Films of coasters
Will Johnson
September): "Hey Amy! I just saw on r.r-c that SIGNALS is offering a 3-D
Coaster tape! We should get that!" Amy: "<snarl> How the hell am I supposed
to suprise you?")... it's, um, okay...
What I liked:
1) Full rides on the coasters, with - of course - the notable exception
of KUMBA <snarl> (I don't mind the editing of most of the "chain time" since
anticipation is not as great when viewed on a TV {no height cues, wind,
etc.}.
2) The Cyclone footage under the credits (what the hell did they attach
the camera with, Scotch<tm> tape?), though I would have liked to see the
WHOLE ride (I wanted to see if they lost the camera entirely on the Post
Turn!)...
3) A ride on Magnum that didn't look like the camera was mounted right
at track level (which is all that I've seen before - though I have to admit
that watching that footage at Eastcoaster last year where the camera was
bopping itself on the tracks _was_ fun)...
What I could have lived without:
1) Those *$&% hosts. Ken and Barbie, come out and take a bow! <blech>
2) Ron Toomer. I'm sorry, but if I see 'Wire Bending 101' one more
time... (not that I think _that_ will be a problem, I'm almost positive that
NEXT time one of these comes out it'll be B&M who will have the most coasters
showcased on it - but then Utah is a _bit_ more convienent than Switzerland,
so maybe not...)
What I didn't like:
1) The 3-D. Well, okay, it wasn't actually BAD...that is, unless I
tried to wear the glasses and see it, which gave me a really nasty migrane
and didn't do ANYTHING for me during the actuall ride footage, and only
looked marginal during the standups at SFMM ("Wow, look, he really IS in
front of those trees that he's in front of!")...
2) The clamped down camera. Somebody has GOT to come up with a mount for
a coaster that doesn't translate EVERY jitter and bump from the track to the
tape. In real life a little 'chitter' is fine, but on videotape it just
looks horrible. Not only that, but it just plain DOES NOT WORK on a coaster
to have a fixed forward position on a camera (more on this later).
3) The 50mm lens on the camera (again, see below).
4) Video tape as the 'filming' medium (diatribe to follow).
Okay, to the point. THE BEST COASTER FILMS (when done well) ARE THOSE
MADE WITH A _HANDHELD_ CAMERA WITH A WIDE ANGLE LENS ON -=*FILM*=-.
The best coaster films I have ever had the pleasure of seeing/owning
are those made by Paul Greenwald. The consistently high quality of these
films is, IMO, nothing short of incredible (considering the vast majority of
handheld coaster footage I have seen - please, steer me in the direction of
any really good stuff I haven't seen, I hope there is lots of it).
Why? I hear you cry.
Film. Film has a "depth" to it that video just plain CANNOT match.
I can't explain it, I don't know WHY, I just know it's true. Tape might be
easier to work with, cheaper, etc. but it just plain does not look as good.
Head movement and visual field. Pay attention when you ride a coaster,
you do not sit there with your eyes fixed forward, nor do you have the
limited field of view of a 50mm lens. Part of what makes a coaster exciting
is anticipation and (even more than usual when VIEWING rather than riding)
the feeling of speed. When you enter a curve your head will turn in the
direction of the curve to see what is up ahead, as you crest a hill you don't
stare into the sky, you tilt your head down to anticipate the drop. SO, even
if a wide angle lens gives an odd perspective around the edges (particularly
noticeable when moving thru the brake shed, as the side supports curve
outward when close to the camer) it gives much more of a sence of being ON
the coaster with it's increased field of view (and it also helps to make any
camera shake less noticeable). Holding the camera in your HANDS (or it could
be mounted so that it can tilt and pan) lets you track the track the same way
your eyes do, this makes the film feel MUCH more natural while you watch it.
Last, but not least, is the fact that MANY films on coasters seem to be
made with the camera mounted VERY to the track. This really stinks on
coasters with loops, and looks very strange (to me) on any coaster. Handheld
footage tends to be made at, or near, eye level.
Now, I hear that there was an IMAX film made of a coaster, where the
camera was mounted at eye level, it was - obviously - done on film and the
camera was mounted so that it could be tilted and panned...as to the truth of
all these points, I don't know, since I've never seen this film (the Air &
Space Museum theatre hasn't seemed to show a very wide range of IMAX films).
<pant, pant>
Comments?
--
-Will . By my count 48 wooden coasters have been lost to us
Johnson .+++++.<> since 1978. Almost all of these were located at a
.+++++++++.<> smaller park. In most cases, the park is gone as well.
.+++++++++++++.<> Please: SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL AMUSEMENT PARKS!!!
