8mm Forum: Airline super 8 projectors ...

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Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on July 18, 2019, 11:56 AM:

I'm sure that I have commented on this before ...

it must have been a long time, however. Do any of the old airline "in-flight movie" projectors actually still exist? I'm sure that, no doubt, when they replaced these with VHS machines back in the day, they no doubt scraped a lot of them, if not all.

I know that it was a neat system in which they simply pulled it down (from it's "hidden" compartment in the ceiling of the plane), ..

but not only have I never (except in pictures) seen one of these projectors ... not even one of the cartridges that they used on these machines ...

So, anybody have in pictures or otherwise of these machines, whether U.S. versions, or international versions of the same, (which might be different).

Posted by Dominique De Bast (Member # 3798) on July 18, 2019, 01:37 PM:

i have never seen an ex-Air France projector for sale, which is a shame since they had two soundtracks playback failities. Several French optical films have the main soundtrack in English and the other one (not really "compensation" in this case) with the original sound in French. Sadly no optical sound projector, as far as I know, allows to read this second track.

Posted by Leon Norris (Member # 3151) on July 18, 2019, 02:46 PM:

They are all kept in storage! What I was told!

Posted by Adrian Winchester (Member # 248) on July 18, 2019, 03:47 PM:

At the very least, a few should be displayed in moving image - and perhaps aviation - museums, ideally with occasional screenings taking place!

Does anyone know if I'm right (or wrong) in thinking that the previous usage of 16mm by airlines involved conventional projectors, meaning that Super 8 was the one format that involved a projector unique to airlines?

Posted by Maurice Leakey (Member # 916) on July 18, 2019, 04:07 PM:

Yes.
I recall seeing pics of many 16mm Bell & Howell projectors grouped all around in the overhead lockers. The film went from one to another, to another, to another, etc.
Can't recall number of mechs and screens but there were quite a lot.
Must have been quite a feat just to lace all the mechs!

Posted by Ed Gordon (Member # 6952) on July 18, 2019, 04:16 PM:

quote:
In-flight movies
Starting in 1971 In-flight movies (previously 16 mm) were shown in Super 8 format until video distribution became the norm. The films were printed with an optical sound track (amateur films use magnetic sound), and spooled into proprietary cassettes that often held a whole 2-hour movie.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_8_film#In-flight_movies

Posted by Kenneth Horan (Member # 3) on July 18, 2019, 08:29 PM:

In Flight Super 8 Projector with cartridge in place

Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on July 19, 2019, 12:12 PM:

Kenneth! I love that picture!

I had read that about 1971, but i believe that the article is off by about 4 years. The first known super 8 optical features, (at least, by myself) is 1967.

Occasionally, they would release a feature film "classic" but as a general rule, they were released as they came out. Disney's "The Jungle Book' is a fairly early release. i have two from either 1967 or 68, "Point Blank" and "Hot Millions" both of which, while not perfect color are still not bad to look at.

Posted by Thomas Dafnides (Member # 1851) on July 20, 2019, 12:26 AM:

I recall an airline stewardess telling me they had consistent problems with the film projectors that simply ended with the adoption of VHS.

Posted by Oliver F. R. Feld (Member # 1911) on July 20, 2019, 02:17 AM:

The picture is fascinating; I have never seen anything like that before. How did it work?

Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on July 20, 2019, 10:32 AM:

You can barely see it, but there is a cartridge that it mounted onto the projector. I'm pretty sure that it played all the way through and then rewinded. I haven't seen the cartridges outside of the projector, but it makes sense that this would be the procedure as, unlike the "technicolor" cartridge system, (which only held upwards of 25 or so minutes and therefore, would be able to be pulled through the projector), these large, nearly two hour cartridges would be too heavy to be pulled through.

In other words, much like the "platter" system of a 35MM projector of today.

That is my assumption, but I could be wrong.

Posted by Chip Gelmini (Member # 44) on July 20, 2019, 11:10 AM:

A 35mm platter rewinds as the movie plays. Some platters did have endless loop capability to avoid multiple lace ups.

The. Airline prints should have rewound as it was playing

Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on July 22, 2019, 11:36 AM:

You could well be right, Chip, as we can't see the cartridge's bottom, as it is in the actual projector.

