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Topic: Strange Booths

Jason Burroughs
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 654
From: Allen, TX
Registered: Jun 99

posted 09-02-1999 06:29 PM

The theatre I'm in now (16 screens) has two booths, because of a large atrium diving the building in half (Standard modern Sony construction) to move prints from one side to the other you have to carry the film down the stairs, across the lobby and back up annother set of stairs. The managers LOVE to move prints here semingly more so from side to side (arg). Its even more fun when the lobby's packed trying to lug that print across there with all the customers oogleing over it... and aside from moving prints during normal operation you get the stairmaster routine while working...

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Rick Long
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 759
From: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Registered: Nov 1999

posted 09-02-1999 10:33 PM

One of the strangest booths I knew of was the Metro on Bloor St. West, here in Toronto, once the showplace of the area. The theatre however fell upon hard times. Abandoned by the major chains, independant hands took it over, and converted it into a modern-day burlesque house.
Although the equipment was rather mundane (Simplex E-7's, Peerless Magnarcs, - the Kintek processor and amplifiers were rather kinky), the show consisted of a mild porno movie, followed by a live strip act. There was a catwalk from the booth to the backstage area and it was common for the stripers to use the projection booth as a change area. (Strangely enough, the B.A. never seemed to have a problem finding relief men to fill in a shift here).
Come to think of it, it seems to me that Gord McLeod had quite a few service calls here too.

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Art Averett
Film Handler

Posts: 14
From: Orlando, FL
Registered: Mar 2000

posted 09-05-1999 11:26 AM

I too worked the Avalon 2 one night, back in the mid seventies. I was stationed at the big "P" and worked under local 224. It was a nightmare to say the least. At that time the Avalon 2 had a pair of Super Simplexes and Pearless MagnaArcs. The film had to be pre-lubed with oil because the gates were so tight. I know because prior to the regular show the manager handed me a short trailer for the Will Rogers foundation. Thought I would take a look before the show. Threaded the trailer up and started the machine. Good grief (not my excact words) all of a sudden the film started to come out of the projector at me! Shut down the projector, gave the now messed up trailer back mto the manager. Now that I'm shaken-up, I wondered if the show would go thru the projector. Checked out the print and it was completely "oiled". OOOOKKKKK. Started the show, and it was going alright. Then the next thing I see is the upper reel on the left projector came around and "slapped back". What the #$&^%$*! is going on? After the reel finished out, I had to take the spindle of and clean out the back half, re-lube it and re-adjust the tension. I never did go back to that theater.

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Gordon McLeod
Film God

Posts: 9532
From: Toronto Ontario Canada
Registered: Jun 99

posted 09-05-1999 11:47 AM

Rick after the metro was twined and the strippers were gone they first used a perescope to put the image into the lower theatre( trhough the booth floor) with a brenkert and Tall Texan Tower and the regular E7's projected down a tunnel to the main theatre. Later the brenkert got moved downstairs into a new booth with the film going down the fire escape and later a pair of century C' with Pups and coperators were installed downstairs.
The machines were at the back of the booth and one crawled in front of them to get at the machines to thread.
Now they use video there

Harbour front theatre a mixed use venue has the machines at the back of the booth and the light console and mixer are in front of them

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Tim Reed
Better Projection Pays

Posts: 5246
From: Northampton, PA
Registered: Sep 1999

posted 09-08-1999 08:59 AM

Kerasotes had a 6 in Rockford, IL I used to service. It had started as a twin or triple, and several configurations later became the six. There were 5 booths, each shaped irregularly and fitted wherever they would go.

From the various expansions, oddball artifacts accumulated, like a door that led nowhere, high up on the wall of the lobby; and a door in one of the booths that opened to reveal a triangular space no more than 5 inches deep!

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RICK HAMILTON
Film Handler

Posts: 28

Registered: Aug 1999

posted 09-08-1999 11:39 PM

The theatre that you're talking about is the North Towne. It is in an old strip mall.

