For the seller

Are Super 8 cameras worth anything?

A Super 8 film camera in hand

Some Super 8 cameras are sought after again, because people are shooting Super 8 film again and Kodak still makes it. Most are not. What decides it is the model and its lens, whether the camera still runs, and above all whether the battery compartment has been left with old cells in it.

Super 8 came out in 1965 and was, for twenty years, how families filmed their holidays. That means there are a great many cameras about, and most of them were never special. A few were, and they are the ones people look for.

What makes a Super 8 camera collectable

The lens. Fast, sharp zoom lenses are what people look for. The Canon 310XL, built round an f/1.0 zoom that Canon called the fastest of its kind at the time, is wanted for exactly that reason.

Manual control. Cameras that let you set the exposure yourself, choose the frame rate, or close the shutter by hand are more sought after than cameras that decide everything for you. The Braun Nizo 801, designed within Dieter Rams's department at Braun, is one; the Canon 1014XL-S, which Canon called the pinnacle of its 8mm cameras, is another.

Silent cameras over sound cameras. Sound Super 8 cameras were built for a sound film that has not been made for a long time. They can still shoot silent film, but most people would rather have a good silent camera.

Whether it runs. A camera that runs, with a lens that is clear and a meter that responds, is a very different thing from one that does not.

Look in the battery compartment first

This is the single most useful check. Cameras put away with cells in them for thirty years very often have leaked. Clean springs and contacts are a good sign. White or green crust that has spread down the wires into the body usually means a serious repair. Take any old cells out now, carefully, and do not try to clean what is underneath.

If a camera seems not to work, it may not be the camera. Our guide Super 8: before you blame the camera goes through the batteries, the cartridge and the meter in the order worth checking.

What is rarely sought after

Simple fixed-lens and point-and-shoot Super 8 cameras, most sound cameras and most projectors are rarely wanted on their own. Projectors are heavy, fragile to ship and mostly bought by people who already own one. Reels of home film are different: they matter a great deal to a family and to the right collector, and should never be thrown away unseen.

If it is a box of them

Cine cameras tend to arrive in groups: a few cameras, a projector, a screen, splicers, viewers, empty reels and the films themselves. Selling that piece by piece is slow, and much of it will not sell alone.

We buy collections like that whole. Super 8 is close to our hearts, and several of the models we see most often have their own page in The models. We do not test every camera first. We look at the collection as a whole, from your photographs and, when it is worth the journey, in person, and take all of it, including the parts that will never be listed. If it is not a collection that makes sense for us, we say so honestly, and where it would do better.

Before anything is sold we record the story of the collection, so it goes on with every camera, with the collector's name on it. We buy anywhere in the world, and for a collection worth the journey we come to it and pack it ourselves.

Short answers

Which Super 8 cameras are the most sought after?

Cameras with fast, sharp lenses and full manual control, in working order. The model name on the side is the place to start.

Is an untested Super 8 camera worth anything?

Often, yes. A clean battery compartment makes an untested camera far more interesting.

Do I need to test the cameras before offering you the collection?

No. Tell us what you know, including what you do not know. Untested is normal in a collection.

What about the home films?

Keep them, or pass them on with the collection. Old film can often still be digitised, and it is usually the most personal thing in the box.

Why we keep the story

A collection is not a pile of objects.

It is years of somebody deciding what was worth keeping, and sold off piece by piece that is the first thing to go. So before anything is sold, we sit down with you and record it: how it started, what the best of it was, the piece that got away. That story stays on every object with the collector's name, and goes with it to whoever keeps it next. You get a page where you can see where each piece ended up.

Three ways the story gets recorded

On camera, where it lives. We travel to the collection and film it properly: you talking about how it started, the room and the shelves as they are, the objects in your hands. Wherever in the world the collection happens to be.

On a call. If the collection is sent to us rather than collected, we have the same conversation over a video call and write it up, with one photograph of the shelf as it stood.

In writing. If you would rather not talk at all, answer a handful of questions in your own time and in your own words. It goes on the objects exactly as you wrote it.

It never changes anything else, and you can always say no to it. Some conversations run ten minutes, some an afternoon. Read the collections we have taken on

If it is a whole collection

We buy whole collections, not single pieces: one person takes all of it, and the story is kept with every object. Tell us what you have and a person replies within two days.

How passing it on works, in full

1The collection
What is in it
Pick everything that applies. Something else opens a line to tell us.
Roughly how many pieces
A guess is fine. Nobody has counted.
How would you describe it
There is no wrong answer here, and a lot of ordinary is a normal collection.
One or two sentences. This is the question we care about most.
2Where it is, and how it could reach us
Town and country is enough.
How could it reach us
Unseend is in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. Sending and bringing are as welcome as a visit; if it is sent, we pay the freight and insure it.
When does it need to be gone
No hurry is a good answer. It lets us plan a visit properly.
3Condition and photographs
In your own words. Broken, incomplete or untested is fine and is normal; it only needs saying.
Photographs
Three to ten photographs The room and the shelves as they stand. Phone photographs are fine, and a slow walk round on video says more than any of them.Send them to hello@unseend.com
Or attach them to the reply that comes back within two days. Any of them works, and nothing is looked at until a person reads it. Do not clean up first — the shelves as they stand tell us more than a tidy arrangement.
4The number, and the story
A number or a range, whatever you have in mind. You will get an honest answer either way.
Would you tell the story of it
Filmed at the collection wherever it is, on a video call, or written in your own time. It never changes the price.
5How to reach you
The reply comes here, from a person, within two days.
Only if you would rather be called.

Answered within two days, by the person who would come, and by email at every step after that. Nothing you send is shared with anyone, and your photographs are deleted if we do not go ahead.

This form is protected by hCaptcha; its privacy policy and terms apply.