Motion Picture Daily (Oct-Dec 1935)

Thursday, October 24, 1935 MOTION PICTURE DAILY 5 S. M. P. E. Sidelights Hays Speaks To Engineers In Washington (Continued from page 1) for the joint cooperation of science and education on one hand and technical development by the industry on the other." The day will come, he declared, when textbooks will be written on celluloid as well as on paper. Hays reviewed efforts made toward film preservation in recent years and welcomed the establishment of the Film Library, which will be located in the new National Archives Building in Washington. "It would be a crime against posterity," he asserted, "if we failed to organize this moving, living, talking record so that historical and educational material may be made available to educators, film creators and students of the future. Many priceless chronicles of current and contemporary events are literally fading away for want of careful scientific preservation which must follow a system of collation and selection of films from a vast footage of material produced every year." Richardson in Talk One basic reason why projection faults prevail in many theatres, declared F. H. Richardson, editor of the Bluebook School Department of the Motion Picture Herald, told the convention today, is that a real projection department is lacking. Even in chains, few directors of projection have sufficient authority to enforce regulations conducive to the best results, he stated. Discussing the essential functions of a chain theatre projection department, Richardson pointed out that the departmental office must be equipped with records that will enable its director to ascertain instantly not only the exact age and general condition of every piece of equipment used, but also the age and exact condition of every part thereof that is subject to deterioration through wear or other causes. J. R. Manheimer, of the E-J Electric Co. of New York, described the operation of electronic tubes to control reactors for setting and changing the intensity of lamps in theatres, public halls, auditoriums and other places. Switchboard Described The switchboard, described by Manheimer, consists of two sections : 1. — The pilot board, which contains the levers and switches, that are under the immediate control of the operator, located in a convenient position either beneath the stage with a porthole for the operator or on either side of the stage. It is comparatively small and, therefore, can be located to the best advantage. 2. — The actual control equipment comprising the reactors, wiring troughs, magazine panels, Thyratron tubes, and wiring terminals. These items are quite bulky, but can be set in less valuable space. The connection between the two consists, Manheimer stated, of multiple cables of comparatively small wires which carry only minute currents. This arrangement provides simplicity of operation and obtains ability to pre-set and control light intensities with the minimum of effort and a maximum of speed, Manheimer explained. It provides proportional dimming and automatic voltage regulation, which enables the load to be varied between 25 and 100 per cent of its rated capacity without affect Washington, Oct. 23. — Lyman J. Briggs, director of the Bureau of Standards, played host to the convention at the Bureau for the Tuesday afternoon session. + Some of the papers have been distinctly heavy, but not equal to the weight of the members themselves. Tuesday, the elevator at the Bureau of Standards balked at being made a vertically-moving sardine can. So Sylvan Harris, operator of the automatic raising device, a good engineer, finally came to the conclusion that some bulk weight had to be removed to permit the motor to overcome the static inertia ! + F. H. Richardson is very much in the limelight. It is he who frequently leads in discussing questions from the floor. + D. B. Judd, in his lecture on color blindness, brought his subject to a very immediate practical value by ing the proportion of dimming established by the position of the regulating switches. A summary of color, starting with a definition, was the gist of "The Conquest of Color" presented by Howard Ketcham of New York, who also advanced arguments why the motion picture was not yet ready for chromatic embellishment. "Color movies are in keeping with the outstandingly revolutionary changes in industry such as — streamlined trains, Diesel engines, synthetic enamels, beer in cans. When will colored movies replace black and white? When they embody a means of reproducing color with fidelity throughout the entire range of the visible spectrum ; when color costs approximate black and white production figures and represent a minimum change in production technique. Then and then only will color photography replace black and white moving pictures on a permanent basis," he said. Speaks on Color "The time is not far distant when color pictures will be made with no additional illumination on the set out of doors, no special cameras or cameramen. On the set, actors and actresses will need no other make-up than is normally worn on the street. The reproduction of flesh tones will be so faithful as to show the slightest variation of powder white or olive tint. "There has been too much tendency to date to treat color as a mere novelty with no real place in the general scheme of things. The colors in this world today are not livid, but gay. "The more color sensations the eye receives, and the fidelity with which they are transmitted, controls, to a degree, the fatigue of the eye. For this reason, a color picture process that employs three colors is less tiring than a two-color process ; and a four-color process is less tiring than a