Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: A green DP 70!

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Posted by Thomas Jonsson (Member # 1902) on 03-12-2005, 09:09 AM:

Found a german website with some 70mm projectors,
among them a DP 70 painted green (!), with the upper
spoolbox mounted under the lamphouse table.

web page

Probably painted green for some special reason. I´ve never
heard of any DP 70 painted other than the original bronze
color. Perhaps Mark Gulbrandsen know some more?

Thomas

Posted by Greg Mueller (Member # 17) on 03-12-2005, 01:42 PM:

I've seen a couple of shades of the brownish color, one was more of a golden brown. Looks like this one's been modified quite a bit. The "control panel" has been changed quite a bit too.
People do strange things to their projectors.

My DP70 is painted silver and black hammertone.
http://www.muellersatomics.com/homepage/film12.htm

Posted by Aaron Sisemore (Member # 145) on 03-12-2005, 02:37 PM:

The two that were in the Stag at Skywalker were painted a gun-metal gray color.

-Aaron

Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 03-13-2005, 09:27 AM:

Thomas,
That green one is GAWD AWFUL! It must have been done by some interior decorator that had a bad nightmare the night before..... Its obviously for a lobby display..... I also wouldn't want that wall paper thats behind it in my booth! And we can thank GAWD that he didn't paint it pink!

There have been machines that have been "Eismanized" and the Skywalker machines, and perhaps Greg's fall in that catagory, it is also reported that some "Eismanazing" has also been performed by Internationsl Cinema Equipment in Miami, perhaps Dan is franchising his process....

BTW: Aaron, Installing new "James Bond" curved runners on those Skywalker machines took care of the really poor 35mm performance big time, and another batch of those runners is in the works. So far we have put back into manufacture the Short Xenon Lamphouse table, gate bands, stainless steel 35mm intermittent sprocket, VKF 35mm feed/holdback sprockets, pad rollers, new direct drive motor drive and mount system. We plan on keeping the between 50 and 60 or so DP-70's in this area running a long,long time for a reasonable price.

Mark @ CLACO

Posted by Greg Mueller (Member # 17) on 03-13-2005, 10:09 AM:

What's "Eismanized"?

Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 03-13-2005, 10:22 AM:

A Person on the west coast that rebuilds film equipment and also does custom work. Known to paint something a different color than it originally was....

Mark

Posted by Greg Mueller (Member # 17) on 03-13-2005, 11:48 AM:

Mine wouldn't be "Eismanized" then. I had all my castings sand blasted and then repainted them myself. All the bearings were replaced and all the gears too. The intermittent was rebuilt and virtually all parts are as close to "new" condition as is possible, given the 50 years since it was made. I still have a few parts to acquire, but I would say I'm 90% new. If I were 100% then I wouldn't have anything to do. But no "Eisman" here.

Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 03-13-2005, 12:00 PM:

I've torn down many movements that were still like new inside and had no signs of wear.... pretty amazing considering the wallpaper sized film that ran through them over the decades of use they saw. Have seen gears, bearings, and shafts in alot of differnt states. Some of the orignal motors were way to hard on the main drive gear train and those normally show some wear. We have switched to inverter drive motors on all DP-70 installations. We generally set them for a nice 6 second run up and down time. That is much easier on those main drive gears!

Mark

Posted by Thomas Jonsson (Member # 1902) on 03-13-2005, 03:26 PM:

Mark,
I agree the DP70 looks terrible in green. The red dots
must be the machine partly blushing of embarrasement.

Your new motors for the DP70, do you mount them on the
original gearbox or on a completely new bracket?

Greg Mueller,
Your DP70 looks great! But one thing confused me a little.
All DP70´s I´ve seen (until now) have two small "signs"
on the projector head door (Philips logo and AO), but your machine has just one. What does it say?

Thomas

Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 03-13-2005, 04:36 PM:

Thomas, We mount them on a completely new bracket The motor is direct drive to the input shaft. These also have a feature that automatically jogs them to the thread position when the motor stops.

