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Posted by Chris Hipp (Member # 1788) on 03-23-2006, 11:18 PM:
 
This is relating to film and equipment. Stories like getting drunk and mooning the audience through the port window belong in a different thread.

something I have seen:

I know of someone who has his or her opening "projectionist" pre-cut the heads and tails of the new prints, then splice them back together and put them back in the cans until the scheduled build up person(s) arrives to officially build the print. This is supposed to somehow make the job easier for the person(s) building up at night.
 

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Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 03-24-2006, 12:04 AM:
 
I know of one guy who has a fool-proof system for removing scratches from prints. His solution? Simply cut out the scratched footage and throw it away! Voila, a scratch-free print.

No joke, he's one of the head local booth guys and it's for a major chain too.
 

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Posted by Ron Curran (Member # 3631) on 03-24-2006, 01:48 AM:
 
To maintain a constant width, for Scope this Projectionist cut a new plate to crop the width and fitted a new lens. who cares what goes on at the sides, he said. Don't try this at home.
 

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Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 03-24-2006, 02:57 AM:
 
Two stories here...

1 - Knowing an operator that would slop up a print with 20 ft of shoe polish on each end of the splice and still use yellow opaque tape at the join. I asked him on this and he told me that he doesn't want to waste his time hunting for the splices (typical lazy-type operator who gets paid royally and still has very lazy booth operations..) on breakdown. ....for a three plex.

2- (this one really tops them all for me...) I was a booth manager for a megaplex and had 6 assistants under me. One assistant (assistant "A"), determined to make a notch with the theatre, was working with my other assistant (assistant "B") for the day session - I wasn't scheduled until the evening shift. We were playing "SW-EPI" back in '99.

I arrived for the evening shift and assistant "B" told me something that I just about flipped over and should have fired assistant "A" for his stupiditiy.

Assistant "A" was covering one half of the building and had called Assistant "B" over to 'verify' something. Assistant "B" got over there and about crapped a brick. Here was a P35 machine, running WITHOUT any loops whatsoever, hammering away like mad. - in the middle of SW:EP1.

Assistant "B" immediately slammed down the machine and reset the loops for normal operation. (guess what happened is that he did something to the Ultramittent shoe to pop them open, thus losing the loops..) and asked Assistant "A", after doing the resetting: "Why the frik didn't you shut down the machine immediately when these loops were lost! Don't you have common sense when these things happen to obviously know what to do?"

Then, the CLASSIC answer was: "Thank you very much. I do have common sense. It's just that I needed someone to come over here to verify that there is something wrong before I shut down this machine...! "

...we had to order a replacement reel that was damaged DUE to "his common sense."

..to this day, even though Assistant "B" has gone off to other lands and adventures, we occasionly keep in contact and remind each other to "use common sense to verify something.."

..that was the worst one I've ever heard about...

-Monte
 

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Posted by Dieter Depypere (Member # 3184) on 03-24-2006, 03:56 AM:
 
I know SOME (not only one!) projectionists, who cut out half of the credits and splice them back on after playing. So you get a print with lots 'o splices in the credits section.
 

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Posted by Jason Winn (Member # 3568) on 03-24-2006, 12:32 PM:
 
This one guy I used to work with was building up the print Van Helsing. He somehow "forgot" an entire reel! He put the reels on like this: ...4, 5, and 7. He skipped reel 6! He didn't even realize it until it was being screened by one of the other projectionists. They were putting away the cans and he saw an extra reel just lying around. He had to stop the movie and add it on.

The same guy I just mentioned above was "attempting" to build up Elektra one night. Notice I said "attempting" because this has to single-handedly be the worst build-up job I have ever seen. First, he put two of the same trailers on. He had two Mr. and Mrs. Smith trailers back to back. Then, he forgot to put the Fantastic Four trailer on. By the way, Fox was advertising Fantastic Four to be shown before Elektra, so it was a big deal. Then, he had two (not one, but two) mis-splices during the trailer pack. But it gets better! He left a piece of tape on the print about halfway through the movie. When it ran through the projector, it caused a brain-wrap. It was a huge mess. About a foot and a half was chewed up and had to be cut off. Plus, I think some of the film got scratched due to the brain-wrap.

Last but not least, the same guy I mentioned both times above started a movie nearly 25 minutes late one time! That is unacceptable! You know why he started it late? Because he just forgot about it. He was sitting around doing nothing and wasn't paying attention to his performance schedule. He wasn't even in the booth, so he didn't hear the projector beeping. What really surprises me is that the customers in the theatre waited so long before they told someone their movie hadn't started yet. It was a weekday and we weren't really that busy. I think there was only like 5 or 6 people in the theatre. But, that is still unacceptable. I never started movies late. I don't see how someone could start a movie 25 minutes late. The best part is, after it happened, this guy was laughing about it like it was no big deal. I just wanted to slap some sense into him.

Oh, guess what happened to this guy? He got promoted to booth manager! Go figure!

Hey, Brad, you were talking about one of the local head booth guys. I think these two guys might be related.
 

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Posted by Louis Bornwasser (Member # 3063) on 03-24-2006, 01:03 PM:
 
Must we DO this? ......oh well:

Guy #1 hears that talcum powder will keep tape from sticking so, during a "guest appearance" at a theatre with AW-2 platter he dumps about 1.5 lb of talcum powder on top of the film pack on feed out platter. Other than dirt he gets by for 2-3 reels, when the center feed arm stops moving due to talcum build up. It took 2 operator and me 3 hours to untangle the mess and resplice. Remember each splice, the film and the hands had to be cleaned before tapa would stick. (This guy had 12 years experience, but not with platters)

Guy #2 had 2 machine auutomation, but did not trust the cues. He "cued early" and also ran down late. 15-20 feet of film "missed" at changeover. Marx Bros. movie had punch line at end...entirely missed. Also 15 year man.

Louis
 

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Posted by Jamie Glossop (Member # 2180) on 03-24-2006, 01:04 PM:
 
25 mins late, wow thats late!

The old cinema i used to work at was kind of ok but thier timetables was done wrong, 30 mins before the films sposed to be on the other showing before thats still on, so we was kind pushed by time at some times,

Also when the film james bond die another day was on the boss gave everyone a few glasses of wine and a free bottle of wine to all the staff including the projectionists while they was on duty.

The cinema was 6 screens number 1 being the biggest 3 on the upstairs which required you to run around alot to each projection room and 3 on the downstairs where they are in the same room, There are always 2 staff on in the booths one doing upstairs and one doing downstairs, Onetime one of the projectionists was late and i had to start all 6 screens and do most of the lens changes to put them into scope, Which at the end of it i was very tired. And not to mention screen 1 projector breaking down and carrying the film down to screen 4.

