nai06 said:

---

aTmAg said:

---

jeffk said:

---

Ideally, yeah, it'd be nice if the actors would inspect the gun they were handed before every take to make doubly-sure it wasn't carrying a lethal load. BUT I have zero confidence that all actors know enough about firearms and ammunition to be able to tell that. Also, that would often require them to unload said firearm and then reload it... also dangerous. So instead of that, the film industry has set standards that require someone knowledgable about weapons to perform those safety checks. Which in 99% of the cases seems to avoid incident. Obviously not the case here.

---

These guys have to take training on how to shoot a gun so that they don't look like morons who have never held a gun before. Surely part of that training could include "THIS is what a bullet looks like" and "THIS is what a blank looks like".

---

visually there probably wasn't any difference between a live round and the dummy round that should have been in the gun.

After watching some videos from prop people and armorers the process could look something like this

Armorer and 1st AD work together (assuming this is the revolver on set of rust).

The gun that is to be loaded with blanks is handed to the 1st AD who puts a probe completely down the barrel to show the armorer it is cleared. 1st AD hands the gun to Armorer.

Armorer loads the gun one round at a time. Before loading a round the armorer hands it to the AD to inspect and ensure it is the correct round.

If its supposed to be dummy rounds, the primer has been drilled out and the casing is to be filled with BBs. That way the first AD and shake each round and hear that its a dummy round.

Once the gun is loaded the Armorer dry fires the gun while pointed at the ground until it has cycled through to prove to 1st AD that it is safe for use. It then goes back on the gun cart until it is read for use.


The Armorer never lets the guns on the cart out of their sight and is the person to hand a gun to an actor to go over with them the status of the gun and any other safety info.


Again thats just based on what i can gather from various different prop masters and armorers i've been following lately. It seems like this is a pretty well established process and almost none of it was followed. It looks like there were colossal lapses in judgement and violation of standards and norms by both the armorer and 1st AD for this to actually occur.

---

powerbelly said:

---

Ulrich said:

---

For this specific incident, Baldwin was playing around with the revolver with no intention of firing. It takes no expertise to spin the cylinder and visually confirm that it is unloaded, or better yet remove the cylinder entirely. That's absolutely basic. I don't think think any amount of shoulda/coulda by other people is going to save him here. He's an actor but it's still a gun.

---

Source?

Everything I have seen says they were rehearsing a scene where his character points a gun at the camera.

---

jeffk said:

---

The safety protocols that are normally adhered to seem to do a really good job in avoiding accidents. Obviously you can add extra steps to that protocol to make them more safe if you want to. Involving the actors could be one of those steps, but honestly I'd rather rely on actual firearms experts. Again, in this instance, the agreed upon safety protocols were NOT being followed.

---

aTmAg said:

---

This is an example of what blanks look like. It's usually pretty obvious.



There may be some out there that are indistinguishable, but Hollywood can avoid using those. It would behoove manufacturers to make blanks that are obviously blank.

---

powerbelly said:

---

Ulrich said:

---

For this specific incident, Baldwin was playing around with the revolver with no intention of firing. It takes no expertise to spin the cylinder and visually confirm that it is unloaded, or better yet remove the cylinder entirely. That's absolutely basic. I don't think think any amount of shoulda/coulda by other people is going to save him here. He's an actor but it's still a gun.

---

Source?

Everything I have seen says they were rehearsing a scene where his character points a gun at the camera.

---

jeffk said:

---

aTmAg said:

---

This is an example of what blanks look like. It's usually pretty obvious.



There may be some out there that are indistinguishable, but Hollywood can avoid using those. It would behoove manufacturers to make blanks that are obviously blank.

---

This is actually a really good illustration of what I was trying to speak to. When loaded, those two types of ammunition are going to be virtually indistinguishable for most actors. Especially in a revolver.

---

jeffk said:

---

Yes, you certainly can look down the loaded cylinder of the loaded weapon to inspect the nose of the ammunition, but that's not something I'd ever advise anyone to make a habit of. Much safer to eject and inspect.

