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Topic: How many hats do you wear? How many hats do you like?

Eric Robinson
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 538
From: Santa Rosa, CA
Registered: Jan 2005

posted 04-21-2006 11:50 PM

One condition for my employment with my company is that I could support more than one technology. I have a yearning to perfect each one; however, with more than 11 theatres to support, this is very difficult. I am involved in the following:
1) Projection and sound
2) Computers POS systems, networking
3) Concession equipment repair
4) Personal computer services to owners and administrative office employees
5) Training and documentation for projection booth.

Theres probably more, but why should I bore you eh?

Do any of you wear more than one hat? Do you try to stick with one technology? Just curious.

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Frank Angel
Film God

Posts: 5305
From: Brooklyn NY USA
Registered: Dec 1999

posted 04-22-2006 01:06 AM

Wearing lots of hats has been what makes the job always interesting. Let's see:

Cinema Director: Booking, budgeting, marketing, brochure design, brochure bulk mailing supervision, even local hand delivery, development
Projectionist
Design, install, maintenance and Program and Promo Producer for lobby monitor display system
Sound Studio Manager and Mixing Engineer
Live Events House Sound Mixer and Recording Engineer
Broadcast Technical Director
Sound Studio Mastering and Dubbing Engineer
Radio Programming Producer
Radio Programming promo spot producer
PAC Systems Supervisor
PAC Computer Services, Network Adminstrator
Telco Digital Switch Adminstrator
Voice Artist (Telephone System Menu & Events Calendar)
Electronic Marquee Administrator
Administrator, Maas-Rowe Carillon and Clock system for Brooklyn College campus.
Composer, various electronic music and musique concrete works for June Lewis Dance Company

Outside Brooklyn Center for the Performing Arts --

AFTRA VoiceOver Artist (Most recently, GEICO national ad campaign)
Cinema Consultant & Projectionist, various venues including Brooklyn Museum, Celebrate Brooklyn Outdoor Summer Festival, Smithsonium Museum of the American Indian
Author, Brooklyn, A State of Mind: Saving A Palace(Loew's Kings)
Audio engineer, TABLE SETTING -- HEO Productions (Stockard Channing and Robert Klein, Mindy Cohn Eileen Heckart)

Is it any wonder I am still here in the office at 2am on a Friday night? But I wouldn't have it any other way. I could have retired a year ago....it is not even a remote thought in my mind yet. I feel like I am 25yrs old, but without the drama or the wife (or were they both one and the same?). I attribute feeling this good to being lucky enough to have great varity in my work. Sometimes I will work for 12hrs and forget to eat I am having so much fun. Some of my friends hate going to work and they are in agony just waiting until 5pm rolls around; I almost feel guilty that I love my work so much -- almost doesn't seem fair.

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Jack Ondracek
Film God

Posts: 2348
From: Port Orchard, WA, USA
Registered: Oct 2002

posted 04-22-2006 01:25 AM

quote: Frank Angel
AFTRA VoiceOver Artist (Most recently, GEICO national ad campaign)

Thought that gecko sounded familiar!...

Seriously, Frank... You are the ultimate spoiler. How does anyone follow that post!?!

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Frank Angel
Film God

Posts: 5305
From: Brooklyn NY USA
Registered: Dec 1999

posted 04-22-2006 01:27 AM

I shoulda save it for last, eh Jack? [Wink]

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Tim Reed
Better Projection Pays

Posts: 5246
From: Northampton, PA
Registered: Sep 1999

posted 04-22-2006 01:29 AM

There's nothing wrong with having a wide variety of knowledge and skills, but it sounds like you are being abused by your company. They're saving big $$$ on your back by not contracting out several specializations.

Booth work alone is a full-time affair.

quote: Frank Angel
AFTRA VoiceOver Artist (Most recently, GEICO national ad campaign)

Let's hear it, baby!

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Michael Schaffer
"Where is the
Boardwalk Hotel?"

Posts: 4143
From: Boston, MA
Registered: Apr 2002

posted 04-22-2006 01:35 AM

quote:
You are the ultimate spoiler. How does anyone follow that post!?!

Frank and his couple little side jobs are easy to top. In addition to my diverse everday duties as technical manager in the movie theater industry, I also work undercover for no less than five international intelligence agencies of which at least three can be classified as ideologically incompatible and therefore competing. Unfortunately, I can not tell you any more details.

I mean, I could tell you, but then I would have to kill you all.
But don't tell anyone, OK? Remember, I know where you live, all of you.

I also took part in a top secret space reconnaisance mission to Mars.

How's that for spoilers?
Ha!

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Frank Angel
Film God

Posts: 5305
From: Brooklyn NY USA
Registered: Dec 1999

posted 04-22-2006 02:05 AM

Actually Tim, when it's lined up that way, it does sound like serious abuse, but the nice thing is none of this runs concurrently. The Cinema operation was running a regularly scheduled series when they were able to give me some very good assistants and tech support. They are gone so now we only do CinEvents -- small groups of themed films, or a big deal with directors and or actors doing roundtable discussions, but they are a few this month, one or two the next. Allot of the stuff, once it's running, just chugs along without much intervention. And everything is at my own pace and I am pretty much left alone to my own devices. Really, it's not as bad as it looks.

That's the idea of different hats -- most of the time I swap 'em, only rarely do I put more than two or three on at the same time. On occasion I will feel they are handing me more than is reasonable and I give just them back. I know how to say NO, which was one of the most difficult lessons to learn; they oughta teach THAT in school.

