Cine Shops of our town's and Our Cities

#1 by Andrew Woodcock ( deleted ) , Fri Oct 13, 2017 10:11 am

While I knew a little bit about Jessops being founded in Leicester, I knew nothing of the owners name etc etc. Thankfully Maurice over on Film Tech, filled us in with these details. Then he went to go on and mention another establishment synonymous with cine from Leicester.

Then it got me thinking, as most of us now here have some early memories of a time when cine was the only method to producing motion pictures, I thought it would be a nice idea for those of us in the UK to catalogue our memories of each town and city we can remember, and list the establishment's that existed for our great hobby, both as general camera shops but also those that went on to specialize in home package movies and cine equipment.

As I was never from London, or visited often in the years these shops operated in, I'd be most interested in finding out whatever anyone could tell me regarding AVD in London also please?

Any photographs we could find and upload to here of each,would of course be an additional bonus.


"C'Mon Baggy, Get With The Beat"


Andrew Woodcock
Last edited Fri Oct 13, 2017 1:31 pm | Top

RE: Cine Shops of our town's and Our Cities

#2 by David Alligan , Fri Oct 13, 2017 12:55 pm

Hello Andrew
I was born and bred in Edmonton, North London and we had a branch of Dixons who sold Chinon Super 8 projectors, it was their which my Dad bought our first projector along with the 400ft of Please sir, they had a rotary stand with Walton Films on it, opposite Dixons was a small photographic shop who also sold Super 8 films, mainly 200ft and I remember seeing Walt Disney Extracts in the window, along in Waltham Cross was a big shop selling a vast selection of 8mm films, speaking to the owner one day when I visited, he told me about this superb dealers that he wanted to be like, when I asked the name of this big dealer he said they were in Dudley, near Birmingham called "Derann" he gave me their telephone number and that was the start, I was hooked on super 8, im sure Barry Attwood would help me out with the name of the shop in Waltham Cross, their was also another shop in Chingford that I went to, this was only a small shop but they stocked all different suppliers inc Walton, Disney, Marketing and Universal 8, once again perhaps Barry could help me with the name.
The last one was Portland Films in Shaftsbury Ave, you could walk past it and not realise it was their, it was so small but what an Alladins cave inside, it was from their that I bought my 400ft of Superman The Movie, think that was in 1978 and cost £21, I also got the full length feature f Wargames from their and that cost me £289, I still have the receipt today in my wallet.
I always popped in when I visited Leicester Square to see the latest block buster and on one occasion I called in to see what they had and noticed that they had "Bundle Of Joy" but this version was the full length feature 5 x 400ft, like King Kong they done many different versions from 1 x 400, 3 x 400, 4 x 400 and mainly B/W but as I said this was the full length feature and in Colour, the chap behind the counter who I was friends with said if I was interested in it I could have it for £40 I snapped his hand off to have it, can you imagine getting a full length feature today for £40.
Those are just a few of my memories of super 8 shops in London and in and around Edmonton


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RE: Cine Shops of our town's and Our Cities

#3 by Maurice Leakey , Mon Oct 16, 2017 10:22 am

Here in Bristol in the 1950s we had six shops who dabbled in cine.

Bristol Cine Service, Alma Vale Road.
M.W. Dunscombe, St. Augustines Parade (Agents for Ampro).
Radioscope Ltd, Broad Street (9.5mm film library).
H. Salanson & Co Ltd, Castle Mill Street (Film libraries in all gauges).
F.G. Warne, Saint Stephen Street. (Film producers).
Whitehall Cine Service, Whitehall Road (9.5mm film library).

My first film projector, a 9.5mm hand-turned Hunter, new at £7.17.6., for Christmas 1946, was bought from Salansons. But they would not let me join their library saying the Hunter (Bingoscope) had no sprockets. However, Whitehall Cine Service had no qualms about hiring films to me. A couple of years later a 16mm Kodak C (£19.10.0) was bought from Salansons and I now joined their 16mm library. It took a few years after the war for most projector manufacturers to get going again. But soon, Specto announced their new 9.5mm 100 watt model, in beautiful silver grey (pre-war models were black), quite expensive then at £37.10.0, but it was new and I could now join their 9.5mm library at last!

