I ran projectors for years, miss putting the movies together and running my old simplex and peerless lamp house. Taking from shipping reels and transferring to show reels. When I started, only had 30 minute reels so you would normally switch the machines 5 times for a 90 min. movie. Loved watching for the cue marks. Now today, 50 years later, when I watch an old movie on TV, I still see the cues. This is a list art. I miss it
I was a projectionist just like the video shown here. I had this job all through high school and made good money for the mid-1960's. It a blast to see all the new films and at times used to go the the 20th Century Fox Screening Room in Indianapolis and preview films that would be coming out. The theater I worked in was small but had a huge screen 60' X 45'. I always tried to keep the best picture for the audience and did that by cleaning the lenses on the projectors after each reel. Each 35 mm reel would last 15 to 20 minutes so there was not much time to goof. Once you got the routine down it was almost automatic to go through the procedures for each film. The projectors I used were Simplex projector head with a MagnaArc carbon rod arc lamp. After about a year of working in the projection room I could tear down the projector heads as well as the arc lamp and do repairs. I also put in a stereo sound system using the four magnetic strips on the film. The projectors also had mono sound optical. It was a great time in my life and think of it fondly. I still to this day love the movies and especially the technical part of it.
Thanks for doing this video. I was a projectionist back in the 60's & 70's in Brea, California. We had Simplex projectors, Peerless Arc houses & Altec Sound. I wish I had taken pictures. Thanks again
I was fortunate enough to have been able to get a tour in a couple different theaters way back in the day as a kid... It was one of the coolest things I had ever seen... The realization that all of the light on the screen came from this little arc, and how it all comes together seamlessly when the projectionist knows what they're doing... I remember thinking it must take a team to operate all that (I knew the basics before ever getting a tour of the booth but of course no details yet)... I was boggled by the idea that normally it was just a single person up there doing everything. Decades later I run across this and get to see what the filled in details look like, as nothing was operating during the tours... Just the explanations.
Perhaps the fact that these are becoming so rare may make my knowledge useful at some point... I was trained on how to run these old Carbon Arc projectors, and also how to clean, disassemble and repair them. I actually have 2 RCA carbon arc projectors in storage disassembled in pieces. Now that they are becoming so rare maybe someone will eventually seek me out to run one for them! I'm only in my 30's now, I was trained by a master projectionist when I bought the old projectors before they tore down the theater. Who knows, 30 years down the road I may be one of the few people on the planet who will know how to operate and maintain these things! Maybe someone will still want to run them for nostalgic purposes...
@@thomasnegovanonline - unfortunately no- there are no theaters in my area still running film. And since my original post 7 years ago, I sold all of the projection equipment that I had in storage. When the covid restrictions hit in March of last year I could no longer afford to pay the fee's on my multiple storages. My wife and I both work in healthcare so we still worked during the restrictions, however because they were performing only emergency procedures and quit all outpatient procedures, our hours were cut dramatically for a long while. Without that disposable income I fell about 4 months behind on the storage fee's. I had to sell the stuff just to pay the fee's on my multiple storages and keep my belongings from being auctioned, as I couldn't afford to maintain our household expenses, mortgage, car payments etc, and pay the storage fees as well. I made some profit after paying the fee's off, but was sad to lose some of the items I had obviously. But it is what it is- I am not complaining some people lost way more... we had a roof, cars to drive and food to eat... so all in all we made it through quite well.
Thanks for the video and hello from Australia, I started as an assistant projectionist in 1963 at age 15 and loved it, couldn't wait to get to the theatre, it wasn`t my full time job but I did it for many years. Sadly colour TV and video recorders, spelt the demise for our local cinemas, my last shift using carbon arcs was at our drive - in which is now a shopping centre. Lots of memories,,, thanks Rex Mower
That's an absolutely beautiful theater... And those machines beautiful relics. Hard to imagine someone just drops in a disc now and xenon is king for light. He'd be sitting down now, not running back and forth between projectors.
Gosh how I miss those days as a projectionist. That has to be my favourite job. There was nothing like building a movie and watching people enjoy it. To this day I still look for cigarette burns, even though most theatres are digital. :-(
I worked as a projectionist in the 1960s.......operated a pair of Bauer B8s....this bought back so many memories......oh for the days of Lacing Up and Change Over marks
Wish modern everything would take a venture back to those days. Things were built like tanks. Because they didn't want them to fail. Now things are built to fail, so they make more money in replacement costs. Really sad to see this era go. Got a few things around here that are 50+ years old and while they occasionally have "personality", they run just as hard and like to be put away as wet as the day they came out of the factory. Check back in 50 years with *anything* that's made today... You'll need heavy equipment to do so... It'll be found at the bottom of a landfill in China. At least it's going back where it came from 🤣
My grandfather was a projectionist back when film was hand-cranked to a theater audience. My father was a projectionist all his working life and remembered the screening of Gone with the Wind and the hoop-la. I filled in on weekends and summer vacations during my last year in high-school.Also ushered. Remember those guys and their flashlights? Another duty was changing the marquee, often during snowstorms Fifty-cents an hour. I will never forget the Simplex arc machines. Had to be careful the carbon arcs didn't get too close together and weld. Wonderful memories of my dad and I walking home together after the last show.
@fbw71u A marquee is the awning or canopy in front of the theatre where they advertised the movie(s) playing inside with large movable letters and the name of the theatre.
I can smell the projection room as I watch this! I worked in several theatre (in and outdoors) on Long Island and in Los Angeles. I never projected but spent many hours hanging out in the projection room. And, the Griswold Film Splicers (the ones used in every movie house in the world) were invented and made in what's now Theatre Three (stage productions) and the Griswold cabaret (down stairs where the splicers were made) in Port Jefferson Long Island-where I've performed as an actor. In 1997 I co produced and co stared in a film called, Change Over, about the last day at another Long Island movie theatre. We actually got to use the projectors-which had sat idle since the late 70's. Very cool
Long Islander here. Yes, the 70s was the decade where I could check the Newsday movie section every weekend and find at least one theater in Nassau or Suffolk showing a double feature of many of my favorites-AND on a single wide aspect screen. Even more delightful was that these places were almost never overpopulated, so you'd hear more of the room's reverb. Plus, less people is always nicer. I miss those days a whole lot.
Brilliant! It still exists. I found that video as a link in RUclips without knowing, what theatre it is. My first guess: Gateway. And when I saw the booth, Brenkert colums, Super Core Lites, the switchboard and the booth monitor ontop of the amp rack, I knew. Some 20 years back during a Chicago visit, I was asked to run film there.. As you're a projectionist, union tzpe, and you know certainly how to screen film. Nice to see it again!
In the 1950's I worked at drive-in that used Ashcraft lamps very similar to these. They drew 130 DC amps and put a bright image on a 100' screen. They were water cooled with distilled water as were the Century projectors. Today's xenon lamps don't come close and the first digital show I saw was lacking in brightness. Sad....
I used to love running the simplex carbon arc projectors at the local theater and drive in at Gaylord, Michigan. My first change over was at 11 years old at a friends theater in Dexter, Michigan.. This brings back a lot of memories!
