I just woundred what your oppinions were off this. I know some people like myself prefer Side masking to vertical masking but how do you guys feel about cinemas with no masking at all?
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Michael Brown
Bradford Student Cinema www.bradfordstudentcinema.co.uk
Movies are supposed to be not only just entertainment but magic (As in magic lantern). The technical side of showing the movie should be absent. Having naked screen is just poor showmanship and should entitle the viewer to reduced admission. In fact, I can't stand theatres without main curtains. If you must show your slides, have a separate roll down slide screen that will at least make the slides look like they were put there with a purpose.
Steve
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"Old projectionists never die, they just changeover!"
Absolutely spot on regarding the screen masking & tabs in cinemas today. To my mind, there is nothing worse than watching different aspect trailers on a screen, it takes all the magic out of the show.
At the cinema where I worked, all trailers were opened up in the right aspect behind closed tabs, it`s part and parcel of the magic.
Sadly, I suppose, the bottom of the accountants sheet, dictates!.
It is THX and has SRD/DTS/SDDS but everything I have seen was shown in SRD. (no DTS ect).
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Michael Brown
Bradford Student Cinema
www.bradfordstudentcinema.co.uk
If I were a film director or producer, and I'd spent so much money on deciding a format, I would flatly refuse to allow my film to be shown in any format other than it was shot in.
The fragile ability to "lose oneself" in the story, as it unfolds on the screen, can so easily be broken by so many apparently minor things, flicker in a corner of the screen,from an incorrectly alingned xenon bulb, incorrect sound playback levels, even a poorly filed aperture plate.
The masking, or floating screen, under correct projection conditions, provide to the viewer, an "edge of the universe". Within those four edges, occurs the story. The high contrast between the masking and the picture area help the viewer to "filter out" all that is umimportant to his/her enjoyment. Nothing seen in the periphial vision, outside these limits is to be considered.
In even our "budget" theatres, we have always provided a masking ability (even manually operated by lowering a rope for top masking, or moveable boards for side masking).
I personally don't like the no masking approach, although the type of floating screen that Gordon mentioned does look quite nice if it's done well
It might have been nice if scope could have been shown raised on the screen to better the sight lines, but as I remember the flat was optimized and the scope pictures were allowed to be a flag stripe across the center, with any single stray dust particle on the plate waving to the audience.
The lenses weren't good, and the periscope setup and the slight curve on the short focal length did nothing to improve matters. The style at the time was to float the screen in front of a blue wall, which meant any error in the plate showed on the wall and was distracting to some of the audience.
A floating screen in front of a black wall, used only for a single format, could be nice. I admit my experience is based on the abomination I just described.
Don't hesitate to "name and shame" any theatre that shows everything on fixed-sized screens. I name and shame such theatres quite often. In fact, I'll do it again:
In Huntsville, Alabama:
Regal Hollywood 18: Auditoriums 3,4,5,6,7,8,11,12,13,14,15,16
Regal Madison Square 12: Auditoriums 3,4,5,6,9,10,11,12
Unless Regal has done something with these in the past few months, all of the auditoriums mentioned above have 1.85:1 screens with no masking, and scope movies are shown with the sides chopped off.
Does anyone know appropriate people to write at some of the major studios about this problem? Regal Madison Square 12, on Friday night, was showing two prints of "The Mummy II" in the small auditoriums, for example. I think these theatres should be forbidden to show scope prints in the above auditoriums until adjustable masking is in place. They'd have to go with top masking, which isn't ideal, but is far better than nothing.
Regal recently spent a large amount of money putting stadium seating in these locations and neglected to spend approximately $2000 per screen (a total of $40000, a drop in the bucket compared to the recent renovation costs) to fix this mess that Cobb left behind for them.
Can anyone provide specific names and addresses at, say, Fox, Universal, etc. to whom I could write about this problem? If just one of the major studios would act against this problem, it might provide the nudge necessary to get Regal to fix this problem.
Roger Frazee, if you still participate here, did anything ever happen as far as getting the adjustable masking approved for these locations? I have not been doing "sneak peeks" of these auditoriums lately since Hollywood 18 was recently robbed twice, and looking into auditoriums for which I don't have a ticket isn't something I want to be doing with probable increased security at these locations. However, people are still telling me about chopped opening titles and end credits, as well as obvious chopping of the image sides.
Don't get me wrong. I am in no way "Anti-Regal". I will be the first to praise Regal when I see that this problem has been corrected. I would love to announce that this problem has been corrected, take away the 7.5 point facility deduction for these locations in my ratings, and remove the pages describing the problem from my site. Regal should have fixed this problem when they took over these theatres in August of 1997.
As for the other problem mentioned of showing flat movies on scope screens without pulling the masking in properly, I typically count off 4 points for that when I rate presentations (see web site in my signature), since the left and right edges generally look poor, and then there is the showmanship issue.
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Evans A Criswell
Huntsville-Decatur Movie Theatre Info Site
Trouble is, many of their sreens (and other theater chain as well) were masked 2:1, and the screen is not big enough to run a full 2.35 without making a postage stamp out of the picture. 
