This is topic Could digital sound be one of the worst things to happen to theatres? in forum Film Handlers' Forum at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.


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Posted by Evans A Criswell (Member # 381) on 12-19-2003, 11:08 PM:
 
At the risk of being shot, I'm going to, for argument's sake, pose this question in the thread title.

I've seen far too many movies where the experience was totally marred by the digital sound not working properly. The most common problem is the sound cutting in and out, going from digital to analog and back every few seconds. At other times, an entire reel may not play in digital and on occasions an entire movie won't. During the drop, the audience is usually treated to distorted sound, usualy of a much lower volume, from an out-of-calibration analog system.

Defective films seem to be an increasing problem. Every friend I've talked to who has seen Lord of the Rings III has told me about digital sound cutting out in theatres locally, and I've read the film-tech posts in the movie review thread mentioning the same thing in other places. This is a widespread problem on a very high-profile movie. Bruce Almightly had a similar widespread problem on one of the reels. The presentation I saw locally was marred by the in-and-out digital/analog switch every seconds during a reel.

Another big problem is that theatres, once they get digital sound, fail to maintain the analog system. Ideally, when the digital sound cuts out, the system will default to the analog soundtrack, which hopefully will sound almost the same as the digital, so there won't be a sudden change in volume and sound characteristic. Nearly every theatre I've been to has a sudden change in volume (usually much lower) and various sorts of distortion when dropouts occur.

Back when analog sound was all there was, there was a need to keep the analog system calibrated and in good working order. A well-calibrated Dolby SR system can sound very good, and there is no reason, except for extreme laziness, not to keep the Dolby SR working. Doing so can make the difference in a ruined presentation for customers when a defective digital soundtrack is present, or when anything else causes the digital system to fail.

The drastic sound changes when digital dropouts occur are the one of the most distracting problems I encounter in theatres nowadays. They happen so often that I usually expect them in every movie at least once for a few seconds. Everyone notices the drastic sound change and it really takes people's minds out of the the movie they're watching.

I feel that the problem isn't the digital sound in itself, but the way it was implemented. The implementations of the 3 digital systems just aren't good enough to be foolproof enough for the way film is handled in the average multiplex. (Note that I'm not saying a well-run multiplex, since few are).

I'm having a lot of friends tell me "Don't go to theatre X to see Lord of the Rings. It was awful. The sound kept cutting in and out near the end.", where X is either theatre showing LOTR here in Huntsville. If the word going around is that theatres can't play movies without sound dropouts, especially on a movie like LOTR that many people see, more and more people are going to wait for DVDs if the labs can't produce reels with working digital sound and theatres can't get their act together to prevent other dropouts not caused by defective film. This problem is going to seriously hurt theatres if it keeps happening.

More and more people are getting the idea that their home theatre sound systems are as good or better than what they hear in theatres and these digital dropout problems are going to make them believe that the theatre sound systems are nowhere as reliable as their home systems either. This is not good for the future of movie theatres.

Opinions?
 

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Posted by David Stambaugh (Member # 1102) on 12-19-2003, 11:21 PM:
 
Funny you should bring this up. A co-worker and I were discussing RotK this morning. We'd seen it at different theatres (he in DTS at a Cinemark, me in DTS-ES at a Regal). We got to talking about movie sound -- he's as passionate about good sound as I am. And he said that the showing of RotK at the Cinemark was marred not only by several digital dropouts, but to make things worse, THE ANALOG SOUND DIDN'T WORK AT ALL WHEN THE DIGITAL DROPPED. He said there was complete silence when this happened. Not only that, but the left-screen channel was cutting in and out randomly. I asked him if this was House #3, and he confirmed it. How did I know? Because that house has had sound problems since at least "Episode 2", when the DTS player locked up or something and the sound reverted to analog for the last third of the film. And I noted the problem with the left channel dropping out almost 2 years ago too (of course this latter may not be a digital problem per se).

