How pathetic is this? I'm curious as to if this is due to possibly a smaller company like Artisan not having the funds to strike multiple internegatives (which I doubt) or why the indie films always seem to have prints made from worn down negatives. Also does TES feel they can stick all of their beat up reels into the "indie guy's" cans thinking that the company isn't big enough to matter about their quality? Any input on all of this?

(My print was from Deluxe Toronto, which normally turns out nice prints.)

 

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John P. Pytlak, Senior Technical Specialist
Worldwide Technical Services, Entertainment Imaging
Eastman Kodak Company
Research Labs, Building 69, Room 7419
Rochester, New York, 14650-1922 USA
Tel: 716-477-5325 Fax: 716-722-7243
E-Mail: john.pytlak@kodak.com
 

You are right though, there IS a diffeence between the focus of the titles and the focus of the picture albeit slight. The projector I was using seemed to have the ability to focus 1/2 way between the titles and picure and still get a good image. It seemed like the titles were floating just a little bit off the screen. They are a damn sight better than those other ones that you can never read 'cus they are always superimposed over something really light!
 

Whilst I have never come across prints of with as much negative damage as Brad encountered (apart from archival prints derived from elements which were not preserved as well as they might have been), indie, art and rep release prints do, in my experience, present problems which you tend not to encounter with mainstream titles.

Firstly, a far smaller number of prints tend to get made of these titles. These prints are transported more during their lifetime, and lower proportion of showings for every time they get made up and packed off. A film like 'Gladiator' might run four times a day for three weeks in a typical venue. By way of comparison, we're showing 'La Veuve de Saint-Pierre' twice a day for one week. Often, we get these sorts of films on three-day bookings or even one-off weekend matinees.

So point one, these prints are used in a way that involves more handling, and consequently more intensive wear and tear during their lifetimes, and more opportunity for bad handling. Point two is that a lot of the venues that show art and rep are those which do not have ideal equipment, properly maintained, and whose projection staff do not have the film handling skills needed to take the best care of these prints. I'm talking student film societies, or state-funded arts centres that show films maybe one evening per week.

You can't stop supplying prints to these places on the grounds that their print handling is lousy, because they represent a significant source of income for distributors of art/rep/indie titles. In fact, probably most of their income. But on the other hand, they are making other cinemas (and audiences) suffer by the way they treat the films in their care. Said print of 'La Veuve' has a horrible emulsion tramline from start to end, is as dirty as hell, full of cinch marks, has lots of edge damage and the SR-D drops in and out all the way through.

Hardly surprising, then, that there have now been several editorials in 'Sight and Sound' (a semi-academic British film magazine aimed mainly at arthouse fans) enthusing about DLP and saying how wonderful the prospect is of nailing down the coffins of all those crappy projectionists.

It's a real Catch 22. On the evidence of where films tend to come to us on crossover and in what state they arrive, I believe that there are about 10 venues in the UK which between them are responsible for 90% of the print mangling. They probably wouldn't be if they had the money to send their projectionist on a one-day course, invest in running spools that weren't bent, buy a proper rewind table or whatever. Nevertheless, if you closed these venues down now, the quality of art and rep prints circulating in this country would improve beyond recognition - I'd put money on that.

The only thing I can do is to request a new print every time I get a substandard one, knowing full well that in nine cases out of ten the distributor won't have a replacement. But if the message gets through that the venues which care aren't willing to put up with knackered prints without making a fuss, maybe constructive pressure can be applied on the places that are causing the problems.
 

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PROJECTIONISTS LOVE THIER CRAFT.
KANDY BAR KIDS JUST GET PAID.

*grumbles something mostly incoherent, and very impolite about technicolor*

Something weird I noticed on the print of The Watcher that I assembled & ran, the image seemed to randomly go out of focus and snap back in focus rather often. And it didn't even seem to be some quirky thing done for 'dramatic effect' either.
And NO, there was not anyone up in the booth messing with the focus knob at the time! The booth was empty, the building was empty aside from the five of us watching the screening. Though, I keep saying that the booth is haunted...and the disturbances all happen at the end where projectors 8-10 are...and The Watcher was on #8.....

~GLB
 

As for GLB's focus problem, I had the same thing with an GK-37 a few years back. I tried everything I could think of until, out of desparation, I swapped the gate plate with one from another machine - and swapped the problem with it. I guess the plate must have worn unevenly, with the result that the film wouldn't sit properly in the gate.