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All I ask for on any new Dolby product with the LCD screens:

USER-EDITABLE FORMAT NAMES (even if only for the 'user' formats) Please??

Maybe a upgrade for the CP500 that allows this too? it would be WAY cool

Formats 02 and 03, you are excused from these proceedings and may go. Thank you for your patience.

As for 70, we wanted to do it in Charleston, but the general consensus was that we would not be able to get prints even if we did.

The seventy mil formats are excused and may also go home with our thanks. (If you hurry, I think that 02 and 03 are still waiting for the cab and will probably share it with you).

As a company, it would seem to me that Dolby must, while respecting the past, also deal with the future. There is only room for so many keys on the front panel.

I think that they are basing the decisions on which formats to support on the formats that we are most likely to encounter in the field. Sure, there are some art houses out there who will need the older formats and I am sure that Dolby would provide them support as needed.

In a first run, commercial theatre, there is NO need for the Dolby-A/No surround format. I still have one CP-55 in operation and this button has never been pushed (except to enable the SR-A5).

I have not seen a CP-650 but I run a shitload of CP-500s. I like them. You can say that they are accurate and expensive and state of the art all you want to. I like them for the simple reason that every time I turn them on, they work. On the rare occasion that they did not, the fix was a quick phone call away.

Besides, if the 650 sets up like the 500, you can make any format you want to anyway! I think that they are just shipping the units in a configuration that will most likely be what the end user needs.

They are not saying that mono is bad. They are just realizing that no one is using it.

Dolby's original purpose was to provide lower noise levels in recorded audio. They got into cinema only because we were the "noisiest" guys on the block. Optical sound, in the early days, was pure crap compared with what it is today.

I guess if I was Ray Dolby, I'd be pretty pleased with the fact that the only complaints about my products were the menu layouts.

As for the folks that argue digital compression ratios, you are arguing differences that the human ear simply cannot hear. Don't tell me that you can. I'm human too. You can't.

We are in the business of amazing our audiences. Dolby Laboratories has in the past, and continues today, to enable us to do this.

They provide one of the very few elements in the booth environment that we can afford to trust when we are forced to deal with other issues that arise during day to day theatre operation.

To those of you that deal with projection only: I envy you! I, on the other hand, cannot stay in the booth. There are cashiers to close out, concession stock to deliver, and loud obnoxious people to be escorted out of the theatre.

I do not work for Dolby and they did not have any knowledge that I would post this!

They just build stuff that doesn't add stress to my life. I always appreciate that!!! *grin*

Russ

As far as not including formats 02 and 03 in the CP650, to be honest, I do not know off hand exactly how many prints were struck in these formats during its day (I've only been in this particular biz since '86), but I would be pretty comfortable saying.. not too many. Therefore perhaps a decision was made to move forward, while still maintaining mag support. I do agree that on the surface of things, it seems simple enough to have included formats 02 and 03, but perhaps this marketing decision was made while realizing the odds of 02 and 03 playback in todays world. As far as 70mm, I would imagine that pretty much everyone who would utilize this format is already equipped to do so with their CP200 or whatever. Those that are not currently equipped for 70mm at least have an option to do so with the CP650. It was felt that the likelyhood of the need for 70 support was far greater than the need for 02 or 03... As far as all or none... I would love it all too!

Aaron,

I also think that it would be totally cool to have User-Editable Format Names in the CP500! I would imagine (don't hold me to it), that this will certainly come up in discussion while deciding any changes to the next software version.

In the 'old' CP200 days, they used ICs to switch the audio channels around. While much better then a whole bunch of transistors, it was still a tough design job to 'direct' the analog signals to the right places.

In the digital domain, everything is just bits, and direction / processing a signal is done in software and digital signal processors (DSP's, which are really just microprocessors, but optimized for specific uses.) I don't know for a fact, but Dolby must have written a software model for A and SR type noise reductions by now. There are even programs that will analyze a signal and create a model for you.