threecolor process. "To summarize, the successful color picture process will present with precision and comfort to the visual organ, any color within the visible spectral range." "Our American quality films will flashing on the screen a slide so constructed that it would indicate whether a person was color blind or not. The tenseness of the audience at this point indicated how very much they were interested in this subject. + The latter part of the Tuesday session seemed to develop into a contest as to the respective merits of color 16 mm. pictures made with third-dimensional effect and those without it. After R. C. Phillips had introduced and shown the former, a special showing was held of plain color film in order that the contrast could be noted. + Whether the entertainment committee had particularly in mind Robert Wildhack's excruciating discourses on "soft-palate calisthenics" — snoring to you — when they negotiated for the special showing of "Broadway Melody of 1936" is not known but the engineers thought the dissertations on these "sound phenomena" singularly and devastatingly funny. never be submerged abroad," N. D. Golden, chief of the motion picture division of the Bureau of Foreign and Domestic Commerce, declared. Among the lesser annoyances, censorship regulations abroad are becoming continually more drastic, even reaching extraordinary heights of "moral safeguards" governing attendance, such as the recent decree in Bagdad, forbidding men and women to sit together at matinees, he stated. Much more serious, Golden explained, are the systems of quotas and "Kontingents" now existing or proposed in foreign lands. But these barriers and competitive efforts form no just cause for indiscriminating pessimism, Golden held. At the dinner tonight, the S. M. P. E. awarded its newly-created Progress Medal to Dr. Edward C. Wente, research physicist in charge of acoustical investigations of Bell Telephone Laboratories. Designed to be an annual award, Dr. Wente was chosen for 1935 for his work in acoustics and acoustical instruments with special reference to their application to recording, transmission and reproduction of speech and music. Award for Paper The Journal award for the most outstanding paper published in the organization's official publication during 1934 went to Dr. Lloyd A. Jones and Dr. Julian H. Webb for their paper, titled "Reciprocity Law Failure in Photographic Exposure." Illuminated parchment certificates were presented to them by President H. G. Tasker. The recipients also received a check for $50 as part of the award. Honorable mention went to John I. Crabtree, Bell; H. E. Edgerton and E. J. Germeshausen, Massachusetts Tech; O. Sandvik, V. C. Ball, W. K. Grimwood, Eastman; D. B. Joy and A. C. Downs, National Carbon. Local managers cooperated in supplying talent for the banquet. From the Earle came Paul Ash, Bob Burns, Gypsy Nina, Rose Marie Deering, Barto and Mann and Bert Granoff. Members of one of Major Bowes' amateur shows playing the Loew's Fox also entertained, including Sara Berner, Youmans Brothers, Dave Siegel, Fritzie Robbins, Michael O'Byrne, "Skeets" Simmons and Celeste Alvi. Thursday's schedule program follows : 9:30 A.M. Little Theatre; Sound Session. Report of the Sound Committee; P. H. Evans, Chairman. "Practical Splice Blooping"; E. I. Sponable, 20th Century-Fox Film Corp., New York, N. Y. "A New Method for Increasing the Volume Range of Talking Motion Pictures"; N. Levinson, Warner Bros. -First National Studios, Burbank, Calif. "Critically Damped Filters"; J. Livadary, Columbia Pictures Corp., Hollywood, Calif. "Reversed Mechanical Bias on LightValue Recordings"; E. H. Hansen, 20th Century-Fox Film Corp., Hollywood, Calif. "Primary Considerations in the Design and Production of Theatre Amplifiers"; T. D. Cunningham, RCA Manufacturing Company, Camden, N. J. "Recent Progress in Motion Pictures in the U. S. S. R."; V. I. Verlinsky, Amkino Corp., New York, 2:00 p.m. Little Theatre; Apparatus Symposium. "Tne • Debrie 16-Mm. Professional Projector"; H. R. Kossman, Andre Debrie Corp., New York, N. Y. "A New Non-Intermittent Editing Machine"; J. L. Spence, Akeley Camera Company, New York, N. Y "A Neon Type Volume Indicator"S. Read, Jr., RCA Manufacturing Company, Camden, N. J. New Wisconsin Rule Allows Free Prizes Madison, Wis., Oct. 23— Free distribution of cards bearing numbers which entitle holders to prizes is not a lottery under a ruling handed down by the State Attorney General's office to District Attorney William M. Gleiss. The question arose over the policy of a Monroe county theatre giving away money each Saturday night to the holder of a lucky number. The holder has not been required to purchase an admission ticket and the winning number has been announced in front of the theatre. Wall Street Paramount Issues Gain on Biff Board Net High Low Close Change 65& 6554 6554 54 554 554 554 Consolidated, pfd. 19 1854 im % Eastman Kodak . 163 16254 163 +1 K. A. O., pfd.... 90Va 9054 9054 + 54 Loew's, Inc 4954. 4954 49/2 % 10754 10754 10754 54 1154 1054 10% + Paramount, 1 pfd 957/6 94 9sy2 +154 Paramount, 2 pfd 1354 1254. 1356 + 54 Fathe Film 6 6 6 + 54 RKO 554 554 554 — 54 20th CenturyFox. 1674 1614 1654 + 54 20th Century, pfd 2654 8 26 2656 Warner Bros. . . . 754 m 4554 441/4 45'/4 +154 Little Curb Activity Net High Low Close Change 3 m -54 1854 18*/4 1854 54 354 354 354 Bonds Hold Levels Net High Low Close Change General Theatre 6s '40 . 15 1454 1454 Keith B. F. 6s '46 . 9154 9154 9154 54 Loew's 6s '41 ww deb rights. .10554 10554 10554 + 54 Paramount Pict. 6s '55 9654 . 8354 9654 9654 + 54 RKO 6s '41 pp... 8354 8354 + 54 Warner Bros. 6s '39 wd . 8274 82 8254 + 54 (Quotations at close of Oct. 23)