Dave Althoff
My first attempt at on-ride motion photography was the Phoenix at
Knoebel's. There, I used a Super-8 XL camera. The resulting film was
fairly good, but it suffered from the use of the standard 18 FPS shooting
speed (though my camera will run at 24, my projector will not), and the
resulting 1/24 shutter speed (with a 270-degree shutter). I was using
the 37mm lens, which is as wide as my camera will go. Note that the 37 is
roughly equivalent to a 50mm in 35mm. The good thing about it was that
the footage was hand-held, so it tended to do those things the head
normally does. I held the camera roughly at chest height in the front
seat, NOT pointing right down at the track, but straight out.
Later that same year, I experimented with a circa-1986 RCA full-size VHS
camcorder. The image was far clearer than what I got on film, and the
color was better (the film was, unfortunately, Ektachrome G instead of
Kodachrome). But this was the Screechin' Eagle at Americana. It was
impossible to hold the camera on my shoulder, so I ended up bracing it
against my chest. And even at that, whenever the train hit the bottom of
a dip, the tape went slack in the machine causing nasty control-track
problems.
Last summer, I bought an 8mm camcorder, a Canon E-61. With it, I can
force the thing into manual focus, and pull back the zoom ring to
full-wide (wider than 50mm equivalent, but not as wide as 28mm equivalent,
I believe with a 7.2mm lens) and have it stay there. The camera is small
enough that I can strap it to my hand, and the fact that it is hand-held
tends to absorb much of the shock and vibration. It is DANGEROUS to look
thorugh the viewfinder while riding, but I am generally able to hold the
camera at or just below head level, and get fairly good video. I have
noticed that it is generally desirable to NOT use the high-speed shutter
due to its strobe effect...better to let the image blur slightly. In this
case, as much as I like film, I think a good video rig can give good
results. The biggest problem is that the professional and industrial
camera rigs are simply too big to hand-hold successfully on a coaster, and
the smaller consumer units (even the Hi-8 systems) are just not clean
enough for broadcast. The trick seems to be to shoot on Super 8, using a
180-degree shutter, in good light, on Kodachrome-40, then do the transfer
to video with a Rank MK-III Flying Spot Telecine...which, unfortunately, I
do not have access to. My video transfer equipment just isn't bright
enough to look good. For now, I'll stick to the video.
--Dave Althoff, Jr.
(Studio Manager, Capital University Television, among other things!)
--
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David Sandborg
Will Johnson <72662...@CompuServe.COM> writes:
> Head movement and visual field. Pay attention when you ride a coaster,
> you do not sit there with your eyes fixed forward, nor do you have the
> limited field of view of a 50mm lens. Part of what makes a coaster exciting
> is anticipation and (even more than usual when VIEWING rather than riding)
> the feeling of speed. When you enter a curve your head will turn in the
> direction of the curve to see what is up ahead, as you crest a hill you don't
> stare into the sky, you tilt your head down to anticipate the drop. SO, even
> if a wide angle lens gives an odd perspective around the edges (particularly
> noticeable when moving thru the brake shed, as the side supports curve
> outward when close to the camer) it gives much more of a sence of being ON
> the coaster with it's increased field of view (and it also helps to make any
> camera shake less noticeable). Holding the camera in your HANDS (or it could
> be mounted so that it can tilt and pan) lets you track the track the same way
> your eyes do, this makes the film feel MUCH more natural while you watch it.
Yes, this is very much what I had in mind when I complained about the
narrow camera angle the other day. I didn't really expect them to use
a hand held camera, but with a wider field of view, at least you can
get some impression of what you actually see when you ride a coaster.
The narrow field was a bit troublesome on the bottoms of dips and in
inversions, where you can see little but track (on noninverted
coasters, of course). I could live with this, but I had more problems
with how turns came out. Here, the track winds up off the screen too
soon; you can't see enough of what lies ahead. Doesn't correspond to
my riding experience at all.
There were also some problems with the inverted coasters. Here you
couldn't see enough of the track. Without this reference point, it was
virtually impossible to tell what was going on. On the corkscrew-style
inversions, I almost felt as if they were simply flipping the camera
over by hand, rather than it being attached to a coaster train that was
flipping over.
Just more evidence that there's nothing like riding the real thing!
But as a winter substitute, it'll do fine...
Dave Sandborg
Dave Althoff
filming/videotaping coasters (not extensive experience, I am afraid, but
interesting if you are interested in that sort of thing...!).
Unfortunately, at that time, my local news server was acting up. Could
someone please let me know if the message got out? If it did, I won't
re-type it (and bore you who've seen it already...)
Thanks...
--Dave Althoff, Jr.
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