Why isn't stuff shot on 65mm neg and using 5 across the screen, a sub, and 3 surround channels? How much more could Titanic or Gladiator cost? It would certainly add to the impact.

Special venue theatres do not need to be large special format (Imax, Iwerks, Showscan etc) to drag a crowd. 70mm, 75 ft screen and 9 - 10 channels is where its at. Lets make the cinema experience like nothing that the home theatre can ever emulate, not even a Norelco AA11 in the garage!

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I am going to modify my original comments here. After setting up the screening room for 5 stage channels and EX, I feel I can make a better judgment call than I could before.

SDDS with 8 channels...this is indeed very impressive! This is the first time I have noticed a difference between 3 stage channels and 5 stage channels. (Note the only other 8 channel houses I've heard ranged from 40 foot wide screens up to an 80 foot wide screen with THX certification.) The added "fullness" between channels was almost like adding more surround speakers to an installation that did not have enough in the first place and had "holes" in the sound...except that now there are 2 extra DISCRETE channels behind the screen that were extremely clear and localized. The argument in this thread up until now has been that 5 stage channels behind the screen is not really necessary with small screens. The screen in this room is 23 feet wide (scope) and I would consider that a small screen, although not for this particular room by any means.

The real difference I believe comes from the baffle wall and acoustics of the auditorium. The 8 channel installations I've heard either did not have a baffle wall, or the THX installations that were 8 channel were in such large auditoriums that the effect was lost in the echo of the room and all the stage speakers tended to acoustically mesh into each other. I add to that comment further by comparing my experience with the Toy Story 2 track.

As most of us know, the Toy Story 2 track had panned dialogue, yet the film was flat. In the 80 foot wide screen with THX certification that I first screened this in, only on a very few occasions did I notice the panned dialogue between the center and left/right stage channels (not a 5 stage channel mix). Also note that this auditorium for all practical purposes has side masking. (The top masking does lift up just a touch, but not enough to matter.) Yet the panned dialogue was wasted in this auditorium due to the echo! Playing the dts disc in the screening room alongside a DVD for picture via the video projector, I found the effect was so discrete that it was distracting. But again, remember this was a flat film on a screen with side masking, making the dialogue pan "outside" of the image area! Not good.

In regards to the EX, the effects in TS2 were indeed fantastic! I certainly do wish more films were mixed in EX, but aggresively like Gary Rydstrom did with this particular movie.

In closing though, here are my overall feelings between the two formats.

Flat films should never be mixed with panned dialogue...EVER! Flat films with panned dialogue may be fine for cheezy stadium theaters with top masking, but because in many instances (generally your better theaters) flat films will be presented on a common height screen, the dialogue should never leave the center channel. I also feel that a 5 stage channel mix is not ideal for flat films either, because again, there is no way to precisely know where the speakers in auditoriums around the world will be placed with the different types of masking systems.

Scope films are an ideal candidate for 5 stage speakers (SDDS-8). This is because regardless of the auditorium design, the scope picture WILL be the maximum width that the auditorium allows. I can only imagine how much the TS2 mix would have improved with 5 stage channels. (Perhaps Pixar will consider this on their next outing.) The only problem with 5 stage speakers is that as I mentioned earlier, huge auditoriums with less than ideal acoustics (echo mainly) will tend to bleed the sound together and kill the effect. Oddly enough, I would recommend the 5 channels more for medium to smaller houses where acoustics are easier to control.

EX is something that if mixed properly, can really add to any movie regardless of picture format. I hope this becomes standard practice and that the 8 channel and EX formats become standard with scope films that have a good sound mixer and can properly place the sound. Both of these combined with panned dialogue in one movie would indeed be something to hear.

Mixing flat films for center-only dialogue seem a bit unfair (although I certainly see your reasoning.) Suppose someone has a 40ft wide flat screen? Wide enough for patrons to "hear" any panning, and as a director, I may not want to "loose" this capability. My understanding is that most theaters now run with fixed side masking, so if making the sound mix match most existing theaters, then I should be able to "pan-away" in either format.

Also, I think people look for the "WOW" factor, and 3 surround channels seem to deliver more of that than 5 screen channels.

I suppose it would be nice if the SDDS processor could be programmed do something, (automatically) like the CP200's "speaker reverse" function, ie: On flat films, the Lc and Rc become regular L and R. Perhaps the L and R speakers (now behind the masking) could be sent some kind of "forward" surround information, since they are no longer screen channels.

With SDDS, you get both screen and surround, but there is a small but growing number of disgruntled SDDS users. Few SDDS films are mixed in full 8 channel, SDDS is the most expensive to install, and several people are not happy with it's reliability. Several rumors about Sony's commitment to SDDS (whether true or not) do not encourage owners to purchase the most expensive system.