Mark

Posted by Greg Mueller (Member # 17) on 03-13-2005, 04:43 PM:

Thomas
It says...
"North American Philips Company.....Norelco"
I've got the two "wing" shields, at least the metal parts, but I have only one of the "shields" that go in them. I was going to have them chromed or gold plated (whatever)and install them, if I ever find the other shield. The search goes on....
Since that picture was taken I've found, painted and installed a new arc lamp table that doesn't have any holes in it

Posted by Darren Briggs (Member # 1071) on 03-15-2005, 01:06 PM:

Kinda like the green one in a stange way.
Check out this pair of DP70's.

http://www.uk70mm.com/cinemas/rex.html

Just been installed last Dec.

Darren

Posted by Per Hauberg (Member # 529) on 03-15-2005, 06:51 PM:

WHAT THE F... -GREEN ???!

It looks like as tank - Brad Miller will love this....

Sacrilege is the word !

p

Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 03-15-2005, 07:31 PM:

quote: Greg Mueller
but I have only one of the "shields" that go in them.

Greg, We have a small bin full of shields and the inserts. Just e-mail me which one you need.

I think I will re-paint one of my FP-56's in retaliation for that Green DP-70. Lets see.... Purple with chartrouse end caps on the rollers [puke]

. WTF*&$^%@@%$$$)! I'd like to know who the iddiot was that painted it to use for display when it should be running in the booth like when it was new!

Mark

Posted by William Hooper (Member # 71) on 03-16-2005, 01:33 AM:

quote: Darren Briggs
Check out this pair of DP70's.

http://www.uk70mm.com/cinemas/rex.html

Sharp equipment, sharp booth.

Knockout auditorium, & it's great to see that some folks understand off the bat that all the parts in the machine have to work for the whole thing to work.

That proscenium is an eyeball-sucker. Those folks will be back. Usually in the USA, those pierced surfaces usually had arrays of lights behind them so that sometimes you can stun people with the view front-lighted, then when they start to get acclimated, turn on the lights behind for the Close Encounters UFO tractor beam effect. I wonder if there were lights behind the proscenium grillework at the Rex.

Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 03-16-2005, 06:28 PM:

Hey Bill,
At least those ladies down in Mobile didn't get aholdif it... it wold have all been painted flat white [Roll Eyes]

!

Mark

Posted by William Hooper (Member # 71) on 03-17-2005, 02:04 AM:

They covered the orchestra pit. Not with a removable pit cover as is usual, but with a structural apron like they must have seen in smaller, non- mutli-use theatres.

Now there is no orchesra pit. Now they can't book shows which use a pit orchestra.

It's interesting how all the photos on the site are cropped or otherwise obscure the "lighting perches" they've hung from the ceiling.

They don't have to ask "How does this work? What does this do?", & they don't want to. You can imagine them taking a car to the mechanic: "There's a black thing under the hood that I don't like the looks of. Take it out, & put in a set of storage shelves instead."

Posted by Darren Briggs (Member # 1071) on 03-19-2005, 06:32 PM:

William,
Yes there are lights behind the pros grills, and it looks great. other fitings are lights around a dome in the ceiling that looks great too.

A must see auditorium in the UK, perfectly well restored and re-fitted with the best projection possible.

Darren

Posted by Dick Vaughan (Member # 540) on 03-20-2005, 03:55 AM:

Darren

the Rex certainly looks the dogs bollocks! [thumbsup]

Will have to pay a visit sometime soon.
Only one thing [Wink]

Did you manage to rig it for nitrate changeovers so the BFI could wander down the road from the archive to run some public shows [Roll Eyes]

Posted by Ben Wales (Member # 92) on 03-20-2005, 04:05 PM:

The Rex Cinema is well a visit and I was able to see the first 70mm screening of "Lawrence of Arabia" on change-overs and the presentation was perfect.

Only last week after attending the Widescreen Weekend at Bradford, I visited the Odeon Cinema at Stoke On Trent and currently being restored and owned by the Chief Projectionist is a Philips DP70 painted Blue! [Eek!]

Posted by Darren Briggs (Member # 1071) on 03-20-2005, 06:43 PM:

Would be a great place for the BFI to use and screen there prints, but no Nitrate provision was installed.

