8mm films of bushwalking Tasmania, Lake Pedder slides/B&W

[guyburns]

Guy Burns here, from near Devonport.

Background
I’m transferring my three-screen slide shows from the 1980s and 1990s onto Blu-ray. They’re wilderness audio-visuals, mostly set in Tasmania. I’m aiming for the visual and sound quality to be the best possible, suitable for showing on a 12-metre cinema screen. I’m about ⅔ the way through this 10-year project.

The end result will be a Blu-ray which will probably only be made available to people who contributed material. This isn’t a money-making commercial project, it’s a hobby. I want to preserve certain aspects of Tasmanian bushwalking, and I’ve chosen high-definition Blu-ray as the format.


My New AVs
As part of the project, I’m putting together three new AVs about wilderness Tasmania:

• Lake Pedder (40 mins).

• The North West Walking Club (NWWC) and what its members got up to in the 1960s (70 minutes).

• Eric Sargent. Eric launched CraClair Tours in 1968, the first bloke to run tours through the Reserve since Bert Nichols in the 1930s (40 mins).

While working on the latter, Eric told me that Alan Richmond – the leader of his party through the reserve in 1947, across the Eldons the next year, and from Mole Creek to Tullah the following year – had a movie camera with him. That changed things a bit. Eric’s AV now has to include excerpts from the 8mm movies taken on the trips.

I can scan slides at home using my Nikon Coolscan, but movies? Well, I’ve worked out how to have them scanned, and then I thought: why not ask around for movies taken in the Tasmanian wilderness? There might be some treasure in a shed somewhere.


What I’m looking for
• Tasmanian bushwalking movies taken prior to 1972.
• Slides of Lake Pedder. I have already scanned about 700, but I would like a few more images in a few areas: walking in on the Scotts Pk Track and Sentinel Range track; the lake being inundated by the encroaching floodwaters; the Truganini statue on the beach; images showing the entire lake. And any other esoteric images that show Pedder in a different way, not just that fabulous beach.


How I’ll scan
If you have Lake Pedder slides, and you live in Tasmania, I’ll come to you with my iMac and Nikon Coolscan. But it’s better if I can borrow them for a few days. For the movies, they’ll have to go to Boston, via me. Or you can arrange it yourself, of course.


What’s in it for you?
Three reasons you may want to think seriously about this if you have suitable material:

1. You’ll get a copy of the high-resolution scans, and it won’t cost you anything. I’m paying.

2. From my experience of looking through about 30,000 slides and scanning 7000 of them over the last four years, obtaining a good scan is become more and more difficult with every passing year: mould, dust, fading, lack of good scanning equipment (Nikon stopped production years ago). Re the latter: my scanner now sells secondhand for more than what I paid for it new ten years ago.

3. Most slides, and some movies, eventually end up at the tip. I am now the proud owner of 60 Lake Pedder slides that I rescued. Husband died. Wife couldn’t be bothered going through his slides. Emptied fifty years of yellow boxes into four Coles plastic shopping bags and was disposing of them one bag a week. I’m missed the first bag, but I got the other three.


But who’s this Guy Burns bloke?
To convince you of my bonafides:

1. I’m the partner of Jenny Pearce, Life Member of the NWWC.
2. I’ve scanned slides from all the club’s Life Members, and almost everyone in the club who took slides in the 1960s.
3. Check out my 200+ page PDF on how to scan Kodachrome: http://www.mediafire.com/download/qc67n ... 29.pdf.zip
4. This thread, http://www.cinematography.com/index.php ... ntry455986, tells you how I’ll be having the movies scanned.
5. To see the type of thing I do, download a short sketch from the Lake Pedder AV: http://www.mediafire.com/download/gyhug ... 60p%29.mp4
6. Or download the closing credits from an AV about the western lakes: http://www.mediafire.com/download/up8if ... its%29.mp4

The video downloads are heavily compressed and reduced in resolution to 360p (from 1080p) for small file size, but they should give you an idea of my style of AV.

