Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Trailer Volume Update - Are Your're Faders Going Up?

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Topic: Trailer Volume Update - Are Your're Faders Going Up?

Gordon McLeod
Film God

Posts: 9532
From: Toronto Ontario Canada
Registered: Jun 99

posted 04-22-2001 11:53 AM

Daryl said " I have the sound set to what I think it should be to my ears."
I don't trust the "golden Ears" approach
that is usually the prescription to blown drivers when a new film comes in or a lot of "knob twidling"
The purepose of the alignment procedures is to replicat as close as practicle what the production personel envisioned and heard when they mixed it. Not what each operater feels it should be mixed at.
On the issue of bleed through I would install an afterburner (or similar compressor) so that the overall mix keeps its balance and only the bleedthrough high levels are delt with

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Mike Blakesley
Film God

Posts: 12767
From: Forsyth, Montana
Registered: Jun 99

posted 04-22-2001 01:37 PM

Many people in general just don't like their movies to be loud. "Audio discomfort" has nothing to do with it. They just prefer softer sound.

I personally love to be immersed in the sound! I still remember the first feature I ever watched in digital sound..."True Lies." That first "kaboom" explosion was amazing!

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Darryl Spicer
Film God

Posts: 3250
From: Lexington, KY, USA
Registered: Dec 2000

posted 04-22-2001 04:25 PM

Gordon what I ment by that is I sit in the auditorium and think to my self is this sound to loud or too soft. because everyone who comes into that auditiorium does not bring a piece of test gear with them and set it up to judge how loud a movie is. Next time I screen a movie I will flip that thing up to 7 and see if my boss complains.

It will be running at the db that we set would be a good test but I know I will have to turn it down a little.

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Darryl Spicer
Film God

Posts: 3250
From: Lexington, KY, USA
Registered: Dec 2000

posted 04-22-2001 04:42 PM

ok just to clarify something I did not use my ears to EQ the auditorium I used a real time analizer with the apropriat microphones that our engineer tech provided me. He showed me what to do and what to look for. He said that getting it perfect would be very difficult in some cases. I just did what he told me to do. We are not that busy of a theater that we used to be. The bleed thru is not the highs but the lows as in subs. You can be watching a dialog movie next door and have an action movie playing in dts and the people next door thinks it is storming outside.

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Gordon McLeod
Film God

Posts: 9532
From: Toronto Ontario Canada
Registered: Jun 99

posted 04-22-2001 05:30 PM

Out of curiosity what type of RTA and Mics
Since the sub is the offender I would invest in a compressor to limit the sub at high levels but allow it to work properly at lower levels
It would get very thin sounding with out it

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Darryl Spicer
Film God

Posts: 3250
From: Lexington, KY, USA
Registered: Dec 2000

posted 04-22-2001 05:42 PM

Gordon I am not sure about the model or brands of the equipment he had it was a small compact type of anylizer. the mics were small tiny ones fed into a multiplexer I do believe. He had it all set up we would just move it to each auditorium and he would let me do the EQ. Next time he comes in I will talk to him about some of the things u suggested. Dealing with a company that is trying to save money getting anything done can be difficult. Randy knows what I'm talking about.

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Brad Miller
Administrator

Posts: 17775
From: Plano, TX (36.2 miles NW of Rockwall)
Registered: May 99

posted 04-22-2001 05:56 PM

Try to achieve a flat response by cutting down on the EQ controls and not boosting them, except where you must. Also, NEVER turn adjacent controls too far away from each other (ie: one near the top of it's boost and one near the bottom end of the cut). The RTA may show a perfectly flat response, but I assure you it will not sound good. If you are using a digital EQ (say an SDDS or a CP500) don't go crazy with that EQ either trying to achieve that flat line. Even though it is "digital", the controls STILL interact with each other. By that I mean if you move the 6.3Khz control up, you are also raising the 5 and 8Khz up too. If that doesn't make sense, I'll get a screen shot of an SDDS EQ that was poorly done to show you what I mean.

