The wierd part was that I had fine-focused at the start of the feature and had checked all the screens constantly, including that one and hadn't seen any problems. Nonetheless, when I received the complaint, I ran down to check and it was tack-sharp. One of the characters was wearing a chequered jacket and each square was perfectly defined. You could clearly make out individual strands of hair. I stood and watched for about 10 minutes and it stayed sharp throughout. Note that this print has played in this auditorium for about a week, several sessions a day without any issues...I did not touch the focus knob at any time from the moment I received the complaint and noted that the end credits were razor sharp, like someone had taken a letraset and rubbed off letters onto the screen. No focus problems and no drift whatsoever, yet the customers who left felt otherwise.

Has anyone experienced this sort of thing before? The frustrating part is that you usually don't get to talk to the customer directly, so you hear it second hand and by that time it's too late - they have already left. Could it be some of the shallow depth-of-field photography in this movie that the customer could be confusing with out-of-focus projection? There's not many of these shots in it and there are many deep-focus shots there, too...what's going on?

Nice place hunh?

Anyways... No clue Mike! I guess patrons can always lie!

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Andrew McCrea

Perhaps they sat very close to the screen; perhaps they didn't like the film and used focus as an excuse to get their money back (or a pass.)

Since you monitor the focus several times during each show and saw no problem, and you actually went into the auditorium for a closer look right after the complaint and saw no problem, and no one else complained, I would agree this couple was just looking for free passes.

Your practice of checking focus frequently is commendable, and one important part of "doing film right".

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John P. Pytlak, Senior Technical Specialist
Worldwide Technical Services, Entertainment Imaging
Eastman Kodak Company
Research Labs, Building 69, Room 7419
Rochester, New York, 14650-1922 USA
Tel: 716-477-5325 Cell: 716-781-4036 Fax: 716-722-7243
E-Mail: john.pytlak@kodak.com
Web site: http://www.kodak.com/go/motion

Tom: I'd have to go with the assessment that it was a quest for free passes. I watched the movie right through the night after it happened, and the focus really is perfect.

I've got no firm explanation, just some ideas, but the drift seemed to follow the reel from showing to showing, whether on the A or B projector.

The thoughts I had:
1. Damage from proud edges causing the film to lift slightly in the gate. With platters not yet common, these could be caused by someone running a projector where the takeup clutch was screwed down too tight. The damage wouldn't have to be excessive for this to happen, and would be greater when the torque on the take-up reel was greater. Warping along the edge from damaged shipping reels might cause something similar.
2. Dirt or excessive wax building up on the gate shoes and then getting knocked off by a splice.
3. Drift from different thickness or type of stocks, or even different pitch sprocket holes on the intermittent, coupled with a tight gate? I mention these only because I couldn't rule them out.

The projectors were the Norelcos with the thin metal band shoes in the gate. I've never been confident that those thin slightly convex bands wouldn't deform under certain conditions and cause a drift of film position, especially when the bands were worn and almost paper thin at points.

I'm sure there are other possibilities. For instance, I never was able to figure out how a change of alignment in the lamphouse always seemed to affect the focus slightly. Could the arc have been wandering?

Part of my point is to always take a customer complaint seriously. That said, there is yet another possibility...

What about secondary reflections from behind the screen?

The light goes through the holes in the screen, reflects off the rear wall or even a speaker (or some other piece of equipment).
The reflection can produce a sort of hazy, double image that comes and goes when you move your head.

It's more pronnounced during scenes with bright objects against a dark background, like credits.

We had that at my old theatre. It turned out to be reflections off the masking motors. We went around and spray painted them all black. Still, that didn't take care of SOME of them. We had to put up some ceiling tiles painted black, placed at an angle to act as guards.

At the college I used to work at we used to hang black border curtains behind the screen to prevent reflections off the light colored back wall.

I'm surprised the whole audience didn't say it was out of focus just to get out the door with some dignity! (Oh...or did those two patrons make up the entire audience?)

John Travolta - Battlefield Earth...Lucky Numbers...next stop...the unemployment queue.