I miss working in the cinema world and i hope this interview ive got coming up will give me a chance to get back into this kind of work.
 

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Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 03-24-2006, 02:51 PM:
 
I saw a guy STAPLE a film to fix a break once. (not in my theatre, and he's out of the business since 1977, so don't worry)

Had a trainee accidentally turn on our old slide projector with a "COMING SOON" slide in it, during a love scene (accident...he was learing to do changeovers and confused the slide-proj switch with the projector motor switch...the audience got a good laugh at least)
 

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Posted by Jamie Glossop (Member # 2180) on 03-24-2006, 03:21 PM:
 
Wow a staple ? Surly that could of some damage if it went through the projector?
 

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Posted by John Eickhof (Member # 323) on 03-24-2006, 04:56 PM:
 
Staples?? Thats not new ... back in the 70s I ran a few spanish prints from Azteca Films, a stapled splice was GOOD! most of the time they were just lapped over on the reel or a hunk of masking tape was wrapped all the way around the film thus when it hit the old gate in my Sups it raised all kinds of hell! The staples would actually make it through the machine unless they were placed in the sprocket holes!! We never had time to inspect it was a grind 18 hr run mexican theatre!!
 

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Posted by Ben Wales (Member # 92) on 03-24-2006, 04:56 PM:
 
A few years ago I worked at a venue and the Head Projectionist had some strange, but true ideas...

1# Ordered Metal Mirror Polish to clean a Glass Mirror for Xenon Lamphouse.

2# Ordered several Bottles of Blooping Ink to use on a 70mm DTS Print!??.

3# Instructed me to lace up a 70mm film through the 35mm Opitical Soundhead on a Cinemeccancia Victoria 8 to test it working - I had to ask him to show how it's done .
 

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Posted by Chris Hipp (Member # 1788) on 03-24-2006, 05:33 PM:
 

quote: Brad Miller

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I know of one guy who has a fool-proof system for removing scratches from prints. His solution? Simply cut out the scratched footage and throw it away! Voila, a scratch-free print.

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That is kinda funny, I know a guy locally that takes a sharpie and colors in the scratches as the film is playing.
 

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Posted by Ron Curran (Member # 3631) on 03-24-2006, 09:51 PM:
 
I remember reading about a projectionist's response to the destruction of hundreds of feet of film. "It wasn't my fault. I was nowhere near the projector at the time!"
And we wonder why we're going backwards to digital.
 

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Posted by Aaron Mehocic (Member # 15) on 03-24-2006, 11:11 PM:
 
Two guys were moving a print without clamps when the center ring gave out on them. Now they probably could have salvaged reels 4-6 rather easily since they were over a platter deck when this happened. Instead, they purposely dumped the whole film onto the floor not being quite sure what to do. It took them about 8 hours to correct their mistake.
 

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Posted by Allison Parsons (Member # 2728) on 03-25-2006, 12:38 AM:
 
How (not) to fix a brain wrap:
1) cut out tightly wound film around brain
2) drop on floor
3)take one end and try to run thru the booth with it, hopeing it will quickly end up as one long piece of film (not taking into consideration that it will twist/bunch up/tangle on you, making it even harder to fix)
4)splice back on to exisiting rewound ring and rewind.
5)splice back on to regular movie

So I've been told by an ex booth op at an old theater i worked at. Ex being the key word.
 

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Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 03-25-2006, 01:40 AM:
 
Practically all of us at one time dumped a print due to clamp slippage, or just being 'brave' in not using them. I was brave once when moving a print from an old AW2 unit where the film was wound so tight that you could practially roll the print down the other end of the booth (in which I did and done many times).

That was okey, but when I was close to the top platter, the ring popped out and 2hrs of film was suddenly in my lap as I collapsed to the floor with the print so the cleanup task wasn't so bad. Took me 3hrs to clean up my mess.. oh well..

-Monte
 

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Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 03-25-2006, 09:07 AM:
 
Ahhhh The woes of having manager operators......

At the Lake Theatre outside of Chicago there was a manager who was previously a Catholic Priest.... don't kow why he wasn't working as a catholic priest... and I still wonder that to this day. Anyway he made up the print of Cocoon-2 and at one point in the film some of the actors "shove off to neverland" and because he had the reels out of order those deceased actors were back when the next reel hit the screen. Moviegoers came running out into the lobby wondering what the heck was up. The manager I believe was relieved of his Saint Hood the next day .

Mark
 

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Posted by Dominic Espinosa (Member # 2122) on 03-25-2006, 11:40 AM:
 
stupid things...

1.) I dropped episode 3 moving it less than 100 feet from one house to another. It was loosely wound and the last 3 reels started slipping between the clamps and fell off.

2.) Most recently I did the stupidest thing EVER. Forgot to put the pin in the makeup table spindle and had a 6k reel go sailing off onto the floor. Absolutely beautiful.
 

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Posted by Jon Miller (Member # 163) on 03-25-2006, 12:46 PM:
 
Like Jason Winn suggested earlier...not accounting for every reel of a feature before making it up onto the platter.

One of the features shown at this year's San Diego Latino Film Festival abruptly ended without an epilogue or credits. The projectionist who inspected, built up and ran the print had no explanation for it. Missing reel? Artistic intent? Who knows?

In the process of helping clear a backlog of prints to be broken down, I took care of the feature in question. While sorting through the heads, tails, cores, cardboard separators and plastic grocery bags (don't ask) in the two plastic ICC shipping cases the print came in, I found a core with about six minutes of film, wrapped in a grocery bag. I inspected the roll to check that it was indeed the missing scenes and credits, which it was.

For the record, some of the heads were marked Reel (x) of 6; only five reels were made up and shown. How that hint could have been overlooked is beyond me.
 

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Posted by Robert Burtcher (Member # 3227) on 03-25-2006, 12:57 PM:
 
I know of someone who was rushed for time breaking down a Technicolor print. (DHL likes to show up early here) The movie came tails out, and the usual print builder swaps the heads and tails after he's done building up so the print can be broken down heads out. Apparently, he forgot to do so on this print, and this someone wasn't paying attention and attached the head of each reel to the tail and the tail to the head. With masking tape splices.

He did realize his error as he finished Reel 1, but the DHL delivery man was waiting on him, so he packed it off with a note explaining the situation.
 

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Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 03-25-2006, 02:14 PM:
 
At least your guy put a note in the can. I can't say anything nice though about the stupid masking tape practice.

quote: Dominic Espinosa

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2.) Most recently I did the stupidest thing EVER. Forgot to put the pin in the makeup table spindle and had a 6k reel go sailing off onto the floor. Absolutely beautiful.

