Some Frequently Asked Questions:

Q: Who am I and why buy from me?

A: My name is Chin Kim & I've owned Focus Photo (a professional photography lab in Ann Arbor, MI) for over 24 years and have experience using everything from color negatives, slides, b&w photos, video tape transferring, movie film transferring, to the most current digital imaging.  This is the exact system I use in my own lab and we have the capability of transferring up to 100 tapes per day.  We're known across the country for our amazing imaging quality and customer service.

Q:  What are ENLARGED APERTURE MASKS ?

A:  ENLARGED APERTURE MASKS allow access to the more of the film frame. This is important because the image size on film is bigger than projected image. The aperture mask crops the original image during projection and your camcorder will crop the edges of the already cropped image again to fill the tv screen during transfer. That means the final size of the image is much smaller than the original image. Basically, this modification gives you more freedom during the transfer process to capture as much detail as possible without having to unnecessarily crop the image due to aperture mask limitations.  That is why I enlarged aperture mask to ensure more of the image is projected before this cropping can occur.  This problem occurs mainly due to the different aspect ratios of projected movie films from the one currently used for todays TVs.  It is sort of like the cropping that occurs when a movie is shot in a wide screen format like 16:9 and then is cropped when shown on a none-widescreen tv or monitor.  All modified metal surfaces are professionally polished to prevent any scratching of film.

 Q: What is Achromatic Lens?

           Achromatic Lens Assembly:  An achromatic lens assembly ensures that all colors are focused at the same point. Achromatic assemblies are particularly good at compensating for chromatic aberration, an optical effect that can be seen as color fringing in the image, usually at high contrast edges. They also improve spherical aberration, an effect where a white point is projected not as a point but as an out of focus blurb.

Optical Dispersion of a Single Lens

A single lens bends different colors at different angles. When a beam of light passes through a single lens, the different colors are bend at different angles based on their wavelengths (called dispersion), and the lens will focus the different colors at different points. The result is chromatic aberration, an unwanted colorfringing that will lower the lens' resolution and that is also problematic in special effects matting and blue and green screen work.

In a two lens achromatic assembly, one lens is compensating the dispersion introduced by the other. For such purpose, one lens is usually made in a crown glass with low dispersion, while the other is made of a flint glass with high dispersion. The crown lens performs the desired optical effect (for example magnifying an image) and introduces some dispersion, and the flint lens aims at balancing this dispersion while having the least possible optical influence itself. 

Q:  Why is Sprocketless drive better?

A:  The SPROCKETLESS drive protects your  films from the damaging typically found on other sprocket driven projectors and transfer system.

Q:  How much film can I transfer at one time?

A:  This unit has a maximum capacity of 400 feet (take up reel included) and comes pre-aligned (VERY CRITICAL) with the condenser lens on a base. Sound film can be run through this unit but it will not reproduce the audio track as it is a silent projector.

A:  Yes, in fact you will need your own camcorder to transfer the film to a digital format.  We recommend that you have a high quality 3CCD camera(or camcorder) in order to get the highest quality image.  This unit needs  a 3CCD camcorder minimum 16X optical zoom or 12X with digital zoom ( You might need Close up Filter +1 or +2).

Q:  Why don't you use new projectors?

A:  We would like to use a new projector but no one makes new projectors anymore.  We've found that these projectors work just as well after our thorough refurbishing process.  And a new projector would only drive up the cost for you and I'm committed to giving you the best value for your money.  The entire unit is completely refurbished prior to modification with all metal film surfaces professionally polished, belts replaced and all mechanicals cleaned and lubed.

Q:  Do I need a computer or software to adjust the image?

A:  No, you can adjust both the speed using our custom variable speed controller and the dimmer to adjust for both flicker free transfer and optimal brightness for both over and underexposed film.  You could use programs such as   Pinnacle Plus or any video editing program on the market for more fine adjustment with a computer.

Q:  What if I need more help setting up or transferring my film?

A:  I offer FREE email support to answer any questions you may have about setting up and using your new transfer system.