splicing problems

I believe I know the source of the splicing problems that caused scanning the first year films film to be problematic, and possibly a contribution to projection issues in your theater.

I don’t believe the problem is associated with the alignment of the splicers themselves.

I think the likely cause is the way the film is held during cutting and taping and curl of the film (which is greater since a lot of the film is 100’ loads).

Cutting – If the film is not pressed down right by the knife blade, it tends to curl up and the curl changes as the film is cut. Once the blade reaches the sprocket hole, thee can be quite a twist.

Pressing the film on the bed right at the side of the knife is a big help.

Taping – I think the taping procedure leads to the biggest problem. I can appreciate that if someone is rushed, and it is late at night, taping may not be his or her biggest concern.

However, when the film is laid across the splicer, it has a tendency to curl up (even minutely) and even more so if the film had been sitting on 100’ daylight spools.

If the film is not press down when first contact is made with the tape then there will be a gap in the splice and also the horizontal edges of the film will not line up. When I spliced the film without pressing the film down the resulting splices looked very much like those I saw on most of the first year films.
A much better splice was achieved when I used the third finger of each hand to hold the film down on either sied of where the tape would land, and then brought the tape across with my thumb.

Below are some images of splices with and without the film being pressed down on both sides.

Given that the punch does not always clear all of the tape from the hole, and that the sprocket hole can be expanded by 5% to 8% and the horizontal edges offset, it is easy to believe that a projector with precise sprockets / claws may jump when they hit these splices.

I am sure if the student knew their final film will “jump” every time they make a messy splice they would pay as much attention as possible. On my end, scanning a student film with a 100 splices, which must stay synchronized to a sound track, is sometimes a “challenge”. The horizontal offset of the sprocket holes also implies a slight rotation of the image which may not seem like a big deal on a 16mm piece of film, becomes apparent when the image is 40’ across.