0:00:04 My name is Neil Doubeck and I'm the Projection Manager. My average day in projection would be just to ensure that the smooth running of the projection department and the projection staff are maintaining the films, showing the films to their customers in the auditoriums and making sure the presentation is at the highest of standard and quality and the sound’s very good as well into the auditorium.
00:00:30 My favourite subject at school was photography which I’ve really enjoyed. Maths, I wasn’t too good at maths which was my downfall in getting a professional pilot’s licence. I enjoyed my English and art, I enjoyed art as well.
00:00:48 My first job at leaving school was working for a London photographer. When I left school, I attended a one year’s 750 City & Guilds photography course and that led onto my first employment with the London photographer and I worked there for about nine months.
00:01:07 Well after the photographer’s assistant, I went into being a laboratory technician and that was also working with static film, developing the colour prints for estate agencies and after that, while I was working with the laboratory technician, there was a cinema being built near to where I lived. I thought it was time for me to go in there and try and see if I can become a projectionist and I went for the interview and thankfully, I got the job and I was successful with the job. And I enjoyed it so much, I’ve stayed there for 17 years now so it's been a long time in the cinema industry.
00:01:49 And I do go out also helping other sites set up the new cinemas that have been built, I help them set up and make sure the projection department is going to run smoothly on the day. So it's been nice, yeah, it's been a long time.
00:02:11 Well you get paid for watching films. It's a nice, you have a small group of teams that you work with and so it's quite a friendly environment, and as I say, you make up your programme and then you, whatever you’ve made up, you watch on the big screen and it's quite nice, quite an achievement. And it's nice to see the people in the auditorium watching a film and you’ve got a big full auditorium of people. It's nice to see the programme that you’ve made up in there sitting there and watching it and enjoying it so it's quite rewarding.
00:02:46 The only drawback I can think of working in the projection or the cinema industry is that you have to work the weekends and you have to do long hours over the weekends and finishing. As a projection manager, I have to be working over the weekends 'cos it's the busiest part of the cinema.
00:03:02 And generally, we finish at two o’clock in the morning but there’s a lot of positive, a lot of positive that overweighs the negative on that respect.
00:03:13 After becoming a projection manager, you can progress onto being an engineer, a projection engineer and this would involve in maintaining and fixing projectors and there’s the sound equipment throughout up and down the country which is quite a good job to do as well. So there’s still more scope to go further after being a projection manager.
00:03:35 If I wasn’t to be a projection manager or working a projection, I would like to have been a pilot but I'm still happy being a projections manager. There’s less risk I think.
ENDS
Neil Doubeck
Neil Doubeck
My name is Neil Doubeck and I'm the Projection Manager. My average day in projection would be just to ensure that the smooth running of the projection department and the projection staff are maintaining the films, showing the films to their customers in the auditoriums and making sure the presentation is at the highest of standard and quality and the sound’s very good as well into the auditorium.
My favourite subject at school was photography which I’ve really enjoyed. Maths, I wasn’t too good at maths which was my downfall in getting a professional pilot’s licence. I enjoyed my English and art, I enjoyed art as well.
My first job at leaving school was working for a London photographer. When I left school, I attended a one year’s 750 City & Guilds photography course and that led onto my first employment with the London photographer and I worked there for about nine months.
Well after the photographer’s assistant, I went into being a laboratory technician and that was also working with static film, developing the colour prints for estate agencies and after that, while I was working with the laboratory technician, there was a cinema being built near to where I lived. I thought it was time for me to go in there and try and see if I can become a projectionist and I went for the interview and thankfully, I got the job and I was successful with the job. And I enjoyed it so much, I’ve stayed there for 17 years now so it's been a long time in the cinema industry.
And I do go out also helping other sites set up the new cinemas that have been built, I help them set up and make sure the projection department is going to run smoothly on the day. So it's been nice, yeah, it's been a long time.
Well you get paid for watching films. It's a nice, you have a small group of teams that you work with and so it's quite a friendly environment, and as I say, you make up your programme and then you, whatever you’ve made up, you watch on the big screen and it's quite nice, quite an achievement. And it's nice to see the people in the auditorium watching a film and you’ve got a big full auditorium of people. It's nice to see the programme that you’ve made up in there sitting there and watching it and enjoying it so it's quite rewarding.
The only drawback I can think of working in the projection or the cinema industry is that you have to work the weekends and you have to do long hours over the weekends and finishing. As a projection manager, I have to be working over the weekends 'cos it's the busiest part of the cinema.
And generally, we finish at two o’clock in the morning but there’s a lot of positive, a lot of positive that overweighs the negative on that respect.
After becoming a projection manager, you can progress onto being an engineer, a projection engineer and this would involve in maintaining and fixing projectors and there’s the sound equipment throughout up and down the country which is quite a good job to do as well. So there’s still more scope to go further after being a projection manager.
If I wasn’t to be a projection manager or working a projection, I would like to have been a pilot but I'm still happy being a projections manager. There’s less risk I think.
ENDS
Neil Doubeck is a Projection Manager for Vue Cinemas. He likes it so much he has stayed for seventeen years. "Well you get paid for watching films. It's a nice, you have a small group of teams that you work with and so it's quite a friendly environment, and as I say, you make up your programme and then you, whatever you've made up, you watch on the big screen and it's quite nice, quite an achievement."
External links
Sector Skills Council for Film and TV Professionals
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