Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Theatre safety with "GODS & GENERALS"

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Posted by Claude S. Ayakawa (Member # 1401) on 02-23-2003, 04:48 PM:

Although there is another thread about this film and it's scheduling, I felt it would be better if I started another one because it involves theatre safety.
I mentioned this in my review of "GODS & GENERALS yesterday after seeing the film and it botherd me very much that I wanted to bring it up here for discussion. During the intermission at the performance I saw at Pacific's Kapoei 16 in auditorium #12, the house light was never turned on during the intermission. It appeared as though the projectionist just started the show and just let it run until the end without bothering to see to it that the house lights were brought up during the intermission. The projector lamp was not turned off when the blank leader was running through the machine so this is the reason why I feel the showing was un attended . There were 48 people at the showing and the majority did get up to go to the bathroom or the snack bar and had to maneuver their way in the dark during the intermission. Yes, there were exit signs and aisle lights that were lit but the auditorium was still very dark and people could have tripped and got hurt. Thank God, the theatre does not have stadium seating because the risk would have been even greater. I have heard that there are magnetic device that can be placed on the edge of the film that can control the lighting in a auditorium and I dont know why it was not used if the theatre was set up for the system. Another thing that bothered me yesterday was the staff cleaning the auditorium during the credits when the theatre was going to be down for two hours before the next show at 7:30 PM. I doubt very much if the theatre was going to be used for another feature because The show I saw ended at 5:30 and the amount of time it takes to turn around a show and a audience, is roughy about thirty minutes. Even if another short feature started at 6:00, it must end no later than 7:00 so the projector can be retreaded and the audience is seated for the next performance of "GOD's & GENERALS" at 7:30. Who knows with theatre owners desire to make as much money as possibe, there might have been another very short feature that ran between the new civil war film.

-Claude

Posted by David Stambaugh (Member # 1102) on 02-23-2003, 05:03 PM:

As I noted in my review, a patron at Gods & Generals fell on the stadium steps during the intermission, and this was with the lights on! I was watching the booth, and the show appeared to be completely unattended -- the projector kept running with the lamp on but nobody was there. They used automation cues for the lights. Good thing too, because if the lights had not been up, that customer who fell might have had an airtight case against the theatre. It's also worth noting that this film seems to be drawing an older audience than usual, hence even more need to be careful to have proper lighting during the intermission.

Posted by Daryl C. W. O'Shea (Member # 1303) on 02-23-2003, 05:04 PM:

quote:
I have heard that there are magnetic device that can be placed on the edge of the film that can control the lighting in a auditorium and I dont know why it was not used if the theatre was set up for the system.

It's not quite so simple. Many automations can't handle an intermission and don't have seperate lighting cues. They may just have 'Start Show', 'Start Credits', 'End Show'. Some might not even have a 'Start Show' cue. Each of these cue's combine the control of the lights, projector motor, lamp, sound, curtains, etc.

Of course there is no reason why they couldn't have manually turned the lights up and down during the intermission. That's what you get when you have operators that don't care. [thumbsdown]

I guess that's what happens when you stick an intermission in the middle of a reel... you limit the number of installations that can handle it without effort (which shouldn't be an issue but is).

Posted by David Stambaugh (Member # 1102) on 02-23-2003, 05:08 PM:

Not to beat this to death, but you'd think that with an unusual situation like this -- a film with an intermission -- they would have some kind of staff meeting where management or somebody makes it VERY clear that the lights must be manually turned on and off at the appropriate times if their automation can't do it. No lights + People getting up = Lawsuit. Add stadium seating and it's more like Lawsuit x 10. [Eek!]

Posted by Daryl C. W. O'Shea (Member # 1303) on 02-23-2003, 06:28 PM:

quote:
you'd think that with an unusual situation like this they would have some kind of staff meeting where management or somebody makes it VERY clear that the lights must be manually turned on and off at the appropriate times if their automation can't do it

We all know that popcornjectionists aren't the only incompentent employees in some theatres.