Posted by Paul Adsett (Member # 25) on July 22, 2019, 01:53 PM:

Remember when they had to pull all the window shades in the cabin during daylight hours to watch the movies? Sometimes passenger's up near the screen would not cooperate and would 'wash out' the picture, ruining the show for everybody else. There's one in every crowd.
As I remember, all the films shown on airlines were current first run films being shown at the cinema's, so super 8mm prints must have been struck immediately upon release of the films. I believe the projectors were maintained and loaded up with film by an external company called In-flight Entertainment or something like that.
This whole subject is very interesting and I wish we had more information to share.

Posted by Chip Gelmini (Member # 44) on July 22, 2019, 04:50 PM:

The optical cassettes would have had to been endless loop. Where the tail was spliced to the head. So in a sense it rewound as it played but was only inserted and never had to be threaded.

So here's my question. Did they ever run "Airplane?"

[Big Grin]

Posted by Steve Klare (Member # 12) on July 22, 2019, 05:31 PM:

Apparently they did!

Our own review mentions the existence of airline prints of Airplane!.

Airplane! Review

Posted by Paul Adsett (Member # 25) on July 22, 2019, 06:56 PM:

Shirly you cannot be serious about that!

Posted by Steve Klare (Member # 12) on July 22, 2019, 07:26 PM:

“The Hospital?!! What is it?!!”

“That’s the big building where doctors work, but that’s not important right now.”

Posted by Maurice Leakey (Member # 916) on July 24, 2019, 02:45 PM:

Not a Super 8 set-up, but allegedly the first film to be shown in an aeroplane in 1921.
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:First-In-Flight-Film-1921.jpg

Posted by Dominique De Bast (Member # 3798) on July 24, 2019, 05:55 PM:

I read that Howdy Chicago, the first film projected in a plane, was a short. The first Feature was the Lost World.

Interesting footage of the plane :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pz0La8f1IHU

[ July 24, 2019, 08:29 PM: Message edited by: Dominique De Bast ]

Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on July 26, 2019, 12:04 PM:

You know, one thing that i have never ran into, in all my years of collecting super 8 optical sound prints, is one of those large cassettes with the film still in it.

Yes, i have ran into the South African "technicolor" cartridges, (news flash, it wasn't technicolor film in those cartridges), which held upwards of 25 or so minutes ...

But I have NEVER ran into one of those large two hour size cartridges used in the U.S., U.K. or elsewhere cartridges.

I could well be wrong, as it has been SO LONG since the airlines used these super 8 optical features, but i wonder if, in the "bowels" of the major airline "hubs', if there might still be stacks of old cartridges, just gathering dust, down below, in those areas of the airports rarely even entered these days?

Posted by Leon Norris (Member # 3151) on July 30, 2019, 12:18 PM:

I'm glad they put features and shorts on super8 optical sound! There are lots of good titles out there to find! I just picked up two goodies The Driver and Pale Rider! Both are near excellent! And the prices are very reasonable!

Posted by Osi Osgood (Member # 424) on July 31, 2019, 10:44 AM:

I remember "The Driver"! I have Pale Rider" as well. it's one of them that was apparantly put on some fairly good stock.

"Preeeeeacher!"

[Smile]

The great fondness i have for these is that, even to this day, i still find titles that i didn't even know existed!

Posted by Leon Norris (Member # 3151) on July 31, 2019, 10:56 AM:

Still searching for more rare titles! I know they are out there!

Posted by Maurice Leakey (Member # 916) on July 31, 2019, 11:31 AM:

I refer to the picture shown above with the flight attendant and the projector. This was an IMPAK projector made by Inflight Motion Pictures.
Here are some details:-
https://www.filmkorn.org/super8data/database/projectors_list/projectors_impak/ impak_model_45.htm
And here's another:-
https://translate.google.co.uk/translate?hl=en&sl=de&u=https://3f-museum.de/56-impak-projektor-mod-45/&prev=search

Posted by Leon Norris (Member # 3151) on July 31, 2019, 11:34 AM:

A very interesting read!

Posted by Matthieu van der Sluis (Member # 6040) on July 31, 2019, 01:07 PM:

Interesting topic indeed.
Would be nice to find a cassette with The Jungle Book on it.

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