Nor is there enough room to hang a bigger screen. Poor auditorium design seems to kill them every time when it comes to showmanship, as well as people who are in the booth that don't have the slightest idea on how to put on a quality performance.
I wait for the movie that catches my eye to come out on video or DVD. It jacks my jaws when I see a crappy performance with crappy sound in a crappy auditorium design. There are tens of thousands of people who feel the same as I do about that issue.
The difference between watching movies at home in a DD 5:1 evironment on a 60 inch mitsubishi TV vs the cinema experience is the set up. The picture and sound NEED to be prefect. What happend to having fantasies being fulfilled at the movies? Someone whom I worked for before would told me about the concept of masking. He pointed out the "picture box" look. 12 inches of black around the screen and you pull the audience attention into this "picture box" ......with that in mind, exit lights behind screens, DTS time code, no masking, venietting, incorrect aspect ratio, badly cut aperture plates etc etc, seems to be with what we have to deal with alot.
The Industry money making incentive + customer satisfaction + <caring coefficient>= good movie experience.
It seems this important coeficient is now = to zero!!! 
Rory!
My opinion. I hate it. I watched "The Mummy Returns" on one of these screens and found it very distracting. The image composition was pretty screwed up. I'm not all that fond of vertical masking either (why should "Driving Miss Daisy" have a larger image than "Die Hard"?). But at least with vertical masking you are getting to see the film presented in its proper aspect ratio. Side masking is the best.
Roger Frazee did the specs for Regal River Oaks Cinema 8 in Decatur, a theatre that does not have the "fixed masking" problem. He specified excellent projection equipment, lenses, and sound equipment. I know that he knows what he's doing. He's probably having a hard time convincing other higher-ups at Regal that the "fixed masking" problem in Huntsville in those 20 auditoriums is worth fixing. I'm sure he would want it fixed himself if he were the sole decision-maker, but unfortunately, technical people and management people typically do not see eye to eye on things. Management tends to see something as a problem only if they see it as something that will cost them money. Either the customers are going to have to be educated and start demanding that this "scope at 1.85:1" practice be stopped, or the studios themselves are going to have to start penalizing the theatres that do so by, say, not allowing them to show their scope prints on those smaller screens.
Speaking of sloppily cut aperture plates, I saw Atlantis at Regal Madison Square 12 last Friday night. If new Christie projectors have been installed there recently, the aperture plate was cut in a sloppy way that made rough, uneven globs protrude into the right edge of the image. Of course, the theatre was very busy that night and I didn't ask if new projectors had been installed, or if the Ballantynes were still there. Boy, that would be an awkward question to ask an average staff member, wouldn't it? I've never had a conversation with the manager of this theatre before.
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Evans A Criswell
Huntsville-Decatur Movie Theatre Info Site
But how many people in the booth are willing to go the extra step to reframe the movie in event of a format change? Unfortunately, the answer is not many these days. One out-of-frame presented to the audience is one too many.
If the screen is three to four feet off the floor as I have seen in several instances, The sightline will be enhanced to those in the rear of the auditoriums if top and bottom movable masking was employed.
That's where most of the people sit anyway.
Nothing like sitting behind someone in the rear rows that has one of those "Poof" hairdos that block the bottom 1/3 of the screen. That has driven me out of movie watching, even when I don't have to pay to see the damn thing. Time for Blockbuster videos......
For the most part, new construction from Regal, Cinepuke, and others have corrected that problem by proper design. On the other hand, there are thousands of older theaters using a fixed 1.85 or 2:1 masking.
Some can be fixed only with top movable masking, but many can also be fixed with both top and bottom movable masking.
I hope Roger Frazee from Regal doesn't have a cast-in-stone policy about using top movable only. A poorly designed auditorium is loaded with compromises. One more in the positive direction just might rent some more seats.....
Roger has plenty of those in the older houses. So does everybody else, for that matter.
It does not require a lot of additional expense to correct some of the the masking errors, other than possibly re-lensing the scope format. I don't think that is a big deal, as many theaters have a healty inventory of projection lenses that are just sitting on the shelf.
Personally, I would rather slightly compromise two or three front rows of seating than to sacrifice four or five rows of prime seats in the back 1/3 of the auditorium. Another reason I don't mind compromising like this is because people do complain the picture is "too big" in the front rows, so they don't use them anyway.
I have seen frustrated movie goers scurry around in the auditorium looking for a place where they can sit without having the POOF hairdos in front of them, or where they can see most of the screen.
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Evans A Criswell
Huntsville-Decatur Movie Theatre Info Site
Personally, I see very little wrong with top-only adjustable masking. I know it's not ideal, but if other details are done correctly, I would gladly accept it over the many other worse things that can be done. People demand large screens, and theaters should try to give it to them (and I don't mean go overboard with a 99ft wide screen). That is what makes them come to the theater, rather then stay home. Depending on the front wall area avaiable, adjustable top masking may be the only way to go. This gives each format (1.85 or 2.39) the largest image possible.
