Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Renting portable 35mm/xenon 16mm projectors

This is topic Renting portable 35mm/xenon 16mm projectors in forum Film Handlers' Forum at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.

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Posted by Andy Uhrich (Member # 3169) on 12-14-2005, 02:36 PM:

Greetings,

I will be projecting for an experimental film festival that takes place in Windsor, Ontario next February. Does anyone know of a place within driving distance of the Detroit/Windsor area that we can rent portable 35mm and xenon 16mm projectors?

Thanks for your help,

Andy

Posted by Ben Wales (Member # 92) on 12-14-2005, 02:57 PM:

Not sure how far is Toronto is for you, you could contact Gordon Mcleod at Toronto, if he can not assiy I am sure he would know some one who can.....

Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 12-14-2005, 03:16 PM:

Another possibility would be Cinema Technology Services (CTS) in NYC. I don't know if they rent portable equipment, however.

Posted by Robert E. Allen (Member # 1351) on 12-14-2005, 04:36 PM:

Also try Robert Film Service in St. Laurent, Quebec (514)337-4956. I bought a 16mm xenon projector from him and I believe he may also rent them.

Posted by Mitchell Dvoskin (Member # 751) on 12-15-2005, 08:41 AM:

Boston Light & Sound rents portable 35mm nationwide, but they are not cheap.

Posted by Paul Mayer (Member # 355) on 12-15-2005, 09:56 AM:

With BL&S you get what you pay for. They are very good at this game.

Posted by William Hooper (Member # 71) on 12-16-2005, 04:04 AM:

But they are not perfect. They brought in projectors for a summer film series at the Saenger in New Orleans a couple of years ago:

1. Color temperature was very different between projectors, & at reel changes it was blue to orange to blue to orange...

2. They were running silver optical tracks on red readers, & the upper freq distortion of silver tracks on red readers was at its worst in the musicals, the highest-attended & biggest investment on return ticket buyers. Oscar Levant's piano was a literally painful crash of noise at the top end.

3. I don't remembr if it was that same year, but one year the A-chain between the two projectors was glaringly different. I think it was in Casablanca that the reel changes would go from having upper frequency response #1 to response #2 which sounded like dropping into mud.

Posted by Gordon Burke (Member # 3370) on 12-16-2005, 10:44 PM:

How well to xenon bulbs transport in portable or otherwise moveable equipment? Do rental businesses usually leave bulbs in lamphouses during shipment, or do they box them separately and let the renter risk breaking one during setup? Are they generally stable enough when cold that when equipment is packed in proper cases that nobody really cares?

Posted by John Pytlak (Member # 331) on 12-19-2005, 10:23 AM:

Shipping a lamphouse with the xenon lamp installed may very well cause the lamp to explode if the lamphouse is jarred during shipment. The lamp should be removed, and put into its original safety shock-absorbing packaging.

The other risk is that the people handling the shipment may not recognize the danger of a xenon lamp exploding (e.g., opening the lamphouse or looking into the lamphouse with the douser open).