Movie Makers (Jan-Dec 1952)

180 JULY 1952 JAPAN REPORTING! With peace and full freedom, amateur movies are again flourishing in this far-eastern island empire MASAO UNO, iranslated by Munesato Yamada STOPPED by four years of all-out war. and hindered from immediate recovery by the shortages and confusion of the first years of the American Occupation. Japanese amateur movie making is now. with the recent peace treaty, well on its way again to active health. CLUB ACTIVITIES The Nippon Amateur Cine-Slide Association (NACSA), organized in August. 1950, has replaced the Sakura Amateur Movie Association which faded during the war. NACSA. with headquarters in Tokyo, now has over 500 members and has nine branches, in Osaka, Nagoya, Kyoto, Niigata, Nagaoka. Sapporo, Matsuyama. Sakata, and Kakogawa. A monthly magazine. ''NACSA,'' is being published, and the branches are now conducting independent contests among their members. The Tokyo NACSA branch has had nineteen meetings to date for movie and color slide demonstrations, and from time to time lectures and research assemblies in the field of visual education have been given throughout Japan. PEOPLE AND PICTURES Among recent outstanding films has been a black and white sound film. Mt. Mihara, showing the famous Tokyo Bay volcano in eruption; it was taken by Nippon News Club members for the Ministry of Education. Veteran lens-man Koji Tsukamoto, who will be remembered ,in the United States for his film Mt. Zao-.^an ACL Ten Best winner in 1937 — Ed.}, has a new color film. Japan Alps, featuring beautiful skiing and alpine plant shots. Dr. Munesato Yamada has produced a successful first picture in color, Whaling in the Antarctic, during his recent trip to the South Polar regions as a research scientist with the Japanese whaling fleet. (Movie Makers will carry soon a richly illustrated report by Dr. Yamada on his adventures filming the great South Polar whales — Ed.) The writer has completed a new color film, Spa Regions of Mimasaka, featuring the giant salamander, a reptile unique to Japan, and he presently is shooting another nature subject, The Life of a (r Old fish. The strongest amateur trend in Japan now is toward nature pictures, under the influence of the Disney True Life Adventure pictures recently surveyed by Movie Makers. We are studying also two amateur nature films by Fred C. Ells, FACL. In The Beginning and Pete, The Lazy Pelican, which have been widely shown to amateur groups here this past year. CAMERAS Post-war Japan has not as yet produced a new 16mm. camera. Those in use are mostly Cine-Kodaks, Filmos, British Ensigns, and the pre-war Japanese Sakura Cine and Arrow. There are no new 16mm. lenses. But in the 35mm. slide field there are now the Nikkor, Serenar, Hexar and others, all f/2, coated, and having a wide sale. Lenses for 16mm. cameras undoubtedly can be expected as conditions improve. PROJECTORS There are four 16mm. sound on film projectors — Hokushin, Kohon, Elmo and Minakawa — currently available. Hokushin has just completed a test model using an air-cooled, super hightension mercury lamp, instead of the incandescent. This model is expected to deliver four times the usual illumination with the same power, with a lamp life of 300 hours. Elmo also has a new experimental 16mm. arc model, No. LC-1. These high-powered projectors are designed for use in the new 16mm. theatres now springing up in Japan. There are three in Tokyo alone, seven all told, and more are in plan. SOUND RECORDING At present, sound on film is too expensive for amateur use. There is a good deal of commercial 16mm. recording, however, by the Tokyo Kohon laboratory and the Nishikawa Talkie laboratory, both in Tokyo. They use J. A. Maurer and RCA recorders, respectively. However, their chief business is the reduction of 35mm. to 16mm. projection prints. Professor Hoshino, of the Tokyo Industrial College, is experimenting with a ferrous oxide striping on one edge of 16mm. or 8mm. film, to permit magnetic sound recording. If these experiments are successful, the way may be opened here, as it was recently in the United States, to amateur sound on film without the present technicalities and expense. MASAO UNO, author of Japan Reporting, holds the pre-war Filmo 70-D with which he has produced films on salamanders and the goldfish. EXPOSURE METERS Before the war only one photoelectric type of exposure meter was manufactured in Japan, the Mazda. During the Occupation, the market grew and many American and other foreign meters came in. Now, however, four new Japanese meters are available. The Walz Super is somewhat like the Weston II in appearance, but the mechanism differs considerably. Another. Samoca II, is a very sensitive unit, the light being concentrated on the receptor through a photogrid by thirty seven carefully arranged lenses. In addition to these, the Seconic and Unitic Model K-l are avail able and are quite satisfactory for general amateur use. COLOR FILMS At present there are two Japanese brands of color film manufactured. Sakura Natural Color and Fujicolor. Both are of the multilayer type, basically similar to Kodachrome. The daylight type was first brought out in 1940 and 1941, in sheet film, 35mm. and 16mm. In 1950 Fujicolor tungsten-type appeared. Both films have had a wide sale, particularly due to the scarcity and comparatively high cost of Kodachrome and Ansco Color. The Oriental Photo Industry Company is now preparing to put out a new color film of the Ansco type. About 20 percent of the 16mm. film now issued is in color. The expansion of color movie production, the development of 16mm. movie theatres, as well as the prospects of television in Japan, are being watched with keen interest by our Japanese amateurs. And w.e hope that soon again we may take an active, honorable part in international film competitions, as in pre-war days. Foreign amateurs wishing to contact the Japanese NACSA group can do so at the following address: Nippon Amature Cine Slide Association, c/o Konishiroku Photo Ind. Co., Muromachi 3, Nihonbashi, Tokyo, Japan.