Dambusters 80th anniversary

[ppppenguin]

Yesterday was the 80th anniversary of Operation Chastise, better known as the Dambusters.

The Broadcast Engineering Museum is in the former Sergeants' Mess at RAF Hemswell. Much of the Dambusters film was shot at RAF Hemswell so we put on a special screening last night in Studio 2 of the Broadcast Engineering Museum. We had a full house of about 80 people from the local area.

Excellent pictures from a DP projector (all 80kg of it hauled up about 10 feet on to a scaffold tower). Very good sound from a pair of Leak valve amps and Marconi-Lockwoods (Tannoy Monitor Gold).

[BusyBee]

It probably had a good flavour of the day in that the building / room was perhaps of the style of the original briefing room for the operation. I know the Lancaster flew around locally although I didn't actually see it.

Tracy

[ppppenguin]

The Lancaster flew over Hemswell just before the screening. We started at 8pm rather than 7:30 because of this.

Our Studio 2 was the main mess hall for the sergeants based at RAF Hemswell. "Expansion era" RAF bases (late 1930s, pre-war) were mostly designed to a similar pattern. It was a high quality design, with comfortable accommodation, central heating and good resistance to bombs. Hence the accomodation blocks, mess halls etc would have been familiar when moving from one base to another. The bases built during WW2 were much more basic.

[Doodlebug]

Was the film an edited version with dog's name changed to 'Tigger' or the original name I wonder ?
On TV a year ago the original was shown but recently an edited
history version was shown?

[PerdioPal]

What is a "DP projector" ?

[ppppenguin]

The original version was shown. Standard Blu-Ray, readily available. The "edited" version would not have been well received in those parts. We paid the relevant copyright fee for a public screening.

DP is maker of the projector. https://www.digitalprojection.com/en/ They make high end video projection kit, though not for the commercial cinema market. Our chairman used to do a lot of consultancy work for them. As a result they donated one of their slightly older models to us. It's still a formidable beast. I forget how many thousand lumens, but capable of filling a cinema size screen at good brightness. 2K horizontal resolution, which is still what many cinemas use. You couldn't see the pixels from the front row. The lens has rise/fall adjustments so you don't need to tilt the projector to get the image centred on the screen. You also don't need to use keystone correction though it's available for cases where the projector or screen has to be tilted.

[CambridgeWorks]

Saturday 13th, our Spalding flower festival. Been revived after a few years absence. City of Lincoln gave a flypast. Once, straight above our garden at low level.
Will see if I can upload a better picture from my phone.
Rob

[CambridgeWorks]

Another pic.
Nope, says file too large at 2.08Mb,  previous one was 2.03Mb
Rob

[Diabolical Artificer]

Didn't fly over our house this time but here's a good video from the bomb aimers bay - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2kFK_AZE9io&t=794s

Andy.

[Refugee]

I managed to get a photo of the Lancaster back in 2012 when it was on the way back from a show.
Photos are not easy when you hear the engines and have to dig the camera our in a hurry.