About a month ago at my theatre, the failsafe in projector 5 was dirty I guess, and I didn't realise it, but the little green light that tells you film is in the failsafe was on without the film. A projectionist was threading the projector, and it just started! His hands were in it! The 10 beeps from the automation BEFORE starting aren't really audible in the noisy booth.

Anyway, this sort of thing could happen all the time if you thread the failsafe first. I guess it would not be much of a problem if you had to manually start the projector, but our automation starts it automatically at the film start time.

I just wanted to see what everyone's take on this is.

 |  IP: Logged

 |  IP: Logged

I just couldn't get the hang of "threading up" so what I started doing is to "thread up" to the lowest sprocket wheel to anchor the film, take up the slack, and "thread down" the rest of the projector.
The trick is pulling the right amount of slack to thread the rest of the machine.

 |  IP: Logged

Josh's pillowcase idea is like a film editor's "trim bin" --- it keeps the film from contacting a hard surface that may scratch it. But launder the pillowcase frequently to keep it from accumulating lint and other debris that will get on the film.

Any dirt picked up by the leaders will contaminate the platter and projector, and work its way into the print, leaving lots of UGLY black dirt specks on projected image.

------------------
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

YMMV,

Demetris,
Yes, threading UP is much, much quicker than threading down if you learned that way or have the ability and/or desire to change your ways. (I say "ability" because some people just never can seem to get the hang of it, no matter how hard they try once they have learned how to thread top to bottom. Of course those are also the same people who care enough to make damn well sure that the leader never comes into contact with the floor, so it is never an issue. ) The trick is turning the intermittent to a certain point in it's travel (not just the dead spot), then actually framing on the holdback sprocket, and working your way up from there. When you have reached the top, all of your loops are perfectly set. 10 seconds is plenty to thread a typical 35mm projector when done in this fashion...and that is not sacrificing "in frame" threading or exacting loop sizes either. Just a couple of days ago Ethan was visiting me in a booth and decided to secretly time me. He said I had threaded the entire platter and projector in under 30 seconds counting from the point I finished rewinding the media cleaner up until the timer was set. I didn't even know he was timing me, but I originally learned to thread down and after forcing myself for a week to thread "up" (to get past the aggravation of the awkwardness) I can now thread much faster than I ever could when threading from top to bottom. The people I train have usually never touched a piece of film before and they just don't know any different. To fully understand, you will just have to force yourself to do it for a few weeks until you get good at it. Then you will understand why it is a more efficient way to thread. Rarelly do I ever have to reopen a pad roller to resize a loop, for they are perfect the first time (which also saves wear on the arms).

Every location I work at loops the leader
through projector rollers (top/bottom).

Then lace top to bottom.

Sometimes the film (leader)MAY touch
the floor, but floor should be clean.

There seems ongoing thought that bio floors
are DIRTY, I fail to understand that.
They should be mopped/vacuumed every night.

At the very least get one of those $2 static
mops and pass it over the the whole projection room, paying attentiomn to where the film might come close to the ground.

Film is a dust/lint magnet.
Remove the dust before the film finds it.

Bill.

That was true before the introduction of Kodak's VISION Color Print film, which has a transparent conductive backing layer that greatly reduce the static charge that can attract and hold dirt to film. If you have an old triacetate or polyester print made before about 1998, compare it to a new print on Kodak VISION Color Print film. Quickly pull a piece of the film through your fingers to try to put a static charge on the film, and then hold it near cigarette ashes or dust. The old film will attract the dirt, much like the old static demo of putting a plastic comb through your hair and attracting things to it. The Kodak VISION color print film will not hold a static charge, and stays much cleaner.

Regardless, I do agree it is always good practice to keep any film away from dirty surfaces. Many threading leaders are "dust magnets" since they are NOT made on the new Kodak VISION stock.

 |  IP: Logged