A Family 8mm Cine Film

Cine Films were first used in the 1920s. However amateur 16 mm film-making was an expensive hobby limited to the affluent. The 8 mm format, introduced in 1932, consumed only one-quarter as much film as 16 mm and finally made home movies a reasonably affordable luxury for ordinary people. Family holidays, trips, family gatherings, and important events such as weddings all being filmed. Standard 8mm remained the established home movie making format right through the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s. In 1965, Kodak launched their Super 8mm cartridge, which was a full 50ft length of film making it easier still for people to record their precious family memories. In the mid-1970s, Betamax and VHS home videocassette recorders were introduced. Colour video cameras, previously beyond the financial reach of all but the richest amateurs, gradually became cheaper and smaller. Battery-powered camcorders combined the recorder and the camera into one portable and increasingly compact and affordable unit. By the early 1980s an hour of blank videotape cost no more than a three-minute 50-foot roll of 8 mm film with processing. The writing was on the wall for cine film as a mass market item. However the old family cine films have a certain charm about them and capture a time long gone but so easily remembered when we watch them again.