Points to remember:

• Changeovers (even on 6000' reels) require threading at least 2 projectors for a given run. Many shows will require 3 or more rethreads per feature. Platters require only ONE thread to present an entire feature. (Most rocket scientists will already side with me here.)
  
• Platters do not need rewinding. How much of your time will be WASTED rewinding reels of film? With 30 screens, how many rewind benches will you have to have? Also, can you imagine that even if your 30 plex was only running short movies, that you will have to be rewinding 60 reels of film every couple of hours!!! Yeah, that's a BIG time saver.
  
• Once a film is screened once on a platter...that's it! The reels will always be in order. Every single performance of a changeover presentation allows for the possibility of a projectionist mistake. Think about all the chances for loading reel 3 instead of reel 2 on the second machine! How bad would it be if the new Disney movie suddenly turned into a sex scene from loading a reel from another movie!!!
  
• Platters do not require handling of the film, thus the prints will AUTOMATICALLY stay in better shape. No longer will reel changes be all scuffed and cinch marked up from all of that unnecessary handling.
  

Expect more points to come as you make your argument.

Obviously, you never took rocket science, but that is another story...

I am presumming that eventhough you are allowing full automation you just are not going to allow me to use my beloved Kinoton FP-30E-R projectors, eventhough the Europeans get to use them. Because if you do, your arguements ALL start to fall pretty darn fast...there are no rethreads, the projectors can hold up to 12K per so just about every feature ever made will fit on two machines, if they are in frame on the first thread up, then they are in frame forever, rewinding is at a leasurly 100fps so no cinch marks...basically it starts to become the operatorless booth...but I would suppose that you would do some hand waving on that and force a more conventional booth (ie Century or Simplex) so here we go on that route

You are threading a projector and a platter, I am threading two projectors. Time difference, negligable and depending on who is the quicker threader upper, it could go either way...not to mention clean up more spills!

>>"How much of your time will be WASTED rewinding reels of film?"<< Since I hope you would allow power rewinds, not much personal time at all...it would be measured in seconds per reel based on the distance of the rewinder from the projectors.

>>"Once a film is screened once on a platter...that's it! The reels will
always be in order."<<

You got me on that one, I guess platters do have a virtue.

>>"Think about all the chances for loading reel 3 instead of reel 2 on the
second machine! How bad would it be if the new Disney movie suddenly
turned into a sex scene from loading a reel from another movie!!"<<

Having seen this happen on a platter house, it isn't unique to reels. Presuming these theatres do not share film bins, the chances are about as slim as threading the wrong print on the platter. Furthermore, go with large hub (8") and large flange reels to ensure all but the longest films played on two reels).

>>"Platters do not require handling of the film, thus the prints will
AUTOMATICALLY stay in better shape. No longer will reel changes be all
scuffed and cinch marked up from all of that unnecessary handling."<<

I can't remember the last time I saw cinch marks on reel changes...they are so easy to avoid it would like me poking fun at platter people for diagonal scraches because they didn't feed the film on the platter properly, sure it is possible and has happened way too often, but it certainly isn't an essential part of the process.

And if you can have a film cleaner on your platter/projector, I can have em on my rewinder/projector. At night, my reels will be in their nice bins.

Now during the day...I'll be walking, leasurly rethreading projectors, rewinding, trimming the focus and what ever else need be done...you will be waiting for the gun to go off for the massive rethread at show change, mine will have been done an hour previously.

Steve

PS The "last fight" really wasn't (and neither is this) and I did as I claimed, I didn't post after I said I wouldn't. We will see how this one goes but tomorrow is Mom's day so I probably won't get a chance to check up. Any time you want to drop it Brad, I'll do the same.

No, very few people have those self rewinding Kinoton projectors, so you are correct I will insist on a conventional setup. HOWEVER, I've worked with systems that DO rewind through the projector and what a joke! Constant film damage, over and over. Let's save this argument for a rainy day and stick to the topic at hand though.

QUOTE:
You are threading a projector and a platter, I am threading two projectors. Time difference, negligable and depending on who is the quicker threader upper, it could go
either way...not to mention clean up more spills!

What planet are you from? I can take you any day of the week on my threading a platter vs. you threading a projector. You are failing to remember that for me to reset the platter is that all-so-hard task of giving it a spin, a quick tuck and a pull of the center ring. The actual threading only takes less than 10 seconds! You on the other hand may be able to thread a projector in 10 seconds, but you are forgetting the loading time to run to that rewind bench, grab the reel, make sure it's facing the right direction, get it on the spindle, lock it down, find the first foot of leader (God I hope you add extra leader) and start threading. Oh, but wait...you've got to run fetch a takeup reel too! Darn, you lose. (And what in the heck do you mean by cleaning up spills?)

Your argument that reels are found out of order on platters is correct, but ludicrous when comparing to changeovers! First, the print will be screened once regardless of film transport to verify print condition and that everything is in frame and in the correct order. Well, AT THAT POINT, the ONLY possibility for a screwup is on a changeover setup buddy...and that possibility can happen on ANY SHOW! Where do you come up with this stuff?

