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Author
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Topic: Make-up for ortho film.
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Stephen Furley
Film God
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Posts: 3059
From: Coulsdon, Croydon, England
Registered: May 2002
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posted 05-22-2008 07:35 AM
I wondered because I was shooting some ortho film yesterday, not movie film, sheet film in a still camera. Iflord still make it, mainly for copying purposes, which is what I usually use it for to the limited extent that I use it at all, I think I've had the present box for about ten years now, but I do need to buy some more soon.
A few weeks ago I bought a 5x4 Graflex Series B RB reflex camera; it's an er... interesting device, though not terribly practical. Anyway, I wanted to try actually taking some pictures with the thing, and ortho film seemed more appropriate for something of that age, probably late '20s. Also, it meant that I was able to develop the film by visual inspection, I suspected that the shutter speeds would be way off, and I could compensate for this to some extent.
There's a light leak at one end of the holder that I was using, which I will need to fix, but it was surprising how much the skin tone darkened, I think some sort of compensation in make-up would have been used, particularly with white females.
I do remember it being pointed out to me some years ago that the hair of one of the characters in a film changed tone between different scenes; it was an early vitaphone type sound film, though I cannot remember which one. The explanation offered, which seems at least plausible, was that the mute scenes were shot on ortho stock under arcs, but that the sync sound scenes had to be under incandescent lighting due to the noise of the arcs, and that to compensate for the increased red content of the light panchromatic stock had been used for these, resulting in a significant change in the red hair of the actress.
This is a mobile 'phone picture of the Graflex; it's in very nice condition for its age, as they often seem to be. I suspect that they were such awkward things to use that they didn't actually get a great deal of use. The last version of them, which wasn't much different to mine, was still being made until about 1959, but I can't imagine who was buying them then.
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Jack Theakston
Master Film Handler
Posts: 411
From: New York, USA
Registered: Sep 2007
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posted 05-27-2008 10:49 AM
As mentioned, most photographers used a "blue glass," similar to other polarized filters today, for the use of getting a sense of what the scene will look like on ortho stock. But most commonly, the orthochomatic spectrum is what established the screen test-- makeup and wardrobe had to be tested despite the actor's skill, and doing so on ortho stock and watching the rushes was the best way to do so.
The base that photographed best was a sort of light pink which leaned towards a blue tint (Factor and Stein brand were the most popular.) Reds, oranges and browns would photograph darkly, and someone with even light freckles or a heavy tan would look really nutty on ortho. Eye-liner or eye-shade would not be black. Instead, common colors were red, gray-green, blue or violet, which all photographed black. After all of this, I'm sure actors and actresses looked very alien to non-movie people.
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