001: The Bolex Test
I started film school thirty years ago.
A major part of my first quarter at school was the Bolex test, an examination that required a student to demonstrate and describe the functions of a 16mm Bolex camera. If you passed the Bolex test you were cleared to make your first film and move on to using more professional cameras - ones with things like electric motors, magazines that held 400 feet of film, and the ability to be used in tandem with sound recording devices.
I hated the Bolex. The nasty old specimens my film school kept in the dark recesses of its gear cage never wound correctly, had dingy viewfinders and the lenses were not properly calibrated. To me, the Bolex was like a troll under a bridge - something to overcome so I could move on to other things.
I don’t feel that way anymore.
I did graduate from film school, and I did move on to other things. Over time, especially since the rise of digital cinema cameras, I began to miss those old wind-up cameras, and I now appreciate Bolex cameras for the precision machines they are.
The Bolex is deceptively simple; it just doesn’t seem like you can accomplish much with it. A well-tuned Bolex can, in fact, do anything.
That’s what The Bolex Test is about. I work as a freelance producer, based in the Detroit area. I’m putting a 1963 Bolex REX 3 back into service, and I’m going to put that camera to the test to find out just how far I can go with it.
When my camera was purchased new almost sixty years ago it was all a filmmaker needed to launch a career making commercials, television segments, and industrial films. Can I do that now? Put another way, can I make money with a mechanical camera that uses a format most consider to be dead?
I’ll be sending out updates once a week. I passed my first Bolex test thirty years ago. Subscribe to see if I make it through this one.