---

Fenrir said:

---

jeffk said:

---

Yes, you certainly can look down the loaded cylinder of the loaded weapon to inspect the nose of the ammunition, but that's not something I'd ever advise anyone to make a habit of. Much safer to eject and inspect.

---

Nobody ever said you had to look down the barrel to inspect a revolver's ammunition...

Regardless in any scenario where you're inspecting the ammunition, I don't see how it's more "indistinguishable" in a revolver. What's going to be indistinguishable to actors (and probably everyone on set besides the armorer) are dummy vs live rounds.

---

Kevin the 3-legged dog said:

---

Swarely said:

---

I don't like even pointing airsoft guns at people.

---

I don't point you guns at people.

---

nai06 said:

---

aTmAg said:

---

nai06 said:

---

aTmAg said:

---

jeffk said:

---

Ideally, yeah, it'd be nice if the actors would inspect the gun they were handed before every take to make doubly-sure it wasn't carrying a lethal load. BUT I have zero confidence that all actors know enough about firearms and ammunition to be able to tell that. Also, that would often require them to unload said firearm and then reload it... also dangerous. So instead of that, the film industry has set standards that require someone knowledgable about weapons to perform those safety checks. Which in 99% of the cases seems to avoid incident. Obviously not the case here.

---

These guys have to take training on how to shoot a gun so that they don't look like morons who have never held a gun before. Surely part of that training could include "THIS is what a bullet looks like" and "THIS is what a blank looks like".

---

visually there probably wasn't any difference between a live round and the dummy round that should have been in the gun.

After watching some videos from prop people and armorers the process could look something like this

Armorer and 1st AD work together (assuming this is the revolver on set of rust).

The gun that is to be loaded with blanks is handed to the 1st AD who puts a probe completely down the barrel to show the armorer it is cleared. 1st AD hands the gun to Armorer.

Armorer loads the gun one round at a time. Before loading a round the armorer hands it to the AD to inspect and ensure it is the correct round.

If its supposed to be dummy rounds, the primer has been drilled out and the casing is to be filled with BBs. That way the first AD and shake each round and hear that its a dummy round.

Once the gun is loaded the Armorer dry fires the gun while pointed at the ground until it has cycled through to prove to 1st AD that it is safe for use. It then goes back on the gun cart until it is read for use.


The Armorer never lets the guns on the cart out of their sight and is the person to hand a gun to an actor to go over with them the status of the gun and any other safety info.


Again thats just based on what i can gather from various different prop masters and armorers i've been following lately. It seems like this is a pretty well established process and almost none of it was followed. It looks like there were colossal lapses in judgement and violation of standards and norms by both the armorer and 1st AD for this to actually occur.

---

This is an example of what blanks look like. It's usually pretty obvious.



There may be some out there that are indistinguishable, but Hollywood can avoid using those. It would behoove manufacturers to make blanks that are obviously blank.

---

I think are talking about different things.

Blanks that are made to fire without a projectile are obviously visually very different. Dummy rounds are made to look like actual live rounds but are inoperable. So every time you see an actor loading a gun it looks like a real live round, but actually isn't. For the movie rust, they likely had rounds like that on set because you would be able to see the difference when looking at the front of the gun when its loaded.

I'm going to speculate here some:

Baldwin was practicing his draw with the gun when it fired and he killed Hutchins. It seems like he was standing towards the camera or near it when he was practicing. It would make sense that the revolver would be loaded with dummy rounds if you were doing a close up shot of the gun or really any shot that didn't involve firing blanks so that it looks accurate on film.

Remember there aren't supposed to be live rounds anywhere on set, just blanks and dummy rounds. So when Baldwin took the gun, it probably looked loaded with actual rounds because that's how its supposed to look.

---

jeffk said:

---

Yep, a lot of the "responsibilities of gun safety" that we've all been taught since childhood get contracted out to the experts that are on set. It's more efficient, faster, and honestly (when done with fidelity) more safe than if we let all the novice acting talent handle the weapons processing themselves. It'd be great if all of the talent could add an extra set of knowledgeable hands/eyes to the process, but if you've ever tried to teach a novice (especially a reluctant one) how to safely handle a gun, it can be a really strenuous and often dangerous process.

---