Saturday, October 27, 2012

El Capitan film restoration

Only a few more days left to pledge money to get this project done!

See the link below for all the info and a big thanks to all that have already helped out with a KickStarter pledge.

http://fishproductsblog.blogspot.com/2012/10/el-capitan-film-restoration-via.html

Tuesday, October 23, 2012

Old Ads

Back in the olde days, we used to run advertising on some online sites and in the print mags.  Some of those ads were pretty funny, odd, outrageous and occasionally pot-stirring.  I'm going to start putting them up here on the blog for posterity.

We'll start with "Romero".  I think the first Romero ad ran in either Rock and Ice or Climbing, or both.  I'll try to narrow the year down, but it was right around 1993 or so.  The line was pulled from the Heminway novel, The Sun Also Rises.  The ad was conceived and published by Chris Persinger, the in-house ad guy, seamstress, and bar tender at FISH Products at the time.


The banner ads below were all put up on RockClimbing.com when it first got going.  The infancy of the web made stuff like this very affordable since nobody really even knew how many people were viewing pages or actually clicking on ads.







Haul Bag shoulder strap attachment



To attach the upper part of the shoulder strap simply thread the 2" webbing through the slider from top to bottom.  Then, and this is the key, run the webbing back up and over the buckle and thread the webbing through the top of the buckle again.  This will bring the 1" tail to right near the 1" buckle that actually does all the holding.  Look at the pic real close and follow the threading pattern.  If you don't do the second pass with the 2" webbing on the top of the buckle, there will be an uncomfortable gap in the connection of the shoulder strap to bag since the shoulder strap will hang too low.  When done correctly, the padded part of the shoulder strap should be snug up against the body of the bag.


The bottom of the bag has two brightly colored tabs sewn into the underside of the main haul straps.  The idea is to girth hitch the 1" webbing around the main haul straps and through these tabs.  Just using the tabs will not be as strong or as stable.  Just using the main haul straps will pull funny on the lower bond stitching where the main haul straps are attached to the bag.


This is what it should look like when attached properly.

Wednesday, October 3, 2012

El Capitan film restoration via KickStarter


The digital restoration of the classic 1968 Rock climbing film, El Capitan.

Launched: Oct 1, 2012Funding ends: Oct 31, 2012

"Even though El Capitan was no longer being distributed, I continued to get inquires and requests for the film. When very, poor, quality bootlegged copies started showing up on the Internet, I knew I had to do something. I decided to look at the original film, that ran through the camera, and to my surprise after almost 45 years, it still looked pretty good. I had it digitized (scanned) in high definition. The new technology is of such high resolution that every little scratch and bit of dirt on the film showed up crystal clear. In order to restore the film to its original condition, over 86,000 frames, one frame at a time, has to be digitally cleaned and repaired. With digital software we are able to reconstruct the film with all the original effects, restore the color, and make it look even better than the 16mm film prints.

After several years of being repeatedly asked, “Whatever happened to the climbers?” I approached them with the idea of making a film that would reveal their lives today, and have them recall their memories of filming El Capitan. About a year ago, I started filming and have captured some delightful and insightful moments of their lives and accomplishments. Though still being edited, the film is turning out to be candid and entertaining. When it is finished, it will be included on the DVD with the restored El Capitan.

With the money that I hope to raise from Kickstarter contributors, I will be able to complete the El Capitan film restoration, finish “Whatever happened to the climbers?” (working title) and prepare the DVD master.

After being out of distribution for over 10 years, with your help, the classic film, El Capitan, will finally be available again, restored in HD and looking better than ever.

If you would be inclined to pass this information on to your friends by way of Twitter and Facebook, it would really help.

Thank you for your support.

Sincerely,

Fred Padula"