Back then when a child you could hear the projector clicking in the background if you sat in the back during the movie and stare and wonder how 1 💡 was producing the image
This brought back memories. In1972-1974 I worked at the theater on McConnell AFB in Wichita KS. I sold tickets and ran the projector sometimes. It was nerve racking especially if you forgot to change the carbon rod if too short to make it thru the reel. And if the film breaks, oh my! And don't get distracted by watching the movie, lol. After the Air Force, I never had the chance to visit any projector room again. But for a long time, when going to the movies, I always saw the switch over circles in the upper corner of the screen. They seemed to be invisible to everyone else. Well that was a different day.
I was navy and went to a 2 week 35 motion Projector operators school in 1962 in Norfolk, Va. Where I was stationed the base theater had 35 mm projectors that came off the battleship Missouri and of course had carbon arcs. In 1965 I was sent to Hawaii and worked as a projectionist, ticket sales and asst. manager. I do remember hand cranking the film for inspection and spliceing when necessary. Films came tails out and had to be rewound and inspected so would be come heads out so we could show them on the film. Always arrived early to check the incoming film, clean and do maintenance on the lamp housing and the projector. When things were slow on weekends I would clean the booth. If you looked at the projection booth of the era you would see the openings with steel shutters above them with a fusible link that would melt if a fire occured. The walls of one both I worked in had sheet metal over all the walls. All this extra fire-proofing were left-overs from the earlier times when films were nitros-celluloid and vary flamible. Best part time job I ever had.
I was a projectionist in the late 40s. The name Sturdevent comes to mind for the Projectors. I’ve “Struck” many a carbon and I can still imagine the changeover dots and smell the acetate adhesive.
I used to sit and watch my brother run the projectors at the old long gone Silver Lake Drive-in back in Michigan years ago. He tried to explain to me what he was doing. I was really only there for the free movies and the food. Now those were the days we thought would never end.....
Thanks for the video. It certainly brings me back to the Boardwalk movie theaters in Ocean City, NJ. I was fortunate that most of the equipment, back in the 70's and 80's, hadn't changed since the 30's, 40's, and 50's. Tending the Peerless and Strong lamphouses, and the Simplex projectors became a passion until the places were sold in 1989.
Interesting to see this. Takes me back. I was a projectionist in 1985, two nights a week while I was at college. Carbon rods. I ran a pair of Westrex Kaylee 21s'. That projection room got very hot very quickly, but it was good and I enjoyed it.
Heh 6-7kW, even with the exhaust... There's a *lot* of heat there haha... And of course for brief periods, both on, 12kW+... Gotta be like standing next to the sun... High up in the building to boot... That said, I wanted to be a projectionist when I was a kid... Never got into the field but did get a couple tours before they quit doing that kind of thing... The heat was one of the things I remember, and the projectors weren't even on during the walk thru! 🤣
@@MartysWhiteSuit I can imagine. I chase these types of jobs... Curiosity is what gets me pointed toward them... Been in some hella conditions at times to satisfy my desires for deeper understanding or just otherwise wanting to see something hehe I also wanted to do it because of the "all eyes on the invisible man" idea... Something about knowing a large group of people are dependent on someone they can't "see" to make the whole experience flow as it should... Can't really describe the idea very well lol I'm sure it's satisfying to successfully get the reels all lined up right for a good show
@@MadScientist267 Oh yes, I think I see what you mean. I was helping two blokes at first. One left and the other, also a student, got expelled from the college for trying to get a girl into his room. I was on my own for the rest of the time. I set up the reels, sometimes adding leaders, running the film, 5 or 6 reels, then rewinding the reels for next day collection. I'd finish at 10.30. Too late to do anything else. I think it was the best job I had really. I went on after that to run a drinks warehouse. Good job, but I liked being a projectionist. The rush of excitement during the 6-second change-over.
Came upon this vid on RUclips and sat enthralled for the entire 17 minutes. I love the casual competence. How many times was this sequence repeated in theaters over the last century or so?
I saw lots of unlabeled stuff after a horrible accident on a water raft ride. They implied the PUBLIC should know what the unmarked red button is. Emergency shutoff. Not marked.
Takes me back.... When in my early 20s I worked part-time at a local independent cinema in the Black Country (UK). Kalee 12 machines and Kalee Vulcan arcs. Then at another independent with Kalee 12s again but with AEI Xenon lamps - the retired Brenkert arc housings were in the old rewind room. In the early 1980s I moved to London and, on the strength of this experience, got a job as an operator in a preview theatre in Wardour Street, then the centre of the film production, cutting and dubbing scene in London. Westar 35mm mechs, AEI xenons, but Dolby, double-head 35mm optical and mag, separate 16mm optical and mag, 4-track 35mm mag...there wasn't much I couldn't run... And I think we had the last nitrate licence in London...
The Bayview (large Milwaukee neighborhood) Avalon Theater will seen be reopening but as a cinema restaurant complete with digital-only projection. The stage has been converted into an 80-seat auditorium and the original main seating area has shrunk to about 250 seats. The theater including balcony once sat 1,800. The balcony is not being altered at this time. The Avalon is an atmospheric theater which opened in 12928 and is said to be the first theater in Wisconsin designed for sound films. The atmosphere features twinkling stars and the appearance of an Italian village. Too bad the 35 mm projection was not retained. When there was an open house for the auction of old equipment I saw a dual lamp house glass slide projector with old carbon rod stubs still inside. And there was a follow spot with carbon rod stubs, too. The projection system when the theater closed in 2000 was 35 mm platter.
In a cinema at Toowoomba, I was the sole audience member so the projectionist came out of the projection room and offered to show me around. The projectors were carbon arc projectors. I remember you can see the shape of the arc through a dark glass viewing hole. There was a clock face with just a second hand and the dial marked out in twelve second sectors for the advertising slides. The projectionist had come from Warwick where the cinema there had closed. This was in 1987 and later I was leaving on the weekly Dirranbandi Mail which was a mixed train (freight train with passenger cars attached). On return at Toowoomba at lunchtime I had a lovely lunch at the Railway Refreshment Room.
I've been in some projection booths with manual rewind. I worked in master control for a short while at the old WXGZ-TV 32 in Appleton back in 1987. When we ran 16 mm film -- cartoons for kids show or movies -- on the film chain, we had to manually rewind the reels.
The old film in fingertips technique for feeling the splices, brings back memories.I used to use the exact same splicer. With that equipment it was a 1 man 1 booth job, platters changed that and the digital messed it all up.And I see the old check your loops at the very end with your fingers, brings back memories.
Wonderful clip! Great that you went into the auditorium to show the beautiful cinema too! I'm guessing that you wouldn't want to open the lamphouse door when lit! Tim O'Neill, you look like an excellent efficient projectionist-there doesn't seem to be any hesitation or doubt about anything you're doing there! A few other clips I've seen seem to show the projectionist back-tracking/fumbling a fair bit! Agree with other comments about film vs. digital. My cinema attendance has dropped by 95%.
I was the projectionist at an 11 cinema theatre in my hometown. We didn't have carbon arc projectors. Ours took really big and scary light bulbs. It would scare the crap out of me having to change those things. We also had a platter system. But I still built the movies on a build table and transferred them to the platter. It was much easier to build it that way. But sometimes I had to build the movie directly to the platter. Eventually my job was done away with because of the digital switch.
Xenon arc bulbs. Yeah I had those in my cinema. We ran on Westrex vertical reel to reel systems that you had to rewind. Never got the chance to run a platter/loop machine.