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quote: Scott Norwood

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Jon -- was that the print of "Additions and Subtractions" that came from "Cinerama Latino" in Providence?

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Scott, yes, it was "+ & -"! Considering the condition you received the print, you get a for sending the print out in better condition than it left, including the note regarding the substitute head on the tape securing R-6.

The more I think about it, I wonder if our guy saw the short reel and thought it was some reject footage? You know what happens when you assume...
 

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Posted by Jason Winn (Member # 3568) on 03-26-2006, 07:16 PM:
 
This girl I used to work with would always put a flashlight in her mouth every time she did trailer work. She'd be removing a trailer or something and she would lean over the platter with the flashlight in her mouth. She would slobber all over it! Everytime me or one of the other projectionists would grab a flashlight, it would always be covered in drool. That's just gross. I mean, come on, if you're gonna stick a flashlight in your mouth, at least have the common decency to clean it afterwards!

Come to think of it, a girl that likes sticking objects in her mouth is okay with me! LOL!

I don't know if that tops the story about the bag of , but I hope it came close.
 

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Posted by George Roher (Member # 91) on 03-27-2006, 03:37 PM:
 

quote: Bernie Anderson Jr

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How about threading the film (don't bother framing it), turn the motor on, light the lamp, hit change over to get it on screen, frame it, turn it off and wait to start the show. I could never figure out why bulbs were going bad quickly until I saw them thread. Unfortunately, this is how my particular Loews theatre people trained them and the tradition carried on for years until I got there.

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That's exactly what the managers did at the last Loews theatre I worked in. I stopped by once on one of the manager days in the booth and saw the man/op on duty doing this. A couple of them had years of "experience" running a booth but they had never learned to set the intermittent when threading.

Management was also completely brain dead about proper cooling of lamps at the end of the night. They had to kill the power (and the fan) the second the shows were over (and as payroll hours were cut back, management was powering down almost every night as well as running the booth a couple days a week). I'd arrive in the morning and sometimes find the tail of a print still in the projector. Several screens had timers for the cooling fans which are helpful, except management would sometimes kill the circuit breakers for the timers when shutting down so the fans still went off too soon.

We had lots of emergency lamp changes. By the time I quit we had an emergency lamp change at least once a week.

Some more stupid things...One of the aforementioned managers sprayed an enormous amount of WD40 into the gear side of a Century projector for the purpose of fixing a travel ghost.

A manager threaded a show on one of my shifts but couldn't figure out why the show wouldn't start. He had not powered up the booth. He threaded with the power off and wrapped the payout platter a bit. Actually, that exact situation happened twice with two different people.

The same management team canceled DLP shows because they forgot how to power it up.

I had a service tech brainwrap a print running a couple trailers with the payout deck off.

And there's lots more...
 

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Posted by Jason Winn (Member # 3568) on 03-27-2006, 03:55 PM:
 
Hey George, don't you just love theatre management?

The word "projectionist" is basically just a fancy word for "janitor." The managers screw everything up, and we come in and clean up after them. I know how you feel. Been there, done that.
 

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Posted by Thomas King (Member # 2745) on 03-28-2006, 03:20 AM:
 
Apropos of nothing, the Dolby 'City' tag looks (and sounds) smashing when it goes through backwards
 

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Posted by Jason Winn (Member # 3568) on 03-28-2006, 12:25 PM:
 
Okay, I'm gonna 'fess up! I'm gonna list something that I did in booth that was pretty stupid.

One night, I was waiting for a movie to drop so I could start threading it for the next show. The movie was in the credits and I was standing next to the projector waiting for it to drop. I like pre-threading as early as possible. Well, the tail just went through the projector. I wanted to go ahead and open all the gates and start cleaning the projector. But, the motor was still running, even though it was slowing down. I got impatient. I didn't wanna wait a few seconds before the motor stopped completely, so I went ahead and opened all the gates while the motor was still running. BAD IDEA! I caught my right middle finger on one of the sprockets and it ripped the skin right off my finger. I started bleeding pretty bad. It hurt like hell! I screamed a bunch of very loud expletives! I'm sure the people down in the theatre probably heard me.

Later that night, I was talking to an usher. He was talking about how easy my job is because I work in booth. And I said, "You thank my job is so easy, take a look at this!" I took off my band-aid and showed him my "battle scar." I said, "I got in a fight with a projector and I lost." He was definitely grossed out. LOL!

Fortunately, that was the only dumb thing I've ever done in booth. I don't know what happened that night. I guess I wasn't thinking.

But, I learned a valuable lesson from all of this: NEXT TIME I THREAD A MOVIE, MAKE SURE THE MOTOR HAS STOPPED RUNNING FIRST!
 

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Posted by Chris Hipp (Member # 1788) on 03-28-2006, 12:32 PM:
 

quote: Jason Winn

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The word "projectionist" is basically just a fancy word for "janitor." The managers screw everything up, and we come in and clean up after them. I know how you feel. Been there, done that.

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quote: Chris Hipp

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Ya know, FD says that all the time. You must have got it from him.

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Ya know, I knew I heard that from someone, but I couldn't remember who. So, I guess that's one thing I got from FD. I hope that's the only thing I got from him.
 

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Posted by Ted Vetzal (Member # 3701) on 03-31-2006, 11:53 AM:
 
Here are two of my favorites that I have come across.

Did you know that you can put the "gate plate" can be installed and run upside down in a Strong Millenium? Luckly this happened while we were opening a theatre and we were using scrap film to train and burn in projectors. They didn't seem to think that the loud noise and the pile of polyester that was building up in the projector indicated that something was wrong!

Did you know that an Osram 3k lamp will operate at 160 amps for three days before it explodes? We had a manager who took the 1-3k switcher that failed, out of a Strong HLII and when they put the replacement one in, didn't check to see if it matched or bothered to check the current. (Aren't they "plug and play" was their responce. ) The switcher that they put in was a 6-7k. They did say that they had good light on screen.
 

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Posted by Eric Robinson (Member # 2966) on 04-03-2006, 12:42 AM:
 
I was once managing in a theatre and woke up early one morning to host a kidee matinee (kids matinee) for a a nice G rated film. I think it may have been Sesame Street Follow That Bird. Anway...the kid show films didn't get pre-screened all the time, I think there was a lack of interest. Somehow, one of the projectionists had spliced a "Jason Goes to Hell" preview right on the front of this film. Needless to say I had a lot of mad people in my face after the kids sat through that preview.
 