The digital systems do seem very "fragile" and prone to problems if they're not VERY well-maintained. And the failure of techs to PROPERLY maintain the analog chain is inexcusable.
 

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Posted by Gordon McLeod (Member # 33) on 12-19-2003, 11:24 PM:
 
We are haveing no dropouts yet with the DTS systems involved
 

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Posted by Aaron Garman (Member # 1653) on 12-19-2003, 11:25 PM:
 
I agree in a way. I love digital sound in the fact that it is clear, free of analog distortions, and can have a nice impact. However, I do agree that now no one cares about the analog backup. The average theatre would say, "If digital works, analog can go broken for the time being." Too many times has this happened at our place. For example, in one of our Dolby houses, when the sound goes into analog, there is a loud buzz/hum coming from the right speaker (which is also in addition to some low frequency hum that always exists). Nevertheless, why can't people just care?! Also, why can't those who care (like me) get the chance to voice their opinions? Too many times to my superiors dismiss me, claming I don't know what I'm talking about. Ugh, just terribly frustrating.

AJG
 

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Posted by Darryl Spicer (Member # 711) on 12-19-2003, 11:26 PM:
 
Sounds to me like they are haveing a problem with the DTS unit sending the signal to the Ultra Stereo processor to swith it to Analog. THat would explain the silence. The left channel situation can be two things. Bad EQ card or Loose conections.

quote:

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For example, in one of our Dolby houses, when the sound goes into analog, there is a loud buzz/hum coming from the right speaker (which is also in addition to some low frequency hum that always exists).

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Sounds like problems in the A-chain. I bet you use Jax light exciters.
 

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Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 12-19-2003, 11:30 PM:
 
Let's face it, there are 3 parts to this problem.

#1 Theater techs are FAR too overworked and *most* people in charge at theaters are too cheap to bring on more or hire in for petty things like "analog backup" sound.

#2 Few projectionists today know how to properly run and take care of the film prints. As a result, it is not uncommon for after a few weeks of running for the "sound on film" digital systems to simply no longer be able to play back the digital sound without constant dropouts to analog (which if you read #1 above will of course mean that the analog is not kept calibrated).

#3 The film labs are rushing things. Most of the time the prints play fine, but on ROTK I know I had a few reels with defective tracks that had to be replaced. I don't think this is necessarily carelessness on the part of the lab, just not enough time to necessarily be able to do the job as best as possible.

Still, digital sound is a very good thing.
 

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Posted by David Stambaugh (Member # 1102) on 12-19-2003, 11:31 PM:
 
Darryl, I don't know, but ever since Episode 2 that DTS player has had a piece of masking tape on the front with what looks like the words "CHECK OFTEN!" written on it. The left channel problem is definitely like an intermittent connection. I've seen numerous shows in that house and this ALWAYS happens. If a tech went in there and sat through an entire show, I'm sure he'd confirm there's a problem.

Brad, do you still do the previews in analog? Actually, if that was required everywhere, maybe the techs would be more tuned in to problems with the analog systems.
 

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Posted by Gordon McLeod (Member # 33) on 12-19-2003, 11:38 PM:
 
Funny before we do anything the A chain is usually done first on routine service calls
 

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Posted by Aaron Sisemore (Member # 145) on 12-20-2003, 01:02 AM:
 
'Could digital sound be one of the worst things to happen to theatres?'

IMO, the answer is a resounding YES, but for a different reason than the faults of the digital tracks:

Digital sound for 35mm was, for all intents and purposes, the 'magic bullet' that KILLED the 5-perf 70mm format for theatres.

Presentation will never be the same.

-Aaron
 

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Posted by Rick Long (Member # 213) on 12-20-2003, 01:57 AM:
 
I agree with Gordon. In the case of basement SRD readers for example, it is imperative to do the optical A-chain first, otherwise you may find that although you have acheived perfect lateral centering in digital, your buzz track is out a mile when you go to check the optical.
 