In 1955 my first 16mm sound projector came from Salansons. a pre-war American Bell & Howell 138 at £95. I used this for a time around the Mendip Hills as a weekly mobile operator. It was a bit of a loss making venture, 2/- for adults, 1/- for children, but it was great fun while it lasted. Soon television came to the area and the locals preferred to stay home at nights!

All those mentioned businesses are long gone, but until last year we did have a shop in the south of Bristol which mainly dealt with still photography, but as the students of cinema at the many universities in Bristol still had to have a knowledge of cine, the business was able to have a good turnover with cine items. But now, Bernard Hunter Bristol Cine Sales, North Street, Bedminster, has gone, the shop being demolished for future shops. I regularly visited, mainly for packets of tape splices and a general chat.

Fortunately, we still have a few cine dealers who operate a mail-order business, but for how long?



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RE: Cine Shops of our town's and Our Cities

#4 by Andrew Woodcock ( deleted ) , Mon Oct 16, 2017 11:31 am

A simply wonderful account of all things cine from a proud Bristolians perspective!
Not too many of us here could ever say of the outlets dating back to pre WWII, so your memories are much treasured here Maurice, thank you again.

You spoke about one last remaining establishment until recently, stocking mainly still photography items but then also providing some cine items due to the courses being attended by students of the area.
Here in Manchester our student facilities have also rocketed these past few years and our own son completed a Motion Design course to BA level, only earlier this year.
At the time of beginning his course three years previously, he was coming back home telling us both of how his studies have been getting along and he would talk of his lecturer showing them 16mm films including animated ones and getting them to study the movement changes in between frames when examined closely as a still transparency.
They would then go onto scratching black leader film using simple techniques like stick men, just to learn actually how to animate in real time.
Also within his same group were others just studying still photography to a similar level but were using 35mm film as well as DSLR cameras.

This got me quite excited ironically at the prospect of what Maurice spoke of earlier, where one or two existing traditional photographic shops in and around the city centre, would now perhaps begin stocking basic film and cine accessories again due to demand from the increase in student courses for many of the media related studies.
Sadly, so far at least from when I have looked around, nothing has manifested so far as a result of the huge increase in Students within the area.

We live in hope however while ever activities like those described above continue to be relevant in course studies.


"C'Mon Baggy, Get With The Beat"


Andrew Woodcock
Last edited Mon Oct 16, 2017 12:25 pm | Top

RE: Cine Shops of our town's and Our Cities

#5 by Maurice Leakey , Mon Oct 16, 2017 12:24 pm

For quite a time the owner of the shop got Polish students, or which Bristol had many, to bring back from leave, the 16mm camera, the Krasnogorsk, which was dead cheap in Poland. He could make good money on selling these to the cinema students.
http://www.k3camera.com/
I myself, bought from him a thirties 16mm Cine-Kodak Special in a leather case fitted with many different lenses and accessories. The 200ft magazine is too big to fit in the case! It had been used for filming inserts for BBC Panorama programmes. I got it cheap as nobody wanted such an old-fashioned camera, and I still have it, although I have never used it. But it is a lovely example of craftsmanship of yesteryear.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kh8useNjroo



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RE: Cine Shops of our town's and Our Cities

#6 by Andrew Woodcock ( deleted ) , Mon Oct 16, 2017 12:39 pm

A beautifully engineered camera Maurice! So so many facilities and I particularly enjoyed the double and multi exposure shots!
I also had a fondness for the engineering shot featuring the helical gear being cut of course. Ha ha.

Fascinating stuff Maurice, thanks once again for posting it to us all here.

I remember imported Super 8mm Russian cameras and film stock were popular here for while. Quite basic but built well and very cheap to obtain as I recall.