Posted by Kenny Thies (Member # 1551) on 02-23-2003, 08:30 PM:

With us playing Gods & Generals, safety was a big concern. I've been there for every intermission to make sure everything is okay in the auditorium, evening though I am a lucky one to have an automation that handles the extra light ques. It worked perfectly, but still, I was in the auditorium for each intermission all weekend.

Posted by Matt Hale (Member # 1518) on 02-23-2003, 09:23 PM:

At the theatre where I saw Gs&Gs, they left the auditorium lights half-on through the entire movie. Not bright enough to be distracting, but not really bright enough to be usefull either. Now I know their automation is capable of multiple lighting cues, so my only explanation is that they were expecting alot of people to be walking out during the movie...
[Confused]

Posted by Aldo Baez (Member # 790) on 02-23-2003, 10:15 PM:

I was going to post in the other thread about turning the lights on during the end credits but I decided to post here.

I'm wondering what the difference is between turning on the lights during an intermission, and turning on the lights during the credits?? In both cases people are virtually guaranteed to be leaving the theatre and it's only with safety in mind that you turn up the lights. For our intermission we have the lights go on to *half* brightness, the same with the closing credits on all movies. I find this the best way to respect the people who want to watch the credits without the lights glaring but to also consider the people leaving who may have a hard time seeing anything.

I guess I want to know if you turn on the lights full and someone complains, but then you turn around and someone tells you that they would like the lights on so they can watch their step leaving, what exactly would everyone do? I'm assuming that everyone would want to have them on .. but the other thread is getting really big about keeping them *off* so.. which is it??

Posted by Mark Maxwell (Member # 1355) on 02-23-2003, 11:56 PM:

There shouldn't even have to be a meeting. It's just good common sence on the projectionists part that if theres an intermission on a long movie, quite a few people are going to get up at one time. The same people made Ghettiesburgh, and I saw that when I was 15 at the crappiest theater in town and even there the lights came on automaticly. The only reason I remember that is because I was sitting there watching the movie and then it said intermission and I was saying to myself " what the... that's a crappy way to end a movie."

Posted by Kenny Thies (Member # 1551) on 02-23-2003, 11:58 PM:

I *think* the other thread is about leaving the lights off that you use to clean with, not the lights hooked up to your automation dimmer. I may be wrong...

Posted by Aldo Baez (Member # 790) on 02-24-2003, 02:10 AM:

Oh geez ok the bright halogen lights I can understand about keeping those off. But still, some people say that there shouldn't be *any* lights at all until the credits finish....

Posted by Darryl Spicer (Member # 711) on 02-24-2003, 01:08 PM:

I decided to run the film in two parts. Lights come up at the end of part one and stay on until the 4 minute mark then they dim to half and after 4 mins. they go to full. This forces the projectionist to be there for the second part and to change the disc's. Works well and no one has complained about it.

Posted by Claude S. Ayakawa (Member # 1401) on 02-24-2003, 02:15 PM:

Darryl,

What do you mean when you say you are running "GODS AND GENERALS" in two parts? Are you saying that you have split the print into two parts and each on a seperate platter? If not and you are running the print as a whole on a single platter, what is the differece than the way most projectionist are doing now by manually adjusting the lights during the intermission?

-Claude

Posted by Darryl Spicer (Member # 711) on 02-24-2003, 02:44 PM:

Yes I am running the film on two platters. The reasons are because I have had situations with speco platters that when the film gets that far out they want to speed up and slow down running the risk of slinging the film off. It also makes moving the print around much easier. We had to move it over the weekend because it was selling out. At the end of the first part at the intermission the lights go all the way full. after starting the second part the lights stay full then the cue that we use for the lights up programing is read at the beggining of the 4 min music section in the intermission to bring the lights to half. Then I use a cue to bring the lights down to full dim at then end of the black segments. This practice has worked well and makes for a professionally handled presentation.

Posted by Claude S. Ayakawa (Member # 1401) on 02-24-2003, 03:19 PM:

Since most theatre appears to and have scheduled just two shows a day without a shorter feature in between, what you are doing makes a whole lot of sense. Warner Brothers idea of running the print non stop in my opinion is very asinine and encourages projectionist to be lazy and not bother with the showing once it starts like the operator did at the Kapolei 16 yesterday. I respect your professional integrity, Darryl!

