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Author Topic: Dolby Fader Levels Mike Baer Film Handler Posts: 51 From: Winterthur, Switzerland Registered: Dec 2002 posted 01-07-2003 02:45 PM                        @Antonio it is not true,that Europlex boughtv Kinepolis Milano. I work for this chain. Greetings Mike  |  IP: Logged Michael Brown Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1522 From: Bradford, England Registered: May 2001 posted 01-07-2003 03:36 PM                     quote: Personally I would do exactly the opposite. I would record my films lower so that a fader that normally runs movies at 7 would have to be played at 8. This would not only be such a drastic difference in level between the trailers and feature thus requiring the projectionist to change the setting at the start of the feature, but it would also give me more "power" when I wanted it. Would just end up with the film being played too quiet at many cinemas. Everybody should mix their films, adds and trailers so that they sound correct at 7. No excuses. That would solve all the problems.  |  IP: Logged Michael Schaffer "Where is the Boardwalk Hotel?" Posts: 4143 From: Boston, MA Registered: Apr 2002 posted 01-07-2003 04:53 PM                        Actually, in my experience, most movies are not too excessively loud when played back on decent and well set-up sound systems at Dolby 7 or SDDS 0dB. The problem is that there are many sound systems which can`t handle high playback levels very well. The resulting "dirty" sound is what makes them appear too loud and unpleasant as we humans do not measure sound levels with our ears but perceive loudness subjectively. I can imagine that most professional mixing studios have state-of-the-art sound systems and when they play their mix on them, it doesn`t seem too loud. Dolby probably also decided to make 7 the standard setting to make the processor compatible with the majority of mono releases at that time. Turning the fader up to 10 gives an extra 10dB which is often necessary for old mono films.  |  IP: Logged Antonio Marcheselli Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1260 From: Florence, Italy Registered: Mar 2000 posted 01-07-2003 07:19 PM                        Michael is right on sound quality. If a good sound seems no loud at 90dB a poor one can be "loud" at the same 90dB. Jean-Michael, I agree with you about the adv and trailer, I usually project them at 4 or less, this is very normal! But I believe that no one with a good sound system should show a movie at a fader level less than 5.0 other than in some strange circumstances. All of us has some patrons that are complaint for volume too loud when you are at 4.0... I had once XXX in a DD theater, running at 6.0. I believe that 6.0 was ok, I would set 6.3 perhaps! There were 4 people in the theater. They complained that the volume was too loud. The ushers told us that that people were the only ones in the theater, so I set immediately the fader at 5.0 Few minutes later there was another complaint about the volume: "too loud". I set down to 4.0. Then that people go away before the end of the movie. The conclusion is: there are people that are used to the 14" TV, and they'll never understand why at cinema the sound should be so "loud". They think that stereo sound, subwoofer sound, surround sound is "too loud" and they are unhappy of that. I have a talk with a patrons once that says that the movie was great but that she don't like the "echo" from the Dolby. "First you hear the gun from the front and then from the rear". She didn't realize that the rear sound were independent from the front sound! He also told me that in some scene he heard sound from back and believed that people was making noise out from the auditorium... I believe that that kind of people are unable to "immerse" themself in the movie. In fact, they're unable to enjoy a movie! With this kind of people there is no hope!!! Mike, Do you work for Kinepolis or Europlex? I have a friend that are working in Kinepolis Milano, he told me that it is an official news! Bye  |  IP: Logged Ray Derrick Master Film Handler Posts: 310 From: Sydney, Australia Registered: Sep 2001 posted 01-08-2003 01:35 AM                     To get back to Ken's original question, the graduations (0-10) on an audio fader are intended to represent equal increments in perceived loudness. If you turn a fader slowly from 10 all the way down to zero at an even rate, the volume should appear to reduce in a smooth linear fashion. Analog faders use what is known as a "logarithmic taper". This is because human hearing is essentially logarithmic in nature, and using a linear fader would cause the apparent volume changes to bunch up at one end of the fader travel. Experience in studios over the years has shown that modifying this logarithmic taper can further improve the apparent smoothness, so high quality faders, such as on mixing consoles, use what is known as the "audio taper". The attenuation per division between 10 and 4 is about 3.3dB (making "4" about -20dB below "10"). Below about 4, the rate of attenuation per division may increase in one or two steps (the points of change in slope being the "knees" mentioned by Steve G), or the rate of attenuation per division may increase in many small steps. Faders on cinema processors may vary somewhat in their attenuation above and below the playback reference level of 7, particularly between processors using conventional analog pots and those using digital rotary encoders, because encoder systems use a lookup table to determine the volume for any given fader setting. So even though the settings all match at level "7", a setting of "4" on a CP500 may be somewhat different to a CP55 or whatever. So one projectionist's 5.5 may be a little louder or softer than another's. Finally, 70% was chosen for the playback reference level for several reasons, including optimising dynamic range through the cinema processor whilst allowing up to 10dB of gain for very soft soundtracks or where the cinema wants to play a film extra loud for a specific audience - say a rock musical for a young audience who want to hear it LOUD. Also it has always been standard practice in professional equipment to have "10dB in hand" above normal operating level on the fader.  |  IP: Logged Jean-Michel Grin Expert Film Handler Posts: 222 From: Geneva & Lausanne, Switzerland Registered: Jul 2002 posted 01-08-2003 04:57 AM                         |  IP: Logged Michael Schaffer "Where is the Boardwalk Hotel?" Posts: 4143 From: Boston, MA Registered: Apr 2002 posted 01-08-2003 09:02 AM                        I don`t think I understand what you are saying, Jean-Michel... Derrick, how is the difference in the steps above and below 4 implemented technically in an analogue fader? Antonio, we all know how stupid some people are... Once we played a film (I don`t remember which) with some scenes in a wet cave and you could hear the water running down the walls. A lady came out and complained that there was water coming out of the walls, and when I explained to her that that was an intended effect from the surround speakers, she became very aggressive and insulting. After the show, when the lights came on, I went into the cinema and pointed out the dry walls with the surround speakers and she just ran out furiously... A final point: People`s TV sets at home are not only less loud, they have no dynamic range. Most people are not at all used to dynamic range as the difference of soft and loud. They simply don`t understand it and can`t handle it as their TV sets and the stuff they listen to on their car radios all has the same narrow dynamics and can therefore be easily turned up and down without losing the proportions (as there are none).  |  IP: Logged Karen Hultgren Master Film Handler Posts: 492 From: Agoura Hills, CA, USA Registered: Mar 2000 posted 01-08-2003 11:40 AM                        Hello Jean-Michel, Many times the trailers are mixed louder than the feature. That is the way they are delivered to us so that is the way we reproduce them. We never change the mix. In regards to the reader head, please email me and I will send you the instructions for calibrating it. Your English is great! I understand you just fine! :-) Karen at DTS khultgren@dtsonline.com  |  IP: Logged Patrick de Groot Expert Film Handler Posts: 161 From: Sprang-Capelle, Netherlands Registered: Apr 2001 posted 01-08-2003 03:35 PM                     There is a pdf file from Dolby which discusses the topic "Are Movies Too Loud?" http://www.dolby.com/tech/toolouds.pdf  |  IP: Logged Ray Derrick Master Film Handler Posts: 310 From: Sydney, Australia Registered: Sep 2001 posted 01-09-2003 05:44 AM                     Schaffer, low cost rotary analog faders use a wiper on a carbon or conductive-plastic track, and the taper is logarithmic (commonly known as Curve C). The track is manufactured so that it's resistance increases more or less logarithmically from one end of the track to the other. "Straight-line" studio faders, such as those made by Penny and Giles, may use several wipers and tracks to achieve more elaborate audio tapers. However the audio taper can be accommodated even in a rotary single-track fader by careful attention to the way the track is manufactured, but these are generally considerably more expensive. From memory, the fader on a CP65 is a linear type and the log or audio taper characteristic is achieved either via the VCA control circuit or in the VCAs themselves.  |  IP: Logged Michael Schaffer "Where is the Boardwalk Hotel?" Posts: 4143 From: Boston, MA Registered: Apr 2002 posted 01-09-2003 11:03 AM                        Thanks for the explanation! quote: The track is manufactured so that it's resistance increases more or less logarithmically from one end of the track to the other. How is that achieved? Do you have a drawing of a fader taken apart?  |  IP: Logged System Notices Forum Watchdog / Soup Nazi Posts: 215 Registered: Apr 2004 posted 06-17-2015 06:47 PM                 It has been 4542 days since the last post.  |  IP: Logged Aron Toplitsky Expert Film Handler Posts: 113 From: Gardena, CA, USA Registered: May 2012 posted 06-17-2015 06:47 PM                     I just have to ask you all, would anyone know if the screening rooms on Hollywood lots play there films at the 7 setting?  |  IP: Logged Mike Blakesley Film God Posts: 12767 From: Forsyth, Montana Registered: Jun 99 posted 06-17-2015 09:02 PM                        They tend to play at whatever the person in charge (director, studio head or such) wants. There is an endless debate over what sounds good. The main schools of thought are: - Movies are designed to be played at 7 so they should be played that way no matter what, dammit - No two theaters are the same, soundwise, so the manager should listen to each movie and decide what sounds best based on the dialogue scenes. Then take into account the type of movie and the type of audience it's playing to (i.e. an action comic book movie can be louder than a "Driving Miss Daisy" and please the audience) I happen to subscribe to the second group. It was confirmed for me that I belonged in this group when I saw one of the Transformers movies at the Dolby Screening Room in San Francisco. It sounded awesome, but was unbearably loud and I spent the whole movie wishing I had access to the fader. (I suppose the fact that it was a crappy movie didn't help.)  |  IP: Logged Jim Cassedy Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1661 From: San Francisco, CA Registered: Dec 2006 posted 06-17-2015 10:52 PM                     quote: Aron Toplitsky would anyone know if the screening rooms on Hollywood lots play there films at the 7 setting? I don't know what they do down in Hollywood, but I do many studio screenings at Dolby's screening room in San Francisco, and my 'default instructions' there are to run everything at fader level "7" I can think of only two times in the past year when a director has specifically asked me to 'turn it down a notch". (Unfortunately, I don't have a 'notch meter'- so it's somewhat subjective) As a bit of fun trivia- - the Dolby room is pretty much acoustically agnostic. The seats were designed to have the same sound absorbtion properties as the human body, so the room essentially sounds the same no matter how full or empty it is.  |  IP: Logged

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