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Author Topic: Location of soundtrack on film Frank Angel Film God Posts: 5305 From: Brooklyn NY USA Registered: Dec 1999 posted 06-25-2006 06:51 AM                        Richard, are those Sondor heads still available (I'd need two)? Phil's still worried about that pesky red vs. white distortion issue as I am -- as should anyone who runs older prints and as should have the SMPTE when cyan was being developed and they KNEW that older white optimized tracks would not play well on them. This gizmo would be the perfect way to switch from white exciters to red exciters and back again, depenting on the print optimization requirement. I mean, we all want to be excited correctly, no? The Sondor would be the perfect solution al la Mr. Hill. But I also have to ask, how robust is the delay circuit that's employed -- there's digital delay and then there's digital delay. Depending on the sampling rate and such, long delays can sound pretty disgusting. Is this thing well designed? What about the mechanics; good lateral guide roller tolerances, easy adjustment for same, decent damping and flywheel stablization etc.? PRICE? To bad they didn't include mag heads as well. That would be just too sweet to have a single piece of hardware sitting atop the projector head. [ 06-26-2006, 11:09 PM: Message edited by: Frank Angel ]  |  IP: Logged Chris Trainor Expert Film Handler Posts: 161 From: Greenville, RI, USA Registered: Jun 99 posted 06-26-2006 08:44 PM                        Randy, I've got my DTS reader on top of the SDDS... not sure why.. think it was for 'looks'. One thing that's a pain tho is having the SDDS after the DTS makes for a really long delay setting on the DTS processor. I think i'm over their max because of it. Of course, if I don't thread the SDDS reader things go right to hell. The upside is my rigging has SDDS as primary, fallback to DTS and finally to analog. I keep thinking of swapping the location of the readers just to bring the DTS delay in a bit, but I havn't had any problems so I'm not entirely sure of the benifit. The one thing I can think of is not having to thread the SDDS reader all the time. --Chris  |  IP: Logged Randy Stankey Film God Posts: 6539 From: Erie, Pennsylvania Registered: Jun 99 posted 06-26-2006 09:15 PM                     I see so few SDDS prints these days (I'm in an art theater not commercial/first-run.) that I don't see why you need to thread the SDDS if there is DTS. I'd reset the delay on the DTS so that the SDDS is bypassed. But, then again, if I had my druthers the SDDS would be taken off all together.  |  IP: Logged Mike Blakesley Film God Posts: 12767 From: Forsyth, Montana Registered: Jun 99 posted 06-26-2006 09:18 PM                        quote: Randy Stankey I don't see why you need to thread the SDDS if there is DTS. Maybe he: 1. Sometimes doesn't get the disks with the film, or 2. Has a projectionist who forgets to load/swap the disks into the player.  |  IP: Logged Charles Greenlee Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 801 From: Savannah, Ga, U.S. Registered: Jun 2006 posted 06-26-2006 10:01 PM                        The Combo reader sound interesting. How well does it work? "(Dumb management decision. I wanted it the other way but I was overruled.)" Yeah that happens alot unfortunatly. Best thing we can do, is instruct managment on how it works, and how to make it work best, and hope the learn. If not, then we just have to deal with their desicions best we can, till we buy our own houses and show them up.  |  IP: Logged Chris Trainor Expert Film Handler Posts: 161 From: Greenville, RI, USA Registered: Jun 99 posted 06-26-2006 11:24 PM                        Randy: This is in my home screening room... and every print I've seen that's recent has an SDDS track (tho very few these days have 8 channel soundtracks). I have very few DTS discs for the prints I get. Plus, for some dumb reason I prefer SDDS. When I owned a 2nd run theater only about 20% of the time did I get DTS discs with my prints. Since I couldn't afford Dolby it was easier to just have a 'guaranteed' soundtrack provided the print I got wasn't completely beat up. --Chris  |  IP: Logged Ron Curran Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 504 From: Springwood NSW Australia Registered: Feb 2006 posted 06-27-2006 01:07 AM                        Which is why, as I said in an earlier post, that our DTS reader is under the Dolby penthouse. Its easier to bypass the DD and ALWAYS lace up through the DTS, which is a snack. The other way round would mean that the DD reader always had to be laced up. There are a lot fewer frames of delay to set this way, no matter how you run (O&OEE). We are mostly second run, so its a toss-up whether we get discs or an unplayable DD track. Good breaking news: Discs supplied most times (sometimes 2 sets in the box) and more DD tracks readable (I think Kodak found what the problem was). I have no experience of SDDS.  |  IP: Logged Gilbert Travin Expert Film Handler Posts: 101 From: Villeurbanne / France Registered: Jan 2004 posted 06-27-2006 02:03 AM                        Hi all ! For standard 8 magnetic : 56 frames in advance. I well know the problem : in 1968 I had purchased an Heurtier P6-24 Super 8 magnetic sound projector. This machine was based on the standard 8 model and soundtracks of "commercial" movies were not read correctly. Heurtier free re-synchronized magnetic sound at 56 frames !  |  IP: Logged Monte L Fullmer Film God Posts: 8367 From: Nampa, Idaho, USA Registered: Nov 2004 posted 06-27-2006 03:13 AM                     quote: Randy Stankey I don't see why you need to thread the SDDS if there is DTS. I worked in a 21 complex where we had all three digital units - the top one was the SDDS, and below the Sony, was the DTS reader (SR-d was the basement reader..for CHR P35GPS units..) and the way this was set up was that we had to lace AROUND the rollers of the Sony unit to lace through the DTS reader (if we didn't want to use SDDS..was an option). Other houses had the CAT-701 mounted on top of the DTS reader and I had to set the CAT-701 delay to where the path went through both units for SR-D to be in proper sync-not around the outer rollers of the CAT-701 if using DTS only. This was instructed my my superior at home office simply .. to keep it simple, stupid...  |  IP: Logged Jack Ondracek Film God Posts: 2348 From: Port Orchard, WA, USA Registered: Oct 2002 posted 06-27-2006 05:30 AM                        quote: Mike Blakesley Maybe he: 1. Sometimes doesn't get the disks with the film, or 2. Has a projectionist who forgets to load/swap the disks into the player. So far this year, we've received 2 first-run prints sans DTS disk. In both cases, ETS has said that "additional print runs" were provided too late to get the accompanying disks. Beats me if this is true or not... but it doesn't do the DTS image any good. In both cases, I've been able to get disk images from another local theatre that runs all their prints in SRD.  |  IP: Logged Stephen Furley Film God Posts: 3059 From: Coulsdon, Croydon, England Registered: May 2002 posted 06-27-2006 06:47 AM                     Something that does strike me is how few film print formats were originally designed to accommodate an optical sound track. The only ones I can think of at the moment are: 42mm Tri-Ergon. 70mm Fox grandeur. 35mm Vistavision, though that just adopted the track position of normal 4-perf 35mm, which was not originally on that format. There were one or two other wide film (56mm ish) formats which were contemporary with Grandeur, but I can't remember the details. Also, a few totally experimental formats in the late teens / early '20s. There are also a few formats which were originally designed for magnetic stripe tracks: Super-8. 70mm Todd-AO. Both of these later gained optical tracks, but these were little used, and short-lived. 55.625mm Cinemascope 55. This one never made it into commercial use. 35mm Cinemascope. This was only a slight reworking of normal 35mm, which started out as silent. Then there was the magnetic Vistavision format for 'Story of a Patriot. Those are about the only ones I can think of, and most of those never made it into general use. Just about everything else started out as a mute format, and, in some cases, was later modified for sound. Cinerama, Cinemiracle, Kinopanorama and Imax were all designed to use separate separate tracks.  |  IP: Logged Charles Greenlee Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 801 From: Savannah, Ga, U.S. Registered: Jun 2006 posted 06-27-2006 11:15 PM                        Ok, well here's a question. Which sound format do you prefer? DD, DTS, SDDS, or even analog (Why? Dunno.)? In my experience between dD and DTS, both are pretty comprable, but I still prefer DTS. That is when deluxe doesn't mess up when printing the timecode. I'd say that I'd like to have SDDS, simply because of the 8 channel capability. But I'm told that SDDS doesn't sound quite right. Either something with the way it's compressed, or how it's equalized, either way I'm told the sounds seems colored. Also, SDDS doesn't seem to be active anymore. Prints still come out for it, but Sony's no longer updating it.  |  IP: Logged David Stambaugh Film God Posts: 4021 From: Eugene, Oregon Registered: Jan 2002 posted 06-27-2006 11:29 PM                        There's only one theater that here that has all 3 digital formats, seen many movies there. SDDS always sounds the best to me. Could just be a fluke with the way it's EQ'd. House #3 at Regal Cinema World 8, which unfortunately will be closed by the end of 2006.  |  IP: Logged Ron Curran Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 504 From: Springwood NSW Australia Registered: Feb 2006 posted 06-28-2006 02:15 AM                        DD seems to be the norm at any other cinema I attend. I haven’t heard DTS or SDDS outside for a few years now, so it is difficult to judge. At my own cinema, all our systems are kept up to scratch by Intec Pacific and I think DTS is a whisker better. My opinion is coloured by the reliability of the system because I can relax while screening the first run through when I know there are discs. We occasionally run an A-B comparison and none of us could pick a clear winner, maybe DTS by a whisker. However, I am amazed at how good DD can sound, so if the drop-out rate is fixed (Fingers crossed, it has improved lately) it will get thumbs up, after uncrossing my fingers. Dolby A and SR can also sound pleasant. It depends a lot on the recording engineers. But I miss the 3-channel surround. If I had to choose between a mediocre image with digital sound and an excellent image with analogue stereo, I would vote for the latter. If digital didn’t exist, the old wiggly would probably be developed further. The cyan tracks play a few db down with the red light reader. Yes, we’ve had it checked. When Dolby stereo was introduced, I remember people in the industry telling me that it was superior to magnetic. It reminds me of the current debate about digital vs film.  |  IP: Logged Carl Martin Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1424 From: Oakland, CA, USA Registered: Feb 2002 posted 06-28-2006 02:55 AM                        is it possible to set up any of the digital formats with different delay options that can be selected? so if you bypass one reader you can hit a toggle switch and the reader above it will still be in sync. or if you have a cobbled-together changeover setup with one basement srd reader and one penthouse reader. it doesn't seem like you could do this with just one da20. but it should be possible in principle.  |  IP: Logged

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