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Posted by John T. Hendrickson, Jr (Member # 849) on 04-03-2006, 05:08 PM:
 
Many years ago, I was asked to break in a new kid. We were showing "Patton". For you oldtimers, you will remember that there was an intermission at the end of reel 6, then reel 7 began with four minutes of call-back music.

After the intermission one afternoon, I left the kid on his own and went down to the balcony. At the end of reel 8, he made a changeover, and bingo- black screen. I jumped up and headed straight for the booth. Even before I got to the ladder I knew what he had done. Yep. Call-back music.

As I entered the booth, he was standing at projector #1 with a dumbfounded look on his face, asking why there was no picture on the screen. I grabbed reel number 9, threw it on projector #2, lit the arc and made the changeover before the callback music ended. Fortunately, we had enough carbon to get through reel #9, or I may not have had enough time to pull it off before the image on reel #6 hit the screen.

He had rewound reel #7 and then threaded it up instead of reel #9. To this day, I wonder what the audience thought- another intermission?
 

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Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 04-05-2006, 12:24 AM:
 
..it's amazing on what 'hidden' tricks we old-timers can come up with and completely fool the public where they just don't know what is going on...

Yeppers, I do remember that intermission in "Patton" when I ran that the summer of 1970 at the drive-in: Hit the Intermission, did the changeover, BUT without striking up the carbons since..why run the lamp with no picture..and I can use cartoon length carbons for the rest of that reel. Plus, I had a tape mark on the edge of the film to where the call back music was getting ready to end and picture begins so I can strike up that lamphouse. This system worked like a charm .... BUT ....

...dummy me on one night:call back music ended and feature started..not paying attention and wonder why all of a sudden all of the cars in the yard are blaring their horns..DUH!! need to strike up the lamp..and I forgot to change out the positive rod since it was down all the way..

Hurridly slipped in a cartoon rod on the Philips Carbon saver, spread the jaws open (ASHCRAFT) shoved that through the silver contacts and locked that carbon saver down, slammed the switch as I was closing the door and with a good strikeup..movie was back on the screen.

Owner came in on wonder what happened..told him, I had a braincramp and wasn't paying attention...for it was a HOT night.
 

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Posted by Chad M Calpito (Member # 3736) on 04-12-2006, 10:36 PM:
 
I remember one time working at a former movie theater circuit before I got a projectionist job at Pacific Theatres in which a projectionist threaded a movie and ran it, but, the movie wound up with the soundtracks upside down on the take up platter. He called me down from P2 to P1 and I looked at it and I was like, WOW, how the heck did you manage to do that? Anyway, I told him to re-thread the movie, but, to make sure that the Soundtracks go through the projector like usual and wind-up on the take-up platter with the soundtracks on top. I know that this is not as bad as some others posted here, but, I thought it was pretty dumb.
 

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Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 04-13-2006, 12:00 AM:
 

quote: Chad M Calpito

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the movie wound up with the soundtracks upside down on the take up platter

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....and some theatres wind soundtrack down on the platters as a standard procedure.. - as long as the soundtrack is right in the projector it doesn't matter on the platter.

Probably what happened is that operator was in a hurry and didn't do the right turn on the film going to the takeup platter, thus soundtrack down...it's one of those things that happen...
 

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Posted by Chad M Calpito (Member # 3736) on 04-13-2006, 12:09 AM:
 
True, the operater might have been in a rush. Of course, that was the first time I saw a situation like that. But, at least there weren't any film problems, which was good.
 

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Posted by Eric Robinson (Member # 2966) on 04-13-2006, 12:13 AM:
 
I used to have a projectionist who would strike up the bulb and stick his cigarette into the aperture to light it up (when he forgot his lighter.)

Lukily he was family with the owner, so he was untouchable.
 

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Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 04-13-2006, 03:34 AM:
 
I have to laugh on this one - for I used to light up customer's smokes with the negative rod from the lamphouse at my drive-in. Customer would walk by the booth door while they head to the snakbar and ask if I had a match, and obviously I didn't.

But, I would strike up the lamphouse, let it run a few seconds, opened up the door, pull the negative out with the pliers and ... "here ya go!" That customer would rear back since he's never seen such a thing, but though that was pretty cool at the meantime..

One of my many fun experiences being a drive-in projectionist.

-Monte
 

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Posted by George Roher (Member # 91) on 04-13-2006, 01:48 PM:
 

quote: Monte L Fullmer

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....and some theatres wind soundtrack down on the platters as a standard procedure..

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quote: Chad M Calpito

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the movie wound up with the soundtracks upside down on the take up platter.

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At least it was like that only on the platter. One time, I saw a guy thread the film through the projector with the soundtrack facing in the wrong direction. He started the movie, and the image was backwards and the soundtrack showed up on screen. He started freaking out when he saw that. He didn't know what to do.
 

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Posted by Chad M Calpito (Member # 3736) on 04-14-2006, 01:33 AM:
 
Wow, that is weird the way the projectionist threaded the projector. I once caught a projectionist recently that he was about to thread the projector the same way you described to me. Luckily, he saw the error and proceeded to thread the projector properly. Of course, he thanked me for seeing that. Anyway, back on track, I prefer to have the Soundtrack on top. Of course, that's just my preferance and the way other projectionists do it too where I work at.
 

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Posted by Ron Curran (Member # 3631) on 04-14-2006, 04:07 AM:
 
I seem to remember somewhere in Kodak film notes that occasionally running the opposite way (soundtrack up/down) to your normal routine was good for the print. We do this and I agree with previous posters that, as long as nothing that matters touches the plate, it is ok either way.
 

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Posted by Robert Burtcher (Member # 3227) on 04-15-2006, 04:06 AM:
 
I'm building onto 6k reels. I pre-cut the leader of the last reel to go onto the 6k and splice it back on with an easy to peel, single-sided splice.

The other projectionist helping me build up loads it onto the platter, and decides it's far too difficult to peel the splice. So what does he do? He lops off an additional frame.
 

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Posted by Eric Robinson (Member # 2966) on 04-17-2006, 03:33 PM:
 
While I was servicing a projector, the projectionist/manager came up and started a movie and promptly walked away. I took a look at the image and noted that the film was scope and the lens was flat. Well you know how this distorts the picture. I walked all the way down to the managers office and informed him that the wrong lens was being used. We both went back up to the booth noting the odd stretched looking actors on the screen. The manager casually pulled the lens out (single lens projector) while the projector was running, inserted the scope lens and proceeded to rotate the scope lens until the picture was straight, all the while providing quite a spectacular display for the patrons.
 

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Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 04-18-2006, 02:58 AM:
 
..we could almost divert this thead to the "You Suck Film Handler's" page the way it's looking towards film presentation procedures..by the booth clowns, usherBees, and just plain idiots.