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Posted by Jack Ondracek (Member # 1466) on 12-20-2003, 02:09 AM:
 
Maybe I've been blessed by the odds... I haven't had nearly the troubles that are mentioned here. I may not have the current state-of-the-art, but I'm pretty happy with what I have. My prints do not toggle out of digital unexpectedly, my SR kicks much butt, and I can switch over to SR without worrying about offending my audience.

Out of 3 DTS systems and one DA20/CAT701 combo, I have had only one case where the audio toggled frequently between digital and analog. That was during the period when the power supply cable in my DA20 was in the process of crapping out & I didn't know (yet) what was going on. It's worked flawlessly since I fixed that problem. In any case, the problem had nothing to do with the print.

I have had to replace a power supply and a drive in a DTS 6D, but even with those problems, if the system started at all it worked fine, though perhaps with only 2 of the 3 drives functioning. After replacing the supply and the drive, I've had no further problems.

The only trouble I'm having with LOTR is that my CP65 is toggling back up to SR at the end of the show, after the automation puts it in non-sync. That's not supposed to happen unless the 6D toggles in and out of digital after the non-sync switch, which it may be doing... I'm still tracking that down.

As for digital vs analog, how hard can it be to keep the system working? Generally speaking, if you do a good A-chain, keep things clean, keep an eye on the levels (especially if you're still using exciter lamps) use a good film cleaner (hint), and make sure everyone stays on the front side of the service covers, this stuff should work pretty reliably. Out of all the elements in my booth, my sound systems are probably up there as reliable as anything else. I spend far more time fussing with my platters and my remaining good ole PRO-35 machines than I do the sound racks. My analog systems do get used, mainly because I don't care much for the compression they're putting on a lot of the trailers we get. Running in SR... or even A on the extreme tracks calms those trailers down to the point where you don't run screaming for the volume control. Call it a personal choice... maybe the purists here won't agree with the practice. I know I'm not fulfilling the trailer producers' goal of filling my auditorium with ear-pounding audio.... and I'm OK with that.

As for Evans' observations; I've been to several screenings at a Seattle AMC theatre. Over the past year or so, there have been serious SDDS problems in one of their larger auditoriums. They know it, will admit it if you ask, yet are still using the processor over a year later. Apparently, they'll run the darned thing until the company pulls it... which they say (think) will happen eventually. That is pretty sad.
 

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Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 12-20-2003, 02:55 AM:
 
David, yes I still run previews in analog, without surrounds or subwoofer. I also run them at typically 4-4.5 on the fader and my features at 6.5-7.5 on the fader. Never a complaint.

By the way, we screen all of our movies in SRD with the analog light source (led or exciter, depending on location) OFF. This way if the digital fails at any point during the movie, it will be painfully obvious to anyone check screening the print. Very, very, very rarely is there ever a blip. If it's just a quick blip in the reel, we let it go knowing that the analog will cover it up.

Jack, I could be wrong here, but I thought the 6D had logic built into it such that during the last 60 seconds of a movie's end credits the dts player could not pulse itself back into digital if it was to drop out and come back in. Maybe a one time glitch on the programming of the discs for this movie???
 

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Posted by Jack Ondracek (Member # 1466) on 12-20-2003, 03:05 AM:
 
That's entirely possible, Brad. This is the first problem I've had of this sort, so I'm trying to be open minded about the source. The docs say that the "interface" card between the data cable & the CP65 is supposed to prevent the system from reverting to SR (or "A") when the '65 is non-sync mode. I didn't see a 60 second window mentioned, nor did the book say anything about this being programmed within the disk... though I suppose both could be possible. I'm going to try a couple more things before I narrow this down... maybe even bring in the end of the print I ran on that screen before LOTR. Should have a better idea what's going on by Tomorrow.

The disk programming idea is interesting though. Theoretically, if you're in non-sync, the system would have to drop out of digital, then go back into it (forcing the '65 to digital), then drop out again in order to revert to SR. If that's happening, it's pretty fast, because I don't see any switch out of non-sync to digital. It looks like it's going right up into SR.
 