Nice job.Very sorry to hear you're not employed to do it anymore. Great to see a professional at work.I grew up with 8mm & it was outdated at the time by video.You can't beat film.Best of luck & thanks for showing me how these giants worked.
This is real old school stuff. My first job was doing this from time to time. In 1988 they were already using xenon bulbs - well past this tech. Building films was the same as here.
A 2000' reel runs about 22 minutes but rarely are reels that full. 16-20 minutes is most common and then there will be some a lot shorter. Sometimes, if you encounter a very short reel and it's not the first reel nor the last, it generally means some major cutting was done by the editors late in the game, when it was impractical to "re-balance" where the reel breaks were. This is about domestic USA films. Foreign films vary. A native Japanese print often puts only 10-12 min on a reel.
The Gateway theater was one of only two theaters designed by Rapp and Rapp with atmospheric ceilings. The other called the Paramount Theater in Toledo, Ohio was more elaborate and sadly was razed for what else but a parking lot.
my father was a carbon arc projectionist in Delhi, India, when i was child i used to go there and really that machines was amazing and i still love those machines, when i was child i want to become a projectionist
Haha I don't know what it is about movie theaters and their projection booths, but they were incredibly enigmatic from the perspective of the seat in the theater... Despite being fundamentally simple... We had all seen film projectors in school but they of course were "toys" compared to these... And I dunno about everyone else, but until I got a tour of a booth, I was absolutely *burning* to know the differences hahaha
My dad was a Master Projectionist... and I learned at a very young age how to thread a machine... at that time? Everything was carbon arc.. although I remember when my dad, myself, and another projectionist/tech, built and installed the very first Carbon Arc to Xenon conversion on the US West coast... This was in late summer 1969, at the Cary Theater at Ft Lewis Washington... That Saturday? was the beginning of the end of Carbon Arc... in the booth..
this was such a clean light -- I used a carbon arc spot back in high school during musicals. It was a timing thing and you had to time it just right so they didn't run out in the middle of a performance.
In thailand there are a few outdoor movie teams that still use carbon arc with film for the movie. But they dont use a few set of projectors like that when the reel run out. Instead they hot swap them. Same goes for the carbon arc rod. They swap them while the lamp running
Yes I was a carbon arc projectionist in New Zealand during the 60's and early 70's. Loved film. I don't think his splice looked that good though. I also never re-winded a reel of film that way. I always re-winded by hand crank running the film through my hand feeling for nicks in the film. Then repairing the film.
Working with carbon arcs was the true test of a showman - in the days when proji's were showmen. Keeping negative and positive carbons trimmed correctly was an art form and keeping them correctly spaced was a fete of concentration on what you were doing. Seamless changeovers from one mec to the other was also part of the projectionists skill, closing and opening tabs on cue and fading up or down the house-lights, stage-lighting and interval music was also part of the showmans job. These days, projectors can be run from the manager's office whilst the proji has become a true machine minder only. How times have changed since my days in the business!
J'ai été projectionniste en utilisant des materiels semblables avec les mêmes gestes! Tout une époque révolue qui avait une odeur de pellicule et de vapeurs d'arc. Changement de bobine toutes les 20 minutes et respect d'une séance impeccable. C'était une autre époque.
omg that sound of the arc dancing all around sets me on edge so bad. This feels so unsafe and scary like the guys in Los Alamos "tickling the dragon's tail"
Might I add my two cents. The finest movie theatre of its day they tore down for a parking lot and its destruction is a metaphor for how far our society has fallen. Look it up on Wikipedia. INDIAN HILLS MOVIE THEATHER in Omaha, Nebraska. Curved screen of 146 degrees, 110 feet long, 35 feet high. It was magic to see a movie there. Lost track of all the great movies I saw there. If you sat in the middle somewhat close it took up all of your peripheral vision. Wish I had a time machine.
OMG! I used to go and sit in a friend's cinema and love that carbon arc machine. This cinema, Aelo, was also demolished a few years for a parking lot as well!!! What is happening? The matrix has broken again.
@@DBuilder1977 It's 'progress'. I wouldn't mind so much as some technology is better, but in most cases the 'improvement' is just a cheap shit half assed attempt.
one of my friends had a 35 mm projector which had what was called a dog beater instead of an intermittent movement ,it used to belt the film through the projector just below the gate very crude.
When I was young I worked on the full platter tree type of projectors. Those didn’t have to wait for the yellow dots and start up a new one for each reel. The movies were one big long strip. On these, projectionists had 2 projectors per theater. Once one reel gets close yo the end, a quick yellow dot appears, signaling the projectionist yo start the next projector / reel. Then once that starts, they put the next reel back into the initial projector and start it once reel 2 ends, etc. movies would be on 5-6 reels with each being about 2000 ft long
Thanks for this explanation. I was wondering if he was switching between different short films or of this was supposed to be one continuous movie. I do remember actually seeing a yellow dot appear on the screen occasionally watching the Chronicles of Narnia back in ‘05 at a theater that was still using its original film projectors (sadly closed down for good a few months ago), but figured it was just some odd artifact on the strip… (that’s a memory that had been buried away until now 😂)
@@X5Industries Indeed, majority of people never thought anything of it. So much noise and artifacts in film, it was "just another one". That was the beauty of it... Secret code right in plain sight. Would have been very obvious it was some kind of signal if it was the only artifact to ever appear on the screen 🤣
This is something I can do too. Grew up in an old movie house (with apartment upstairs). We got our first Xenon bulb in 1989...but the other projector still had a carbon arc lamp. Finally got a Xenon bulb for the other one in '94.
Brings back wonderful yet sad memories..............I too was another Tom O'Neill.....worked for almost 25 years for Local 306 IATSE . Film projected via carbon rod light is unsurpassed, no digital format with xenon lamps will ever surpass the sheer power and enjoyment of projected 35mm film and carbon light. Indeed for years I worked the RKO Keith's theater in Flushing NYC............Ashcraft Super Core lights with Simplex XL heads...........with close to 1800 seats, going to the Keith's was a true experience. As was the Loews Paradise up in the Bronx. RIP projection craft, the gifts you gave will soon be all but a distant memory.
As a retired I.A.T.S.E. 306 projectionist I am surprised that the silver jaws for the carbon rods were not cleaned nor polished. My grandfather hand cranked projectors in Chicago befor moving to NYC He was a projectionist at the DeMille and then the Cinema One.
ONCEUPON A TIME WHILE IN THE USAF I GOT A JOB AS AN ASSISTANT PROJECTIONIST AT THE BASE THEATRE....MY JOB WAS JUST TO KEEP THE CARBON RODS IN THE PROPER PLACE AT ALL TIMES...
I ran a pair in Rosenberg TX at the Cole Theater in the early 80's before progress shut the place down. The Sister Theater one block down, played movies on a projector that was older than those in the Smithsonian Institute in Washington.
Interesting to see something really old still in use. There is a oil leas in southern Illinois that has the same set up engine type that was installed in 1906 using a flywheel open crankcase engine and a multiple rod line pumping system
Most people don't realize how light a touch you have to have when you guide the film from reel to reel if you try to put a closer grip on the film it can slice your fingers like a razor blade.