Not shuttind the dowser when changing lenses..'bout as bad when they question the lens format that you tell them cuz they don't know the difference in the image on the screen - let along slicing the wrong format trailers on the front of the feature..

Now, you wonder why DigCinema is getting a lot of buzz...

..us old guys are gradually dying off, or fading away from popularity in this day and age...since we were the teachers at one time...

-Monte
 

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Posted by Stephen Furley (Member # 1277) on 04-18-2006, 05:49 AM:
 
I visited a cinema in Leningrad, as it was at the time. Managed to get a visit to the projection room. One projector wasn't working, but the projectionist had a way around that problem. About a minute before the end of the reel pull the remaining film off the spool and onto the floor, having previously cut off all leaders from the film. Put next reel on the machine, quickly splice the film together, break the splice after it ran through the machine, take the full spool off the machine, letting the start of the new reel run onto the floor, put empty spool on machine, take up start of new reel on this spool (with no leader remember), spin take-up spool like mad by hand to take up the film from the floor ... and there you are, until the end of the next reel.

Projectors had some strange light source, very blue, and took several minutes to run up, some sort of mercury I presume.
 

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Posted by Eric Robinson (Member # 2966) on 04-18-2006, 10:45 PM:
 
I'm surprised this hasn't caught on in the states where the low budget companies could save some money. I know my company would have jumped at the opportunity.
 

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Posted by Thomas Haskell (Member # 3744) on 04-20-2006, 11:58 PM:
 
I caught an assistant manager once cutting whole portions of the credits out of some prints. He claimed that doing so would A) give the ushers more time to clean between shows, and B) cause the movie to end earlier (so he could go home sooner).

When I brought this to the attention of the general and district managers, he changed his story saying that the credits in those prints were heavily damaged and needed to be cut.

Two weeks later, I'm emptying our large booth trash can to discover the cut credits at the bottom! And, from what I could tell, that film still could have run in a projector despite sitting at the bottom of the garbage heap for weeks on end.

This same guy also "didn't believe in suction cups." We had our print of 'Shrek' fly right off an uneven Potts platter during its second weekend and then forced the projection assistant to clean it up.
 

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Posted by Brian Michael Weidemann (Member # 2243) on 04-21-2006, 05:06 AM:
 
If you believe in suction cups, close your eyes tight and clap your hands ... come on, everybody! If you don't, those damned fairies will be the only things magically holding the prints in place ... and we know they're all in cahoots with the evil booth monkeys secretly employed in insufficiently staffed booths around the globe!

Once, however, I was astonished to find a projector jam and film break caused by a poorly stuck suction cup. It was found, as I recall, wedging the film in the bottom roller of a Christie platter tree mast. It slid off its feeding platter and fell JUST right, that it jammed the film enough to pull itself out of the projector. Nobody could even attempt to recreate the incident, but it clearly happened. No brain-wrap, very little damage; just pull, snap, fail-safe, projector stop, baffled projectionist.
 

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Posted by Louis Bornwasser (Member # 3063) on 04-21-2006, 09:56 AM:
 
A customer lemon-pledged an entire 8-plex of Potts platters. Film would not stay put. The temporary fix was 5 "spokes" of double thickness duct tape. Louis
 

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Posted by John Pytlak (Member # 331) on 04-21-2006, 10:20 AM:
 

quote: Louis Bornwasser

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A customer lemon-pledged an entire 8-plex of Potts platters. Film would not stay put. The temporary fix was 5 "spokes" of double thickness duct tape. Louis

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Prints "Slip-Sliding Away".
 

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Posted by Robert Burtcher (Member # 3227) on 04-22-2006, 03:01 AM:
 
According to the managers...

A previous projectionist got a bright idea with our 10 Christie AW3 platters and a tub of Turtle Wax. I guess he figured a slick platter would make the film payout easier... Instead, it just made it easier for the platter to payout onto the floor.

He attempted to correct his mistake with Stainless Steel cleaner/polish, which didn't help the situation much.
 

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Posted by Eric Robinson (Member # 2966) on 04-22-2006, 05:23 PM:
 
During a random visit to the booth I noted that one of our projectors was happily playing the movie and depositing it on the floor.

Also I noted a very alarming mechanical squeaking sound...one I never had heard before. The sound was coming from the employee break room. I walked in to discover the projectionist spinning round and round in a chair which was badly in need of some new bearings, this chair made a horrible screech and sqeak each time it went around. The projectionist was oblivious to the noise though since he had his walkman on full blast, staring at the ceiling with his eyes closed. I was not a happy camper.
 

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Posted by Floyd Justin Newton (Member # 1316) on 04-22-2006, 06:04 PM:
 
Eric--

If the "projectionist" had THAT much time on his hands to do
what he was doing I would have fired him on the spot.
 

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Posted by Geena Phillips (Member # 3726) on 04-29-2006, 08:30 AM:
 
We never use suction cups. The theatre I used to work at had very uneven Christie platters, so we definitely used things to hold the prints in place (that's its own story), but where I am now, we use Neu-Made platters, and I've never had a single problem with films moving out of position.
 

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Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 04-29-2006, 01:21 PM:
 

quote: Robert Burtcher

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platter would make the film payout easier

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..it's sorta interesting to hear these stories of polished decks to ease payout since I've seen it also (only thing that I had to do to decks was used a cleaner to clean the formica decks of the AW2's, but never had to wax the decks to make them shine-and told the manager, that made the recommendation on waxing the surfaces, that the prints would fly off quite easily if did..) at many other cinemas.

...and you tell them that the payout comes from the center of the roll.....and there is no resistance when film leaves the center of the roll.

..where do these 'booth clowns' come up with these crazy ideas anywho..

-Monte
 

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Posted by Robert Burtcher (Member # 3227) on 04-30-2006, 03:39 AM:
 
Monte,

Not a clue. At least the managers had their heads on right. They about filled the booth with bricks when the previous guy told them he'd waxed the platters.
 

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Posted by Paul Montz (Member # 3741) on 05-01-2006, 01:35 AM:
 
so not having people trained rightthat are under me is awesome (got to love bosses that wont let me train people) , not to mention that i have only been head of my booth for about a year. but still certain things are or should be known not to do. we had a brain wrap one day i was gone and they decided to cut it out and string it on the floor from end to end and re load it by hand, they reloaded around 30 minutes of film back on to the platter, needless to say it looked like crap afterwards. we just need to teach people to think more i guess. and my boss always wonders why are prints look like crap
 

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Posted by Frank Angel (Member # 248) on 05-01-2006, 10:29 AM:
 
In a change-over house years ago, the chief projectionist had put on the wrong reel. He realized as soon as he made the change-over that he had put the wrong reel on -- R5 instead of R4. He yelled at me to grab R4 for him, but he didn't stop R5. He just let it play as he threaded up R4. I ask why he wasn't stopping R5. He said, "Oh, I never stop the show, unless I absolutely have to." I asked what he planned on doing. He told me to "watch and learn." He unthreaded what he had on the second projector and threaded R4l he watched the screen for a moment and then made a change-over. The audience never saw a dark screen. Of course they would see a few minutes of the same material that they already saw when R5 comes around again, but he said that would be less of an visible mistake than stopping the show for the time it would take to remove what was on the second projector and rethread the right reel.