"C'Mon Baggy, Get With The Beat"


Andrew Woodcock
Last edited Mon Oct 16, 2017 12:42 pm | Top

RE: Cine Shops of our town's and Our Cities

#7 by Maurice Leakey , Mon Oct 16, 2017 1:00 pm

I tend to buy things and never use them. Thinking that I might one day!
Some 15-20 years ago I popped into The Widescreen Centre in London for a demonstration of their Super Zenit Quarz camera. I came out with one. Perhaps I might use it when/if film becomes available. It's clockwork, and exposure can be manually set if you have a separate meter, which I have. Therefore no batteries are really needed.
One day?
http://zenitquarzcameras.blogspot.co.uk/


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RE: Cine Shops of our town's and Our Cities

#8 by Andrew Woodcock ( deleted ) , Mon Oct 16, 2017 1:50 pm

I sincerely hope that opening statement there Maurice, doesn't ever apply to your stainless Spindle Hubs!


"C'Mon Baggy, Get With The Beat"


Andrew Woodcock
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RE: Cine Shops of our town's and Our Cities

#9 by David Ollerearnshaw , Thu Oct 19, 2017 11:13 pm

We had Dixon's, Boots not sure if they sold package films though and Photomarkets who had a small selection. Looking through some 50 year plus magazines how many shops that dealt with films was amazing. I became aware of home movies in 1973. A visit to Bakewell looking at postcards in a shop and came across Movie Maker magazine, although a few years passed (stll at school) before I got a projector.


I still love the smell of film in the morning


 
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RE: Cine Shops of our town's and Our Cities

#10 by Andrew Woodcock ( deleted ) , Thu Oct 19, 2017 11:26 pm

In Manchester and the surrounding areas it was generally fairly hard pursuing a hobby that was at the time at its peak in the early to late 70's as I remember.

There were the usual Dixon's, Wildings and Jessops in the City Centre. Dixon's, there were two, one in the Arndale centre and one in St Anne's Square.
The one in the Arndale was a much larger store and sold all of their cameras and projectors they regularly advertised in magazines and newspapers and they always had a rotating wire rack that held about 20 or so Walton titles like L&H and T&J etc in 200ft variants ranging from b/w silent to col/ snd titles where applicable.
By 1975 already Standard 8mm package films were nigh on impossible to find on any high street in both the City and neighbouring town's.

We also had an oddball shop called Mazel Radio on London Rd, Piccadilly.
A kind of Aladdins cave style shop that sold records, tapes, films and audio visual equipment from back in the day.
It was little more than a kind of Steptoe's Yard arrangement, but they did have some interesting stuff for those with the money back then.

Stockport was very poor for Cine overall and A-U-L provided the only specialist cine package film store in my area by opening Jubilee Film Library in 1977 on Old Street there.
Jubilee Films stocked all that was available in the day from all the major players of that time.
A great establishment and one which eventually led me to my first knowledge of a certain dealership in the Midlands! 😊


"C'Mon Baggy, Get With The Beat"


Andrew Woodcock
Last edited Fri Oct 20, 2017 10:57 am | Top

RE: Cine Shops of our town's and Our Cities

#11 by Mats Abelli , Fri Oct 20, 2017 8:34 am

I don´t have much to add to this interesting subject, as I live in Sweden. I started collecting, as a kid in the early 60´s. There were no package film stores in Sweden. Films were sold in photo shops and some bigger department stores, as well as a couple of mail order companies. Most films were 50ft silent. In the mid 60´s sound films became more common. I guess that was thanks to Eumig´s introduction of the Mark S, 1964 and later the dual format 709 and super 8 701. Package film were never a big deal in Sweden, so I started importing films from USA, UK, Denmark and Netherlands. I never left the hobby, but found it hard to find films in the 80´s and 90´s. I had no idea that Derann and some others still were active. Thanks to internet I found them appx 2000 and started to collect actively again.


 
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RE: Cine Shops of our town's and Our Cities

#12 by Andrew Woodcock ( deleted ) , Fri Oct 20, 2017 11:32 am

I lived only 70 or 80 miles away from Derann Mats, but still had no idea that they were still operating on the level that they were in the mid 80's, having seen the demise of the hobby altogether in my area with the demise of Jubilee Films as an actual package film shop.