Thanks for the memories. My father starting teaching me how to run a booth when I was about 11 or 12 years old. I threaded my first Simplex at the Bay Theater in Pacific Palisades and did my first changeover at The Four Star in Los Angeles, apprenticed at The Beverly running "That's Entertainment" in 70mm and worked as a projectionist for the next 23 years before digital made my skills obsolete
I can remember my early years in IATSE Local 640 as a projectionist. Started on carbon arc lamphouse, e7 projectors with one hour reels. Hated watching horror movies and didn't think about this as a problem until I had to make changovers in them.
I run film like this, reel to reel, carbon arc at an archival house in Palo Alto Ca. One thing we see here that is a no no with archives is dropping film on the floor. Dirt walks it's way up the leader and into the print.
Rapp and Rapp designed several Milwaukee movie palaces. I think the Oriental is the only one still showing movies. The Warner, later called Centre and for its last 13 was called the Grand I-II is dark but still mostly intact. In fact its owner, Marcus has removed the 1974-vintage twinning. The Garfield still exists but has been extensively remodeled with the auditorium serving a church with the original plaster ceiling and walls covered. with other materials.
That is so cool!!!! I have a couple of the carbon arc projector lights. They are called Jewell, which I cannot find any information about them. They are black in color and say Supr Arc made in Chicago. Do you know about any of these? Thanks for your time. John
13.6 mm. At the current consumed, the traditional copper coating would have melted in the beam, so the current was supplied to the water cooled solid silver jaw unit, just ahead of the flame. This was the reason that the carbon rotated, to maintain electrical contact without pitting the jaw. Despite that, it took about 20 minutes every day on each lamp to polish the pit marks out of the jaws.
@@kleetus92 The jaw was conducting around 180 amps to the electrode at between 30 and 40 volts DC. In early installations the current was regulated by series ballast resistors from the output of a thermionic (mercury) diode, while in later installations the multi tap coupling transformers and solid state diodes stabilised the current and prevented surges. The strike current was between 400 and 600 amps. The electrical resistance of tungsten would have generated heat in the series circuit, so along with its abrasive surface oxide it would have been unsuitable. Machining the cooling waterways through the jaw would have also been a huge problem The conductivity characteristics are the same as the commutator or slip rings on an electric motor, where being in a lower temperature environment high purity copper is used.
@@kleetus92 We could have used gold, but with security and the jaws needing replacement every year or so, that may have been a step too far. 😊 As you may have guessed, I am a retired chartered engineer. I was also the chief engineer of the UKs leading cinema operator back in the days of rotating positive carbon arc-lamps. We had a few Ashcraft, but most of ours were Mole Richardson. They were coupled with Kalee 21 projectors in large theatres, but were later used mainly in 70mm houses.
Carbon arc technology makes much more sense to me now that I see how little effort it takes for a skilled projectionist to maintain it. Compared to all the other chores, it's insignificant. And it halves the energy consumption in 2-projector setups since I notice how he turns the idle projector's arc off. (That is rarely done with xenon since every strike shortens the lamp's life.) I recall reading that Ingmar Bergman required carbon arc for all movies screened at his private cinema at Fårö, since he preferred its color temperature so much over xenon.
Really the machine does most of the work as far as maintaining the arc. If they had to manually keep every aspect of the arc in check, they would have needed to hire someone to do only that, "full time". That said, it's still quite a bit more labor intensive than xenon, for sure.
It may be more convenient now but to me the old carbon arc projectors and sound systems of the 70’s performed better than those digital systems today by far.
OMG Carbon Arc guides and motorized advancers? That's cheating! I ran a pair of 1939 RCA Arc Welders. Just the very basics plus the massive 100-degree transformers that was also in the booth. Roasty-toasty! Advanced the rods myself. I think there was plenty of rod to do another reel for the one he swapped out :) We burned our rods to the bone!
Never had a tape splicer nor power re-winders in my time in the box! Must be a large screen for that current as well - only got the high when we ran 70mm Todd-AO prints. Got the old 3D spool boxe's as well I see. I always used to help the lower spool pick up when I did it ran; found I counted t 8 as well!! Have some 16mm at home now; would die for a pair of 35mm - anyone with a pair of FP20's looking for a good home? - smile. Happy days.
Ashcraft "Super Core-lite" lamphouses - made to handle 13.6mm rotating positive carbons. Simplex XL with a 4 Star soundhead. Bummer, no mag penthouses in use.
Not by a long shot - Xenon is 10 times more economical to operate than carbon arc, even though the light from carbon is 10 times better than xenon being more closer to the light spectrum. A bulb can replace 2 cases of positive rods to break even in cost.Then it gains value with running longer. Also, if the bulb fails under warranty, it can be replaced whereas the carbon rod is simply spent and used.
I read a theory as to why many modern digital remasters of films have a blue cast to them. Films were graded to be projected with carbon arc lamps. Modern projectors most likely use xenon lamps, which give a blue tint to the picture. So the people doing the digital colour timing are just following how it looked when they projected it. You'd think film restorations would be smarter, but I'm not surprised.
Impressive. Dont know much about Carbon Arc Projection. This is going to be extremely rare given that film projection itself is coming to an end. I believe studios plan to stop 35 mm film distribution by end of 2013.I hope this doesn't happen.
I ran projectors for years, miss putting the movies together and running my old simplex and peerless lamp house. Taking from shipping reels and transferring to show reels. When I started, only had 30 minute reels so you would normally switch the machines 5 times for a 90 min. movie. Loved watching for the cue marks. Now today, 50 years later, when I watch an old movie on TV, I still see the cues. This is a list art. I miss it
I was a projectionist just like the video shown here. I had this job all through high school and made good money for the mid-1960's. It a blast to see all the new films and at times used to go the the 20th Century Fox Screening Room in Indianapolis and preview films that would be coming out. The theater I worked in was small but had a huge screen 60' X 45'. I always tried to keep the best picture for the audience and did that by cleaning the lenses on the projectors after each reel. Each 35 mm reel would last 15 to 20 minutes so there was not much time to goof. Once you got the routine down it was almost automatic to go through the procedures for each film. The projectors I used were Simplex projector head with a MagnaArc carbon rod arc lamp. After about a year of working in the projection room I could tear down the projector heads as well as the arc lamp and do repairs. I also put in a stereo sound system using the four magnetic strips on the film. The projectors also had mono sound optical. It was a great time in my life and think of it fondly. I still to this day love the movies and especially the technical part of it.
Thanks for doing this video. I was a projectionist back in the 60's & 70's in Brea, California. We had Simplex projectors, Peerless Arc houses & Altec Sound. I wish I had taken pictures. Thanks again
I was dreaming to see those projectors from behind the scenes since I was a kid, never had the chance. Awesome!
One of the few plus of youtube.
I was fortunate enough to have been able to get a tour in a couple different theaters way back in the day as a kid... It was one of the coolest things I had ever seen... The realization that all of the light on the screen came from this little arc, and how it all comes together seamlessly when the projectionist knows what they're doing... I remember thinking it must take a team to operate all that (I knew the basics before ever getting a tour of the booth but of course no details yet)... I was boggled by the idea that normally it was just a single person up there doing everything.
Decades later I run across this and get to see what the filled in details look like, as nothing was operating during the tours... Just the explanations.
