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Author Topic: Century's Vistavision and Cinerama Steve Matz Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 672 From: Billings, Montana, USA Registered: Sep 2003 posted 07-04-2014 07:21 PM                     CINEMECCANIA VICTORIA 10  |  IP: Logged Dick Prather Master Film Handler Posts: 259 From: Portland, OR, USA Registered: Feb 2002 posted 07-04-2014 07:24 PM                     Mark, They look like BTH Supa machines. Common in the UK. Dick  |  IP: Logged Steve Guttag We forgot the crackers Gromit!!! Posts: 12814 From: Annapolis, MD Registered: Dec 1999 posted 07-04-2014 08:42 PM                     I've only ever seen 5 in RCMH (Simplex 35/70s on the middle three and Simplex XLs on the outside 2). I've personally put in two 4-projector booths (two 35/70s and two 35/16s in each booth). In the big cities, 3-projector booths in the 70mm houses were not uncommon.  |  IP: Logged John Eickhof Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 588 From: Wendell, ID USA Registered: Jan 2000 posted 07-04-2014 09:04 PM                        the Dorothy Chandler Pavillion in Los Angeles (long time home to the AMPAS and academy awards) Had 3 Norelco AA2 s flanked by 2 XLs, (one on each end)2 Eastman 25 16mm next to them. (one at each end)The entire back wall of the booth was sound racks! That's seven projectors!I will try to find the pictures took (1980s) and scan and post them. I once submitted a bid to move all the equipment across the street to the new Kodak Theatre, I lost the job by a small margin! A crane would have been used to lower the equipment to the street then the street would have to be detoured a couple hours while everything was moved across the road and lifted up again by crane. Not your normal booth install!  |  IP: Logged Will Kutler Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1506 From: Tucson, AZ, USA Registered: Feb 2001 posted 07-04-2014 10:35 PM                     Hi John Glad to see your back. Please P.M. or e-mail me regarding some projects you were helping me with.  |  IP: Logged Steve Matz Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 672 From: Billings, Montana, USA Registered: Sep 2003 posted 07-05-2014 01:17 AM                     Dick Prather is Correct,The BTH Supa MkI's were changed out in 1962 for the 3 Cinemeccania Victoria 10'S ...  |  IP: Logged Stephen Furley Film God Posts: 3059 From: Coulsdon, Croydon, England Registered: May 2002 posted 07-05-2014 08:12 AM                     Ok, I won't name them, but I will say a few things about them. While they were quite widely used, they weren't considered to be a very successful design, and were generally quite short-lived comparted to other models. The Telekinema at The Festival of Britain had a pair on which the 3-D shorts were shown. The Projected Picture Trust has one, and there used to be one in the Science museum in London. They were strange machines, and the manufacturer reverted to a more conventional machine for their following model. The optical axis slopes downn within the machine, as can be seen by the fact that they are tilted down much less than the VistaVision machines in the picture. They took strange spools with a large centre hole to fit a splined shaft, and couldn't easily be converted to take larger spools when these were introduced.  |  IP: Logged Jim Cassedy Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1661 From: San Francisco, CA Registered: Dec 2006 posted 07-05-2014 08:19 AM                     Somebody probabaly beat me to this by now, but from the little bit of the ass-end you can see in the picture, they look like BTH Supra's (from a 1950's equipment catalog)  |  IP: Logged Steve Moore Expert Film Handler Posts: 211 From: Leeds, West Yorks, UK Registered: Apr 2008 posted 07-05-2014 08:45 AM                     And i know someone with one in storage; we keep talking about getting it restored and re-assembled - but I can't quote it's name  |  IP: Logged Gordon McLeod Film God Posts: 9532 From: Toronto Ontario Canada Registered: Jun 99 posted 07-05-2014 10:10 AM                     There were also lots of issues with focus due to the design of the curved gate as well  |  IP: Logged Frank Angel Film God Posts: 5305 From: Brooklyn NY USA Registered: Dec 1999 posted 07-05-2014 11:54 AM                        The optical path had a built-in down tilt? I guess you didn't see these used much at drive-ins!  |  IP: Logged Mark Gulbrandsen Resident Trollmaster Posts: 16657 From: Music City Registered: Jun 99 posted 07-05-2014 12:03 PM                     Dick gets the steak dinner! I have a book here on British projectors that also says the Supa had a plastic star wheel. Steve Guttag... I have pictures of RCMH booth in International Projectionist Magazines from the 30's and again in the 40's and it shows six projectors. Mark  |  IP: Logged Stephen Furley Film God Posts: 3059 From: Coulsdon, Croydon, England Registered: May 2002 posted 07-05-2014 03:09 PM                     quote: Will Kutler Glad to see your back. Will, I think you mean Glad to see you're back. the way you wrote it sounds like a very different meaning, i.e. Glad to see the back of you. I don't think that's what you meant. I've never heard a projectionist that worked with them speak well of the SUPAs. I've never actually seen one running, most were scrapped before my time, but I have seen a couple of disused pairs in ex cinema buildings, plus the two museum ones. Steve's picture looks like the Projected Picture Trust one, with a Kelee behind it. The publicity for them when they were introduced saw them as being an ultra-modern projector. In some ways they were the predecessor of the modern 'console' type projectors, with everything built in. One configuration had the amplifier housed within one projector, and the rectifiers for both housed within the other. 'Ultra-modern' they may have been when introduced, but they soon became outdated, and were not the easiest of machines to modernise. I'm told that the light output wasn't great, just as screens were getting bigger and more light was needed. The built-in lamphouse couldn't be replaced by a Xenon one, and the existing one wasn't well-suited to conversion to typical early vertical Xenon lamps. They weren't the easiest of things to mount anamorphic lens brackets on; I think BTH did eventually produce one, but several pictures which I've seen had makeshift arrangements. You couldn't easily fit them up for 4-track mag; you certainly couldn't just mount a standard mag penthouse on top of them. The Telekinema did survive the closure of the Festival of Britain, and became the first home of the National Film Theatre for a few years, tith the television projector in the centre position between the SUPAs replaced by a Bell & Howell 609 16 mm machine, but the SUPAs themselves were soon replaced by Kalee machines with large spoolboxes for showing 3-D. Interestingly, the Kalees had mechanical inteerlock, whereas the SUPAs had used selsyn motors. The SUPAs at Leicester Square would have been there for about 10-12 years I think; a surprisingly long time given that the cinema has replaced its projectors quite frequently during it's life, and the rapid rate of change in cinema technology at the time.  |  IP: Logged Steve Guttag We forgot the crackers Gromit!!! Posts: 12814 From: Annapolis, MD Registered: Dec 1999 posted 07-05-2014 05:09 PM                     Oh, I can believe it has had more machines...just that I'VE never seen it with more. It has done so many special shows I have no doubt it has had more projection based equipment come and go that most booths. The problem I've run into with the greater than 2 projection booths are keystone issues. Naturally, the bigger/longer the theatre, the less of an issue. I have one screening room where film #1 and DCP are essential at the left/right edges of the screen and have to lens shift/toe to get the image on screen. And forget about tracking systems...the "booth" is on a riser, the DCP is suspended in mid-air already and you can't open the #1 machine without unbolting it and pivoting it! One thing we discovered when we were putting dual 35/70 systems into IMAX venues was the importance of putting like pairs on the SAME side of the center line rather than equally splitting them on either side. While you can cut a plate so that the rectangle is the same from both machines, the perspective is so great that the changeovers are annoyingly apparent. When you move the like pairs to the same side of the centerline, that problem goes away. This is why at the AFI/Silver and Library of Congress you'll see the 35/70s grouped together (in both cases they happened to be machines 1 and 2) and the 35/16s grouped together (in both cases as 3 and 4). The AFI/Silver wasn't so bad since its throw is over 100 feet...LOC Culpeper...that is about half that.  |  IP: Logged John Eickhof Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 588 From: Wendell, ID USA Registered: Jan 2000 posted 07-05-2014 07:07 PM                        In extreme center offsets it was common to shim the film trap rails or machine an angle into the trap mounting surface to compensate for lateral keystone. Howard Straight had shown me several sets of modified XL traps with left and right offsets. The pad on the trap door would easily self locate to the angled rails and straight gates were always used.At the film plane the offset was quite minimal to achieve a good result.  |  IP: Logged

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