If you like what you see, and you have material I’m chasing, please get in contact. Gmail me at gdburns, or phone 03 6428 2976.

Guy Burns

[whynotwalk]

Lovely work Guy - that Pedder excerpt is beautiful, and very moving.

I can't contribute, alas, as I turned down the chance to fly in to Lake Pedder with some Sydney friends in 1972. My excuse - that I didn't have the money - now seems a flimsy and regrettable one. I've written more about that here http://www.naturescribe.com/2011/04/returning-to-rhona-3.html

I wish you well with this very worthwhile set of projects,

cheers

Peter

[DaveNoble]

Sounds like a very worthwhile project. Good luck.

Dave

[Nuts]

Hi Guy, can't help (before my time) I'd love to see some footage of Alan's/ Eric's escapades, heard the accounts from Alan prior to my first Overland walk and later from Eric. The Eldons expedition sounds like a classic. Will you make them available to the public/forum? Or please let us know if any public screenings happen (for non-NWWC)

(Well done, good work)

[north-north-west]

If only I'd had a camera when we went into Pedder . . . I could nick that Coolscan and get ALL my slides scanned and digitally stored. Of course, I'd probably have to kill you to do it, but I do need more compost for the garden . . .

[guyburns]

Today I went searching for info on the Sentinel Range track to Lake Pedder, the track from the Gordon River Road. Second on Google's list was a thread about 8mm films. Sounded interesting, so I clicked on it. And here I am – my own thread!

I hadn't forgotten about this thread, just didn't think there had been any replies as I was relying on emails to notify me about new posts. No emails came, so I assumed no posts. I must have forgotten to tick the box "Notify me when a reply is posted".

Anyway, thanks for the responses above, even if I am almost a year late. No luck with Lake Pedders slides though, except… just before Christmas I was very fortunate to be given access to the whole of John Pickford's slide collection (a NWWC Foundation Member and Life Member) – all 904 yellow boxes, numbered, starting in 1954. The family assured me there were no Lake Pedder slides, but I found 9 boxes of them from 3 separate trips, including rare photos of walkers on the Sentinel Range track.

The films loaned to me were scanned at 2K in Denmark on a Lasergraphics Scanstation – 320 GB of ProsRes 4444 from an hour's worth of material – and the results look pretty good for vintage 8mm films.

Clytie & Me
Someone asked about public showings of Eric Sargent's AV. It now has a title: Clytie & Me. There'll be one at the Launceston Historical Society on Sunday afternoon, 17th September 2017. Eric will be there to answer questions. I hope to have other showings around the state at a later date – and I'm aiming at proper cinemas. Ya gotta dream.

Lake Pedder slides/Bushwalking films
I'm still interested in any of the material mentioned in my original post, so if anyone has bushwalking films or Lake Pedder slides in a shed, let me know.

[Mark F]

Have you approached the National Film and Sound Archive about the material? I am not sure of their remit regarding private film materials but in the longer term much of this valuable material tends to disappear as time passes and people die/lose interest. I am currently in discussion with my family regarding the long term preservation and public availability of private Max Dupain (family friend) and Cazneaux photographs which is why I raise the issue.

[Nuts]

Clytie & Me
Someone asked about public showings of Eric Sargent's AV. It now has a title: Clytie & Me. There'll be one at the Launceston Historical Society on Sunday afternoon, 17th September 2017. Eric will be there to answer questions. I hope to have other showings around the state at a later date – and I'm aiming at proper cinemas. Ya gotta dream.

Thanks Guy.

[norts]

Just sent you a msg with some details

Sent from my GT-I9295 using Tapatalk

[tas-man]

Guy, all my slides of Lake Pedder are posted in the topic I started many years ago here - viewtopic.php?f=9&t=699
If you are interested in using any of these in your Lake Pedder production, please let me know.

[guyburns]

Thanks Tas-man. Private message sent.

To anyone else interested: forget the message board. You can gmail me at gdburns, or phone 03 6428 2976 and ask for Jenny Pearce or Guy Burns.