Ed and Rob the two guys who installed the site had to push to get 70mm, only had one lens till the week before the show. Think Ed suplied the lens for free.
City Screen LTD programme the venue, and i will push to get any 70mm prints we have circulating in the chain, screened at the Rex, I even did the print transport for Lawrence just to ensure we get 70mm on the sheet.

Darren

Posted by Peter Hall (Member # 695) on 03-20-2005, 11:49 PM:

Hi

"The best projection possible" - I thought the site was using Spanish speakers and had not installed Dolby because the technician concerned "doesnt really like Dolby" - is it really best to decode the film in a manner other than it was encoded ? I wonder if, for the customers good, it might have been a better investment to put SRD in rather than 70mm - 99% of visitors would have benefitted from this rather than the odd Sunday rep visitor to 2001 ! I do wonder if the install has been looked at from both sides of the port glass..

Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 03-21-2005, 12:20 AM:

quote: Peter Hall
I do wonder if the install has been looked at from both sides of the port glass..

Actually Peter it appears that their technician was smart enough to look at the system design from the middle of the port glass, very few engineers seem to be able to do that these days. The Panastereo is a far better processor in just about every respect than any make of Dolby including the 200 and 650. Its also very flexible towards other digital formats, the 70mm version of this processor having two mag and two digital inputs. Also the SR noise reduction is again better than Dolby's own SR and the modules are record/play to boot. I like to call it the sleeper processor because its a giant awaiting in the shadows! Although I know little of the Spanish speaker systems in this theatre it still rates as one of the finest projection/sound systems on the planet and is easily adaptable to a DA-20 or DTS if needed. That its a classy place is all the better! I hope to visit it someday soon......

Mark

Posted by Gordon McLeod (Member # 33) on 03-21-2005, 08:40 AM:

I know of two speakers systems from Spain
KCS which we installed many of with no complaints and Wassman which along with there projectors we had no complaints with
both are THX approved
And the choice of the panastereo is a forward thinking good move

Posted by Darren Briggs (Member # 1071) on 03-24-2005, 01:11 PM:

Yes I think the best bet would of been a CP200 with DA20, for the price having both SRD and 70mm capabilities. But installer chosse Panastereo brand new and DTS plus 70mm. So has everything and digital covered all be it DTS not the more widely used SRD

Peter
You should go have a peak at it. Worth the train fare. When we both have an evening free ill buy the beer and train ticket to berko.

Darren

Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 03-24-2005, 07:33 PM:

quote: Darren Briggs
Yes I think the best bet would of been a CP200 with DA20, for the price having both SRD and 70mm capabilities. But installer chosse Panastereo brand new and DTS plus 70mm.

Actually one can hang both a DA-20 and a DTS on the CSP-1200 and then there is still the mag input which can also function as a third digital input if needed. After you hear a lossless DTS track you'll cringe at hearing SRD or even regular DTS. This is the one GOOD cinema processor than can handle the dynamic range of the lossless stuff flawlessly. The 200, and even its upgrde cards are certainly good but still very stone age compared to the 1200. The 1200 is simply the best sounding processor there is.

Mark

Posted by Darren Briggs (Member # 1071) on 03-25-2005, 04:14 AM:

Mark
I was just comaring for the price and money they had to spend, a S/H CP200 plus DA20 and maybe DTS for the price of a new non DA20 equiped Pannastereo. The panastereo did sound good, especaially on optical SR tracks. Mag was a little bright and harsh.

[Smile]

Posted by Gordon McLeod (Member # 33) on 03-25-2005, 05:52 AM:

Regretably it doesn't have the academy filters for non NR encoded mag so when you eq the head you have to build in the academy curve then

Posted by Thomas Jonsson (Member # 1902) on 06-22-2005, 03:51 PM:

The DP 70 isn´t green anymore. The pictures of the ugly
green one has been replaced with pictures of a much nicer
looking machine. It has been supplied with a motor driven
framing device - the only thing I don´t like about the new
pictures.