I will give you the cinch mark argument. However, you must agree with me cinch marks on changeover houses are more common than platter scratches from a misthreaded platter. I've yet to see a changeover setup that did not cause cinch mark scratches after a decent amount of running the same print, but I will take your word on it...at least until I visit the Uptown and can verify one way or another.

Film cleaners...oh but you forget that "brute force" pull of the weight of the reels my friend! As your reels come closer to an end, there is more tension exerted onto the film at the film cleaner. That's not a good thing. You lose again.

Finally, as to me "waiting for the gun to go off", when is the last time you've been to a 30 plex??? That's NOT how things work. There are movies starting every 5-10 minutes...NOT ALL AT ONCE! Go get a paper tomorrow and check the start times.

Where's that darned referee 'cause Steve is down and no one is counting!

(And yes for those listening in, no we're not really angry at each other. This is something we do from time to time for fun.)

jasoN

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Steve:
Now during the day...I'll be walking, leasurly rethreading projectors, rewinding, trimming the focus and what ever else need be done...you will be waiting for the gun to go off for the massive rethread at show change, mine will have been done an hour previously.

>>"No, very few people have those self rewinding Kinoton projectors, so you are correct I will insist on a conventional setup."<<

They are now a current off the shelf product (Kinoton FP30E-R) so it is wrong to disqualify them and it would be a knock down punch that you just couldn't recover from. Is the only way you can make your arguments is to disqualify anything that doesn't help your arguement? Because right now YOU LOSE!

>>"The actual threading only takes less than 10 seconds! You on the other hand may be able to thread a projector in 10 seconds, but you are forgetting the loading time to run to that rewind bench, grab the reel, make sure it's facing the right direction, get it on the spindle, lock it down, find the first foot of leader (God I hope you add extra leader) and start threading. Oh, but wait...you've got to run fetch a takeup reel too!"<<

Gee Brad I have run platters but have you run reels? The T-U reel comes from the upper spindle, it doesn't have to be fetched. On the reels I don't have to spin the reel or pop out the center ring and such nor thread through a cluster, tree 15-30 feet of rollers, take up, move the takeup cluster to the appropiate platter. Again, it will be a wash as to who is faster here. The "spills" point was a (rather poor) joke..."quicker picker upper" (ie Bounty) vs the "quicker threader upper."

Regarding out of order, as usual you simply omit that which doesn't fit your case...I consided that once a platter is properly made up, you have eliminated the out of order, upside down reel issue. But are you now also refusing me large reels to ensure my print is on just two reels? If not, then out of order is also rather hard on reels. My other comment was towards that both systems can fall victim to threading the wrong feature (have seen it done many times). We have one customer that anodized their reels different colors to avoid the possibility.

>>"I will give you the cinch mark argument. However, you must agree with me cinch marks on changeover houses are more common than platter scratches from a misthreaded platter."<<

No I won't give you that one...Lets just walk around the country and look at all the platter related scatches out there but if it is just you and me running things (the theme of this fantasy or nightmare arguement) lets just agree that neither are an issue.

>>"Film cleaners...oh but you forget that "brute force" pull of the weight of the reels my friend! As your reels come closer to an end, there is more tension exerted onto the film at the film cleaner. That's not a good thing. You lose again."<<

By this I presume you don't even allow me torque motors for the reels (just like Brad, never allow technology to help another's arguement). Ok then, hence the large hub reels...the tension is minimal through out (I've only been doing it for decades), no problem using film cleaners or, as I said I set one up on the bench. If I get to use my Kinotons, then I use the Kinitronics cleaner/anti stat...get two cleans per show without applying a pertrolium product to the film.

You mean in your fantasy 30-plex you can't run 30 separate titles at once? Shoot, I had mine (31 screens)running art, rep and first run because I could. Yeah, the typical mega-plex runs 2-3 prints of the same titles (it was coming up as an arguement on the stupidity of the 30-plex). I mean if you wanted to run a 10 -15 plex build it that way with bigger rooms. But the "typical" 30-plex is all that much more easy to run, in fact it is as easy to run a modern 30-plex on reels as an old 10-plex.

>>"Where's that darned referee 'cause Steve is down and no one is counting!"<<

Not by a long shot...you have tied my arms and one leg but I still haven't lost, not even close.

One last question Brad, what year would you consider the piviotle year for the platter, that is when it became the norm for operation?

Steve

PS To the others, I would like to keep Brad's comments separate.

Dustin, your argument about changeovers not improving an operator's likelyhood of checking his presentation has proven false by observation...the nature of being forced to come by a particular screen once per show and actually be in the proximity of the port tends to make them more aware, no guarantees since slothdom is seemingly a virtue to some. In Brad and mine's case, I don't think this will be an issue.

All the rewinding and rethread does to the operator's time is insure that they come to each screen just once per show, are you trying to tell me that you don't even do that? Is just one check up per show too much?

In actuallity, there is just as much time for cleaning ports, mopping floors and volumes more time for print "build ups and tear downs" They go quicker and start sooner (in both directions).

"Aha! Jason must not have tried FilmGuard yet! That knocks the static argument right out the port window."

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nope. i have to talk the cheapskate into buying some. wish me luck

jasoN

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