Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Kodak resurrects Super 8

kodak.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 202 posts

Re: Kodak resurrects Super 8

#21

Post by ghaff »

sitharus wrote: post #15
smacktoward wrote: post #3

I'm strugging to figure out who exactly this thing would be for . Amateurs for home movies? Nope, digital will always be cheaper, and faster/more convenient to work with to boot. Aspiring filmmakers? Nope, if you want to shoot on film professionally you'll want at least 16mm to avoid the magnification/graininess Super 8 brings with it. People nostalgic for the blurriness of old home movies? Do any of these actually e…

The same people who buy impossible project instant film. Sure you could shoot a perfectly in-focus colour corrected image and filter it, but there's something fun about not knowing the result instantly. It's the reverse of when digital cameras came out, then instant was exciting.

I can actually kind of see the instant film thing in that it lets you hand people a rather unique physical artifact at a social activity or whatever. It's a break from "The pics will be up on Facebook." I'm obviously not the target market but this just seems weird. I remember Super 8. We used it because we didn't have an alternative. It was low quality and expensive.

Re: Kodak resurrects Super 8

#22

Post by Zikes »

smegel wrote: post #12
rfrank wrote: post #8

If Kodak is scanning all of the photos and putting them into the cloud themselves, does that mean they have rights to said images?

What amazes me is the lawyers haven't been able to come up with some legalese that allows companies to transfer your data around their internal systems for your own use without stating "we can do whatever we want with your content".

Copyright says you get to define that however you like. It's why we have so many options for code licensing. The problem here is that companies would much rather have the "we can do whatever we want with your content" option because it benefits them much more, and not enough users care enough to make them change it.

Re: Kodak resurrects Super 8

#23

Post by rfrank »

Someone1234 wrote: post #17
rfrank wrote: post #8

If Kodak is scanning all of the photos and putting them into the cloud themselves, does that mean they have rights to said images?

No. Photographs belong to the person who pressed the shutter release. The actual format or medium of the photograph (digital, print, negative, whatever) is irrelevant to the copyright, which is created during the act of taking a photograph. So remember: Next time you hand someone your camera to take a picture of you, that person effectively owns the copyright on that image. Including a monkey[0]. [0] https://en.wikip…

Is there theoretically anything preventing them from putting a line like this from insta's TOS in there?

"Instagram does not claim ownership of any Content that you post on or through the Service. Instead, you hereby grant to Instagram a non-exclusive, fully paid and royalty-free, transferable, sub-licensable, worldwide license to use the Content that you post on or through the Service, subject to the Service's Privacy Policy..."

Re: Kodak resurrects Super 8

#24

Post by iwillreply »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #7
smacktoward wrote: post #3

I'm strugging to figure out who exactly this thing would be for . Amateurs for home movies? Nope, digital will always be cheaper, and faster/more convenient to work with to boot. Aspiring filmmakers? Nope, if you want to shoot on film professionally you'll want at least 16mm to avoid the magnification/graininess Super 8 brings with it. People nostalgic for the blurriness of old home movies? Do any of these actually e…

I could see someone trying to shoot a professional movie that wanted that effect for part of it, because that part was supposed to be someone playing a Super-8 movie. But I suspect that there's a Photoshop filter for that...

Gus van Sant did exactly this in Paranoid Park.

The skateboard scenes in the movie were shot on Super 8, as inspired by the common style for home made skate films.

Here's a short clip: https://vimeo.com/7170912

Re: Kodak resurrects Super 8

#25

Post by lotso »

sitharus wrote: post #15
smacktoward wrote: post #3

I'm strugging to figure out who exactly this thing would be for . Amateurs for home movies? Nope, digital will always be cheaper, and faster/more convenient to work with to boot. Aspiring filmmakers? Nope, if you want to shoot on film professionally you'll want at least 16mm to avoid the magnification/graininess Super 8 brings with it. People nostalgic for the blurriness of old home movies? Do any of these actually e…

The same people who buy impossible project instant film. Sure you could shoot a perfectly in-focus colour corrected image and filter it, but there's something fun about not knowing the result instantly. It's the reverse of when digital cameras came out, then instant was exciting.

No, I think instant film is fun because you always get a physical artifact that you can give to your friend instantly.