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Posted by Jeff Klump (Member # 1870) on 12-20-2003, 04:11 AM:
 
I agree on many of the points listed above. I believe that techs these days are overworked and most projectionist don't know how to handle prints correctly or take care of their equipment. Our tech barely gets to make it out because he has to watch over theatres that take up half the state of Texas. That's a lot of screens for him to keep track of. At my theatre (Regal) we have become self-reliant because if something happens we don't have time to wait for our tech to arrive. Thus, this keeps us projectionists up to speed on how to keep every screen running at its best. At least two of us do.

I do feel that some prints come with bad digital tracks because I've seen even the best kept sound system fail. Except usually its only the DTS or SR-D thus leaving other digital tracks to choose from. Then again, we're blessed at our theatre to have DTS-6D's, SDDS 2000's, and SR-D in 14 of our 16 auditoriums and SDDS 2000 and SR-D EX with an SA-10 in our other 2. Oh yeah, and CP-500's in all houses. So, needless to say, every movie we run gets played digitally no matter what. This is probably why everyone in Austin knows our theatre is the best. (sorry, i had to boast a little there)
 

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Posted by Brian D. Whitish (Member # 825) on 12-20-2003, 04:34 AM:
 
Im old fashioned but I run Dolby tone once a month to make sure my analog is working fine and the volume levels are close. Sometimes I still prefer the sound of a good SR print to the digital. Im running 701 penthouses on Norelco AAIIs and I rarely have default to tthe analog side. And I really miss 70mm mag! To my ears its still sounds the best. We havent run 70mm since Branaghs Hamlet in 1996. But man did that movie look awesome in 70mm!!!!
Brian
 

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Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 12-20-2003, 09:53 AM:
 
I feel that digital has its pluses and minuses. We have to live with it and through proper equipment maintainance we should try to make the best of it. As for analog I am pretty much a purest in that area and would normally rather listen to a really good analog track rather than the digital version. The areas that digital affords better quality is in harmonic distortion, seperation, and signal to noise ratio, but a good SR track is not far behind in the S/N department either and installation of a good reverse scan reader(BACP) with a proper processor that has real SR decoding can lower the analog outputs distortion level about 10% plus increase seperation and improve decoding by at least that much. There are two problems with analog these days, one is that no one is making decent pink noise any longer and unless you have some of the good old stuff its impossible to properly adjust slit loss, and two, there are fewer and fewer really good analog tracks being made with probably less time spent shooting the analog negative because the film will have digital tracks anyway. So unfortnately in this day and age we pretty much have to live with all varations of cinema sound and the problems that go along with them but there is one problem that should not exist out there....read on....

There are several things I would wish for.... One. For DTS to redesign and include a better verrsion of the time code reader that offers longer LED life through using multiple LEDs if necessary and to also build in an auto-level adjuctment and eliminate the internal(4 volt) adjustment. This would eliminate ALOT of DTS's problems in the field. The new XD-10 player is an absolute knock out performer but will suffer from the same problems that the rest of their players suffer.....an inadaquate TC reader that requires at least yearly adjustments to maintain the 4 volt level. If this adjustment gets much below 2 volts level the system will constantly ping pong between digital and analog. On my last service run there were several locations that were my first visit and most of the 8 DTS systems were doing this very thing and several of the TC readers adjustment levels had fallen below 2 volts with a couple of them at 1.7 volts! Needless to say they had not been running any of these DTS systems for months due to them needing a very stupid, simple adjustment that takes less than 2 min to do. In fact I did the adjustment to all of the readers, while shows were running, and put in the disks and had all of them back on DTS in less than an hour. In fact it should not have to be done at all! The DTS time code reader is simply a stupid, cheapo design that needs to be adressed and pretty darn soon. This stupid design will eventually ruin any plausability in the field that DTS presently has. And IMHO DTS has ALOT going for it with the new XD-10 player. Perhaps its time for BACP to design a proper DTS time code reader. I have no doubt it would sell very well.