Yeah, yeah, Michael....what you don't know is, who do you think was the Senior Interpol agent giving you your assignments? Huh? That's right, baby! Why do you think you had to pick them up in that dumpster off Flatbush Avenue in Prospect Park in Brooklyn? [Big Grin]

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Tim Reed
Better Projection Pays

Posts: 5246
From: Northampton, PA
Registered: Sep 1999

posted 04-22-2006 04:22 AM

Frank, you've always had a full plate, I know. And you've taken a lot of what I call "hobby jobs" over the years. But Eric's company has him servicing all these different departments and that seems to be more than a little lopsided on their part.

So, let's hear your radio spot, Frank! URL, please...

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Eric Robinson
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 538
From: Santa Rosa, CA
Registered: Jan 2005

posted 04-22-2006 02:17 PM

I have many ideas to give visibilty to areas of need. I have aspirations to develop a preventitive maintenance plan. Ideally I would like to have a technical support staff running under my direction. The only problem; however, is that the companys budget has only enough funds available for one tech. "Me"

I'm sure there have been in other techs in the same position as I, before. I wonder if any of them were successful selling the ideas I have above?

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Michael Schaffer
"Where is the
Boardwalk Hotel?"

Posts: 4143
From: Boston, MA
Registered: Apr 2002

posted 04-22-2006 10:58 PM

quote: Frank Angel
Yeah, yeah, Michael....what you don't know is, who do you think was the Senior Interpol agent giving you your assignments? Huh? That's right, baby! Why do you think you had to pick them up in that dumpster off Flatbush Avenue in Prospect Park in Brooklyn?

Frank, Frank... Of course we knew it was you all the time. Did you think the slouch hat and trench coat thing fooled anybody? BTW, you weren't working for Interpol, that was just a facade, part of a bigger setup. But it's better for your safety if I don't tell you more. The Russians always said you must be either a bloody amateur, a really good actor, or working for the North Koreans.

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Tim Reed
Better Projection Pays

Posts: 5246
From: Northampton, PA
Registered: Sep 1999

posted 04-23-2006 02:24 AM

quote: Eric Robinson
The only problem; however, is that the companys budget has only enough funds available for one tech.

If their budget is such that they can't afford to support day to day operations, then they're in serious trouble. Concession equipment, for example, and its requisite maintenance are necessities. If they told me they couldn't afford to cover these things, well they just wouldn't get done...

Sorry, but I've seen these attitudes escalate over the years. Theatres that got by fine on several operators per screen in the past, all of a sudden are now having income from 14-20 screens without paying a corresponding increase in projection operation cost. These outfits should have money coming out their ears from all the projectionists they didn't have to pay for all those screens all those years!

Don't give yourself away, make them give.

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Mark Gulbrandsen
Resident Trollmaster

Posts: 16657
From: Music City
Registered: Jun 99

posted 04-23-2006 07:04 AM

quote: Frank Angel
I almost feel guilty that I love my work so much -- almost doesn't seem fair.

Hardly, it is very fair. You undoubtdly paid the price one way or another to get where you are. Hence you deserve a job that you do really like.

quote:
Wearing lots of hats has been what makes the job always interesting. Let's see:

I agree that wearing many hats is a good idea. Although giving 150 to 200% effort at work to me is normal just don't let it get too out of hand! If it gets out of hand you could always go in for surgery or have a nervous breakdown and then take it easy for a while, sometimes this puts your employer in your shoes for a while [Big Grin]

quote:
Frank and his couple little side jobs are easy to top. In addition to my diverse everday duties as technical manager in the movie theater industry,

Michael,
Its probably a good thing that you have those secret agent jobs going on the side.... since you are installing digital on all your screens and all digital systems are 100% reliable they soon won't need your services in the film industry!

Mark

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Phil Blake
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 558
From: esperance western australia
Registered: Nov 2003

posted 04-23-2006 08:01 AM

Just like many others i guess, my hats include from standard booth operations, to cleaning, candy and ticket sales , interior and exterior maintenance , equipment servicing, banking staff rostering ordering supplies, system programming , catering during functions and advertising .And in my spare time I do a little long distance truck driving .

This is all good , but becomes hard when a holidays are needed , so hard to teach a replacement to cover all these espects.

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Adam Fraser
Master Film Handler

Posts: 499
From: Houghton Lake, MI, USA
Registered: Dec 2001

posted 04-23-2006 12:05 PM

Lets see:
Theatre:
Concession Sales
Box Office
Nightly threading
Occasional buildup/breakdown
Concession equipment maintenance
Computer system maintenance
Yard work
Sprinkler system maintenance and repairs
Customer service
Special event booking
Seat repairs

Furniture store:
Sales
Assembly
Customer service
Yard work
Repairs
Order processing

Motorcycle Repair:
Repair bikes
Billing/ordering/advertising
Licensing
Anything that needs to be done because this business is just me.

35-50 hrs/wk in the off season
70-95 hrs/wk from Memorial-Labor Day

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Michael Schaffer
"Where is the
Boardwalk Hotel?"

Posts: 4143
From: Boston, MA
Registered: Apr 2002

posted 04-24-2006 03:05 AM

quote:
Michael,
Its probably a good thing that you have those secret agent jobs going on the side.... since you are installing digital on all your screens and all digital systems are 100% reliable they soon won't need your services in the film industry!

Au contraire, the digital systems do have some problems too, and since they still need installing and film will be around for quite some time anyway and there are still sound, automation and lighting systems even in digital cinema installations, people who know both will be in more and more demand in the future.
Besides, we prefer the term "Undercover Operative". "Secret Agent" sounds so Hollywood!

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