Perhaps the fact that these are becoming so rare may make my knowledge useful at some point... I was trained on how to run these old Carbon Arc projectors, and also how to clean, disassemble and repair them. I actually have 2 RCA carbon arc projectors in storage disassembled in pieces. Now that they are becoming so rare maybe someone will eventually seek me out to run one for them! I'm only in my 30's now, I was trained by a master projectionist when I bought the old projectors before they tore down the theater. Who knows, 30 years down the road I may be one of the few people on the planet who will know how to operate and maintain these things! Maybe someone will still want to run them for nostalgic purposes...
Go watch "The Omega Man" with Charlton Heston. Report back.
Right on, man!
Or "the Blob" 1958
That's fantastic! Have you been able to get work at a theater running film?
@@thomasnegovanonline - unfortunately no- there are no theaters in my area still running film. And since my original post 7 years ago, I sold all of the projection equipment that I had in storage. When the covid restrictions hit in March of last year I could no longer afford to pay the fee's on my multiple storages. My wife and I both work in healthcare so we still worked during the restrictions, however because they were performing only emergency procedures and quit all outpatient procedures, our hours were cut dramatically for a long while. Without that disposable income I fell about 4 months behind on the storage fee's. I had to sell the stuff just to pay the fee's on my multiple storages and keep my belongings from being auctioned, as I couldn't afford to maintain our household expenses, mortgage, car payments etc, and pay the storage fees as well. I made some profit after paying the fee's off, but was sad to lose some of the items I had obviously. But it is what it is- I am not complaining some people lost way more... we had a roof, cars to drive and food to eat... so all in all we made it through quite well.
Thanks for the video and hello from Australia, I started as an assistant projectionist in 1963 at age 15 and loved it, couldn't wait to get to the theatre, it wasn`t my full time job but I did it for many years. Sadly colour TV and video recorders, spelt the demise for our local cinemas, my last shift using carbon arcs was at our drive - in which is now a shopping centre.
Lots of memories,,, thanks
Rex Mower
That's an absolutely beautiful theater... And those machines beautiful relics.
Hard to imagine someone just drops in a disc now and xenon is king for light. He'd be sitting down now, not running back and forth between projectors.
Gosh how I miss those days as a projectionist. That has to be my favourite job. There was nothing like building a movie and watching people enjoy it. To this day I still look for cigarette burns, even though most theatres are digital. :-(
❤
I worked as a projectionist in the 1960s.......operated a pair of Bauer B8s....this bought back so many memories......oh for the days of Lacing Up and Change Over marks
Those old projectors were a true work of art. Built to last for decades, yet they had such elegance.
Wish modern everything would take a venture back to those days. Things were built like tanks. Because they didn't want them to fail.
Now things are built to fail, so they make more money in replacement costs. Really sad to see this era go. Got a few things around here that are 50+ years old and while they occasionally have "personality", they run just as hard and like to be put away as wet as the day they came out of the factory.
Check back in 50 years with *anything* that's made today... You'll need heavy equipment to do so... It'll be found at the bottom of a landfill in China.
At least it's going back where it came from 🤣
My grandfather was a projectionist back when film was hand-cranked to a theater audience. My father was a projectionist all his working life and remembered the screening of Gone with the Wind and the hoop-la. I filled in on weekends and summer vacations during my last year in high-school.Also ushered. Remember those guys and their flashlights? Another duty was changing the marquee, often during snowstorms Fifty-cents an hour. I will never forget the Simplex arc machines. Had to be careful the carbon arcs didn't get too close together and weld. Wonderful memories of my dad and I walking home together after the last show.
@fbw71u
A marquee is the awning or canopy in front of the theatre where they advertised the movie(s) playing inside with large movable letters and the name of the theatre.
I can smell the projection room as I watch this! I worked in several theatre (in and outdoors) on Long Island and in Los Angeles. I never projected but spent many hours hanging out in the projection room. And, the Griswold Film Splicers (the ones used in every movie house in the world) were invented and made in what's now Theatre Three (stage productions) and the Griswold cabaret (down stairs where the splicers were made) in Port Jefferson Long Island-where I've performed as an actor. In 1997 I co produced and co stared in a film called, Change Over, about the last day at another Long Island movie theatre. We actually got to use the projectors-which had sat idle since the late 70's. Very cool
Long Islander here. Yes, the 70s was the decade where I could check the Newsday movie section every weekend and find at least one theater in Nassau or Suffolk showing a double feature of many of my favorites-AND on a single wide aspect screen. Even more delightful was that these places were almost never overpopulated, so you'd hear more of the room's reverb. Plus, less people is always nicer. I miss those days a whole lot.
Wonderful, candid footage of a skilled technician. Thank you so much for filming this.
Reminds me of the film Cinema Paridiso
I helped with installing a phone system at a plant in Fostoria, Ohio that used to make carbon rods used for projector lamp housings and such.
Brian Zachel Perhaps National / Union Carbide (UCAR)?
National Carbon,Co
National Carbon Co 8:38
Brilliant! It still exists. I found that video as a link in RUclips without knowing, what theatre it is. My first guess: Gateway. And when I saw the booth, Brenkert colums, Super Core Lites, the switchboard and the booth monitor ontop of the amp rack, I knew.
Some 20 years back during a Chicago visit, I was asked to run film there.. As you're a projectionist, union tzpe, and you know certainly how to screen film.
Nice to see it again!
In the 1950's I worked at drive-in that used Ashcraft lamps very similar to these. They drew 130 DC amps and put a bright image on a 100' screen. They were water cooled with distilled water as were the Century projectors. Today's xenon lamps don't come close and the first digital show I saw was lacking in brightness. Sad....
The digital projectors first generation had a brightness issue. Not anymore. They’ve come a long way.
really clever design to use what's basically a welding rod as a projection lamp
Not xenon, right?
Nowadays, solid-state arc welding power supplies are used as elements in final power amps for AM and FM radio stations.
I used to love running the simplex carbon arc projectors at the local theater and drive in at Gaylord, Michigan. My first change over was at 11 years old at a friends theater in Dexter, Michigan.. This brings back a lot of memories!
Back then when a child you could hear the projector clicking in the background if you sat in the back during the movie and stare and wonder how 1 💡 was producing the image
This brought back memories. In1972-1974 I worked at the theater on McConnell AFB in Wichita KS. I sold tickets and ran the projector sometimes. It was nerve racking especially if you forgot to change the carbon rod if too short to make it thru the reel. And if the film breaks, oh my! And don't get distracted by watching the movie, lol. After the Air Force, I never had the chance to visit any projector room again. But for a long time, when going to the movies, I always saw the switch over circles in the upper corner of the screen. They seemed to be invisible to everyone else. Well that was a different day.
I was navy and went to a 2 week 35 motion Projector operators school in 1962 in Norfolk, Va. Where I was stationed the base theater had 35 mm projectors that came off the battleship Missouri and of course had carbon arcs. In 1965 I was sent to Hawaii and worked as a projectionist, ticket sales and asst. manager. I do remember hand cranking the film for inspection and spliceing when necessary. Films came tails out and had to be rewound and inspected so would be come heads out so we could show them on the film. Always arrived early to check the incoming film, clean and do maintenance on the lamp housing and the projector. When things were slow on weekends I would clean the booth. If you looked at the projection booth of the era you would see the openings with steel shutters above them with a fusible link that would melt if a fire occured. The walls of one both I worked in had sheet metal over all the walls. All this extra fire-proofing were left-overs from the earlier times when films were nitros-celluloid and vary flamible. Best part time job I ever had.