As for all three digital systems.... the labs really need to slow down a bit, and or hire at least several more quality control people to ensure that the tracks can play back. I am still seeing locations that receive defective SRD reels and on occasion the entire print will not play back. Last Samauri was the lastest one and at one location had three bad reels. Its pretty obvious the labs are VERY lacking in the QC departments.

Hello Labs.....Wheatfield Wyoming has SRD playback, so does Wheatfield Idaho! You can no longer send your reject prints to them or very many locations without getting them thrown back at you as I see they do! Too many locations now have digital of some sort.

I've concluded that which system sounds better or not is no longer a valid point. You can make your own conclusions about that yourself. What it boils down to is which system works best at a particuluar location. Many locations still do not get DTS disks and many locations still receive defective SRD reels or entire prints. Today there is only one thing for sure, and that is that Sony is the looser in the digital war. Its a great sounding system though.

Mark @ CLACO
 

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Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 12-20-2003, 10:12 AM:
 
As others have mentioned, the real tragedy is that digital sound largely killed 5/70 for mainstream theatrical releases, despite the fact that 70mm (even just blowups) looks so much better than 35mm, especially on large screens. As a result, I've never run 70mm and probably never will.

I've never heard of a theatre neglecting the optical A-chain when equipped for digital. At most, some places (stupidly, IMHO) will install digital sound without also upgrading to SR decoding on the optical side, but even they make sure that their optical system stays properly aligned. Many trailers and snipes (as well as older films and a nontrivial number of new films) don't have digital sound and wouldn't benefit from it anyway, so a properly aligned optical system is still critical and will continue to be as long as we're still using film (which will be a while).

In general, though, digital sound is good to the extent that it has made high-quality sound available to many theatres that would never have installed mag or 70mm. Thus, the general public has had more exposure to high quality sound reproduction and, in general, popular expectations for sound quality in theatres and at home have increased since the early '90s. This benefits everyone. Obviously some films benefit more from high-quality reproduction than others. Big-budget action films gain quite a bit from digital (or mag 70), while dialogue-centric films gain little or nothing when compared with a good SR track, properly mixed and played back.

Related question: has anything changed in the process of printing soundtracks on film or in the process of recording the sound negative in the last year or two? At one theatre, we sometimes run older prints from a private collection (not for public screenings, of course); when these prints have SRD tracks (usually made from the mid-90s until 2001 or so, some on acetate and some on polyester), they almost invariably play fine, even when the print itself is somewhat beat-up. In this same auditorium (single projector/platter with Simplex 5-star and CE basement SRD reader), we often get higher error counts (5-F vs. 3-6) with lab-new prints. This makes no sense to me. Is there an issue with with reading the track on new ("green") film?
 

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Posted by Jeff Klump (Member # 1870) on 12-20-2003, 10:27 AM:
 

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since Branaghs Hamlet in 1996. But man did that movie look awesome in 70mm!!!!

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I'll second that!
 

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Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 12-20-2003, 12:06 PM:
 
This is probably a stupid question but it's one I've always wondered about: Why do the labs have such trouble printing the digital sound tracks -- even the non-intricate DTS time code -- but they can print the picture area with no problems whatsoever?
 

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Posted by Richard Fowler (Member # 893) on 12-20-2003, 12:42 PM:
 
We are looking at an "Analog" visual image and outside of the negative dirt, image jump and weave our eyes are very forgiving
 

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Posted by Frank Angel (Member # 248) on 12-20-2003, 01:22 PM:
 
Bottom line, if you can't make your SR sound damn close to the digital in terms of fidelity and precise level, then your system is out of alignment; it is wrong headed to think that switching to the all Holy Digital tracks will save your ass.

It's like my contention that if a booth is making prints scratchy and dirty, then putting a digital projector into that dirty booth run by that incompetent operator will not produce the "pristine" images that the digital evangelists claim. Popcorn oil on a DLP projection lens does the same thing to the images as popcorn oil on a 35mm lens.