Don't forget here, it was well before the internet days, high street magazines devoted to the hobby of cinematography had all taken a new route down the video path unless you were aware of the specialist magazines and CHC hadn't even opened or begun trading.

There were a few others "still at it" as it were, but finding out information on such establishments a fair few miles from your region proved really quite difficult to obtain back then.

I remember one of my main sources of inspiration for pursuing the hobby at around that time was through buying a twice weekly released newspaper called "Loot". It was a kind of newly derived exchange and Mart pre ebay days and it allowed you to find bits and pieces by searching through the various photography sections within the paper.
I distinctly remember sourcing my first copy of "Dressed To Kill" on one 1200ft spool from this paper.
I travelled to the outbacks and beyond to collect it and an ST1200 from the same collector.
Without Cyril from Jubilee Films making a passing statement regarding Derann in the Midlands, I too would never have known still of their existence and no doubt wouldn't be in this hobby today otherwise but for that one small snippet of conversation all those years previously.

By the time the internet would have become commonplace in most people's homes here in the UK, many of the titles released by Derann in those halcyon days would have been already out of print again, so relying solely on the internet for information regarding the Super 8mm hobby, you would have still missed out on many of their later New feature prints and you would have been left relying only upon their second hand lists to stand any chance of obtaining certain newish titles back then.

When I was receiving regular mail from Derann in the mid to late 80's and then throughout the 90's, the second hand lists were something of complete frustration back in those days for many many collectors.

98% of what was being sold on those lists were "one offs". By the time the mail had landed on your doormat, so often all of the 30 best titles on the lists had already been taken.
The titles and the used prices were nothing short of mouth watering in those days, but just often like ebay of today, you try landing any of them!!😂😂


"C'Mon Baggy, Get With The Beat"


Andrew Woodcock
Last edited Fri Oct 20, 2017 11:56 am | Top

RE: Cine Shops of our town's and Our Cities

#13 by Maurice Leakey , Fri Oct 20, 2017 12:21 pm

As I recall, Derann second-hand lists nearly always landed on my door mat on a Saturday, and Sunday was a closed day at Derann.
After waiting until 9am on Monday to phone them their lines were then always busy, and, when at last you got through, the answer always was the same, "Oh! That title was sold first thing this morning". In the end there seemed little chance of getting a second-hand title that you wanted.


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RE: Cine Shops of our town's and Our Cities

#14 by Andrew Woodcock ( deleted ) , Fri Oct 20, 2017 12:27 pm

I seemed to get mine on various days throughout the week Maurice, however the outcome was entirely almost always the exact same!

I think camping overnight outside their shop may have been the only answer at times! 😂😂😂

Far more demand than supply, hence my digression and thoughts surrounding the possibilities and the overall popularity of a Super 8mm only sales arena for the modern day.

I'm sure there must still be very many out there in the Super 8mm world of today with "unfinished business" as it were.


"C'Mon Baggy, Get With The Beat"


Andrew Woodcock
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RE: Cine Shops of our town's and Our Cities

#15 by Andrew Woodcock ( deleted ) , Fri Oct 20, 2017 12:51 pm

Wrong thread sorry.


"C'Mon Baggy, Get With The Beat"


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Last edited Fri Oct 20, 2017 12:53 pm | Top

RE: Cine Shops of our town's and Our Cities

#16 by David Ollerearnshaw , Sun Oct 22, 2017 12:45 pm

Through the magic of time travel. Or me scanning some magazines, here is an advert for Phoenix Films


I still love the smell of film in the morning


 
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RE: Cine Shops of our town's and Our Cities

#17 by Andrew Woodcock ( deleted ) , Sun Oct 22, 2017 2:43 pm

Keep em comin' please David as you scan them. Articles like these are precisely what are loved and treasured in places like these!