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BTW, In addition to EP1, Harry Potter has SDDS-8 and EX. There are more 8-channel mixes out and in the shoot than EX.

If all theatres were to equip for 8-channel then panned dialog could be a reality for all films, Flat or Scope since LC and RC can handle L and R rolls for "Flat" films. Brad, I'm surprised you don't have your screening room set up for this. You should look into making your own relay board for it or perhaps try and latch onto the Dolby SI-1 studio interface unit (which has the interchange function on it...you can't use the CP-200's internal switch since all of the digital formats come after the Processing unit). At the Uptown in DC, LC and RC are always used for "FLAT" films.

I agree that size matters not on the 8-channel question. The front-end and speakers should be proportional to each other.

Incidentally, I know of several screens that are SDDS-8 and EX equipped.

As to SDDS reliability...the 2000 is a bit of a mystery in it's erratic reliability (it works then it doesn't, but always tests fine in some installations). The 3000 series for me has been completely reliable.

Steve

As you know, I am outputting the un-EQ'd SDDS signal back into the control unit of the CP200 where all 5 stage speakers (and surrounds) get treated to good old fashioned (and vastly superior sounding) analog EQing via the cat64B cards. I've been looking for a simple solution to this senario and thus far the easiest thing I've come up with is to simply make a DB25 cable that switches the L into the LE channel and the R into the RE channel. I'm not sure how easy this would be to automate, but as far as rigging an external switch that could be thrown manually, I don't see any real difficulty there. Still, I like the separation that 99% of the flat films provide when using the L and R speakers. This only turns up with panned dialogue on flat films, which I still hold my ground as to saying is a bad idea. I wonder how many people sit at home with their DVDs and each speaker is 8 feet to the side of the tv listening to panned dialogue like that...or is the DVD mixed differently for home use?

As to the DFP-3000, I have been nothing but pleased with it's performance as well. Never a dropout and the quality of the audio is phenomenal. My only complaint is the sprocket drag is WAY TOO MUCH! I can't hear the projector sitting in the screening room, but I can quite easily hear that singing sprocket on the SDDS reader. There really must be SOME way to lower that tension just a little bit. I have an email off to Sony, so hopefully they have a solution and will email me back (or post it here).

More significant than the invention of sound itself, panned dialog is the most amazing thing ever to happen in movie sound history, and increases audience numbers over tenfold. There should be no fewer than 20 independant screen channels (for small screens). There should not be a space larger than 2cm between each speaker, so larger screens would require more speakers to provide adequate panned dialog. But even this setup would demand that the onscreen character's moving mouth stay vertically centered on screen. If he/she were to bend down or stand on their tiptoes, the mouth would be lower/higher onscreen than where the actual sound was emitting. This is absolutely unacceptable and would confuse audiences with poorly placed audio. Therefore there needs to be more discrete channels placed above and below, all the way to the top and bottom of the screen just in case, again with no more than 2cm of empty space above and below each speaker. There would be room for at least two rows above and below, bringing the minimum amount of discrete speakers required for a medium sized screen to 100. Only then would it approach acceptability.

Surrounds are stupid and serve no purpose. How can you pan dialog outside of the screen? It wouldn't make any sense! Therefore there is no need to have surrounds. All effort should go into making sure the panned dialog is perfect before any thought is given to "surround sound". Panned dialog is far more enveloping and has much more "wow" factor. Hearing things fly around the room only scares me and makes me hide under my seat.

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I agree that it is odd that the 3000 doesn't offer the interchange option, the DCP-1000 did!

As to the sprocket tension. I agree it is too high. Sony did that, no doubt to offset the fact they didn't incorporate a true flywheel into the 3000 series reader. Why do engineers feel the need to out design old technology that works. There is no shame in using flywheels. There was no need for the "mag-clutch" thing. BTW, Brad, if you have more back tension on the film (from the platter or reel) the buzzing should stop. Also, I have noticed that if you change the film's angle of attack into the sprocket, it stops making noise (ie Sony could have come up with a film-path that would have lessened or eliminated the noise). Just grab the guide roller immediately before the sprocket and see if the buzz stops as long as you hold the roller.

Steve

The only other complaint I have on the DFP-3000 is when the SDDS fails, there is a brief section of perhaps only a couple of frame's worth of silence as the processor switches to the backup format. Now in all fairness, the only way I was able to get it to drop was to stick a business card over the leds, but I wish it would switch just a bit quicker, without that quick mute. (The CP500 does the same thing.) Past that, the 3000 series machine was very well thought out and do provide outstanding reliability and audio quality. I have been extremely pleased.

** This post has been De-Toxified by the writer**