So my point is 02, 03, and other formats could have been added, but Dolby simply did not want to spend the development time writing the software required. Dolby has lots of competition now, and sort of have to keep up.

This is why I thought that the way an SDDS unit handles signals was pretty cool (almost all digital.) Maybe the actual implementation is not so good, but I think Sony has what will ultimatly prove to be the right idea.

And as far as being able to hear the difference between digital/analog or levels of compression, I think the differences are very slight. Even the worst compression (SR-D?) still sounds pretty good. With people making noise, seats squeaking, slight echos and other auditourium noises it doesn't seem to make sense to spend money on reducing THD from 0.02% to 0.002% or increasing the sampling rate, etc.

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_Quadrophenia_ is Format 03.

I'm not saying release prints are as good as they could be. But they generally are pretty good, given the time and cost contraints the labs have to work under. Getting answer print approval, and making the master positive, duplicate negatives, sound negatives and turning out 3000+ prints in a matter of a few weeks is not a piece of cake. Kodak is working with our lab customers to continually improve the quality of the film, printing, and processing, given the "real world" of high volume releases.

We want to hear details about problems, so we can address them, rather than just complain about them. Specific information helps --- e.g., if a print is unsteady, are all the reels in that print unsteady? Are only a few prints unsteady, or is every reel printed from a particular negative unsteady? If an image is unsteady, are the print perfs "rock steady" while the image moves, or is the print film itself unsteady in the projector?

Unfortunately, we cannot all have wet-gate "show prints" made directly from the original negative. It's impractical to turn out thousands of prints at 180 feet per minute. But we can work together to improve the quality of the thousands of release prints that are made every week by labs that really do care about quality.

------------------
John P. Pytlak, Senior Technical Specialist
Worldwide Technical Services, Entertainment Imaging
Eastman Kodak Company
Research Labs, Building 69, Room 7419
Rochester, New York, 14650-1922 USA
Tel: 716-477-5325 Fax: 716-722-7243
E-Mail: john.pytlak@kodak.com

As for formats 02 and 03, I remember several Swedish titles from the mid-eighties that used 03. I really think that Dolby should take the time to implement both of these formats in any new processor. After all, as many here have pointed out, these formats are created in the digital domain anyway so it shouldn't be too hard to include them.

But, (playing devil's advocate) let's look at print quality. In another post topic I asked about the THX grading scale for print quality. For the "B" catagory, it was said;

"B" = Minor negative or positive dirt. Reels given "A" or "B" grades are set aside for L.A./N.Y. select release prints.

So, I could infer that if I'm not in LA or NYC, I'm always going to get a print that is only one notch above "Reject" because I'm not important enough. No reason to change out those old Kollmorgens, I guess....

Even John P. has to state:

"... they generally are pretty good, given the time and cost contraints the labs have to work under."

And I'm sure they are, but increasing production- even at the cost of quality- is what studios want (I don't blame labs at all; in fact I compliment them for doing as good as they do. How can anyone drop off a negative and say, "Could I have 3000 of these in two weeks..?")

(Now, I was a little mean to the THX fellow and especially JP there, and I apologize, 'cause I know he's part of the solution, not the problem. But my point is it's tough for even respected industry people to get improvments. And I'm just as guilty- even more so- because I'm the guy chopping 6 frames off of reels to dummy-proof make-ups!)

I"m pretty convinced the problem is at the theaters. And I feel studios could help and they are not ("You're not helping, Leon!") I've already blabbed about testing materials and instruments that are too expensive for theaters, so I won't repeat myself. Same for lack of ELR's to save labor costs. TES wants their print five seconds after it runs out, so you have to break it down at warp speed on broken reels- but don't damage it...

And there is a solution to improve print quality- fairly cheaply, quickly, using established methods and equipment already installed in thousands of theaters. But it would make digital cinema look like crap, so studios won't use it. It begins with a "7" and ends....

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John, why can't we at least have all the "regular" release prints printed on Vision Premiere stock? That would be a big improvement.