I must say, although I thought that procedure was just compounding the mistake, not a single patron complained or even mentioned it. On the other hand, this was at a Drive-in.

So do we have a pro and con here? Which is a more agregious error (assuming a change-over booth)? I am on the side of stopping the wrong reel. My rule of thumb is, if the filmmaker were in the audience, what would he/she think.
 

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Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 05-01-2006, 12:26 PM:
 
If the film-maker was in the audience he'd probably have a heart attack when the first frame of the wrong reel hit the screen... but he's a guy who knows his movie intimately, whereas unless you're showing a classic, the audience doesn't know diddly-squat.

In a change over situation I would let the film run, thread the proper reel as fast as possible and change'er over. 75% of the crowd wouldn't notice, and those people who did notice would get back into the story and forget it happened. (IF it's a good movie, that is.)
 

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Posted by John Pytlak (Member # 331) on 05-01-2006, 12:46 PM:
 
I agree, in a change-over theatre, if you accidently put the wrong reel up, better to quickly correct your mistake without going to a blank screen. A minute or so of repeated action will be less obvious than a blank screen. About the only exception would be a movie where the premature wrong reel gave away the ending of the movie or a "spoiler".
 

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Posted by Sam D. Chavez (Member # 1841) on 05-01-2006, 01:14 PM:
 
Being a purist, I think you should stop and put up the correct reel.

But, on the one occasion in 14 years I put up the wrong reel, I kept running and changed back to the correct reel.

The movie was "Bullitt" I had a full house in a brand new theatre and the Chief Projectionist in the house (not in the audience). Didn't want to draw attention to myself and get fired. It's amazing how fast the mind (even one with 102 fever) can work in crisis mode.

I went all the way from reel 2 before the car chase to reel 5 where the effects of the chase were being discussed. It only took about 30 seconds and only 7 people came out to ask WTF.

Turned out the Chief had left the building so all was cool.
 

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Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 05-01-2006, 01:40 PM:
 
Yep..did that as well - put on a wrong reel, realized that I did that, kept the wrong reel playing while I hurriedly put on the correct reel on the other machine (left the lamphouse on knowing that I had enough positive carbon length) and quickly and smoothly did the changeover...and did get the out of some of the customers..

Now, what's bad is when you do the changeover and you've forgotten to check for positive carbon length and the rod is way too short for the duration of the reel. This is when you remember the show and the dark scenes - good place to switch off the lamphouse to put a new rod, or a stub rod that can run the rest of the reel - you might get a few yells or honks if at a drive-in, but it was only off for a few seconds.

Ah..the life of a projectionist. Can the booth operators nowdays handle such crisis and stay under control?

-monte
 

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Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 05-01-2006, 02:09 PM:
 

quote: Monte L Fullmer

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Now, what's bad is when you do the changeover and you've forgotten to check for positive carbon length and the rod is way too short for the duration of the reel.

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Been there, done that. With the theatre owner in the booth, no less.

/me hides face in shame
 

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Posted by Frank Angel (Member # 248) on 05-02-2006, 12:06 AM:
 
Ah, that super shot of adrenalin that surges through your blood when you nonchalantly peer into that lamphouse and !KAZAM! -- you see that you've got 5 minutes left on the carbon and 10 minutes on the reel! I am sure you loose a couple of days at the end of your life due to that shock to your system (then again, who wants those extra few days drooling in the rest home anyway?).

With the good ole Magnarcs, if you are running out of the postitive, you're a gonner, BUT, if you were running out of the negative carbon, there's this little trick that you can do; it's saved my life at least two times: once the transport mechanism can no longer feed the negative rod, there is nearly an inch of rod left beyond the end of the support. Of course normally you can't burn that inch. BUT, you can open the back of the lamphouse and loosen the mirror screw lock at the top of the mirror holder. Unscrew the knurled lock nut at the bottom of the mirror holder as well. Then you can slowly adjust the mirror and the positive carbon simultaniously so that you keep the arc focused as the negative burns back toward the support -- you're moving the mirror to follow it. You can get about 5 minutes out of this which JUST be enough to finish the reel, and to save your ass. However, you are not out of the woods yet. The next trick is to judge exactly when you need to leave that machine and get over to the other machine to make your changeover. You've to time it just right because there are two pitfalls -- 1) you misjudge how close you are to the changeover and you leave your arc focusing manuver and go to the other machine. But you've misjudge and you wait and wait for your cues and since you are no longer adjusting the arc focus and feed, the arc dims and go out, or 2) you miss judge when you need to get to the other projector and you miss the motor cue. If the celluloid gods are smileing on you, you get it just right and no one notices that you pee-ed your pants.
 

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Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 05-02-2006, 12:32 AM:
 

quote: Frank Angel

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With the good ole Magnarcs

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.. when your negative is too short for the run, I'd shove a new rod BEHIND the short one by very gradually opening up the jaws with the lock arm - not to loose arc connection, then suddenly and quickly dump the knife switch, shove that old stub through with the new rod, roll the negative unit back with one turn (knowing that one turn is a good 2 inches of negative feed), snap down the lock arm, throw the knife switch and do a hurry up strike..all in 10 seconds..or less..

Ah..once again, the fun stuff as a "projectionist of yore"

-Monte
 

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Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 05-02-2006, 12:48 AM:
 
Gosh, I really do hate the hassle of xenons running out of life and platters running the reels in the wrong order!
 

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Posted by Frank Angel (Member # 248) on 05-02-2006, 12:59 AM:
 
Yeah, but if I run a reel out of order, I can fix it in about 45 seconds. Try doing THAT with a reel spliced out of order on a platter!
 

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Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 05-02-2006, 01:34 AM:
 

quote: Monte L Fullmer

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Now, what's bad is when you do the changeover and you've forgotten to check for positive carbon length and the rod is way too short for the duration of the reel.

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I did that a time or three.

