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Author Topic: Blade Runner Andy Summers Master Film Handler Posts: 397 From: Bournemouth Dorset United kingdom Registered: Jun 2005 posted 10-21-2005 02:30 PM                 Bill’ Cheers for that I was just watching parts of “Ben-Hur” early this afternoon, and now I’ve got “Ice-Station Zebra” running it’s a small word, the titles you listed I looked down that list and confirmed these are the titles that I have on DVD, apparently there’s a newer version of Ben-Hur just realised on DVD, as the version I have is slightly cropped, but still viewable I’ll be looking forward to it’s arrival. The six-track Dolby mix on “Ben-Hur” is clear, the recording maybe dated but still holds up well, LFE sub bass is very deep but during that era sub bass tracks where not around, so what techniques have the re-recording mixings used to create this new mix? Ben-Hur West Side Story Lawrence of Arabia My Fair Lady 2001: A Space Odyssey Ice Station Zebra Tron Brainstorm Far & Away “2001: A Space Odyssey” is not a good re-mix all the dialogue panning has been butchered big time, thank God I have the Laserdisc edition ML102233), with all the dialogue panning going on within the mix. “Torn” and My Fair Lady are my Favourite six-track Dolby Stereo mixes, “Come on Dover move your blaming ass” “My Fair Lady” saw this new restoration print by Robert Harris and “Gene Katz” around 1995 and it was astonishingly clear visually and audibly as well, the wild dialogue panning was all over the screen and was joyful, it helps make the film seem more realistic. “Tron” is a different kettle of fish, when the computer digitizes “Flynn” it’s like taking the trip with him, the Dolby mix and visuals satisfying from start to finish. The image looks a tad on the cropped side, but I’m still pleased to be able to watch the film in its widescreen aspect ratio. Well “Ice Station Zebra” has now finished and the Exit music is about to roll, cool  |  IP: Logged Monte L Fullmer Film God Posts: 8367 From: Nampa, Idaho, USA Registered: Nov 2004 posted 10-21-2005 02:35 PM                     I saw "TRON" in 70mm in 1982 (great presentation!). The DVD release is formatted to the standard 70mm of 2.20/1 - Monte  |  IP: Logged Andy Summers Master Film Handler Posts: 397 From: Bournemouth Dorset United kingdom Registered: Jun 2005 posted 10-21-2005 03:02 PM                 Monte’ Yippee, “Tron” looks cool, though I’m not going to run it tonight it’s getting late, although I can use “Mr Dolby compressor.” So do you think the DVD version of “Tron” holds up on DVD, along with the six-track Dolby Stereo mix, this version as split-surrounds, did the theatrical realise come in format 43?  |  IP: Logged Monte L Fullmer Film God Posts: 8367 From: Nampa, Idaho, USA Registered: Nov 2004 posted 10-21-2005 03:20 PM                     Hi Andy - DVD is great, but can't beat the original film/sound releases, do to once again, the analog pure mag recording against the peak robbing digital. When I went to that theatre(which, unfortunately wasn't the VILLA, but the REGENCY in SLC), I did go upstairs to the booth, but unfortunately didn't get to notice the sound system if it was a Dolby setup or whatever, since I paid more attention to the machinery (which were AA'2s with STRONG 60's with beam spreaders, pushing 4k light in this changeover house). But, I'm sure it was a Dolby setup and using the format 43 as mentioned-the way it sounded downstairs in that 1400 seat auditorium When I played "TRON" on my computer, yes, it was good and such, but I can't help think on how that 70mm release was so crisp and clear with the 5channels behind screen was extremely absolute in reproduction. Also, I do believe that the DVD releases actually do some cropping some and still call it "Wide-Screen". Sorry, in a nutshell - DVD's will NEVER match up to any 70mm release, but always play the close 2nd. -thx Monte  |  IP: Logged Steve Guttag We forgot the crackers Gromit!!! Posts: 12814 From: Annapolis, MD Registered: Dec 1999 posted 10-21-2005 05:03 PM                     Monte, You need to study up on your digital theory and noise theory...you are a bit off...there is not "chopping" off of the peaks in digital recording/reproduction of sound. If I were to record a pure sine wave at say 1KHz, then play it back...do you think that you would hear some sort of chopping off of the signal...do you think that if you have a super-duper O'scope that let you see deep down into the wave that you would see little stair steps? If you do, you would be wrong. It is a popular misconception, but a wrong one none the less. Now a digital recording will be band limited (a