Shoot First - Code of the News Cameraman

CHAPTER 1

A Kiss and a Promise

On a July afternoon in 1968 news cameraman Lou Calderon returned to Television Station KPIX in San Francisco, bearing the fruit of his labor. Entering through the front glass door on Van Ness Avenue, he routinely walked past uniformed security at the reception desk and proceeded along the first floor corridor to the rear of the building. Arriving at the processing area, he deposited the Giants game he had shot earlier onto a receiving table – camera magazines loaded with exposed 16 millimeter black and white reversal film. The processing machine dominated the room, an imposing row of stainless steel tanks filled with chemicals, driven by a labyrinth of film spools, and extending ten or twelve feet from a darkroom wall to a dry-box and take-up reel at the far end. Now it stood motionless and unattended. As always, Lou couldn’t help but notice the sign on the darkroom door which read: DONT LET OUT THE DARK.

The film processing technician, a young novice named Raymond, delivered his reel of developed film to the news department on the third floor, then returned to his post at the processing machine downstairs. He collected magazines of exposed film left for him on the receiving table and carried them to the darkroom for unloading. Opening the outer door, he instinctively closed it again before opening and entering through a second door. Standing in total darkness, he set the magazines down onto a workbench to prepare the film for processing. With Braille-like efficiency, he unscrewed and opened the round panel door on the take-up chamber of the first magazine. Tipping the magazine just so, he carefully removed four hundred feet of exposed film from inside the chamber. Once wound securely around a plastic core within the chamber, the roll of film now moved slowly, precariously between his hands toward the spindle on a rewind flange. He was inches from the spindle when Lou Calderon stepped from his hiding place in the dark and kissed him gently on the cheek. The first three innings of the Giants game hit the ceiling, then spiraled downward to the darkroom floor which was now bathed with streaks of invading light, as Raymond exited through the inner door, the outer door and the front glass door on Van Ness Avenue, never to be seen or heard from again. As told to me, so goes the story of how I got my first big break in television news.

IRONICALLY, THE KPIX darkroom fiasco occurred at the same time I was performing duties similar to Raymond’s at a film lab not far away. I had been working as a film processing technician at Monaco Laboratories for about four years when opportunity came knocking on my own darkroom door. “You in there, Hank? Call Channel Five.”

I would, but first I had to complete the task which, in retrospect, made me appreciate poor Raymond’s fate all the more.

Back in 1968, film used for shooting television news carried a high speed emulsion for exposure at lower light levels, sometimes in difficult environments. Due to the extra sensitivity to light, processing called for loading the film in the dark. With precision and sans safelight, the overlapping ends of film and machine leader were stapled together. Guided along by the leader, a resilient 16 millimeter wide pilot strip with matching sprocket holes, the film snaked around spools in the “first developer” and stop bath tanks in total darkness, initially producing a negative image. Then it passed into the light through a tiny aperture in the darkroom wall, where each frame reversed as positive in the tank of “second developer.” The film wound and dipped through another stop bath, a cleansing rinse, air squeegees to blow off moisture and a box housing heat lamps to dry. The fifteen or twenty minute journey finally ended on a take-up reel outside the dry box.

Originally, all news film shot for KPIX had been processed at Monaco Laboratories. Cameramen showed up at the service counter in relay: dropping off or picking up a day’s work on their way to and from the television station. It was a convenient arrangement, with less than half a mile between two points.

Inevitably, the day arrived when a KPIX accountant realized a more convenient arrangement, and economical. Following the up-front investment of a machine, processing news film at the station would be cheaper in the long run. And, since the machine seemed so easy to operate, pushing a few buttons or winding film on reels didn’t require a great deal of experience. Almost anyone could be trained to do it. Two had. Practical jokes notwithstanding, Raymond and his predecessor had been boon-docked by accidents waiting to happen due to poor maintenance and carelessness. One news story too many had expired at the bottom of a tank of chemicals or, with a most recent disaster, on the darkroom floor. Finally, someone was sending up a flare for help.

