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Author Topic: In-flight Entertainment Patricia Phalen Film Handler Posts: 2 From: Washington, DC, USA Registered: Jul 2011 posted 07-28-2011 10:50 AM                     Hi all. I am researching the history of in-flight entertainment...welcoming all memories, ideas, hints on where to find archives of organizations like David Flexer's Inflight Motion Pictures...etc.  |  IP: Logged Martin McCaffery Film God Posts: 2481 From: Montgomery, AL Registered: Jun 99 posted 07-28-2011 11:08 AM                        I never worked them myself, but IATSE Local 224 in DC used to handle them back in the 16mm days. If you can find who has their records there may be useful information and names.  |  IP: Logged Patricia Phalen Film Handler Posts: 2 From: Washington, DC, USA Registered: Jul 2011 posted 07-28-2011 02:22 PM                     Thanks - that's a great thought!  |  IP: Logged Rick Raskin Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1100 From: Manassas Virginia Registered: Jan 2003 posted 07-28-2011 03:58 PM                     Local 224 is no more. The remaining members were taken into Local 22. You may want to check with them. 11247 Lockwood Dr # C Silver Spring, MD 20901-4561 (301) 593-1265  |  IP: Logged Bill Gabel Film God Posts: 3873 From: Technicolor / Postworks NY, USA Registered: Jan 2002 posted 07-28-2011 08:09 PM                     In-Flight Entertainment was handled by Local 150 in Los Angeles area. But remember the Union operators were employed by In-Flight Entertainment. So there was only X amount of people doing the job. Most of those people have long retired from the business. Talk to the Old Timers  |  IP: Logged Bruce Hansen Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 847 From: Stone Mountain, GA, USA Registered: Dec 1999 posted 07-29-2011 05:25 PM                     My father worked for Pan Am, and showed me a couple of different systems at different times. The first was a 16MM system they were trying to make work. I remember seeing this set up on saw hourses in the shop. There were two sets of projectors, and two movies wound together on a large reel. One set of projectors would run foward, and be on screen, the other set would run backward. I don't think that they ever got this to work. I can see one problem, the two films would be slightly different diamaters the way they were wound together. I was told that they had to just splice the movies back to back, and had rewinder systems at the airport. Then they went to a video tape playback system that used Sony 2" helical machines that used 7" or 8" reels.  |  IP: Logged Leo Enticknap Film God Posts: 7474 From: Loma Linda, CA Registered: Jul 2000 posted 07-30-2011 05:07 PM                        There has been one academic paper I know of published on the subject: Stephen Groening, 'Film in Air: Airspace, In-Flight Entertainment, and Nontheatrical Distirbution' in The Velvet Light Trap, no. 62 (Fall 2008), pp. 4-14. Frustratingly, though, there is virtually no information on the technical details of the projection systems used on the early airliners, especially the super 8 and 16mm endless loop machines that I gather were installed widely on 707s, VC-10s, DC-8s etc. etc. in the early days. Pretty much the entire essay focuses on the economic side. Wasn't Super 8 optical sound developed more or less entirely for this market? The technological history of this has absolutely yet to be written, and I'm glad that someone is taking an interest.  |  IP: Logged Brad Miller Administrator Posts: 17775 From: Plano, TX (36.2 miles NW of Rockwall) Registered: May 99 posted 07-30-2011 09:28 PM                     quote: Leo Enticknap Wasn't Super 8 optical sound developed more or less entirely for this market? That is correct and I've yet to see a picture of a setup from a plane. I would love to see some shots of the film being interlocked through 2 or more projectors and the film track running from front to rear of the plane.  |  IP: Logged Joe Redifer You need a beating today Posts: 12859 From: Denver, Colorado Registered: May 99 posted 07-31-2011 12:26 AM                        I'd rather see a print interlocked between two or three planes.  |  IP: Logged Brad Miller Administrator Posts: 17775 From: Plano, TX (36.2 miles NW of Rockwall) Registered: May 99 posted 07-31-2011 12:51 AM                     You saw Executive Decision, right? If they can fly 2 planes near each other at the same speed enough to dock them, interlocking is a no-brainer.  |  IP: Logged Paul Mayer Oh get out of it Melvin, before it pulls you under! Posts: 3836 From: Albuquerque, NM Registered: Feb 2000 posted 07-31-2011 10:55 AM                        Oh, I love a challenge.  |  IP: Logged Martin McCaffery Film God Posts: 2481 From: Montgomery, AL Registered: Jun 99 posted 07-31-2011 12:11 PM                        quote: Brad Miller You saw Executive Decision, right? If they can fly 2 planes near each other at the same speed enough to dock them, interlocking is a no-brainer. And as a bonus, Steven Segall dies!  |  IP: Logged Brad Miller Administrator Posts: 17775 From: Plano, TX (36.2 miles NW of Rockwall) Registered: May 99 posted 07-31-2011 02:49 PM                     Yeah, the funny thing about that movie was NOBODY wanted to screen it because Steven Segall was in it. We had 2 prints to deal with too. We ended up all agreeing to suffer through it together as a team and about 20 minutes into it we all cheered (as did some audiences). The rest of the movie was fantastic.  |  IP: Logged Leo Enticknap Film God Posts: 7474 From: Loma Linda, CA Registered: Jul 2000 posted 07-31-2011 05:21 PM                        quote: Brad Miller That is correct and I've yet to see a picture of a setup from a plane. I would love to see some shots of the film being interlocked through 2 or more projectors and the film track running from front to rear of the plane. I guess these setups must have used an endless loop system of some description - there's no way a flight attendant could have rethreaded an interlock system mounted above hundreds of seated passengers between screenings. On the DC-10s that Northwest got rid of about 4-5 years ago I caught a glimpse of an S-VHS deck in a compartment next to the main entrance while boarding once. I guess that this was the source for the in-flight entertainment system, which consisted of CRT projectors in the front of each block of overhead bins above the centre aisle, projected onto a white-painted bulkhead.  |  IP: Logged Jeff Kane Film Handler Posts: 74 From: corpus christi, tx Registered: Jun 2011 posted 08-02-2011 03:56 PM                     Another place you might ask this question is Airliners.net. Tons of people there who're aviation fanatics and know commercial aviation details to a fault, as well as quite a few that were working in the industry way back when. Speaking of: IFE on the DC-8/707 Historical Firsts of IFE  |  IP: Logged

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