very hard maximum recordable frequency). The presumption that the digital nature of the recording also gives the analog version a leg up since it is "continious" is also debunked...the smallest gradiation on any signal is inherently limited to its inherent noise. However, mere noise and frequency repsponse are just but to measurments that go into what constitutes sound. I believe it was Bob Carver that said something to the effect of "tell me how you want something to sound, I'll make it sound that way." or words to that affect. I remember that he made a tube amp, measured it as well as he could to come up with a transfer function...then made a solid state amp to have the same transfer function and thus sound either identical or nearly identical. I think the tube amplifier was known as the Silver-7. Sound and how it is processed by humans is not a simple, measure one thing, and you have everything you need to know about it. I too perfer the sound of good analog over digital...why? Perhaps I grew up with it or perhaps my brain processes the analog version better. The same may/will be true with digital pictures versus film. I will say, that digital images absouletly flatten an image so it looses its depth...this has been true of all digital presentations I've seen up to 4K. 70mm Dolby SR was the best sound I've yet heard in a movie theatre. True Lies has to be the hottest, cleanest track I have ever heard...it was increadably loud yet not painful at all. Very clean. It was not my favorite mix, but I do respect the quality that seemed to be put into that 70mm magnetic release.  |  IP: Logged Andy Summers Master Film Handler Posts: 397 From: Bournemouth Dorset United kingdom Registered: Jun 2005 posted 10-21-2005 06:28 PM                 Steve’ “Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade” 70mm six-track Dolby Stereo SR with split-Surrounds Lucasfilm”THX” sound system, “Empire” Leicester Square this was incredible powerful the lows kicking me in the chest, and this pinching sound towards the end where the holy Grail water is poured on Indiana’s dad, the lows for a brief moment pinched my stomach, WOW, and I haven’t come across any other film to this date that’s done that.  |  IP: Logged Gordon McLeod Film God Posts: 9532 From: Toronto Ontario Canada Registered: Jun 99 posted 10-21-2005 09:26 PM                     Tron was format 41 ToddAo with NR  |  IP: Logged Martin Brooks Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 900 From: Forest Hills, NY, USA Registered: May 2002 posted 10-21-2005 09:57 PM                        quote: Monte L Fullmer Course, this statement is an automatic no-brainer here. Analog sound is actually a more truer soundform being that digital is actually "squaring off" the analog waveform by "chopping" off the peaks of each waveform. Echoing what Steve said....I think you're confusing over-driving an analog signal, which does exactly what you describe, with quantizing, which is how analog sound is converted to digital. Once a waveform is converted to digital, it's no longer a waveform. It's just a bunch of numbers. If you get the numbers right than the resulting signal will be right. Digital conversion works by taking one moment in time, reading the level and converting that level to a binary number. In the case of CD RedBook audio, that happens 44,100 times per second and the numbers are 16 bits long. The key to quality recording and playback is the quality of the filters that limit the upper frequency limit to 22KHZ. Why is there an upper frequency limit? Because according to the Nyquist theorem, the sampling rate has to be twice the highest frequency (which means that the upper frequency must be less than half the sampling rate). Movie sound is a little different because it is size-compressed and whenever you have compression, you have artifacts. DTS is less compressed than Dolby Digital, but the compression algorithms that Dolby uses are amazingly good. But there's a new technique that's going to be used on the new high-definition DVD formats that might also be able to be used in theatrical presentation. What they do is combine the compressed tracks with the "difference" tracks. The difference tracks are created by taking the original uncompressed tracks and combining them out of phase with the compressed tracks. The signal that results is what's missing from the compressed track. But the combination of the compressed track and the difference track still takes a lot less real-estate than the uncompressed track. Many audiophiles never felt that 44.1/16 recording was good enough. So there's a DTS format that creates CDs in a 44.1/20 bit format and DVD-Audio supports