I returned the KPIX phone call, agreed to a meeting time and arrived through the front glass door on Van Ness Avenue. Dave Horwitz, designated flare holder and producer of the six o’clock newscast, greeted me in the small lobby with a smile and firm handshake. Without further ado, he escorted me down a hallway on the ground floor to a room in the rear of the building. The processing machine had been out of service during rescue runs back at Monaco Labs. Good thing. First impression was the stink of rotten chemicals left to stagnate in tanks, particularly the stop-bath acid. But the obvious red flag was the machine leader. What should have been indestructible had frayed edges. And it had been staple-spliced repeatedly into piecemeal sections, rather than replaced with a new, seamless 1,000-foot roll.

One section of the machine leader had detoured from a sprocket-driven spool designed to guide it toward the next tank of chemicals. The result of an uneven splice, it hung over the sharp edge of the spool. Even an untrained eye wouldn’t have missed the scratch that ran down its center. And, where the leader went so followed the film. Had not three innings of a game met their demise on the darkroom floor, they would have perished in the bowels of the machine. I said something like, “I’ve seen enough,” and we moved on.

Studio A was in transition. Engineers and floor attendants were moving about, busily rearranging lights and props for an upcoming talk show. Studio B was permanent home to the news set. Smaller by half than Studio A, and less impressive when compared to the mega-sized broadcasting centers of today, it was still big enough to make a significant dent in a modest three-story building.

It was between newscasts and the studio was deserted. Having entered through one sound-proof door, Dave and I made our way toward the other. We passed under rows of lights

rigged along a ceiling two stories above our heads, stepped between abandoned cameras on pedestals, crossed in front of an elevated anchor desk for three and watched our shadows slip across a weather map of the Bay Area with varying temperatures. This was your ordinary meat-and-potatoes news set, circa 1968. Forget flashy lead-ins: eye-popping graphics and ear-splitting music. It also happened to be where the top-rated news show in Northern California came from, and I was impressed. Of course, preceding the CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite probably had something to do with it.

Riding the building’s one passenger elevator to the third floor, Dave made reference to the second floor in passing. The General Manager’s office, Programming, Engineering and Human Resources were located on that level. Additionally, due to space restrictions, other departments such as Special Projects and Public Relations operated out of a large, old Victorian home across the street.

Master Control was the broadcasting nerve center of the station and eminent domain of the engineers. Dave led the way, as we entered light of foot on the third floor level. We were overwhelmed by gauges, dials and video monitors. Amidst the busy hardware were two 16 millimeter film projectors, mounted side-by-side. Dave gave the rundown on how a news story on film was transmitted over the airwaves: An electronic sensor received impulses of light and shadow from the two projectors. Edited in a synchronized format called “checkerboard,” opaque film leader from one reel yielded alternately to the projected image of the other. “A-roll” carried magnetically striped film for recording narration or “voice-over” as well as for interviews or “sound bites.” “B-roll” provided the pictures. To this day, even while keeping pace with an ever-changing technology, the visual element of a news story on film is typically referred to as the “B-roll.”

My cook’s tour continued down a corridor, past several film editing booths resembling walk-in closets. All were vacant. Before I could ask where everyone had disappeared to, I entered the newsroom where some dozen or so people were standing around, cheering and applauding. Not in the habit of being the center of attention, I was taken by surprise. Emerging from the crowd, News Director Ron Mires approached me in a kind of strut, while grinning from ear to ear. He offered another hand to shake, then gestured the rest of the way into his office. What followed was a brief, yet satisfying meeting of the minds, launching my 29-year career at Westinghouse owned, CBS affiliate, KPIX Channel 5 Eyewitness News.

But there was one condition.

“I don’t want to spend the rest of my life in a darkroom,” I told the news director.

I would agree to run the station’s film processing machine, but not indefinitely. I had not come to the table without some experience behind the lens: four years in the Navy as a Photographer’s Mate, two years...