Re: Kodak resurrects Super 8

#26

Post by johansch »

dietrichepp wrote: post #9

I see USB and... SD card slot on the back? HDMI and... 3.5mm audio? One of the most characteristic features of Super 8, at least to me, is the complete lack of audio (at least, on most Super 8 works). So if you went to a theater to see something on Super 8 there might be a live band playing the soundtrack. I wonder if Kodak is doing something like putting audio on the SD card and then storing digital synchronization…

You're just imagining what the product could be like instead of reading the actual product/specs page? That's an interesting approach, but should probably label your fantasies accordingly.

http://www.kodak.com/ek/US/en/consumer/Product/Product_Specs...

"FILM GAUGE: SUPER 8 ( EXTENDED MAX-8 GATE )

FILM LOAD: KODAK CARTRIDGES WITH 50 FT (15 M)

SPEED: VARIABLE SPEEDS (9, 12, 18, 24, 25 FPS) ALL WITH CRYSTAL SYNC

LENS MOUNT: C-MOUNT

FOCAL LENGTH: FIXED / 6 MM, 1:1.2 – RICOH LENS (OPTIONAL ZOOM 6-48 MM LENS )

FOCUS / APERTURE: MANUAL FOCUS & IRIS"

etc.

Re: Kodak resurrects Super 8

#27

Post by lcrs »

With modern film stocks and scanners Super8 can look remarkably good. It'll be interesting to see how Kodak's scanning service compares to scans like these, both of which were shot with another new Super 8 camera, the Logmar Digicanical:

https://vimeo.com/129700087

https://vimeo.com/groups/super8/videos/87243287

Re: Kodak resurrects Super 8

#28

Post by wmf »

smegel wrote: post #12
rfrank wrote: post #8

If Kodak is scanning all of the photos and putting them into the cloud themselves, does that mean they have rights to said images?

What amazes me is the lawyers haven't been able to come up with some legalese that allows companies to transfer your data around their internal systems for your own use without stating "we can do whatever we want with your content".

AFAIK this is a solved problem in B2B. e.g.

AWS: "We do not access or use customer content for any purpose other than as legally required and for maintaining the AWS services and providing them to our customers and their end users. We never use customer content or derive information from it for marketing or advertising."

SoftLayer: "As a Processor, SoftLayer will not access the Customer Content for any purpose beyond providing You with support as described above, and will not disclose it to any person or entity."

Re: Kodak resurrects Super 8

#29

Post by Someone1234 »

rfrank wrote: post #23
Someone1234 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. Photographs belong to the person who pressed the shutter release. The actual format or medium of the photograph (digital, print, negative, whatever) is irrelevant to the copyright, which is created during the act of taking a photograph. So remember: Next time you hand someone your camera to take a picture of you, that person effectively owns the copyright on that image. Including a monkey[0]. [0] https://en.wikip…

Is there theoretically anything preventing them from putting a line like this from insta's TOS in there? "Instagram does not claim ownership of any Content that you post on or through the Service. Instead, you hereby grant to Instagram a non-exclusive, fully paid and royalty-free, transferable, sub-licensable, worldwide license to use the Content that you post on or through the Service, subject to the Service's Priva…

Why does that text concern you?

If you want Instagram to display your photograph back to you (or other users at your request) then you have to grant them a license like this.

Where terms get concerning is when they want a redistribution license, or they want to allow unnamed third party "partners" to be able to utilise your photograph royalty free. Neither of which appear in the snippet above.

Re: Kodak resurrects Super 8

#30

Post by ghaff »

meric wrote: post #19
drglitch wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As sad as that is, it's a pretty long life for a company that was killed by mis-management: they invented the digital cameras but chose not to cannibalize their incumbent analog business. To combat demise, they chose to fire people and become an IP shell. Last try at survival was to sell off most/all IP and license its name. The rest is history.

We weren't in the company. It can be hard to tell. You could open a beauty therapy shop, and it's revenue increase every year, and suddenly after the introduction of cheap laser treatments and race-to-the-bottom competitors, in one year you could face a reduction of 70% of your revenue.[1] [1] Anecdote.

Kodak certainly did a lot of things wrong--especially with the benefit of 20-20 hindsight. Part of their problem with digital was that they were arguably ahead of curve (and not quite on the right curve) with things like PhotoCD and providing equipment to photo shops to print customer photos.

However, the bottom line is that it would probably have been very difficult for even the most brilliant management to replace the film, photo paper, and chemicals consumables business. That revenue basically doesn't exist in the digital world unless maybe you count inkjet ink--though that's trending down too.

Fujifilm did end up doing OK by, among other things, applying their film making expertise to other industries like medical. But they had a tough run too. [1] The film business fell off a cliff that made CD sales look like a gradual decline.

[1] http://www.economist.com/blogs/schumpeter/2012/01/how-fujifi...

Post reply on HN