As for SR, in fact the surround reproduction might even sound subjectively BETTER in analog because the matix allows the naturally out-of-phase sound that is always present in live recording to slide into the surrounds, especially the music. Discrete doesn't do that -- only what is recorded in each channel comes out of that channel.

This is what caused theatre owners who, in the early days of Dolby Optical Stereo, complained to techs that the surround sound in their 70mm installions wasn't nearly as good (read: quantity not quality) as their 35mm Dolby Stereo houses and the constantly recurring demand to the techs was to turn up the surround level in the 70mm house. They heard more surround in the 35mm houses and that was a bit off-putting, given their investment in the 70mm theatre. Of course the 70mm was the more accurately reproducing the original mix while the 35mm matrix, especially 150B and C, was, well let's just say if it weren't for the time delay, it would sound like everything was coming from everywhere. Funny thing is, if they try to place sounds in all channels at once, just the opposite happens -- the matrix gives up and the entire soundfield collapes into the center and nearly mono.

And Mark, I can't resist, but surely you didn't mean that SR gets 10% distortion? You meant .01%, right?

Like many of the guys here who pride themselves on how good their well-tweaked analog SR sounds,I too know that if we had SRD (which, unfortunately we don't) and I got a print that started to flip-flop in and out of analog, it wouldn't take me a second to force that sucker into SR and leave it there and not feel bad about it at all. I even split my analog surround with a stereo generator so that I get simulated stereo out of the mono surround in SR.

Rule of thumb, if you are aligning the A & B chain the way they both should be, you never will have to apologize for your analog sound.
 

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Posted by Joe Schmidt (Member # 822) on 12-20-2003, 01:53 PM:
 
All Sins Forgiven, All Problems Solved

Due to the Fatal Disease knowns as "Carmikeitis," I'm pleased to announce that here in Billings where I live, we've got all these problems Solved. I and everyone I know waits for the DVD.

Nothing is ever completely hopeless.
 

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Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 12-20-2003, 02:01 PM:
 
Frank,

I've always advocated tha thigh the highest quality analog playback should be the first thing on the list in designing new sound systems. There are many reasons for this that have already been mentioned in this thread so I won't repeat them.

Please go back and read again. What I said was that by using one of the high quality LED reverse scanners, the BACP in particuluar, that you can lower your analog playback distortion by about 10% over using an exciter, slit lens, and solor cell. There REALLY is a huge difference and this is probably the best example of why a JAX light really gains you absolutely nothing except the color of the light. You will find that even though you can lower harmonic distortion by 10% the Inter Modulation distortion will still be quite high although a tad better. I find that most of the pre digital cinema processors are still equipped ONLY with type A noise reduction as well adnb this IMHO is another big snafu. There are a few exceptions to that though in upgrades that were done right.
Mark @ CLACO
 

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Posted by Jack Ondracek (Member # 1466) on 12-20-2003, 02:45 PM:
 

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Im old fashioned but I run Dolby tone once a month to make sure my analog is working fine and the volume levels are close

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I don't see anything old fashioned about that at all. While a led-based scanner is more stable than one based on an exciter lamp, there's nothing that says that a problem might crop up 2 weeks after the tech leaves. Your maintenance habits might make the difference between 2 weeks (or less) of trouble... or maybe 6 months or more.

I keep a decent set of loops here, as well as an RTA & C/E tone generator card, dual trace scope & DTS test disk. While not etched in cement, I tend to do A chains about every month or so, & B chains a couple times a year... maybe more if something sounds out of balance. That seems about right for systems that revolve around a CP65. Maybe someday I'll get some fancy new processors that give you guys an excuse to pack around those nice new laptops
 

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Posted by John Hawkinson (Member # 1135) on 12-20-2003, 03:05 PM:
 
Scott, could you be seeing a lateral shift due to shrinkage? Maybe you should measure the shrinkage?