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Gordon McLeod
Film God

Posts: 9532
From: Toronto Ontario Canada
Registered: Jun 99

posted 04-22-2001 06:00 PM

The digital EQ in the CP500 and Cp650 is a digital simulation of the Cat64 and as such has the same phase shifts as an analogue eq would have
Cut is always better than boosting

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Steve Guttag
We forgot the crackers Gromit!!!

Posts: 12814
From: Annapolis, MD
Registered: Dec 1999

posted 04-22-2001 09:06 PM

I don't mind boost or cut so much...for me, the goal is to turn the fewest number of pots (digital or otherwise). When people go crazy for that flat line...the EQ the life out of the track. Bi-amping goes a long way towards minimizing EQ as well.

Steve

------------------
"Old projectionists never die, they just changeover!"

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Randy Stankey
Film God

Posts: 6539
From: Erie, Pennsylvania
Registered: Jun 99

posted 04-22-2001 11:03 PM

Darryl,

If you are using the equipment Bob has then you have an Ivie IE-30A analyzer and a USL MMX-10 MUX.

Lemme' tell ya' I found out that doing a good EQ is just as much "art" as it is "science".
I've done two of them by myself and I got "good" results in one house and "just so-so" results in the other.

At this point, I get so tied up with "other" things that I don't have time to sit down with a cup of coffee (figuratively speaking) and really tinker with things to "teach" myself how things work. Right now, I just leave things as they are unless they really need it. (Replacing a speaker, for instance.)

I've seen EQs done before and I was shown how to work the equipment but nobody ever went through the whole process in-depth with me to show me the finer points of what I'm supposed to be looking for.

What I'd REALLY like is to sit down and do a full-on EQ from the ground up and have somebody who is 10 times smarter and more experienced than I am looking over my shoulder showing me what I should be doing. At least I'd like to see some pictures of an analyzer that show a "good" and a "bad" EQ. That way I have someting to compare to when I have to do it again.

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Darryl Spicer
Film God

Posts: 3250
From: Lexington, KY, USA
Registered: Dec 2000

posted 04-23-2001 12:25 AM

Yes Randy that was Bob's equipment that was being used. The whole thing started with wanting to set all the preasure levels with the fader set at 7. When NCS used to service our area they did not set thes up correctly so we were running the fader to low. I had some EQ cards that had been replaced but had not been checked for EQ levels so I decided to check all of them following Bob's guidence. Also we checked all of the A-Chain alighnments. Wanted to make sure they were as perfect as could be. If this is not correct. It will not matter how good that B-chain is the sound will be crap.

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Randy Stankey
Film God

Posts: 6539
From: Erie, Pennsylvania
Registered: Jun 99

posted 04-23-2001 12:34 AM

Yes! Agreed! If the A-Chain is

then your B-Chain will be

I'm really starting to get the hang of doing the A-Chains. Some of them were REALLY messed up. (For various reasons) Now that I'm starting to get them all fixed I think it'll be time to start straightening out the EQs. That's why I was asking for tips on doing that.

Some days I do a better job than others. As it stands now, all I seem to be doing sometimes is damage control. I think I'm getting things shaped up little by little. Soon, it will be time for me to say, "Now's the time to REALLY bear down and do things right."

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Dustin Mitchell
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1865
From: Mondovi, WI, USA
Registered: Mar 2000

posted 05-02-2001 01:12 AM

I'm sure all you techs know this, but for the layman going up 1 dB won't represent a certain % directly. What I mean is, an increase by 5 dB's is a 100% increase in loudness. So while 1 dB may not be enough, it is still a larger step in the right direction than some people might think.

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System Notices
Forum Watchdog / Soup Nazi

Posts: 215

Registered: Apr 2004

posted 04-21-2004 05:09 AM

It has been 1085 days since the last post.

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William Hooper
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1879
From: Mobile, AL USA
Registered: Jun 99

posted 04-21-2004 05:09 AM

From the Amercian Tinnitus Association web page:

quote:
Hearing Conservation Tips
2. Wear earplugs during the trailers at the movies. The volume is typically cranked up for these. Ask the manager of the theatre to turn the volume down if the movie is too loud. They will very often comply with this request.

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