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This topic comprises 5 pages: 1 2 3 4 5
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Topic: Are we the last of a dying breed?
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Frank Angel
Film God
Posts: 5305
From: Brooklyn NY USA
Registered: Dec 1999
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posted 01-14-2008 06:22 AM
quote: Ron Funderburg
To answer the question of the thread the old fashioned film handler is a dying breed or more likely a changing breed. Platers were suppose to end the need for real projectionist but it didn't and this will be same the job will change not disappear.
Actually, it did, at least in numbers. Where it took 15 well-trained projectionists to run fifteen screens, platters and automation eliminated 14 of them. And even enticed the exhibitor to replace that trained one with one who would not need quite as much training and who was not in it as a career, thus allowing Mr. Exhibitor to hire him/her at a lower, some might even say, non-living wage salary. THAT is what gave exhibition an erection when patters and automation came on the scene, not that new system would give better image quality or improve presentation -- that was the LAST thing on their minds.
And that is how all the poor presentation quality that we have documented here in lenghty threads has come to pass. It's not that film can't be look and sound spectacular, it is just that all the other factors have conspired to prevented it from acheiving anywhere near its potential in most of your average assembly-line multiplexes.
Modern distribution patterns also contribute to this decline given the number of prints that have to be made in very short time frames. This is where have gotten today. That is why many, like Mark, hold that digital offers the ability to provide consistant quality at a higher level, NOT of what film is CAPABLE of, but better than what actually is presented on the majority of screens throughout the country. Film offers the theoretical possibility of superb image quality....digital offers actual, consistant results which are better than most film presentations in the average multiplex -- at least while everything is brand new.
The issue of course is, that's the way it is today, with all the digital projectors spanking new out of the box. Problem is, they are being put into the same booths where exhibitors weren't concerned enough about hiring well-trained projectionists/technicians, albeit at higher salaries. They are being put into booths were bulbs are being run long past their rated hours, and in booths where managers want to show a better bottom line by refusing to keep a supply of lens cleaner or where there is only a supply of the cheapest masking tape. What makes anyone think that ten years into the digital scenario that the same concern ONLY for the bottom line won't have the same detrimental impact on digital equipment and presentation quality as it had when the projector in the booth was film-based?
I don't know the answer because that remains to be seen, but given the past history of how exhibition approaches maintenance and concern for booth equipment, I am not convinced at all that history won't repeat itself and we will find the same kind of neglect and unconcern about the equipment and presentation that these very same people had for film won't be visited on digital. Putting in different equipment isn't going to change that mindset.
In fact, digital may make it worse, because Mr. Exhibitor is going into the digital era thinking this equipment will run itself FOREVER without so much as a thought to what's going on in the booth....you KNOW they are salivating because they think that all they will need to run 15 , 20, 45 screens is grunt of an assistant manager to push icons on a touch screen and that's the extent of it. This is their wet-dream come true....they finally have their "people-less" booth.
In that environment, a digital projector will be just prone to neglect as was the film projector that it replaced. Only difference is, now the exhibitor won't have to buy ANY masking tape.
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Thomas Pitt
Master Film Handler
Posts: 266
From: Leeds, West Yorkshire, UK
Registered: May 2007
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posted 02-16-2008 04:16 PM
I hear there's a new system to stop camcorder copies with digital projectors. It involves projecting an interference pattern in addition to the picture - the pattern is invisible to the naked eye, but wreaks havoc with the camcorder CCD.
There's also the method of putting IR lamps behind the screen and flashing them at random - again the naked eye can't see them, but they'll cause the camcorder picture to be blotchy and washed out. This works with film as well as digital ![[Wink]](wink.gif)
Have you ever heard of a 'rogue' projectionist sneaking in a mini-telecine and copying the film that way, during a normal showing? I've never seen it happen, but I have heard rumors.
With digital projection, after the initial set up of the projector you can lock the booth door and not have anyone going in and out (except when the bulb needs changing). Everything can be done from a master console and server, in a back room off the lobby.
I reckon that before long, when everything is 100% digital, projectionists will no longer be 'film handlers' and will be trained completely differently. Nobody will need to build up prints and thread up projectors any more; instead people will be trained how to ingest digital prints onto a server, and set up start timers. Perhaps the wage will go down as you won't have as much to do!
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