyle St., Chicago 40, III. 6MM—16MM KODACHROMS SLACK & WHITS. 55&S 8MM Enlarged to 16. 16MM Reduced to 8 F Free Catalog on Request. ^" NATIONAL CINW LAB BOX44-Z5 » WASHINGTON 17, DC 8MM MAGAZINE FILM AT UNHEARD OF LOW PRICES DOWN . . . DOWN . . . DOWN . . . DIVES DELTA'S PRICES OF BRAND NEW AND FULLY GUARANTEED 8mm magazine film. Packaged exclusively for DELTA, each magazine contains LABORATORY FRESH STOCK Don't wait. BUY 'EM BY THE DOZEN and SAVE . . . SAVE . . . SAVE!!! 8mm Magazines, Super X, type 50 Weston, each $2.95 12 for only . . . $34.50 8mm Magazines, Full Natural Color Daylight or tungsten, each $3.95 12 for only . . $46.50 Magazines fit all 8mm magazine cameras. Prices include processing and return postage. DELTA PHOTO SUPPLY CO. fDept. MM 9) New York 17. N. Y. h')l) Third Av ACL makes color leader [Continued from page 329] ACL leader meets these high standards. Here's how it was created. To begin with, we decided on the background of the revolving globe as a symbol of the world wide association of League membership. The positioning of this unit, activated by a tiny electric motor, seemed easiest to do on a horizontal plane so that we could shoot directly down on it. This meant — if we still were to use the reflex viewfinder of the camera without a stepladder — that the revolving globe should be both horizontal and low. Thus, we started at the floor level and worked up from there. First there was thrown together an adjustable framework of odd pieces of lumber which looked, on the face of it, like nothing so much as a backyard woodpile. It stood, at its top level, about a foot above the cellar floor. Housed in it, below a centrally open area about two feet square, was the electrically driven globe, while surrounding this area were smooth metal railings from which the intended animation could be executed. While this framework was being built and rebuilt, the preparation of the globe was going forward as a separate and exacting operation. We began with a commercially made model, about nine inches in diameter, formed of cardboard and mounted on a spindly and wholly unusable axis. In fact, no feature of the original globe was used in the final product except its basic spherical shape. Its finish was too shiny for effective lighting; the map designs were too detailed for background use, and the axis was unadaptable to motor drive. Thus, working with an understanding commercial artist, we repainted the map patterns, matte finished its surface and then mounted over its curved face the letters. ACL, cut from Lucite and heatshaped to fit. The design and installation of the motor drive was supervised by our technical director — of whom more later. Specifically, the motor was a small Kollsman unit, equipped with a two way switch and geared down to turn the globe at one revolution per second. Tripod-installed directly above the globe was a Cine-Kodak Special equipped, by choice, with the standard 1 inch f/1.9 lens. The camera stood about 3 feet above an open title area 15 by 18 inches in size, with the topmost arc of the globe some 4 to 5 inches below the titling level. Because of this difference in planes, and by purposely adjusting the intensity of illumination so that the 1 inch lens could be used wide open, we were able to achieve a slight but pleasing differ ence in sharpness between the letters and the moving background. The letters themselves, when in their final diagonal pattern across the revolving globe, were set up by hand on strips of lightweight brass, which had been spray-painted with a matte finish red paint. Three such strips, IV2 inches wide and about 3 feet long, were used to mount the "Member" and "World Wide" legends of the opening sections of the leader. One strip, 4 inches in width, was used for "The End" section. The letters mounted on them were from the Mitten Display Letter Company— using a % inch Modern on the longer opening legends and a 3 inch Tempar font on the end title. The final lighting setup for the combination of revolving globe and the letter panels was essentially simple. Two RFL-2 flood bulbs were used to illumine the globe, shining slightly up towards it from floor level at distances of about 6 feet from the lower left and upper right corners of the field. One RSP-2 spot-type bulb cross lighted the letters, positioned high on a lighting stand about 7 feet away from the upper left of the field. The illumination was balanced for an exposure of f/1.9 on Type A Kodachrome at 16 fps. Such was the basic setup for the shooting. And, once arranged, it was really quite simple. But so far in this discussion there has been no mention of how the leader's animation was achieved. With the revolving globe, of course, it was by use of the electric motor drive. With the panels of title wordings the answer was — again quite simply — reverse motion. The entire ACL leader was shot backwards and with the camera positioned upside down in relation to the field. This technique, essentially simple in theory, can create in practice some fairly interesting problems. To begin with, all A DOWN VIEW on the production setup for ACL color leader shows the geared motor drive for globe, the movable end title strip and below it the revolving globe.