I noticed them.
I've haven't worked at this booth since the tape was shot.
Did the number of screenings there slow down? I used to go to this theater all the time for silent films when I lived in Chicago!
@@thomasnegovanonline Were they in DOLBY?
@@thomasnegovanonline it's probably been shot up
I was a projectionist in the late 40s.
The name Sturdevent comes to mind for the Projectors.
I’ve “Struck” many a carbon and I can still imagine the changeover dots and smell the acetate adhesive.
I used to sit and watch my brother run the projectors at the old long gone Silver Lake Drive-in back in Michigan years ago. He tried to explain to me what he was doing. I was really only there for the free movies and the food. Now those were the days we thought would never end.....
Truly a lost art. Thanks for posting!
Thanks for the video. It certainly brings me back to the Boardwalk movie theaters in Ocean City, NJ. I was fortunate that most of the equipment, back in the 70's and 80's, hadn't changed since the 30's, 40's, and 50's. Tending the Peerless and Strong lamphouses, and the Simplex projectors became a passion until the places were sold in 1989.
Interesting to see this. Takes me back. I was a projectionist in 1985, two nights a week while I was at college. Carbon rods. I ran a pair of Westrex Kaylee 21s'. That projection room got very hot very quickly, but it was good and I enjoyed it.
Awesome projectors had the pleasure of seeing two of those working back in 1983
Heh 6-7kW, even with the exhaust... There's a *lot* of heat there haha... And of course for brief periods, both on, 12kW+... Gotta be like standing next to the sun... High up in the building to boot...
That said, I wanted to be a projectionist when I was a kid... Never got into the field but did get a couple tours before they quit doing that kind of thing... The heat was one of the things I remember, and the projectors weren't even on during the walk thru! 🤣
@@MadScientist267 Hi. It was just something I did while at college. It was a good thing. I enjoyed it.
@@MartysWhiteSuit I can imagine. I chase these types of jobs... Curiosity is what gets me pointed toward them... Been in some hella conditions at times to satisfy my desires for deeper understanding or just otherwise wanting to see something hehe
I also wanted to do it because of the "all eyes on the invisible man" idea... Something about knowing a large group of people are dependent on someone they can't "see" to make the whole experience flow as it should... Can't really describe the idea very well lol
I'm sure it's satisfying to successfully get the reels all lined up right for a good show
@@MadScientist267 Oh yes, I think I see what you mean. I was helping two blokes at first. One left and the other, also a student, got expelled from the college for trying to get a girl into his room.
I was on my own for the rest of the time. I set up the reels, sometimes adding leaders, running the film, 5 or 6 reels, then rewinding the reels for next day collection. I'd finish at 10.30. Too late to do anything else.
I think it was the best job I had really. I went on after that to run a drinks warehouse. Good job, but I liked being a projectionist. The rush of excitement during the 6-second change-over.
That's the same way , I did it back in the early 70's. Great job.
Came upon this vid on RUclips and sat enthralled for the entire 17 minutes. I love the casual competence. How many times was this sequence repeated in theaters over the last century or so?
Those projectors were like steam engines 😁 and the projectionist their engineers.
Yes, and like the old steam locos, they had lots of un-labled controls. You just had to know what they all did.
I saw lots of unlabeled stuff after a horrible accident on a water raft ride. They implied the PUBLIC should know what the unmarked red button is. Emergency shutoff. Not marked.
Takes me back.... When in my early 20s I worked part-time at a local independent cinema in the Black Country (UK). Kalee 12 machines and Kalee Vulcan arcs. Then at another independent with Kalee 12s again but with AEI Xenon lamps - the retired Brenkert arc housings were in the old rewind room. In the early 1980s I moved to London and, on the strength of this experience, got a job as an operator in a preview theatre in Wardour Street, then the centre of the film production, cutting and dubbing scene in London. Westar 35mm mechs, AEI xenons, but Dolby, double-head 35mm optical and mag, separate 16mm optical and mag, 4-track 35mm mag...there wasn't much I couldn't run... And I think we had the last nitrate licence in London...
The Bayview (large Milwaukee neighborhood) Avalon Theater will seen be reopening but as a cinema restaurant complete with digital-only projection. The stage has been converted into an 80-seat auditorium and the original main seating area has shrunk to about 250 seats. The theater including balcony once sat 1,800. The balcony is not being altered at this time. The Avalon is an atmospheric theater which opened in 12928 and is said to be the first theater in Wisconsin designed for sound films. The atmosphere features twinkling stars and the appearance of an Italian village.
Too bad the 35 mm projection was not retained. When there was an open house for the auction of old equipment I saw a dual lamp house glass slide projector with old carbon rod stubs still inside. And there was a follow spot with carbon rod stubs, too. The projection system when the theater closed in 2000 was 35 mm platter.
I remember the Avalon had the last Cinemascope screen in Milwaukee.
In a cinema at Toowoomba, I was the sole audience member so the projectionist came out of the projection room and offered to show me around. The projectors were carbon arc projectors. I remember you can see the shape of the arc through a dark glass viewing hole. There was a clock face with just a second hand and the dial marked out in twelve second sectors for the advertising slides. The projectionist had come from Warwick where the cinema there had closed. This was in 1987 and later I was leaving on the weekly Dirranbandi Mail which was a mixed train (freight train with passenger cars attached). On return at Toowoomba at lunchtime I had a lovely lunch at the Railway Refreshment Room.
I ran carbon arc machines in the late 60's and early 70's at a drive-in theater. This is a smooth projectionist. Practice makes perfect.
I've been in some projection booths with manual rewind. I worked in master control for a short while at the old WXGZ-TV 32 in Appleton back in 1987. When we ran 16 mm film -- cartoons for kids show or movies -- on the film chain, we had to manually rewind the reels.
The old film in fingertips technique for feeling the splices, brings back memories.I used to use the exact same splicer. With that equipment it was a 1 man 1 booth job, platters changed that and the digital messed it all up.And I see the old check your loops at the very end with your fingers, brings back memories.
Wonderful clip! Great that you went into the auditorium to show the beautiful cinema too! I'm guessing that you wouldn't want to open the lamphouse door when lit! Tim O'Neill, you look like an excellent efficient projectionist-there doesn't seem to be any hesitation or doubt about anything you're doing there! A few other clips I've seen seem to show the projectionist back-tracking/fumbling a fair bit! Agree with other comments about film vs. digital. My cinema attendance has dropped by 95%.
I was the projectionist at an 11 cinema theatre in my hometown. We didn't have carbon arc projectors. Ours took really big and scary light bulbs. It would scare the crap out of me having to change those things. We also had a platter system. But I still built the movies on a build table and transferred them to the platter. It was much easier to build it that way. But sometimes I had to build the movie directly to the platter. Eventually my job was done away with because of the digital switch.
Xenon arc bulbs. Yeah I had those in my cinema. We ran on Westrex vertical reel to reel systems that you had to rewind. Never got the chance to run a platter/loop machine.
Nice job.Very sorry to hear you're not employed to do it anymore. Great to see a professional at work.I grew up with 8mm & it was outdated at the time by video.You can't beat film.Best of luck & thanks for showing me how these giants worked.
