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This topic comprises 4 pages: 1 2 3 4
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Author
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Topic: What goes wrong in digital cinema?
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Mike Blakesley
Film God
Posts: 12767
From: Forsyth, Montana
Registered: Jun 99
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posted 09-12-2014 08:49 PM
In 4 years/3 months of digital operation, seems like about 90% of problems we've had have come from operator error. (The "pink screen" 3-D thing, for example.) Now that I'm dialed in on how the machinery actually works, problems are extremely rare.
I can see why poor bulb alignment is a problem. At least on the NEC it's a time consuming process. If I was a teenage booth operator I would get extremely bored very rapidly with tweaking those settings. I'll bet a lot of bulbs just get put in and not aligned -- if it lights up, it's good to go.
The only things we've had "go wrong" are:
Two RAID hard drive failures on the server. In both cases, GDC replaced all three drives free, even after the warranty period.
One bulb. It just failed to light one night. Still looked fine and didn't throw any errors --- it just wouldn't come on. Put in the spare bulb and all OK. (Ushio bulb)
One NEC power switch, which has been well documented here...so now we don't use that switch anymore. If we power down the machine we use the UPS switch.
As far as "throwing out" the 35mm equipment...we left it in place over 3 years, and having never even turned it on, we finally hauled it all behind the screen, so it's back there waiting to be reused some day -- which I'm sure it never will. When we installed that equipment in 1980, we hauled all the previous equipment back there too, figuring somebody might want it for parts, or it might be needed somewhere, or our shiny new machine might quit and we could use a spare... nope, it just sat back there and gathered dust and it's still back there, now with 34 years of dust accumulation (which in this theater is A LOT of dust). 2 Motiograph heads and two Ashcraft (I think?) lamphouses, now joined by a Simplex projector and soundhead and a Christie console and platter.
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Steve Matz
Jedi Master Film Handler
Posts: 672
From: Billings, Montana, USA
Registered: Sep 2003
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posted 09-12-2014 09:27 PM
quote: Mike Blakesley
As far as "throwing out" the 35mm equipment...we left it in place over 3 years, and having never even turned it on, we finally hauled it all behind the screen, so it's back there waiting to be reused some day -- which I'm sure it never will. When we installed that equipment in 1980, we hauled all the previous equipment back there too, figuring somebody might want it for parts, or it might be needed somewhere, or our shiny new machine might quit and we could use a spare... nope, it just sat back there and gathered dust and it's still back there, now with 34 years of dust accumulation (which in this theater is A LOT of dust). 2 Motiograph heads and two Ashcraft (I think?) lamphouses, now joined by a Simplex projector and soundhead and a Christie console and platter.
Well I at least Congratulate you for not taking the Equipment to a Landfill or Pacific Hide and Fur(Blgs) I would think the MOTIO AA's would be wanted by some collectors...
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Jim Cassedy
Phenomenal Film Handler
Posts: 1661
From: San Francisco, CA
Registered: Dec 2006
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posted 09-13-2014 12:36 AM
quote: Frank Cox
How in the world do you steal speakers from a theatre without someone noticing?
Well, Frank, since you asked - -
I remember back in the late 70's, when they were turning a lot of big, old, single
screen movie theaters into 2, 3 or even 4 screen "mulitplexes" there was a theater
out on Long Island (NY) where I was living at the time that was just about
to re-open after being converted from a single to a multi-screen.
They took out a lot of advertisements in the local papers, and in particular, they
made a big deal out of their new sound systems. (Remember, Dolby optical stereo
was "a big deal" back then.) Soooo- - the night before the theatre's grand
opening, somebody broke into the largest auditorium overnight, and removed all
the surround & stage speakers- - taking the latter by cutting holes in the
(new) screen to get them out. I remember how pissed their head tech was.
He wasn't too upset about the speaker theft- - those could easily be
replaced almost overnight. But he was really pissed at loosing the screen,
since it was a custom size, and not only that- - but had the thieves broken
in through the old stage door, instead of through an auditorium door that opened
into the same alley, they could have easily carried the speakers out that way,
leaving the screen intact.
Several nearby business owners saw the thieves in action, but they didn't think
too much of it at the time since there had been a lot of last minute overnight
work going on at the theater for several weeks. SO they didn't think it was
anything suspicious. I know they did get a good description of the van the
thieves were using, but I don't recall if they ever made any arrests.