Probably the dumbest thing I ever did in my changeover days was, I was running the first show of a new movie and somehow I got it in my head it was a 5-reel print. So I thread up reel 5 and it's running, and I'm relaxing and just sort of watching the end of the movie...only it's not ending. "This is going to be the most abrupt ending in the history of cinema," I'm thinking, when finally with about a minute or 90 seconds of film left to play in reel 5, I happened to glance at the can...and there was reel 6, still with paper band in place! And this was back in the days when most everything arrived tails up, so there I was frantically hand-winding that thing as fast as I could when reel 5 ran out....then the owner came busting into the room and chewed me out good. Needless to say I was better about verifying the # of reels after that.

Can't remember the movie title but I do remember it had Brian Keith in it.
 

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Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 05-02-2006, 03:21 PM:
 
This is heaven - what a "real" projectionist does:


 

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Posted by Rick Raskin (Member # 1561) on 05-02-2006, 04:20 PM:
 
Notice a real projectionist who doesn't let the film touch the floor.

My goof was once when I was working at the old Penn Theatre in DC. The regular operator had spliced trailers to the head of reel 1 which overflowed the reel by about an inch. Likewise Reel 5, a short reel, had been spliced onto reel 4 and overflowed by the same amount. When I changed over to reel 4, trailers hit the screen. I raced to thread up the correct reel on the outbound machine, trimmed carbon and made another changeover back to the correct reel as the trailer ended. Never a complaint. I guess the audience thought it was just a commercial.
 

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Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 05-03-2006, 12:15 AM:
 

quote: Mike Blakesley

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....then the owner came busting into the room and chewed me out good. Needless to say I was better about verifying the # of reels after that.

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..wait until you hit that so-called last reel since it's your first night on shift and another operator worked the opening film date.

You hit that so-called last reel,and as Mike mentioned, that "last" reel was coming up and you suddenly realize that wasn't the last reel...but, where in the frik was that last reel? You looked in the cabinet and you're certain that you pulled that last reel out since the next bin was empty. Then, I started to panic: I went through each bin and found a reel of film ..unrewound and it was the last reel. Previous kid operator placed that reel in the wrong bin-he was too lazy to rewind that last reel at the end of the night and just placed it in the wrong bin ..way down at the end of the cabinet set so he can get out of there in a quick.

So, as what Mike did, cranked my arm off rewinding that reel - and just in time since the reel alarm went off while I was cranking away like mad, and we had a good two minute delay from alarm to first cue to be seen on the screen, thus, even though I missed the first cues when I was done, I only allowed the "4" and "3" to hit the screen when I punched the dowser and sound changeover.

I told this to the chief projectionist and he immediately took that lazy idiot out of the booth immediately. That kid was the assistant manager's brother who needed a job.

Only the STRONG MUTS can rewind a reel faster than cranking your arm off on those Neumade crank assemblies.

I became the chief projectionist at this theatre 4 yrs later due to the retirement of the previous chief projectionist.

-Monte
 

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Posted by Frank Angel (Member # 248) on 05-03-2006, 01:50 AM:
 
OK, but you guys actually HAD the last reel and you cranked and you got it on the screen.

I had a situation that didn't have that happy ending. The museum where I freelance was also breaking in another freelancer and asked me if I would show him the oddities of the booth. As it turns out, he had only worked platters so I was walking him thru the oddities of the booth and the changeover operation.

The museum programming is very eclectic and they book all kinds of odd stuff, so when I went found a single can in the booth with four reels in it, I figured, OK, another one of those artsy-fartsy films and thank you that it's short. And of course they never schedule a preshow run, so it's hand inspect and on the screen she goes. Only this day I was distracted by my new coworker. No excuse, but there it is. Now I run the show and all is fine, perfect changeovers (he's very impressed) and as I am blathering away I am hearing the dialogue out of one ear while trying to answer his questions at the same time I am looking at the 5 minutes of the "last reel." Seems those characters on the screen are talking about going into town to do something that sounds to me like a setup for a sequel, because by god they are not going to get it done by the end of this reel. It dawns on me we are wadding up to our noses in it and we are about to go under. I ask him, "Uhh, Jason, is there another can somewhere?" He senses my urgency. "Why?" "Well, this reel here is about to end and it's not the end of the movie." He turns white....I swear, even in the darkened booth with blue show lights, it is as if someone just sucked all the blood out of him. He tries to ask a question, but can't even formulate it. Then he almost whispers, but in a high, almost girlie voice, "But that's the cue." I taught him well. "Yes, Jason, now we bring up the lights." He is shaking. "Now what are you going to do?" he asks. And I swear, this is exactly how I said it, "Oh, I am not going to do anything....YOU are going to go out and tell the people that we don't have the last two reels of the film." I saw that he was so terrified that I had to help out or he could have fainted right then and there. I said, not to worry that I would go out and tell them. Which I did and they took it very nicely. I said we were very sorry, they could get refunds, etc., and I thought I was going to get away scott free until one guy asked the question that I almost ducked -- "Well, how come you didn't know this wasn't the last reel before you started showing it." I knew that in my defense I couldn't tell him that there actually was a fade out at the end of the reel and that I was gabbing away and distracted by the new guy on the block, maybe soon to be the only guy on the block. I just mumbled something to the effect that I was sorry and slunk away back into the booth, where, BTW, there was no escape because the entire front wall is glass -- Nowhere to run, nowhere to hide!!

Jason and I became great friends but both of us only talk about that day when know one else is around and then only in hushed tones. But we do get a great laugh out of it.
 

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Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 05-03-2006, 03:58 AM:
 
..Frank - That's a good one. Ever find that other can of film that should have been with the other 4reel can, or just a shipping goofup and only one can was shipped?

Went to one of my theatres that I take care of (back when Matrix 2 came out) to watch the movie for a pre screening. Danged if I didn't see reel 4 being played back to back. ETS had shipped out two, reel 4's, and no reel 5 in the one can and the 'booth clown' at this theatre didn't catch this goofup when building.

Might say, that the first two showings were cancelled until that missing reel 5 was shipped in the next day.

I've told, told and told these idiots to check the prints immediately when they get arrive at the theatres, so if there is a goofup, the depots can be called immediately to order the proper print correction so that the corrected delivery can arrive early on Friday.

But, do you think that they listen, at least one percent of the time?

- thx Monte
 

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Posted by Christopher Meredith (Member # 3767) on 05-03-2006, 07:10 PM:
 
I'm sure this is not the best place for my first post, but I will admit the dumbest thing I've ever done.

Within the first few weeks of my "promotion" to the booth, I was in a situation where I had threaded a movie up in the wrong house. So what did I do?

I attempted to move the print (White Chicks) by myself... with no ring in the middle. I cranked something like 8 film clamps on it and slid it into my arms. I waddled over to the right house and dumped the thing on the platter, taking off the clamps and forming it into the best circle I could.

