Extract from a Super 8 movie filmed in Norway, 1969
For historical interest I’ve put this extract of a movie I made in 1969 here. I shot this just three weeks after after nearly losing my life on the nearby ‘Fiva Route’ in Romsdal. My brother had already returned home, but I stayed on for an extra week, determined to shoot something with my Minolta Super 8 camera, that I’d lugged out to Norway. I had climbed the East Ridge of Bispen with my brother a few days before and realised that this would make a good subject, as I would be able to shoot the whole route from the conveniently positioned South Ridge to one side.
Of course, I was very limited with what I could do with just one camera, so some rather crude ‘cutaways’ – close-ups of ropes etc – had to be shot later in the day. For speed I soloed the South Ridge, ably assisted by Mike Sharp. We had to traverse around quite a lot to get into the best camera positions.
The results were just about acceptable. Warning … there is a rather embarrassing intrusion of music about half-way through …
The camera used was a Minolta Autopak-8 K5 with a Rokkor f1.8 9.5-30mm zoom lens, and could shoot at 12, 18 and 24 frames per second, i.e. slightly speeded up, standard, and slightly slow motion. Unfortunately this beautiful piece of kit, that I treasured, came to an unfortunate end. But that is another story …