So, in answer to your question- - that's one way thieves could steal speakers
right out of a theater without being noticed. I suppose there are others. . .
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Monte L Fullmer
Film God
Posts: 8367
From: Nampa, Idaho, USA
Registered: Nov 2004
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posted 09-13-2014 12:44 AM
Issue that has never been mentioned is content, during playback, either skipping, stuttering and/or heading to a solid freeze.
A full system reboot is in order to clear out this issue.
"Hey, it's a computer - a washing machine/dishwasher - a kitchen appliance! "
Simple method to eliminate, or at least reduce this problem is weekly full system reboots of both projector and server, if these units have to remain on 24/7/365 due to log pulls by the DCI police.
Stuff like this never happened when film was king.
But, in all due honesty: when film was around, the owners had control of their operation. Now, it seems that after digital installs, so much red tape has to be in place to have such a setup - mainly enforced by the DCI police.
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Mike Blakesley
Film God
Posts: 12767
From: Forsyth, Montana
Registered: Jun 99
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posted 09-13-2014 01:04 AM
quote: Monte L Fullmer
content, during playback, either skipping, stuttering and/or heading to a solid freeze.
We've had that happen two times, both due to the hard drive failures I mentioned in my post.
We had one other movie ("Red Tails") which inexplicably, at a certain spot about 12:00 into the movie, would kick the playback back to the beginning of the program -- not the feature, but the whole program, trailers and all. I tried it playing the movie from the server and from the shipping drive itself, with the same problem both times. Corrupted file, no doubt, and not enough time to ship in a new one -- so we put up an "apology" sign at the boxoffice, and at the appointed time, I would pause the projector, skip ahead about 30 seconds and resume.
You can't say this kind of thing didn't happen with film...the results were just different. There would be the occasional "solid freeze" in the film days but those always led to that wonderful old "melting film" image that we all know and love/hate!
quote: Monte L Fullmer
these units have to remain on 24/7/365 due to log pulls by the DCI police
I think you mean the VPF police, don't you? We're not on a VPF program so our projector isn't connected to the net and nobody has ever asked for a log.
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Marcel Birgelen
Film God
Posts: 3357
From: Maastricht, Limburg, Netherlands
Registered: Feb 2012
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posted 09-13-2014 07:54 AM
Hey, a presentation standard, that doesn't sound like such a bad idea actually ![[Wink]](wink.gif) .
But the VPF police doesn't care about quality, all they care about is the number of shows you played.
One of the problems I often encounter with DCI is bad RGB convergence. Sometimes it's really bad, giving everything a clear red, blue and green outline... With a new install, this usually isn't such a big problem, but after some time, the alignment slowly starts to slip and is often not being taken care of. It's also not something being adjusted by a push on a button, in practically all cases, you need to get "under the hood" of the projector to fix it. It's not really that hard, but obviously too time consuming for many operators...
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Marco Giustini
Film God
Posts: 2713
From: Reading, UK
Registered: Nov 2007
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posted 09-13-2014 09:11 AM
quote: Joe Elliott
Staff running projectors, even though there are errors, and not reporting them, because they were able to keep it running (overheat errors), until they have nearly fried the projector.
I quote that too. The more user friendly the projectors are (warnings and status lights) the more the warnings are ignored unless the projector catches fire.
I once serviced a Barco to find the filters so clogged I could not vacuum them - had to wash them.
"How often do you clean the filters?"
"What filters?"
"Didn't you see the blue light on the back?"
"Yes. It's always been blue, doesn't that mean that all is good?"
So let's say that 99% of issues are 'staff not being trained'.
quote: Joe Elliott
Missing channels on sound - most companies service contracts don't cover sound, and 35mm contracts used too. They have no one to check it anymore, so there is no one reporting it until the center has gone out. I have gone into theaters that have reported sound problems to find that only one channel was working. The rest had blown one by one for various reasons.
I'll second that too.
It's usually the company itself that don't want the service company to do the sound.
And despite being massively easy to check the sound in the auditorium (Dolby 5.1 channel ID would suffice), nobody ever does it, until the centre channel dies.
That said, I know a place who run the auditorium without MF on centre channel (and many others missing components on other channels) without realising that.
Even though there was a device that automatically checked the auditorium for them (and USL make one), that would be ignored anyway unless fire would come out of the projector.
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