Hopefully your manager is still alive.

Good post should be drilled into management staff.

Anyone entering booth should have to announce themselves when projector's are running. Including management. It's for their own safety.

#7 Do not allow anyone in the booth except for management. Projectionist don't think it is very funny when someone from the floor staff comes into the booth and grabs them from behind yelling "GOTCHA!" when the projectionist is changing out a xenon lamp or has their hands inside a moving machine adjusting or checking something.

#8 In the event of downtime, do not repeatedly call the projectionist every 30 seconds on the radio saying "is it fixed yet?" This will only double the time it takes for the task to be repaired for half of the projectionist's time will be spent replying and not repairing.

#9 Should the power or fire alarm go off, do not run into the booth and restart the projectors. Many times the film will "jump the track" and your restarting it could end up damaging the remainder of that print.

#10 Did you read rule #5? NEVER try and "help" the projectionist unless he/she specifically requests it. You will almost always cause more problems and/or a damaged print.

It has been my experience that the projectionist is always the last person to know what movies are playing and where they are playing.

I have a couple of rules too:

# 11. Don't yell at the projectionist about a problem that he/she informed you about months ago that you were too cheap to get fixed.

# 12. Don't wait until the picture on screen is pitch black or flickering violently before you order new lamps.

# 13. Follow ALL of Scott and Brad's rules to the letter.

Bless the manager out. Threaten to call the D.M. directly. Any manager worth his or her salt will apologize and fly right. We are all in it together, and a good manager doesn't want any of this any more than you do.

Send any complaining managers to me. (I'm looking for an "evil grin" smilie.)

#14. The booth is not a breakroom. Please don't put the breakroom in the booth or make it necessary for employees to walk through the booth to get to the breakroom.

#15. Don't get angry if the projectionist cannot hear you clearly on the walkie. There is a lot of noise coming from projectors and the projectionist is not always in a position to hear you clearly the first time.

I of course agree with everyone else's rules thus far as well.

Thread and start all projectors for every set.

Maintain said projectors by cleaning gates,platters, rollers, lubricating gates rollers etc. changing worn belts and misc. parts when needed.

Changing Xennon bulbs when needed.

Making sure that we have adequate spare parts as well as ques splicing tape etc.

Making up and breaking down films each week (Thursdays).

Shipping old trailers back to the individual film companies.

Oh and this one is for you Brad... I am the one who makes sure that the projectionist (Booth/Ushers) are actually using Film Guard and it is not just sitting on the shelf.

I could go on but I think that you get the general idea. So I think that I know where I am comming from when I do the showclock every week or when I decide to move prints to a bigger/smaller house or decide to interlock prints. Thank you very much.

OK...I need to get off my soapbox now...whew.

Do not allow non-booth personnel to use your tools. You will not likely see them again.

We keep a combo lock on our toolbox for a reason.

quote:

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The good news is that Regal is taking a very proactive stance in training all operators and managers in the booth and is going as far to have a certification process as well.

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That is great news. Major Kudos to Regal on this one. Some problems in local theatres in my area has been due to operators not receiving the proper training. One booth person at one point said, "They put me up there without me knowing much." Out-of-frame splices and misframings were very common during that time, too.

Regal needs to implement a better quality checking and control system as well to seek out problems and fix them. A good system is to train some users to notice the most common types of problems (focus, alignment, shutter ghosting, misframing, etc.) and each showing checked by someone twice during each showing and have them report any problem they notice (even minor ones) so they can be corrected. One theatre in my area uses this technique and as no surprise, they have the best presentation quality.

I take it that many of the rules posted in the early part of this thread assume that the manager is not an experienced projector operator. At least one of the managers in my area is a very knowledgeable, qualified operator and used to be involved in training projectionists. Are technically knowledgeable managers a rarity in theatres these days? By the sound of these rules that y'all posted, it surely sounds like it.

I sent the 'rules for customers' to my cinema last week, and we all had a good laugh about the common problems. This one is so true though.

So many times i've walked in and threaded all machines only to be told after i saunter back downstairs "Oh yeah, were swapping 1 and 2 for this show"!!!

It has been 1191 days since the last post.

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