From: by way of Pip Chodorov (email suppressed)
Date: Tue Jan 03 2006 - 09:33:47 PST
My experience has been that there are mag machines in Europe but far
fewer in North America.
Mag sound is excellent-----with reservations.
It can be erased(!). When you use a track applied by a lab (as opposed
to mag stock supplied with the stripe applied at the factory), the
stripe tends to age rapidly and can peel off. Some lab-applied striping
is more uneven than one would wish for. The balance stripe, on the
perforation side, (which may be used to record a second track for
stereo) is way smaller than the main stripe, and can peel off even more
easily. Because the stripe adds thickness, the film sits differently on
a large reel.
There used to be various systems for applying your own mag stripe to
16mm film. This is a tricky business, and certainly not suited to
release prints.
Double-system machines like the Bauer and the Siemens (n.b. both German
manufacturers) are great recorders. If you record on the mag side, you
may have to be sure you're recording on the edge track and not the
middle of the film.
All of this is troublesome----but mag sound is so excellent (compared to
the disaster of 16mm optical) that it's well worth coping with.
-----------t0ny
PS-- The only system worse than normal 16 optical is 16mm VARIABLE
DENSITY optical.............
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For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.