This is real old school stuff. My first job was doing this from time to time. In 1988 they were already using xenon bulbs - well past this tech. Building films was the same as here.
In my day, we had to rewind those spools by hand! Sweet memories.
I was a projectionist at a drive-in theater and it had carbon arc lamp housing, different with no bulb.
A 2000' reel runs about 22 minutes but rarely are reels that full. 16-20 minutes is most common and then there will be some a lot shorter. Sometimes, if you encounter a very short reel and it's not the first reel nor the last, it generally means some major cutting was done by the editors late in the game, when it was impractical to "re-balance" where the reel breaks were. This is about domestic USA films. Foreign films vary. A native Japanese print often puts only 10-12 min on a reel.
The Gateway theater was one of only two theaters designed by Rapp and Rapp with atmospheric ceilings. The other called the Paramount Theater in Toledo, Ohio was more elaborate and sadly was razed for what else but a parking lot.
my father was a carbon arc projectionist in Delhi, India, when i was child i used to go there and really that machines was amazing and i still love those machines, when i was child i want to become a projectionist
Must be quite a few of these still India or not. Would love to visit one when in India next time. Any clue where to look for them?
Haha I don't know what it is about movie theaters and their projection booths, but they were incredibly enigmatic from the perspective of the seat in the theater... Despite being fundamentally simple... We had all seen film projectors in school but they of course were "toys" compared to these... And I dunno about everyone else, but until I got a tour of a booth, I was absolutely *burning* to know the differences hahaha
My dad was a Master Projectionist... and I learned at a very young age how to thread a machine... at that time? Everything was carbon arc.. although I remember when my dad, myself, and another projectionist/tech, built and installed the very first Carbon Arc to Xenon conversion on the US West coast... This was in late summer 1969, at the Cary Theater at Ft Lewis Washington... That Saturday? was the beginning of the end of Carbon Arc... in the booth..
this was such a clean light -- I used a carbon arc spot back in high school during musicals. It was a timing thing and you had to time it just right so they didn't run out in the middle of a performance.
Hope hes still going love watching old films i watch lots of 16mm films at hope
In thailand there are a few outdoor movie teams that still use carbon arc with film for the movie. But they dont use a few set of projectors like that when the reel run out. Instead they hot swap them. Same goes for the carbon arc rod. They swap them while the lamp running
Gracias por publicar y compartir su trabajo
I ran a carbon arc follow spot in my highschool projection booth in 1961-3....monster spot light.
Yes I was a carbon arc projectionist in New Zealand during the 60's and early 70's. Loved film. I don't think his splice looked that good though. I also never re-winded a reel of film that way. I always re-winded by hand crank running the film through my hand feeling for nicks in the film. Then repairing the film.
had these lamp house on Phillips DP70 at the Esquire Theater Melbourne Victoria Australia. Bloody Fantastic with very shinny jaws.
Working with carbon arcs was the true test of a showman - in the days when proji's were showmen. Keeping negative and positive carbons trimmed correctly was an art form and keeping them correctly spaced was a fete of concentration on what you were doing. Seamless changeovers from one mec to the other was also part of the projectionists skill, closing and opening tabs on cue and fading up or down the house-lights, stage-lighting and interval music was also part of the showmans job. These days, projectors can be run from the manager's office whilst the proji has become a true machine minder only. How times have changed since my days in the business!
J'ai été projectionniste en utilisant des materiels semblables avec les mêmes gestes!
Tout une époque révolue qui avait une odeur de pellicule et de vapeurs d'arc. Changement de bobine toutes les 20 minutes et respect d'une séance impeccable. C'était une autre époque.
Not sure if it was a foot switch but, at 5 minutes in he gives 'er the good ol' kick start and that's awesome!
Yep. Pedal that "drops the clutch"... Opens the douser, engages transport, etc... He didn't yell "Roll film" but hey 🤣
omg that sound of the arc dancing all around sets me on edge so bad. This feels so unsafe and scary like the guys in Los Alamos "tickling the dragon's tail"
Might I add my two cents. The finest movie theatre of its day they tore down for a parking lot and its destruction is a metaphor for how far our society has fallen. Look it up on Wikipedia. INDIAN HILLS MOVIE THEATHER in Omaha, Nebraska. Curved screen of 146 degrees, 110 feet long, 35 feet high. It was magic to see a movie there.
Lost track of all the great movies I saw there. If you sat in the middle somewhat close it took up all of your peripheral vision. Wish I had a time machine.
OMG! I used to go and sit in a friend's cinema and love that carbon arc machine. This cinema, Aelo, was also demolished a few years for a parking lot as well!!! What is happening? The matrix has broken again.
@@DBuilder1977 It's 'progress'.
I wouldn't mind so much as some technology is better, but in most cases the 'improvement' is just a cheap shit half assed attempt.
one of my friends had a 35 mm projector which had what was called a dog beater instead of an intermittent movement ,it used to belt the film through the projector just below the gate very crude.
When I was young I worked on the full platter tree type of projectors. Those didn’t have to wait for the yellow dots and start up a new one for each reel. The movies were one big long strip.
On these, projectionists had 2 projectors per theater. Once one reel gets close yo the end, a quick yellow dot appears, signaling the projectionist yo start the next projector / reel. Then once that starts, they put the next reel back into the initial projector and start it once reel 2 ends, etc. movies would be on 5-6 reels with each being about 2000 ft long
Thanks for this explanation. I was wondering if he was switching between different short films or of this was supposed to be one continuous movie.
I do remember actually seeing a yellow dot appear on the screen occasionally watching the Chronicles of Narnia back in ‘05 at a theater that was still using its original film projectors (sadly closed down for good a few months ago), but figured it was just some odd artifact on the strip… (that’s a memory that had been buried away until now 😂)
@@X5Industries Indeed, majority of people never thought anything of it. So much noise and artifacts in film, it was "just another one". That was the beauty of it... Secret code right in plain sight. Would have been very obvious it was some kind of signal if it was the only artifact to ever appear on the screen 🤣
This is something I can do too. Grew up in an old movie house (with apartment upstairs). We got our first Xenon bulb in 1989...but the other projector still had a carbon arc lamp. Finally got a Xenon bulb for the other one in '94.
Brings back wonderful yet sad memories..............I too was another Tom O'Neill.....worked for almost 25 years for Local 306 IATSE . Film projected via carbon rod light is unsurpassed, no digital format with xenon lamps will ever surpass the sheer power and enjoyment of projected 35mm film and carbon light. Indeed for years I worked the RKO Keith's theater in Flushing NYC............Ashcraft Super Core lights with Simplex XL heads...........with close to 1800 seats, going to the Keith's was a true experience. As was the Loews Paradise up in the Bronx. RIP projection craft, the gifts you gave will soon be all but a distant memory.
As a retired I.A.T.S.E. 306 projectionist I am surprised that the silver jaws for the carbon rods were not cleaned nor polished. My grandfather hand cranked projectors in Chicago befor moving to NYC He was a projectionist at the DeMille and then the Cinema One.
Are the xenon dangerous to the eyes?
ONCEUPON A TIME WHILE IN THE USAF I GOT A JOB AS AN ASSISTANT PROJECTIONIST AT THE BASE THEATRE....MY JOB WAS JUST TO KEEP THE CARBON RODS IN THE PROPER PLACE AT ALL TIMES...