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Tim Reed
Better Projection Pays

Posts: 5246
From: Northampton, PA
Registered: Sep 1999

posted 09-11-1999 12:24 AM

Yeah, that's it! I couldn't remember the name. Thanks.

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Joe Redifer
You need a beating today

Posts: 12859
From: Denver, Colorado
Registered: May 99

posted 09-11-1999 02:47 AM

I think that the booth I work in is a bit strange. The building itself is nearly 90,000 square feet. I have 16 awesome Christie projectors (I am blessed) divided up into 4 booths. there are 2 seperate booths which have 1 projector each (the big houses) and 2 other seperate booths that have 7 projectors each. Status panels in each booth let me know when the movie has been threaded, just started, in the movie, in credits, or needs to be threaded. Our management loves to move prints from one side of the building to another, even though the auditoriums are the exact same size. They just love it to death. Moving prints requires going through a public access hallway upstairs (we need it since we are stadium seating). But we have to go up and down stairs and through many doors, most of which must are locked and must have a combination punched in to proceed. It's really quite fun when holding a print with the other arm.

Another older theatre in the same chain I work for has a crusty old 5 plex with 3 booths. The booths lead out to the hallway/lobby. Of course, it is a mall theatre.

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David Kilderry
Master Film Handler

Posts: 355
From: Melbourne Australia
Registered: Sep 1999

posted 09-12-1999 03:46 AM

The Hoyts Midcity cinemas in Melbourne, Australia was a large twin, both houses around 1,000 seats. In 1976 a third house was needed, part of the foyer and offices was taken over and 200 seats put in.

In the shopping arcade 50ft below a news stand was purchased and built in. A Philips(Norelco)FP20 was installed, it threw the picture onto a mirror, the beam went up the 50ft shaft to hit another mirror and finally onto a giant 12ft screen!

I worked in this box for almost a year. Shoppers almost fell over when you openned the door to the arcade and they saw a projector shinning onto a mirror. It was fully automated and the easiest show I have ever run.

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Christopher Seo
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 530
From: Los Angeles, CA
Registered: Jun 99

posted 09-12-1999 04:19 AM

My booth is simply one long, straight hall with 18 projectors... about 170 yards long. It's divided into three roughly same-sized sections by two small, square electrical rooms which occupy half the width of the hall. Does anyone have booths with such a simple layout? It may not be strange, but it's pretty creepy at night.

Also... with all this talk about bouncing images off mirrors, I have to ask if any such setup actually produced a good, clear, sharp, bright picture.

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Gordon McLeod
Film God

Posts: 9532
From: Toronto Ontario Canada
Registered: Jun 99

posted 09-13-1999 11:44 AM

Some of the mirror units installed originally at Eastons centre were amazingly sharp as they were front surfaced mirrors but over time they have been replaced with some secondsurfaced ones and they produce double fringeing