tracks up to 96KHZ sampling/24 bit. If you do the math, a 16 bit binary number results in values up to 65,535. A 24 bit number results in values up to 16,777,216. So the DVD-Audio format has a level resolution that is 256x the resolution of regular CD-Audio and it samples more than twice as much. Some of what many people prefer in analog sound is actually distortion. It so happens that most people like the sound of odd harmonic distortion - it's what we like about a fuzz guitar (which also does what you claimed digital sound does - it chops off the top of waves to create square waves.) It tends to sound warm to us. Unfortunately, the audiophile digital formats have had virtually no impact in the marketplace. In fact, consumers have opted for far lower quality in the form of highly compressed MP3 files playing out of 1/4 watt amplifiers. Seems to me we've taken some steps backwards. But having said all that, I admit that I'd still prefer to hear a 70mm 6-track mag (analog) presentation if the tracks were still in good shape. And to get back on topic, I saw a revival of Blade Runner in 70mm 6-track at Radio City Music Hall many summers ago. As it turns out, aside from the thrill of seeing a movie with 7000 people, Radio City Music Hall was a lousy place to see a move like Blade Runner. The image was distorted, only the center seats had decent viewing angles and the reverb time of the room was way too long.  |  IP: Logged Monte L Fullmer Film God Posts: 8367 From: Nampa, Idaho, USA Registered: Nov 2004 posted 10-22-2005 02:55 AM                     Thx Martin, and Steve for the correct descriptions of analog to digital sound forms. Just been around too many audio tape, analog devotees that actually dislike anything that is digital. quote: Martin Brooks DTS is less compressed than Dolby Digital, but the compression algorithms that Dolby uses are amazingly good. Yes, I've heard this argument before that DTS being better than SR-D, but to the normal ear, there is no difference between the two popular digital formats, if the systems are tuned correctly. To my ears, I can't tell the difference between the two, so it looks like both are doing what they are designed to do. thx-Monte  |  IP: Logged Andy Summers Master Film Handler Posts: 397 From: Bournemouth Dorset United kingdom Registered: Jun 2005 posted 10-22-2005 09:23 AM                 Monte’ quote: Martin Brooks ________________________________________ DTS is less compressed than Dolby Digital, but the compression algorithms that Dolby uses are amazingly good. _____________________________________________________________________ I disagree with some of these issues on which is best to the oscilloscope and test equipment dts may look fantastic over Dolby SR-D, I remember sometime back in 1997 when going for a job interview at the a cinema just outside London no names mentioned, except it was a 12 screen multiplex, and I had arrived ahead of schedule so I was offered to watch a film so I choose “face/off” (Dolby SR-D) the sound was well fantastic with not much slam or kick in the presentation, high frequencies where clear, and during the chase scene at the opening I noticed four people getting up an walking out one it, that didn’t surprise me because I was close to doing it as well, there set-up was piss poor, it was (ARMAGEDDON). Anyway I was then called to the interview, which lasted 40 minutes, after the interview had finished I was offered another freebee this time it was “Alien Resurrection” presented in dts in one of the two lager screens, sat throw this for 109 minutes and the feeling was, once again (ARMAGEDDON) this cinema had a nice booth layout it was such choice, but the final playback was simply (ARMAGEDDON). As for the job at there site, I didn’t get it…. (ARMAGEDDON). Dolby and dts played back in (Lucasfilm “THX” sound system theatre) sounds at its best and there’s only one cinema that did that in the past, the “EMPIRE” screen #1 in a nutshell it was simple the best sounding cinema around at its time. If you look in the Film-Tech pictures hear, you’ll see what I mean by spectacular. http://www.film-tech.com/warehouse/pics/empire/empire.html Gordon’ Do you happen to have a list or a direct link to the 70mm film Dolby format, now that will tickly me cheers.  |  IP: Logged Gordon McLeod Film God Posts: 9532 From: Toronto Ontario Canada Registered: Jun 99 posted 10-22-2005 12:46 PM                     Andy said "Gordon’ Do you happen to have a list or a direct link to the 70mm film Dolby format, now that will tickly me cheers. " Nope if someone asks I just dig out the test film for that title and see the notes stored with it  |  IP: Logged Andy Summers Master Film Handler Posts: 397 From: Bournemouth Dorset United kingdom Registered: Jun 2005 posted 10-22-2005 12:59 PM                 Gordon’ Ok then, how about “Return of the Jedi” theatrical release 70mm Dolby Stereo, and it was shown in two THX sound system theatres in the U.S. this was around, May 25th 1983, anyway information regarding it’s (Dolby Stereo THX) sound presentation, please. Cheers. Andy  |  IP: Logged Monte L Fullmer Film God Posts: 8367 From: Nampa, Idaho, USA Registered: Nov 2004 posted 10-22-2005 01:10 PM                     ..course, when I mention that I saw "SW" in 70mm, I should have added that I saw the other two in 70mm at the same theatre (CENTRE, in SLC), but the theatre wasn't THX approved. Plitt Theatres didn't want to spend the money for THX stuff and be under that control by THX. I also saw "ALIEN" there in 1979 in 70mm as well. -Monte  |  IP: Logged Andy Summers Master Film Handler Posts: 397 From: Bournemouth Dorset United kingdom Registered: Jun 2005 posted 10-22-2005 02:20 PM                 Monte’ So I take it you also like Sci-fi films like myself, at the present time, I’m watching my ole “STAR WARS” PAL Laserdisc analogue audio due to the discs pressing was around 1982, the Laserdisc is showing slight signs of little sparkles, (Laser Rot) I hope not. The Laserdisc is encoded in Dolby Stereo which is the original sound head on the 35mm Dolby Stereo prints around that time a long time ago, over the few hours I’ll be spinning the Laser discs from this is the PAL version I have. http://www.blam1.com/StarWars/images/LaserDisc-UK/1130-70_front.jpg The image looks great, for Laserdisc that is 23 years old not bad going. The sound well light years different from all the other version some 6 in total, 35mm Mono 1977 / 35mm Dolby Stereo optical 1977 / 70mm Six-track Dolby Stereo for the Road Show premiere houses 1977 / THX Laserdisc Dolby Stereo which marked the 4th version 1992 / Special Edition Dolby SR-D dts SDDS this again marked a 5th version of the controversy surrounding this classic Dolby mix whilst playing in more cinemas with Dolby Digital and THX sound systems 1997 / THX Laserdisc same version as the theatrical mix 1997 / DVD THX Dolby Digital surround-EX STAR WARS Special edition, this one hope they didn’t do another re-mix, as this one represents the 6th version 2004 / http://japanld.free.fr/cover/07901-08000/07972.jpg So next I’ll be selecting one of the CAV sides of the Definitive collection sides, of “STAR WARS episode 4 A New Hope” that hope is “Luke Skywalker” to bring peace to the galaxy…. http://i.a.cnn.net/cnn/2004/SHOWBIZ/Movies/09/20/sidebar.hamill/story.hamill.jpg Next will be the Special edition 1997, followed lastly by STAR WARS episode 4 DVD THX Dolby Digital surround-EX …. http://japanld.free.fr/cover/05001-05100/05091.jpg DVD version http://images-eu.amazon.com/images/P/B0001ZE1OU.02.LZZZZZZZ.jpg So by the time this reaches you I’ll be starting up the CAV version, and whilst typing this, I’ve been running the credits on the PAL Laserdisc, some 7 times now….make that 10 times now...  |  IP: Logged Paul Mayer Oh get out of it Melvin, before it pulls you under! Posts: 3836 From: Albuquerque, NM Registered: Feb 2000 posted 10-22-2005 03:16 PM                        Sparkles on LD playback? Yep, the first signs of "laser rot." The sparkles will get worse over time, looking much like a color version of the "snow" seen on analog broadcast TV when the signal strength is weak. The rot spreads, eventually rendering the entire disc unplayable. Out of the several hundred LDs I have, only a couple have succumbed to the rot. Certain pressing plants back in the day were infamous for putting out discs that were prone to rot. I was fortunate to see SW in 70mm at the pre-twinned Avco General Cinema theatre in Westwood, one of the first (the first?) THX houses, in May of 1983. Got a private weekday afternoon showing as there was no one else in the place that day. My mom and grandpa were next door, taking in "Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence." Was quite a week: Graduated from community college, passed the exam for my amateur radio license (technician), went to see the new Spruce Goose display in Long Beach, interviewed for an aerospace engineering job with Northrop in Pico Rivera, and caught SW in one of the best theatres on the west coast. Took my mom and grandpa flying while I was there too. Never had the pleasure of seeing Blade Runner in a theatre. I remember my mom was quite depressed upon seeing it. She didn't like the bleak dystopian industrial look of LA in that pic.  |  IP: Logged

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