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Author Topic: I love explaining interlocking to managers who never handled film Justin Hamaker Film God Posts: 2253 From: Lakeport, CA USA Registered: Jan 2004 posted 11-29-2019 07:09 PM                        Since my threatre has been fully digital for 8 years, I've had a number of assistant managers who have never experienced working with film. I always love telling them about interlocking, then showing the video of interlocking 16 screens. They are always so amazed by it. It's also fun explaining how different the business operation was with film vs digital, especially talking about the things like print throws, threading backwards, and the other things that could go wrong. More than anything it's interesting to see how digital has changed the way we manage our show times and operate the theatre. One downside of losing film is I realize it was a good core exercise. 20-25 repetitions a day of the bending and twisting involved with threading a projector actually helped keep my stomach flat.  |  IP: Logged Brad Miller Administrator Posts: 17775 From: Plano, TX (36.2 miles NW of Rockwall) Registered: May 99 posted 11-29-2019 07:39 PM                     quote: Justin Hamaker More than anything it's interesting to see how digital has changed the way we manage our show times That's what delayed interlocking was for!  |  IP: Logged Bobby Henderson "Ask me about Trajan." Posts: 10973 From: Lawton, OK, USA Registered: Apr 2001 posted 11-29-2019 07:42 PM                     Interlocking could be pretty cool. I liked the demo video here on this web site. Those old Flash-based videos need to be converted to a format that can play on modern browsers and mobile devices. The old Carmike 8 in my town didn't interlock very often. They would do it with a few opening night releases of big event movies. The theater would receive 1 or 2 prints of the big movie. But the screen count would double via interlocking, usually between the two THX houses and the pair of auditoriums flanking them to the left and right. Since only one set of DTS discs shipped with a print I made dupes of the discs so all shows would at least have DTS. One print, two sets of discs.  |  IP: Logged Brad Miller Administrator Posts: 17775 From: Plano, TX (36.2 miles NW of Rockwall) Registered: May 99 posted 11-29-2019 07:51 PM                     Bobby, that is finally in the works. I think Justin should show his staff this video of one of my platter array setups.  |  IP: Logged Justin Hamaker Film God Posts: 2253 From: Lakeport, CA USA Registered: Jan 2004 posted 11-29-2019 07:57 PM                        I interlocked 3 screens a couple of times for midnight premieres of Twilight movies. And I think I did a 2 screen interlock one time to add seats for a showing that sold out very early. I know 3 screens is amateur hour for Brad, but I was pretty impressed with myself for making it work. I can't even imagine the delayed interlock, but we also didn't have the equipment to "fly" the film overhead. quote: That's what delayed interlocking was for! Unfortunately it wouldn't work for adding a 4th session of a really long movie. This is how the conversations came up today at work. We were talking about how we used to only be able to get 3 shows a day when the movie approached 3 hours.  |  IP: Logged Marcel Birgelen Film God Posts: 3357 From: Maastricht, Limburg, Netherlands Registered: Feb 2012 posted 11-29-2019 08:16 PM                     I still want to see a functioning interlocking system between two separate cinemas, using film-over-utility-poles.  |  IP: Logged Bobby Henderson "Ask me about Trajan." Posts: 10973 From: Lawton, OK, USA Registered: Apr 2001 posted 11-30-2019 12:35 PM                     It would be tricky to bird-proof that.  |  IP: Logged Buck Wilson Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 894 From: St. Joseph MO, USA Registered: Sep 2010 posted 12-01-2019 04:45 PM                     quote: Brad Miller I think Justin should show his staff this video of one of my platter array setups. Brad, at the end of that video, did you have the projector specific overhead light tied into automation?! That's badass!!!! What a cool idea!  |  IP: Logged Marcel Birgelen Film God Posts: 3357 From: Maastricht, Limburg, Netherlands Registered: Feb 2012 posted 12-01-2019 05:30 PM                     quote: Bobby Henderson It would be tricky to bird-proof that. A good case for FilmGuard+, with pigeon repellent. It's somehow a bit sad that those days are pretty much over. When was the last time a theater has run an interlocked film? Digital simply doesn't have the same magic as film has, probably, because we all have "digital" at home already... PS: What's the emergency procedure in a 16-projector interlock when one projector craps out? Head for the main switchboard and pull the biggest switch in it? Or simply close all the booth doors and run for it?  |  IP: Logged Brad Miller Administrator Posts: 17775 From: Plano, TX (36.2 miles NW of Rockwall) Registered: May 99 posted 12-01-2019 07:54 PM                     Emergency procedure? That's just silly. That was real honest to goodness FILM equipment. You know...gears, belts, etc. It's not like this flaky digital gear designed to fail and over-complicated with all kinds of security checks (aka failure points). Buck, yes I always wired the overhead lighting in, along with automating the auditorium janitor lighting after each show ends (so the kiddos downstairs can't flip it on until the credits are DONE) and so forth.  |  IP: Logged Buck Wilson Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 894 From: St. Joseph MO, USA Registered: Sep 2010 posted 12-02-2019 05:41 AM                     BRILLIANT!!  |  IP: Logged Sascha F. Roll Expert Film Handler Posts: 140 From: Berlin, Berlin / Germany Registered: Sep 2015 posted 12-02-2019 06:43 AM                     At the venue I worked back then we could interlock all 8 screens, although the maximum we ever did for an official screening was 4 screens. I shot a video of the 2 screen interlock at said venue in 2007 while screening the Mr Bean movie. BTW I didn't lace up the projectors, terrible upper loop size. Link to YouTube, 2 screen Interlock with Ernemann 14  |  IP: Logged Jarod Reddig Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 513 From: Hays, Ks Registered: Jun 2011 posted 12-03-2019 08:59 PM                     Cool Vid Sasha.  |  IP: Logged Sean McKinnon Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1712 From: Peabody Massachusetts Registered: Sep 2000 posted 12-04-2019 12:14 PM                        Sasha, Are the platers by Erneman? They look a lot like the Big Sky platters which would make since because Big Sky I think imported (or at least sold) Erneman in the US  |  IP: Logged Sascha F. Roll Expert Film Handler Posts: 140 From: Berlin, Berlin / Germany Registered: Sep 2015 posted 12-04-2019 03:49 PM                     Sean, in fact those are Big Sky platters - CineProject (the german distributor of Ernemann) installed those at this venue when we opened in October 2006. The whole setup with the E14 (a very basic, stripped-down E15 without frictions) and the Big Sky platters was an offer for "cost sensitive" cinema owners back then, not wanting to spend too much money on film technology when DCI was already there. We were not very happy with those platters, by the way...  |  IP: Logged

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