A problem with adjustable top masking is the framing usually must be changed to recenter the image when going from one fromat to another. A simple mark on the framing knob will show where it should be set. This is a decision management must make: ("We choose to have a narrower auditourium, which means top masking, which means a person must adjust the framing.") If adjusting the framing knob is too much for the operators at a theater, then they are (again) too cheap, and not worth going to.
I'd rather have proper images, but with no masking at all, then cropped images.
Isn't that what we are all about, folks?
quote:
Wait, Evans, are you saying that there are some screens in your area that are fixed at 1.85 ratio?! I've heard of 2:1, but not 1.85:1. That's pretty bad.
That's exactly what I'm saying. Severe cropping occurs when scope images are shown on those screens. Cobb built those screens that way (20 of them out of the 30 in the two theatres I'm mentioning) and Regal took them over on August 1, 1997. One theatre, the Madison Square 12, was built with 8 screens and opened June 28, 1985, with 4 screens with side masking and 4 screens fixed at 1.85:1 only (non-adjustable). On May 22, 1992, 4 more screens with 1.85:1-only size with no adjustable masking opened for use. On July 15, 1994, Hollywood 16 opened with 4 auditorums with adjustable masking and 12 screens with fixed 1.85:1 non-adjustable masking. Regal recently added two more auditoriums in late 1999 that have adjustable side masking, bring the number of screens to 18 at that location.
Unless Regal has gone in and changed these and put in adjustable masking in the last couple of months, two thirds of the screens in those two theatres are flat only and scope movies get cropped to the "flat" size when shown.
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Evans A Criswell
Huntsville-Decatur Movie Theatre Info Site
John, if you have lens turrets, this can and should have been aligned properly with the turret's adjustments. If you have single lens holders, the collars can be shimmed to compensate for this. Sounds like someone did not set up your lenses properly. Never should a framing adjustment be needed when switching formats...top or side masking.
Also, Brad, AMEN to your framing knob comment. 
Of course none of this would be an issue if the designers would stop doing common width systems.
Here are two actual theaters:
Example 1:
Cinemeccanica V8 single lens, 60ft throw,
Flat 23' x 12'7" - 55mm lens
Scope 23' x 9'10" - 95mm lens
At this theater, dumb luck prevailed. By simply threading the film in the gate one sprocket up (out of frame) scope is centered without needing to move the framing knob. I'm guessing that since sprocket holes are about 0.187" apart, the scope lens would have moved down by that same amount to re-center the on-screen image without using the framing knob, but still have the film in the normal projector center.
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Example 2:
Century SA single lens, 120ft throw,
Flat 24' x 14'- 105mm lens
Scope 24' x 11'- 180mm lens
Here the framing knob had to be moved only slightly.
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I’m not familiar with all lens holders, but I can’t see any way to make a Cinemeccanica, AAII, Simplex or Century single lens holder go up/down for just one format. While I suppose a (5 inch to 2 25/32”) lens bushing could be specially-machined to position the scope lens, I’m sort of not counting that. Both of the example theaters were done before Schneider or ISCO made that lens offset thing that goes into a 5 inch lens holder; using that wasn’t an option at the time. If a projector only has a 2 25/32” holder, there's no option at all.
On a Simplex (PR1060) lens turret, the lens holder can be moved only slightly, but no where enough for the screen in example 1. The only turret I’ve worked with that might do is a Cinemeccanica 3-lens model. They make several different models, and I not sure exactly which one we have. It came on some V9’s we bought in 1975. Each lens barrel has two rods with offset (cam-like) ends. One will move the lens up/down, the other left/right.
In example 1, a heat baffle behind the V8’s trap required filing to allow the light to clear. The trap did not require filing, as the opening was quite tall. (I suspect that Cinemeccanica made the trap opening tall for Cinerama; they would then only have to inventory only one part for both projectors.) I’ve seen a Century JJ-2 trap filed out on the top inside; being all brass, that was quite a job.
All of this does not address Gordon’s point about light loss. Even if both flat and scope images are centered on screen, one of the formats will not be centered on the lamp’s optical center. Most techs (at installations that have adjustable top masking) will tilt the projector normally for flat. They align the lamphouse, flatten the light, and file aperture plates normally. Then, they move the framing knob to position the scope image and file aperture plates. Generally, this means the bottom of the scope screen will be darker than the top, because the scope image is outside the lamphouse’s optical center light “spot”.
I read in a SMPTE article (“Screen Illumination of 35mm Film Projection” Dec. 1983) a suggestion to change the set up procedure. Instead of setting the tilt of the projector for flat, tilt it for scope first. Align the lamphouse, flatten the light, and file aperture for scope. Then, move the framing knob to center the flat image on screen (and file it’s plate.) The result is the flat image will still be within the lamp’s light spot.
Gordon’s also right about having bottom masking come up to keep the image centered, but the motors and rigging for that are expensive. If the theater had that kind of money, they wouldn't be doing top masking in the first place!
Sorry for giving everyone my long-winded opinion, but I really do feel that adjustable top masking is no where near the worst thing that a theater can do. It can be made acceptable if a small amount of work is done.
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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 Cell: 716-781-4036 Fax: 716-722-7243
E-Mail: john.pytlak@kodak.com
Web site: http://www.kodak.com/go/motion