@Cholentpot I have an MG I bought in 1981. They focus hyperfocal, about 5 feet to infinity, and have a slide-in close-up lens that focuses at 4 feet (plus-minus DOF).
BTW, Film Photography Project is now offering film labeled for Minolta 16, and 3D printed cassettes to load it in, so once more, the ones with no cassette as usable (those cassettes aren't cheap, but they're done by camera people so should be better in terms of leaks and scratches than the cast resin ones that used to be all over eBay in the early oughties).
I've heard of FFP doing this. My issue is getting hold of reasonable lengths of 16mm B&W. No, I don't want nor need 400 feet of Eastman XX.
I load my Minolta 16/Kiev 30/303 cassettes three ways: cut a roll of 120 down to 127 and keep the strip left over; it's long enough (barely) for two standard Minolta loads (a little short for the longer loads standard in Kiev 30 and 303, 30 exposures instead of 20). If you don't shoot 127, it's easy to build or buy a slitter that can get four 15.5mm strips (close enough) out of a 120 roll -- that's eight reloads. Or, I find sellers who offer 16mm single perf in camera rolls (for 16mm cameras, that's only 100 feet). Foma 100R comes in this length, for certain, and I think I've seen Freestyle and B&H offering other stocks in 16mm single perf. Load the perforations toward the cassette bridge, keep track of which side the emulsion is on, and a couple feet will cover even a Kiev 30/303. Or I find 16mm microfilm, which is typically unperfed (works fine in Minolta format cameras and many others) and comes in 50 or 100 foot rolls.
Now, FPP offers a slightly easier option, as their Minolta 16 film is sold in 25 foot lengths, two color (repurposed cine) and two B&W (also repurposed cine, it seems, since they recommend D96 for the ISO 20 and XX is clearly the standard Kodak cine stock). At their price, a reload for an actual Minolta (20 exposures, 16-18 inches) ought to cost less than two dollars for the film. If that's too much, buy a longer camera roll of 16mm single perf cine film (or, for the 10x14 frame, double perf or Double 8, which is 16mm wide and perfed both side, intended to be slit after development).
Freestyle has Foma 100R in 10m (Double 8 and Double Super 8 -- perfectly usable in a Minolta with 10x14 frame) and 16mm Foma 100R and Tri-X Reversal in 100 foot rolls.
So no, you don't have to buy four hundred feet -- worst case, to get below a couple bucks a reload, you have to buy 100 feet. Doesn't take up a huge amount of space (in your darkroom, fridge, or freezer). Not a huge problem to cut down to length.
The only reason I don't use my Minolta/Kiev 16mm cameras much any more is that I've gotten addicted to big negatives. Put me back in a situation where I need smaller cameras again, and I'll be right back to the small film.
Perhaps I missed it, but why no buy 16mm Kodak or other super16mm movie film, like Tri-X?
B&H has Tri-x reversal film ISO 200 daylight in single pref, 100 foot rolls and says it can be processed as negative film in typical b&w chemistry, all be it, with increased grain, but perhaps PMK Pyro or Xtol can give better results than say, D72.
IMO.
Lots of info for me to digest.
I have a 70mm to 120 slitter, a 35 to 16 slitter. If I could slit down the 70 to 16 that would give me more than enough. I don't have that yet though.
Double 8 is 16mm I take it. They just slit it down to 8mm when processed. Would be useful in my Kiev and Minolta but not in my Pentax 110. Something to look into though.
Anything with the Kodak name is expensive compared to, say Fomapan. That said, Freestyle has 16mm Tri-X Reversal on sale (as of earlier today, anyway) at around $52 per 100 foot roll -- or about the same price as 16mm single perf Foma 100R.
In a 10x14 Minolta both perforations of 16mm (single or double) as well as Double 8 or Double Super 8 will work -- the camera ignores the perforations (works fine with unperfed film) and there's room between double perfs for the 10mm frame width. The 13x18 MGs/QT and Kiev 30/303 work with single perf, perf loaded on the bridge side, but double perf (of any flavor) will have perfs intruding in the frame, since the 13mm frame runs virtually to the edge of the film (offset to clear the single perf on 16mm cine film). The Pentax 110 may stop advance based on a "feeler" inside the cassette light trap, but as I recall, the camera will still work (with slightly more random and increasing frame spacing, if you don't have backing paper to use for the numbers) with both unperfed film, and with sprocket perf, as long as you tape the feeler or clip it off short enough not to get into the film. ALL of these (in fact, virtually all 110 cameras) will work with unperfed 16mm film slit from a larger format. For my money, slitting 120 into four strips is the best bang for buck -- more emulsions than 70mm, virtually as many as 35mm; less waste (no perf strips to slit off and throw away), and you get more usable strips. The only tricky bit is is you have to somehow keep track of the original edges of the 120, so you can load the edge markings at the cassette bridge for Minolta/Kiev (so they aren't in the image), or to ride on the feeler track (where the one perf per frame would be in original 110) for 110 cameras (same reason).
120 is 61-62 mm wide, so you can cut four strips 15+ mm wide from a roll, which is close enough to work in Minolta format cameras. 35mm only has 26mm between perfs, so you only get a single 16mm strip (though there's room for a 9.2 mm Minox strip, too, and still stay clear of the perfs). 127, if still economically available, would give three slightly under width strips from 46mm film, and 70mm (with those huge perforations) will still only give three between perfs, with something like 13 mm wasted.
Cine short ends, when available, are probably the sensible way to get 16mm film, but your best combination of emulsion choice and cost (for Minolta 16, probably also for 110) is still slitting from 120. Eight reloads from a $4.69 roll (.EDU Ultra 100, 200, or 400) is close to that 20 cents a foot and no need to modify the Pentax to use it.
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