Thomas

Posted by Leo Enticknap (Member # 534) on 06-24-2005, 09:32 AM:

quote: Dick Vaughan
Did you manage to rig it for nitrate changeovers so the BFI could wander down the road from the archive to run some public shows

I may be wrong, but I think that NFT2 is now the last auditorium left in Britain which is licensed to project nitrate. That's very sad because, as you point out, the BFI/NFTVA has lots of surplus element release prints which could potentially be shown. Many of them are much better quality than the questionable acetate dupes made during the 'nitrate won't wait' era of the '60s and '70s.

Posted by Dieter Depypere (Member # 3184) on 06-24-2005, 09:43 AM:

I surfed a little bit on that site and I found a green Philips FP6. Doens't look nice too.

Posted by System Notices (Member # 2357) on 08-17-2008, 03:13 PM:

It has been 1150 days since the last post.

Posted by Ben Wales (Member # 92) on 08-17-2008, 03:13 PM:

quote: Darren Briggs
The panastereo did sound good, especaially on optical SR tracks. Mag was a little bright and harsh.

An old Topic now, but I agree with this as I have heard in two places with the Pannastereo 70 the same problem with the above.

Is the Pannastereo 70 still in production or only "Made to Order" as the web site states?

Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 08-18-2008, 04:11 PM:

As of my last communication with Norm, Panastereo is out of production but seeking a suitable company to continue the product.

As for Panastereo 70mm...yes it would sound bright and harsh on conventional tracks. This was due to the misconception that since there were no specified "academy filter" on magnetic tracks as there was on optical mono, that no such filter was needed.

After much discussion with Ray, and also documenting what an existing theatre sounded/measured of the era sounded like we came to the conclusion, as Dolby had on the CP200, that some sort of filter was indeed needed as theatres of the day were not "flat" as they would be if modern EQ was applied. That is, the Academy filter was based on what happens if you EQ a theatre and play a film that was mixed in a non-EQed theatre. It will have the pre-emphasis of the film (caused by the natural roll off of an old mixing theatre) and then the EQ of the cinema processor in a modern theatre.

By applying a Low-pass filter (on that actually approximates the "X-curve" to an old 70mm print and then playing the resulting filtered print on a modern B-Chain with EQ, you actually get a VERY clean sounding and quite natural theatre

I had the fortunate circumstance of having two identical theatres, back-to-back and at one point of my Pana 70 installation of having an existing '50s-'60s sound system and the a Pana system playing against each other. Ray came up with a modification that allowed me to use the "slit loss" control as a variable LPF with a turnover frequency of about 2KHz.

We then played the 70mm prints and listened to them back to back until the "spitiness" was eliminated. I measure the rolloff and it was pretty darn close the "X-curve" roll off. The remaining preamps had the same rolloff applied and then serious A/B evalutations were done. The net result was the Panastereo had a much cleaner sound with superior intelligibility than the existing system and now none of the spitiness (and really not too much hiss either).

The facility was none other than the Patriot Theatres in Colonial Williamsburg, Williamsburg, VA.

As a side note, we also found that the Le and Re channels on the back of the CSP4600 were being summed and required a motherboard modification (Traces being cut)...the problem stemmed from the thought that the dual full-octave EQ card used on surrounds might be used for Le/Re (which it never was)...it takes seconds to fix.

Steve

Posted by Ed Mauger (Member # 4813) on 08-20-2008, 10:26 AM:

quote: Peter Hall
"The best projection possible" - I thought the site was using Spanish speakers and had not installed Dolby because the technician concerned "doesnt really like Dolby" - is it really best to decode the film in a manner other than it was encoded ?

Really Peter, you're not STILL banging on about the "cheap Spanish loudspeakers", Possum? [Wink]

The ones at the Rex are from WSS (now Luis Wassmann) - THX approved and sound great! As for the Panastereo choice, I agree with Mark Gulbrandsen that this still is the best sounding processor available. The SR decoding is so good that you really cannot hear the difference between Dolby SRD and analogue, so why waste money installing SRD? The DTS unit was purchased as a "combo" with the CSP1200 processor, so didn't cost very much. All in all, there's been absolutely no problems in the 3 years the Rex has been open, and the customer is very happy. Have a look at the website bookings, and you'll see that the cinema is sold out most evenings, so we must have done something right!

