Cinema News and Property Gazette Technical Supplement (1924-1925, 1943, 1946)

May 28, [925. Supplement to THE CINEMA NEWS AND PROPERTY GAZETTE. prizes of joints of beef are offered as an inducement to patronage. Can it be that the idea is to offer some little compensation for lack of " meat " in the programme? Reminds one of the dear old days when we used to inveigle the kiddies in to our children's performances by distributing lollipops and hags of sherbet. SQUASHED. The new musical director at a big cinema in an industrial centre up North was proud of his tall, .esthetic figure and his long-: sleek hair, until on a busy night, an irreverent urchin, finding his view of the screen obstructed, yelled to an attendant, " Tell tha' loonie wi' 't fiddle ta taak off tha' busby." He sits on a lower stool now. SELF PRESERVATION It is evident that those concerned in the construction of new cinemas are studying with marked earnestness the all-important question of self-generated electric current supply. Not only does the price of current from district supply vary so enormously, even in adjacent areas, that exhibitors oft-times feel that they are being bled to maintain incompetent administration of the service undertaking, but the injustice of charging lighting rates for the motor current generators practised by many authorities is becoming an intolerable burden in these days of need for the strictest economy in overhead expenses. GAS— OB PARAFFIN. It has long been realised that vast saving is to be made in cost of current when a self-generating plant is installed. The Marble Arch Pavilion produces ;the whole of its current by gas-engine power, both for bioscopes and lighting, at less than threepence per unit, while a cinema on the outskirts of London has recently installed a paraffin set giving bioscope current at a cost of less than ^3 per week, against the local supply charge of treble this figure. Not only has the exhibitor decreased cost, but he has the security of freedom from failure of supply due to power-station breakdown or labour difficulties, when using self-generated current. THOSE AUTOMATICS. That vastly popular idea, the automatic delivery machine, which enables the picturegoer to get a packet of cigarettes or matches right up to the time of closing of the show, has encouraged an inventor to suggest a similar means of supplying ice-cream during the hot months. Just how he proposes to bring about a service so devoutly to be desired is difficult to see, unless, iadeed, the would-be customer has to put his penny in at the top and hold his mouth open under a spout at the bottom. Anyhow, when the experiment is made, " may we be there to see." FILM MUTILATION. INFORMATIVE LECTURE BY E. E. BLAKE. A POINT HE MISSED. There was a large gathering of operators, and not a few prominent London exhibitors, at the Piccadilly Cinema on Wednesday morning, when Mr. E. E. Blake, of the Eastman-Kodak Company, delivered a most interesting and informative lecture upon the subject of film damage and its prevention. The lecturer was introduced by Dr. Fowler Pettie, chairman of the London Branch oT the C.E.A., and was supported by several members of the General Council of that body, as well as by Mr. Frank Hill, secretary of the K.R.S. By means of lantern slides and slow-motion films the lecturer demonstrated how inaccurate gate pressure, improperly made joins, worn and defective sprockets and guide-rollers, insufficient loops, and too weak or too strong take-up pressure not only brought about serious damage to the film-stock, but made even reasonably good projection an impossibility. The speaker showed in the plainest possible manner the need for daily and systematic inspection of the moving parts of the projector-mechanism, and he demonstrated how the magazine film-trap rollers having become " fixed " would become worn flat, and so present almost knife-like edges to the travelling film. He showed how the outer edges of the film became " Jagged " by reason of wear on the guide-roller bushing or washers ; how the sprocket holes may be torn by "drag" in the film travel, and by the hooked formation of worn sprocket teeth. He demonstrated how a badly made join might run its erratic and jumpy way through the gate aperture only to " run off " at the bottom guide roller, and cause a cut through dozens of feet of the perforations ; he pointed out the fire risks present in the passing of such joins through the machine. But he did not point out — and we think he should have done — that projectors presenting the possibilities of damage noted had no right, in the exhibitors' own interests, to be in any operating enclosure at all. The lesson that a precision machine of the delicacy of a film-projector has a limit to its period of maximum efficiency beyond which it is not only a menace to the film put through it, but also to the reputation of the theatre in which it grinds out its senile days is one that might well be added to Mr. Blake's excellent propaganda. Meanwhile, operators interested in the subject — and those who are not ought not to be operators at all — can receive a copy of an admirably illustrated epitome of the lecture free of charge by writing to Mr. E. E. Blake at the Eastman-Kodak Offices, Kingsway, London, W.C.