"C'Mon Baggy, Get With The Beat"


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RE: Cine Shops of our town's and Our Cities

#18 by Vidar Olavesen , Sun Oct 22, 2017 3:10 pm

How about adding them to Picture Gallery Catalogues?


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RE: Cine Shops of our town's and Our Cities

#19 by David Ollerearnshaw , Sun Oct 22, 2017 4:46 pm

Was looking everywhere for the picture bit, only just seen it at the top right of page.


I still love the smell of film in the morning


 
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RE: Cine Shops of our town's and Our Cities

#20 by David Ollerearnshaw , Wed Oct 25, 2017 9:03 pm

Mention of The Widescreen Centre 48 Dorset Street visited them a couple of times.


I still love the smell of film in the morning


 
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RE: Cine Shops of our town's and Our Cities

#21 by David Ollerearnshaw , Wed Oct 25, 2017 9:05 pm

And a shop in Manchester, Salford and one in Dudley.


I still love the smell of film in the morning


 
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RE: Cine Shops of our town's and Our Cities

#22 by Andrew Woodcock ( deleted ) , Wed Oct 25, 2017 9:12 pm

A bit before my time is Delta in Broughton Rd.
I don't remember it anyway.


"C'Mon Baggy, Get With The Beat"


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RE: Cine Shops of our town's and Our Cities

#23 by David Ollerearnshaw , Wed Oct 25, 2017 11:06 pm

I think Delta was run by Harry Nadler. The scans are from 1973


I still love the smell of film in the morning


 
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RE: Cine Shops of our town's and Our Cities

#24 by Andrew Woodcock ( deleted ) , Wed Oct 25, 2017 11:12 pm

I know the name Delta films and I've heard of Harry Nadler, but I never got the opportunity to visit this shop before it closed for good.

In 1973, I was still a young boy and my parents never shopped in Salford.
Wrong side of town for us blue noses.


"C'Mon Baggy, Get With The Beat"


Andrew Woodcock

RE: Cine Shops of our town's and Our Cities

#25 by Tom Photiou , Sun Oct 29, 2017 10:51 am

Well, here in Plymouth our hobby all started when i was around 8/9 years old. My brother worked in a resturant next door to Framptom cameras.(years latter it became jessops) which was a couple of doors away from another shop called Tom Mollands. Both sold super 8 but Framptons had a half of there shop dedicated to it and had loads of shelves of projectors. My brother who still works in the same resturant was looking around framptons and spotted the 50ft std 8 silent extract the the defiant virginian. He enquired what it was as the box stated the american civil war,(his huge interest along with all history) and he bought it for £1.11. Of course he needed a projector so he bought his first one,a eumig p8. The rest is history. Here in plymouth we were lucky yo have the two shops along with dixons and a few others but also of course roger lily with his library and sales shop. When we moved into sound he bought himself a eumig 810 dlux from Framptons and a 400ft copy of stagecoach from dixon on the spinny rack and a 200ft b/w extract from one million years bc from framptom cameras also from the spinning rack.
A chap called gordon clark worked in framptons and was himself a very good ameture film maker often winning awards with the IAC and many many years later helped us to do our own war film already documented on here. Our little film got into the top ten in the IAC competition that year and we won both the blue seal certificate and a gold award from kodak. A great year for us both.
Frampton cameras were huge in super 8 and we believe it was because of Gordon Clarks interest in the hobby that it was so succesful with selling 8mm films and equipment for as long as it was. When the film side began to demise with the introduction of video he rang us as they were selling off a lot of items cheap, we bought the last stocks of the superb eumig 800ft spools in the grey plastic cases. We bought 15 and paid someting like 2.99 each for them.
Both shops are now foreighn cafes.
Its also worth noting here, the relation building of shop assistant and customers like the one we had with Gordon in framtons,going onto makin movies with him, and the people in Tom Mollands is all but gone today with online buying and big superstores and malls. All gone. Today its about nothing but money. No or very little customer relations. Theres very few shop assistance who know how to build any repore with customers.sad


Looking for Home alone trailer and Abba Scope trailer


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