I know I’m just picking nits here, but true gelatin filters haven’t been used in the movie or theatre lighting industry in years. They have been replaced by plastic filters. A terrific explanation of how they are made can be found here (click on Products in the upper left corner, then Color Filters, then Roscolux). These new filters are still commonly referred to as gels, however. Interestingly enough, this page says that gelatin filters began to be phased out in the 1960s.
Unfortunately, the advent of this new technology as taken away one of the old theatre jokes. If you had some old gels that had been worn out (lost some of their color), you could have the new guy (or girl) go wash them, so they would look good for the next show, stressing how important these gels are for the upcoming production. The gels would disintegrate when they got wet, and hilarity would, of course, ensue.
To my knowledge, the “shore line” product has been discontinued, however, they’ve recently announced a new and improved “jetwash” with environmentally friendly cleaning agents. And, of course, for hydraulic systems, they’ve come out with a larger size “fallopian tube”, however, it only seems to be the female supply officers that have them.
Is Jet Wash compatible with Prop Wash? Can the two be mixed together?
Also, I’ve got two reels of shore line and a bucket of steam left over from a contract project with the Navy. If anybody has some extra flight line, I’d be happy to arrange a trade!
As for the best boy, send him off to find a film stretcher as we didn’t bring enough film today.
If the best boy is going out, have him pick up a board stretcher, too. Gotta save some money on lumber. Oh, I could also use a new metric crescent wrench. I can’t find mine anywhere.
Hmmm…not according to the documentation that I have.
We sent a guy to look for Prop Wash one time and he told us that he knew that joke and wasn’t falling for it. 2 days later, we sent him for Jet Wash and off he went, bucket in hand. I understand that he got sent to five different places and probably walked about 5 miles looking for it. Same guy a few months later got sent for a Fallopian tube. He eventually ends up down in Eng. They gave him a 15 foot section of the biggest goddamn hose I’ve ever seen (it was probably close to 2 feet in diameter made of hard black rubber. So this kid drags it up from Eng to just below the flight deck (6 stories maybe?). Walks in with it. My chief looks up and without hesitation says “Goddammit, #3 Fallopian tube, not #2! Take that shit back!”
A good friend of mine was a US Navy new guy in the Viet Era. He was sent out for a bucket of steam. He came back nine hours later with a big lump of dry ice in a bucket, with a little water thrown in at the last minute. It went over very well.
Where did he get the dry ice? Well, they were in port at the time, and it took him a while to find an ice cream store…and a nearby bar.