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Gordon Leslie
Film Handler

Posts: 39
From: Perth ,Western Australia
Registered: Sep 1999

posted 09-30-1999 05:24 AM

This is not so much a strange booth story but is unusual compared to booths of today.
This booth is located in a 4 screen complex that was built in 1980. At the time I worked for an independent whom then was owned by a cashed up tv network. This complex was a new style of going to the movies in this city so we had to have the best of every thing that was available at the time.
The projection booth is 115ft long by 18ft wide, the floor is carpeted throughout and with sound tiles covering all the walls. There's a 6 man service lift to the booth.
Amenities in the booth consist of a shower and toilet, a kitchen with microwave and fridge with coffee and tea supplied.
At one end of the booth is a recording room ( the tv network owned a radio station, thought we might have use for one) this was used basically for making music master tapes for the cinema and foyer in the day's before cd's.
The equipment consists of 5 35/70 Cinemaccanica vic8 projector's with 6500
Zenith lamphouses , one being a spare on wheels which could be slot into extra projection ports at each cinema, 3 phase couplings are on the front wall for projector and rectifier hook up. They also have 4 Cinemaccanica slide machines.
Later in 1985 the company added 2 5 plate Cinemaccanica non rewinds to replace 5 christie aw3's (all on wheels with one spare) the christie's became a constant problem after they were converted to 70 and back to 35 a couple of times.
The processors are Dolby CP100, the amp's and active crossovers were assembled by the tv network's engineering dept and unfortunately resulted in a few problems in this area,(best to stick with what you know) the automation system is Kinoton pin matrix.
In the basement is a 38kva detroit diesel auxiliary power plant which comes on automatically if the mains supply is off for around 20 sec's.
The booth also has 4 10ft rewind benches all fitted out with the usual tape splicer, counter, spool's etc.
When this cinema complex opened in 1980 there was no union award to cover 1 projectionist working with more than 1 screen, so we had 4 projectionist's per shift, this consisted of 2 shifts 9:30am -4:30pm and 4:30pm -11:10pm 5 day's a week which also meant 2 more projectionist's to do day off relief.( got to be a bit crowed at shift change ). This lasted for about 9 month's when a new award came out which allowed for 1 projectionist to run 2 screen's, an assistant ( trainee) projectionist was also in the booth. This manning level lasted till 1989 when the union award changed once again to allow for greater screen numbers. When this booth changed to single man operation , monitor's were installed within the booth , a 20" hanging from near each end of the booth plus a smaller one at the desk.

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Raphael Jacquot
Film Handler

Posts: 7
From: corenc, N/A, France
Registered: Oct 2003

posted 10-09-2003 10:30 AM

well, I have a story about a theater in Paris that has to be the wierdest booths of all [Wink]

the theater that is next to the Alesia metro station was built during the 1930s (I think it's a Pathe now).
they architect designed the auditorium with the back wall going all the way to the street wall (stadium seating, the box office and lobby under it), forgetting this was a movie theater, which required a booth. when the company came in to install the projector, there was no booth to put it in....
So the theater kept closed for 3 more months or so and they built a booth, extending one meter above the street, an 2 meters inside the seating area...

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Frank Angel
Film God

Posts: 5305
From: Brooklyn NY USA
Registered: Dec 1999

posted 10-09-2003 10:55 AM

At MassMoCA (Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art) we designed an unremarkable booth for an unremarkable theatre, except for the fact that we chose a 70mm setup at this late stage of the game and also its large size -- 1800 seats. Then they said they were thinking of putting in a cafe outside the building in a courtyard and gee, wouldn't it be nice to be able to run movies out there during summer months while the patrons sipped their tea and crumpettes. How much would it cost for an additional projection setup? Well, as luck would have it, the back wall of the theatre booth was the wall that flanked the courtyard cafe. Well, says I, if you don't mind thinking outside the box, how about we put the two Century JJs on a big, BIG rolling dolly and when you want to show movies in the courtyard cafe theatre, you simply get a bunch of stage hands to turn the projectors 180o and roll them to the back wall of the booth. Bingo....mobile projectors.

The dolly has pegs in it so it can anchor into the floor in both locations. Except for minor touch-up adjustments before the show, the pegs get them pretty close to perfect alignment....two theatres for the price of one booth! The lens compliment had to be unique to each screen, but I believe there is some overlap (the 1.66 for the courtyard is the 1.85 for the indoor). There are separate sound systems for each but each screen has its own 3rd octave eqs -- the CP100's eq is flat.

Frank

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Emma Tomiak
Expert Film Handler

Posts: 238
From: Carrollton, TX, USA
Registered: Aug 2003

posted 10-09-2003 04:19 PM

Christopher,
Our booth is a generic UA layout- one long hallway, projectors on either side, with a middle section raised on stairs for the big auditorium. And yes, it is creepy when you can see all the way to the other side at night. All 4 of the projectionists at my theatre have claimed to have seen the "ghost of old man Booth" at some point! [Big Grin]

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