As for other points, I must admit that the colour of the DP70s there is a bit disgusting! They were re-painted in gold when they were installed at the Metro Cinema, Ashton-Under-Lyne, so we decided to keep them that colour, and paint the tower to match. The Peerless lamphouse conversions are better than usually, but the light on the screen could do with improvement.
The lighting in the proscenium arch and the ceiling dome follows the original 1930s installation, with 110 x 40w bulbs concealed at the top of the proscenium and 90 x 40w bulbs lighting the dome. Not very green, but they look lovely.
We did not install any nitrate facilities, as the BFI didn't seem very interested in anything at the time. When re-developing, the developers removed both of the original external staircase exits, and bricked up one of the exits completely, so this is now impossible. Still, both NFT1 and NFT2 can show nitrate films

I agree that the Panastereo 70mm processors can sound a bit "toppy" at times. But, the old format 40 mag tracks seem to lose some of their treble content over time, so playing one of these old tracks without a roll-off seems to compensate well. When we installed our 1st one at the NFT, we installed a complete relay switching system, to compare the sound with the CP200. Once you got used to the Panastereo sound, switching to the CP200 sounded like someone had installed a bank of pillows in front of the loudspeakers - it was so muffled.

quote: Steve Guttag
As a side note, we also found that the Le and Re channels on the back of the CSP4600 were being summed and required a motherboard modification (Traces being cut)

I wasn't aware of this mod - perhaps it has already been done in the factory by Smart on our processors? On the last batch of units I discovered that the Le and Re signals were inverted with respect to the L,C and R, so cancellation was taking place when using the Le/Re mix-down facility. The mod for this involved soldering a LF353 chip and some resistors onto the Control/logic card, and certainly didn't take only a few seconds!

Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 08-20-2008, 08:34 PM:

Comparing the CP200 to the Panastereo when the Pana is playing the conventional format 40 incorrectly will naturally have one saying that the CP200 sounds dull. It is the same (silly) statement that was used back in the days of cassette tapes when people would encode with Dolby-B and play back with Dolby off so it would be more trebbly. Never mind that the frequency reponse was wrong as a result...people will always gravitate to the more treble sound. Kinda like "blueish" light versus "orangeish) light when comparing images...the blue one seems brighter...never mind that the flesh tones are shot to heck.

As for the mix-down function...yes the control board DOES need an opamp added to get the phase correct. The mod I was referring to was if you HAVE Le/Re and are playing tracks 2 and 4 through them without a mix-down.

Note too, the CSP4600 doesn't really decode format 42/43 correctly with respect to Le/Re...Le/Re is supposed to play everything from 250Hz down to 100Hz if a subwoofer is present such that the bass may be panned a bit. If no subwoofer is present, the Le/Re should have the ability to play everything from 250Hz on down, with suitable downward expansion.

Now the CSP4600 does do well in most other respects...especially when you consider that it is an "add-on" box to pre-existing processor(s).

For honest to god 70mm playback where the full range of existing and new 70mm prints are to be played...I'll take the CP200 over the Panstereo...the CP200 treats the signal properly and sends it out of the right channels. The Panastereo would only win in the noise department and the ability to automate.

Its too bad the CSP1400 and CSP4800 never made it to production...I think they would have fixed and improved on several of the issues. I know that both were designed quite a ways.

Steve

Posted by Rob Younger (Member # 1770) on 08-21-2008, 12:31 PM:

Just to add my two-penneth to the 'Spanish Speakers' comments, we installed the same ones in the new Picturehouse 3-screen cinema in Norwich last year, with Dolby CP650's & QSC amps. They were a delight to EQ & sound fantastic! THX approval on certain models, price is excellent, Luis is a pleasure to deal with, so what's the problem? I have since fitted them in our cinema in Barnsley, Yorkshire & am planning to install them in sevetral more Picturehouse sites as we upgrade the existing sound systems & remove several 'unbadged' units from these sites!

Regarding the use of non-Dolby processors, maybe the old proverb "people who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones" is applicable here??

Posted by Richard Fowler (Member # 893) on 08-21-2008, 02:21 PM:

Regarding Spanish speaker companies...There is Wassman and Kelonik. Many of the source components for Wassman is Beyma....Beyma is in some of your "home grown" models from Krix. [Smile]