-Claude

Posted by David Stambaugh (Member # 1102) on 02-24-2003, 03:34 PM:

I like Darryl's approach too, even though the Cinemark here ran it non-stop & unattended with no problems. It was weird though to look up in the booth during the intermission with the lights up and everything and see film still running through the projector and the screen with a kind of eery dark glow. [eyes]

Posted by Daryl C. W. O'Shea (Member # 1303) on 02-24-2003, 03:54 PM:

quote:
Warner Brothers idea of running the print non stop in my opinion is very asinine and encourages projectionist to be lazy and not bother with the showing once it starts like the operator did at the Kapolei 16 yesterday.

On the other hand, it prevents per-cap obsessed managers from having an excessively long intermission.

Posted by Ray Brown (Member # 1449) on 02-26-2003, 08:28 PM:

quote:
I have heard that there are magnetic device that can be placed on the edge of the film that can control the lighting in a auditorium

Claude, here's an example of some of the cues we use. The cues are set up differently in every theater. We use 1/4 inch cue foil with our CE TA-10 automation and plan on using the lights up and down cues during the intermission of Gods and Generals.

Here's what ours do from top to bottom.
1. Change lens from flat to scope. (used when running flat trailers & scope movie)
2. Change lens from scope to flat. (never used)
3. Lights up.
4. Lights down.

There are 3 sensors on the cue reader/failsafe.
Outboard (soundtrack side), Center & Inboard. Any combination of the 3 can be used to trigger and event. With our setup, we are only using 1 or 2 of the sensors at a time to trigger an event.

I was a little sloppy putting this together but this should give you an idea how it looks and works.

Posted by Claude S. Ayakawa (Member # 1401) on 02-26-2003, 09:27 PM:

Thanks Ray! [Smile]

-Claude

Posted by John Pytlak (Member # 331) on 02-27-2003, 08:57 AM:

quote:
Outboard (soundtrack side), Center & Inboard. Any combination of the 3 can be used to trigger and event. With our setup, we are only using 1 or 2 of the sensors at a time to trigger an event.

I was a little sloppy putting this together but this should give you an idea how it looks and works.

Cues that intrude into the picture or soundtrack areas hurt presentation quality. [Frown]

The use of notched or metal foil cues on printing originals has almost completely been replaced by frame count cueing, where cues are synced to frame count picked up by an encoder.

Posted by David Stambaugh (Member # 1102) on 02-27-2003, 11:24 AM:

This question is straying off-topic, maybe should be in its own thread. Anyway, with Christie automation & cues, do the cues always cover part of the image area (and thus are visible onscreen)? Or does this only happen on scope prints? Or should Christie cues never be visible at all onscreen, regardless of whether it's a flat or scope print?

Posted by Ray Brown (Member # 1449) on 02-27-2003, 08:15 PM:

Yes this is straying off topic. Claude had asked a question about metal cues and if they can control the lighting, so I gave him a quick demo.

Sometimes you have to sacrifice a little on the presentation when you are getting by with what you got. I like to keep the cues in the frame lines on the base side to keep the distraction down to a bare minumum. We remove the cues before we ship the print back out.

What I hate is when we get prints with cues buried under splice tape and they are different than our setup.(almost every print) One theaters lights up cue is another theaters scope to flat cue ect. ect.

Anyway back to the subject. It looks like we will be getting Gods & Generals and I plan on using the lights up and down cues during the intermission for customer safety.

Posted by Aldo Baez (Member # 790) on 02-27-2003, 09:42 PM:

David I luckily got the cue stamper thing that lets me put the cues as just a little tiny dot (kinda like a hole puncher) on the film. With my automation I just have three cues one on the soundtrack, one in the middle of the film, and one opposite the soundtrack. Luckily the cue readers have a generous pickup where I can put the cues as far outside of the actual film as possible so that only about half a dot is shown onscreen.