I managed to get it threaded back up and started right on time. Of course, I did have to manually spin the platter the whole time cause we have Strong platters with motors which have been rebuilt a half dozen times. They tend to backwrap a little, then "catch up" real fast, which would certainly have sent my messy print off the platter.
 

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Posted by William Collins (Member # 3773) on 05-03-2006, 07:33 PM:
 
I got a good one. Whilst I was working for a 6 screen cinema in the UK, there was a young girl employed who decided to just 'have a go' at being a projectionist. she was trained up to do the simplest of things, and she was asked to plate off a film.

At the time she was on her own in the booth and she set everything up but couldnt find a spare ring to put in the centre of the film. so she thought that she would try doing it with out a ring but slowly! she started it going slowly, and left it for a few seconds. then woosh, the whole print came flaying off the platter and onto the floor in a giant ball of film.

The silly girl then tried to rectify this on her own with out telling anyone and spent about 4 hours winding the film from the tangled mess on the floor onto spools manually!

Least to say when I re-made the print and played it to check the damage, it was, ruined. she later removed herself from the booth and back to making popcorn!
 

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Posted by Paul Burt (Member # 3743) on 05-06-2006, 05:54 PM:
 
I had a screening of "Fight Club" for some academy members back when the film was under consideration. The print arrived shortly before screen time, and since we do changeovers, I just checked the heads of the reels. All seemed fine: the leaders were double spliced on all reels, and properly labeled. Since it was a US release print, I assumed the cue marks & such were normal, as they always are, especially since the print had come from the studio.
Midway through reel two there was a splice, in the middle of a scene. The picture reversed, and the soundtrack showed up on the right side of the screen. Frantically, I unthreaded the machine, reversed the splice, and started up again. A few minutes later the film reversed again, at another obviously deliberate splice. I was beginning to suspect that the last operator had taken the antics of the character Tyler Durden to heart.
At the changover to reel 5, the film came up upside down and backward. The leaders were spliced on that way, at both ends (both of which were very dark scenes & hard to make out).
And as a final bit of fun, the last operator had glued a piece of felt to the middle of reel 6, so the film lost the loop going through the gate. And in case anyone missed the point, he had spliced selected frames OUT of the film.
All in all, the worst evening in the booth, and the nastiest trashing of a film I've seen.
 

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Posted by Leo Enticknap (Member # 534) on 05-07-2006, 05:44 AM:
 
My first 'solo' screening at a London arthouse was the Thursday afternoon old folks' matinee, which that week was Brief Encounter. The chief projectionist was generally pissed off at life, the world and everything (and me, who he thought had been brought in as part of a plan to ease him out). He'd made up the print and left it on six 2k running spools in the rack. As builders were in the following morning, there was to be no time for a rehearsal screening, but he'd assured me that he'd checked the print and that it would run OK.

I found out the hard way that he'd removed reel 4, put it in his locker and substituted it for a reel of a hard core gay porn film called No Skin Off My Ass. So I did a seemless changeover from Celia Johnson and Trevor Howard whispering discreetly to each other on the railway station, to two skinheads having oral sex! What made it worse was that I knew the changeover shutter on the outgoing machine to be a bit sticky, so immediately after the changeover I dashed over to close the douser, and didn't actually realise what was on the screen until, I'd guess, around 20 seconds of it. The incident made the local paper, and it's a wonder there weren't any heart attacks in the audience.
 

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Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 05-07-2006, 01:56 PM:
 
I was running a movie about the Andes plane crash of 1972, called "Survive" .. in late 1976.

Up in the booth, we had a PA system to make announcements through the sound system.

Dummy here made an announcement that the snakbar was closing when it was time .AND...when the survivors of this crash were doing the cannibalistic duty to survive. BAD TIMING!!

... talk about the roar of laughter coming from the audience..and the manager came up to the booth, screaming at me for my horrible bad timing...but we laughed about it afterwards when we left the theatre that night...

I learned from then on to pay more attention when I do announcements - to find a segment that has nothing to do with food sales,.or eating.

-Monte
 

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Posted by Kara J. McVay (Member # 1285) on 05-07-2006, 05:18 PM:
 
This is one we still laugh about, we still had 2 booths that were both reel to reel carbon booths on 2 different levels. We usually had just one of us running both booths, so it was a constant back and forth thing. Anyway if both movies were lets say 5 reels, we would build up to 6K reels like: 3 & 2 and the other booth 2 & 3.

We had had a movie for a while running in booth #2 that WAS for weeks in a 2 & 3 format, but we got in another movie and made it 3 & 2. I can't rember why, but it worked out better for the changeover. We were training a new girl Bobbi to do changeovers, she only worked on the weekends, so she didn't know we switched the reels. So she came in to work, we forgot to tell her and all of a sudden she sees the changover scene approaching, she panics and tries to light the carbons on the #2 projector too fast and shoved them so hard together that they were standing straight up in the air. She came running up to the other booth in a panic that she was going to miss the changeover, we went back down and pointed to the 6K reel with 20 min. of film left. 20 years later we still giggle about that.

Carbons, oh how I miss you......
 

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Posted by Chris Unwin (Member # 3792) on 05-19-2006, 06:21 AM:
 
I once saw a manager drop a whole print on the floor and it rolled down the stairs into the middle of the lobby ten minutes before the first of four shows for that day. It took me eight frustrating hours to fix HIS mess. Oh ya..........all four shows were canceled for the day.....the company gave up their plan of trying to replace projectionists' with manager "THREADERS"..........and I never did see that manager again!
 

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Posted by Dan Zastrow (Member # 3796) on 05-21-2006, 04:05 PM:
 
I had a trainee who after starting a projector using a Cat. 701 digital sound head was sure that the drive sprocket wasn’t moving. So…she stuck her index finger in it! Left a nice set of sprocket holes in her fingernail. She left after doing a similar thing with a 6K reel on the rewind table.
 

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Posted by Tom Sauter (Member # 616) on 05-21-2006, 05:01 PM:
 
I was training a guy to run changeovers a few years ago, and he had this great idea that instead of watching for the cue marks he would just time the reels with his stopwatch. I told him not to, that it wouldn't work, etc, and he agreed, but being something of an ass he didn't take my advice. I was in the booth with him, watching over his shoulder, as the motor cue hit. A few seconds later I began saying, over and over, with increasing urgency, "start the motor. start the motor. START THE F***ING MOTOR!" But he wasn't paying attention, rather, he was staring at his stopwatch convinced he had another 20 seconds to go. After the tail ran through, and he treated the audience to a nice countdown leader, he got the point.
 

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