I ran a pair in Rosenberg TX at the Cole Theater in the early 80's before progress shut the place down. The Sister Theater one block down, played movies on a projector that was older than those in the Smithsonian Institute in Washington.
Interesting to see something really old still in use. There is a oil leas in southern Illinois that has the same set up engine type that was installed in 1906 using a flywheel open crankcase engine and a multiple rod line pumping system
Most people don't realize how light a touch you have to have when you guide the film from reel to reel if you try to put a closer grip on the film it can slice your fingers like a razor blade.
Thanks for the memories. My father starting teaching me how to run a booth when I was about 11 or 12 years old. I threaded my first Simplex at the Bay Theater in Pacific Palisades and did my first changeover at The Four Star in Los Angeles, apprenticed at The Beverly running "That's Entertainment" in 70mm and worked as a projectionist for the next 23 years before digital made my skills obsolete
Thank you! Great video!❤
Oh how I miss my days I’m the booth.
A time in America when one would have a skill and could bring home a pay check. Technology has tossed that out the door
You still can. Just be resourceful.
The Gateway Film Center always takes great care with our prints!
I can remember my early years in IATSE Local 640 as a projectionist. Started on carbon arc lamphouse, e7 projectors with one hour reels. Hated watching horror movies and didn't think about this as a problem until I had to make changovers in them.
I run film like this, reel to reel, carbon arc at an archival house in Palo Alto Ca. One thing we see here that is a no no with archives is dropping film on the floor. Dirt walks it's way up the leader and into the print.
Rapp and Rapp designed several Milwaukee movie palaces. I think the Oriental is the only one still showing movies. The Warner, later called Centre and for its last 13 was called the Grand I-II is dark but still mostly intact. In fact its owner, Marcus has removed the 1974-vintage twinning. The Garfield still exists but has been extensively remodeled with the auditorium serving a church with the original plaster ceiling and walls covered. with other materials.
Excellent video. That booth is huge!
I ran that same projector during my high school years and simplex the rest is history
A study of a master craftsman at work.
Back when films were lit with fire.
That is so cool!!!! I have a couple of the carbon arc projector lights. They are called Jewell, which I cannot find any information about them. They are black in color and say Supr Arc made in Chicago. Do you know about any of these? Thanks for your time. John
Never ran a Core-Lite. Those carbons are huge. Looks like those could run three reels between change-overs?
13.6 mm. At the current consumed, the traditional copper coating would have melted in the beam, so the current was supplied to the water cooled solid silver jaw unit, just ahead of the flame. This was the reason that the carbon rotated, to maintain electrical contact without pitting the jaw. Despite that, it took about 20 minutes every day on each lamp to polish the pit marks out of the jaws.
@@wilsjane Wonder why they didn't use tungsten for the holder.
@@kleetus92 The jaw was conducting around 180 amps to the electrode at between 30 and 40 volts DC. In early installations the current was regulated by series ballast resistors from the output of a thermionic (mercury) diode, while in later installations the multi tap coupling transformers and solid state diodes stabilised the current and prevented surges. The strike current was between 400 and 600 amps.
The electrical resistance of tungsten would have generated heat in the series circuit, so along with its abrasive surface oxide it would have been unsuitable. Machining the cooling waterways through the jaw would have also been a huge problem
The conductivity characteristics are the same as the commutator or slip rings on an electric motor, where being in a lower temperature environment high purity copper is used.
@@wilsjane Ah, that makes a lot more sense with the additional current information.
@@kleetus92 We could have used gold, but with security and the jaws needing replacement every year or so, that may have been a step too far. 😊
As you may have guessed, I am a retired chartered engineer. I was also the chief engineer of the UKs leading cinema operator back in the days of rotating positive carbon arc-lamps. We had a few Ashcraft, but most of ours were Mole Richardson. They were coupled with Kalee 21 projectors in large theatres, but were later used mainly in 70mm houses.
My dad was a projectionist doing this for about 10 years before joining the brand new TV industry in 1950 as a film director.
Miss those clattering noise of projector
Carbon arc technology makes much more sense to me now that I see how little effort it takes for a skilled projectionist to maintain it. Compared to all the other chores, it's insignificant. And it halves the energy consumption in 2-projector setups since I notice how he turns the idle projector's arc off. (That is rarely done with xenon since every strike shortens the lamp's life.)
I recall reading that Ingmar Bergman required carbon arc for all movies screened at his private cinema at Fårö, since he preferred its color temperature so much over xenon.
Really the machine does most of the work as far as maintaining the arc.
If they had to manually keep every aspect of the arc in check, they would have needed to hire someone to do only that, "full time".
That said, it's still quite a bit more labor intensive than xenon, for sure.
It may be more convenient now but to me the old carbon arc projectors and sound systems of the 70’s performed better than those digital systems today by far.
OMG Carbon Arc guides and motorized advancers? That's cheating! I ran a pair of 1939 RCA Arc Welders. Just the very basics plus the massive 100-degree transformers that was also in the booth. Roasty-toasty! Advanced the rods myself. I think there was plenty of rod to do another reel for the one he swapped out :) We burned our rods to the bone!
Awesome! Thanks for posting!
Never had a tape splicer nor power re-winders in my time in the box! Must be a large screen for that current as well - only got the high when we ran 70mm Todd-AO prints.
Got the old 3D spool boxe's as well I see.
I always used to help the lower spool pick up when I did it ran; found I counted t 8 as well!!
Have some 16mm at home now; would die for a pair of 35mm - anyone with a pair of FP20's looking for a good home? - smile.
Happy days.
Ashcraft "Super Core-lite" lamphouses - made to handle 13.6mm rotating positive carbons. Simplex XL with a 4 Star soundhead. Bummer, no mag penthouses in use.
Not by a long shot - Xenon is 10 times more economical to operate than carbon arc, even though the light from carbon is 10 times better than xenon being more closer to the light spectrum. A bulb can replace 2 cases of positive rods to break even in cost.Then it gains value with running longer. Also, if the bulb fails under warranty, it can be replaced whereas the carbon rod is simply spent and used.
It is a long time since I saw an Ashcraft lamphouse. They were very rare her in the UK.
I read a theory as to why many modern digital remasters of films have a blue cast to them. Films were graded to be projected with carbon arc lamps. Modern projectors most likely use xenon lamps, which give a blue tint to the picture. So the people doing the digital colour timing are just following how it looked when they projected it.
You'd think film restorations would be smarter, but I'm not surprised.
True, carbon-arc projected a warmer color temperature.
Impressive. Dont know much about Carbon Arc Projection. This is going to be extremely rare given that film projection itself is coming to an end. I believe studios plan to stop 35 mm film distribution by end of 2013.I hope this doesn't happen.
Nice video.
Tim O'Neill просто волшебник. Интересно сейчас там показывают фильмы на плёнке.
My most favorite projector was a simplex in Christy I ran some centuries
Beyond cool. Would love to run a changeover.
Emocionado de ver este oficio en vias de extincion enhorabuena!
All I got to say is it was an awesome job and I was Union for years until it was taken away 😢to digital
I operated this same type of projector in 1970 in the San francisco bay Area
I do miss it
I also had a cassette storage as seen in the first seconds