Man behind the moving pictures
Throughout Foxton are volunteers from every walk of life, helping the community in almost every way you can think of. In this occasional series of photo articles, MAVtech museum’s photographer Jacob Brookie is using vintage cameras from its collection to show you a day in the life of our town’s volunteers.
Lit by a beam of light as hot as the surface of the sun, working carbon arc cinema projectors are rare in New Zealand — just like people who are trained to operate them. One of MAVtech’s cameras made the very short journey from the back of the museum to the projection booth to photograph MAVtech projectionist and volunteer trustee Gavin Cowern as he prepared for the monthly cinema night.
Gavin has been a projectionist since he screened National Film Library 16mm films at primary school and has a passion for bringing a film to life on the screen.
“Some say it must have been an easy and neat job, seeing all those great movies — not so!” he says, explaining that the job involved rewinding film, splicing in ads and trailers and cleaning the projector, lamp and screen among many other tasks.
Operating these projectors was an important job, and an apprentice projectionist had to train for about four years before becoming fully qualified, with the first job being preparing and screening the advertis- ing slides shown during the intermission. But for Gavin, who also runs an old-time cinema and events business in O¯ roua Downs, hearing the laughter and seeing the smiles of the audience makes it all worthwhile.
The light from MAVtech’s projectors comes from two rods of carbon with an arc of electric light between them, made brighter by the vaporised carbon. Part of the projectionist’s job was making sure the gap between the rods was even as the carbon burned away — otherwise the light would become uneven and duller. These arc lamps were once used for street lighting, factory lights and searchlights as well as in projectors. By the late 1950s, the carbon arc projector was being replaced by the xenon lamp. MAVtech and Blast From The Past Cinema have some of the few 35mm carbon arc projectors in regular use in New Zealand.
Foxton’s Coronation Hall has been the town’s cinema since 1926. When it opened, the first feature films with sound were yet to be released and audiences would add their own cheering and booing for the heroes and villains on screen. Sometimes they were so loud the manager would threaten to switch the projector off and send everyone home if they didn’t quieten down! The foyer still has the Western Electric plaque from when the theatre first played sound films, in 1930. That’s not the only change in the projection booth — a digital projector is used to play short films for groups touring the museum.
On the last Friday of each month (except December) Gavin starts the carbon arc projectors to screen a classic film at Coronation Hall at 7pm. Tickets cost just $10, with the museum open from 6pm to give patrons a chance to see the collection of audio and visual technology. With an archive room full of films, there is always something different screening.
“I always try and screen something with a good story,” explains Gavin. “It is said you need three things to make a great movie: a good script, a good script, and a good script.”
The photos in this article were taken with a Polaroid Sun 635 camera made about 1985. This was an instant camera taking self-developing photographs, which were often swapped and shared like social media photographs are nowadays. The selling point for this camera was a light management system flash that varied its light depending on how bright the scene was. The thick white border at the bottom of each photo hid the
packet of chemicals used to develop the photo.
To find out which film is screening during the next cinema night, and to see more photographs taken with vintage cameras, go to www. mavtech.org.nz. The museum has an open day on the last Saturday of each month from 1pm-4pm and there are plenty of projectors on display, from professional carbon arc units to 8mm home movie models.
You can also tune in to the resident broadcasting station, Radio Foxton on 105.4FM — or go to MAVtech’s website for a link to the digital stream. It’s been coming to you from MAVtec, 24/7 for the past eight years.