Hello everyone My name is Al and I currently reside in Sacramento Ca......My story starts in the San Fernando Valley where I was born and raised. To make a long story shot.....I was 13 years old in 1977.....Star Wars really had an effect on me and I was mezmerized by the special effects especialy the lasers!......I was an Only child and the son of an areospace engineer.....so when I took an intrest in the movies my father bought me a elmo 1012 s xl super 8 movie camera with a full body pod. this camera was not a home movie camera. the camera was very professional grade at the time...remember ...we had no video cameras, no cell phones, and the only movie cams we had were super 8 silent cameras that had no sound....My elmo had a 10 to 1 electric zoom with a macro, sound on sound, and a fps selection of 1, 18, and 24.....Fade in Fade out Iris control, and was one of a hand full of cameras that had the capacity of using a 200 foot cartridge rather than the standard at the time of 50'....I still have it!...So Friends and myself started making movies!....Just like the cartoon ..Home movies....lol......Living in the San Fernando Valley you meet alot of people that work for the studios....my father had friends at Paramount and I was able to spend some time there where I met alot of real movie stars...Henry Winkler (The Fonz) at that time and you can imagine what a thrill that was, Penny Marshal, Cindy Williams, , They were shooting Scorpio at the time and I was able to meet Al pacino, They were also shooting Little House on the Prarie so I meet Michael Landon and Melissa Gilbert. My fathers friend was a set painter and he knew I was interested in a carrer in films and told me about a friend of his that worked at universal.....His friend was Don Martin who was the Technical director of the Screen Test Theater .....I met Don on a trip to Universal before Galactica and I became friends with him....shortly after that they opened the Battle of Galactica attraction and then I went to universal every weekend for next year!.....I went through the tour once a week at least 20 to 30 times!.....and I have many super 8 sound films of BOG.....Of course it was 2 fold as at the end of the tour I would go to Screen Test Theater and spend the rest of the day with Don!.....Galactica was also one of my favorite TV shows and I think I still have the VHS tapes I recorded off of TV....Now I own the collectors dvd's but in them day's you hade to record it from the brodcast.......Time goes on and things change.....Got married, Had Kids..Moved....But I never lost my love for Battle Star, Star wars or movies.......The reason I decided to join your group, was because of my experiance as a kid ...but I am also an avid R/C aircraft Modeler and we build r/c airplanes from scratch....One of my skills from this is Vacuum forming! so I think I have a little to contribute to this group...Although I have never made a Cylon, or a storm trooper, I do have the technology! and have created many plugs, molds and I have also built many machines!......Thanks for your time and I will post more soon.
....I love the videos and they look just like my 8 mm footage...unfortunatly my films are in storage and I never had them transfered...I guess I will have to put that on my list....
