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I believe it saves time to go ahead and thread my projectors at night so I am ready when we open at 3p the next day to begin showing movies.

I have had some discussion of late as the do and not do of this practice.

What do you think?

Most "PROJECTIONIST" wont do it , but I do not believe it does any harm ..Ther will be plenty of people who do not agree.....

I never cared for the practice, though I don't suppose it really hurts anything... especially if you're the guy who's going to start up what you threaded last night.

In colder weather I like to run up my machines for awhile. I also cover my platters at night. Both practices would be difficult if the machines were already threaded. In a multi-projectionist environment, you're technically trusting the last guy's threading, though you could probably check it faster than you could start from scratch. If I hit the button and something goes wrong, I'd rather it be my fault than be pointing at somebody else.

Most people I know do their cleaning before threading, rather than after the film runs out. You couldn't check that if the projector was already set up.

I'd might have a much different outlook if I had a 15 screen theatre. Since I don't, I have no practical reason to consider the issue.

In the end, it may be another of those personal choice issues, though Slap's right. It does tend to be an item that some people use to judge the perceived "professionalism" of others.

[This message has been edited by rodeojack (edited September 13, 2007).]

On another film forum, this practice would be strictly frowned upon.

At my last theatre, this very practice was done every night for 10 years with no noticeable problems.

It's an operational decision best left to the manager or owner.

During the summer months, I get 2 nights off during the week (usually Tuesday & Wednesday), and my wife runs the place for me. While I love my wife dearly, she is not what I would refer to as a "technically minded" individual.

On Monday nights after closing, I'd usually clean out the projectors, rewind the film cleaners, re-thread the machines, and get them framed up and ready for her to simply "flip the switch" for the next night. Tuesday's during lunch, I'll usually sneak off down to the theatre and do it again.

While some might not consider it to be a "professional" way of doing it, it's sure more professional than trying to explain how that big green scratch ended up on all 9 reels of Pirates because somebody threaded the machine wrong or didn't clean it out before they ran the show.



[This message has been edited by Barry Floyd (edited September 14, 2007).]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, helvetica">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by reelman:
...this practice would be strictly frowned upon.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

But why? Since Filmfisher is the projectionist and if he/she has an automatic cleaner on the projector, I don't see the harm. What are some reasons why it would be considered "unprofessional"?

The posters on the Film-Tech website urge very professional practices for the art of 35mm film projection.

This particular method of nightly threading is on their no-no list. I can't recall the exact reasons but I have threaded this way just about my entire 23 year career with no apparent harm.

The goal is always to maintain the brightest, cleanest, sharpest images. If you have never read their archives and want an education, you should check them out. The late, great John Pytlak has thousands of helpful posts there for "film done right".