How I Converted My Old Super 8 Film to Digital
When I was 14 years old, my dad and I bought a brand new Super 8 movie camera. It was the mid-1970s and we were living in the coastal town of Albany in Western Australia.
My parents left a settled life in Sydney to explore the country when I was just a baby. So, I grew up travelling around Australia. Normally, we would only stay in each town for a few weeks. But, we stayed in Albany for longer because of my dad’s work commitments there. We even rented a house rather than living in a caravan as we usually did.
A large jar on the kitchen bench served as the “bank” for our camera fund.
I put in part of my pocket money each week along with any money I earned for doing odd jobs and collecting aluminium cans for recycling. Dad, of course, contributed the bulk of the funds, but it still took us months to save up for the camera. We weren’t rich, so there was not a lot of spare money for luxuries like movie cameras.
It was a momentous day when we counted our camera fund and found that we finally had enough money. We headed into our local camera shop and bought the movie camera, a projector and screen, and a few cartridges of film to get started.
I loved it from day one.