Jack, you ran a full A-chain monthly? Or you run Dolby tone monthly? The former seems like way overkill, and the latter probably about right.

--jhawk
 

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Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 12-20-2003, 03:59 PM:
 
The bottom line is digital surround sound for movie theaters has been a very good thing. The matter of systems dropping out has more to do with bad theater maintenance and not enough investment in the technical service end. Those are big problems in and of themselves, not something to hang blame on digital sound. I may be a "luddite" about things like bringing back the great ANALOG quality of 70mm. However, the movie going environment is much better with 5.1 digital sound on 35mm.

For one thing, even if 5/70 was a healthy and alive format (like it should be) there is no way in hell we would ever see an entire print inventory made up of 70mm prints. In the very best case scenario if 70mm were really popular I would not expect to see any more than 10% of an entire print inventory consisting of 70mm prints. What is every body else out there in the market supposed to live with? 35mm with Optical SR (if even that)? Baloney. That's one of the reasons why DTS gave Dolby Labs such a giant kick in the ass back in 1993 when it debuted on 800+ screens. Dolby had the attitude SR*D would only replace 70mm equipment in flagship theaters. DTS had the correct attitude that digital surround sound should be available to all.

As I said before, I really disagree with any comments one might make to blame companies selling digital sound processors for the technical problems happening in theaters. It is the theater management that is 100% to blame for that. Not Dolby. Not DTS. Not Sony. With any kind of digital equipment anywhere (not just theater stuff either) you have to maintain it. As is the problem with American culture, we have this stupid, cheap-ass attitude these days of just doing barely enough to get by.

Finally, I would not go back in time and "uninvent" these digital sound processes. If we did, there would be no 5.1 surround sound on DVD or on your computer or anywhere else except in the most expensively big theaters in the biggest cities. F**k that.
 

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Posted by Bruce Hansen (Member # 281) on 12-20-2003, 05:29 PM:
 
The problem is greed. It costs money to make things work correctly. Quality control at the labs is just "send it out, and see what comes back". They don't want to spend the money to check their prints properly. Theater techs are not seen as a profit center, they are seen as a loss. The tech manager needs to show that by hiring more techs, there will be fewer lost shows, fewer refunds, and in the long run money will be saved by hiring more techs. Techs need to be shown as making a profit for the company.
 

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Posted by Jack Ondracek (Member # 1466) on 12-20-2003, 05:36 PM:
 

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Jack, you ran a full A-chain monthly? Or you run Dolby tone monthly?

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Yep... my bad.
Tone... just to check on things. I put a lot of time into this place, but not quite that much!

________________________________

On the DTS problem (maybe should have started another thread):
It appears, if this is possible, that the RATING STRIP at the end was spliced pre-print. You can see where the splice was made, though the print is physically intact. The DTS forces itself to SR just after this point. The box shows timecode but no valid file.

Can it be possible that someone could splice in "extra" rating strip after the DTS encoding is done on the negative? It appears that the last half of the strip is serialized for some other audio.

Wierd!
 

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Posted by Rich Ferrando (Member # 2056) on 12-20-2003, 06:07 PM:
 
When I went to see "Brother Bear" I heard that lack of analog upkeep firsthand. The film reached a point near the end of the third reel where they obviously had a massive problem at a prior screening - platter scratches galore, and then that switch to analog sound. And the difference was frightening.

At our theater we still use analog a lot anyway. Since our matinee clientele are 99% over age 65, we tend to run films in our one digital house in SR for the first show on weekdays only (even though the two are approximately the same level, more seniors complain about the volume in digital than they do in analog). Of course, this depends on the film. With "The Station Agent," even the most critical ear is hard-pressed to find differences between the digital and analog soundtracks. But, with "Bubba Ho-Tep," I refused to use the analog track because the mix is too damn cool, and any old person who can't take it shouldn't be seeing that movie anyway.

Personally, I prefer digital over analog sound, but that's probably because I'm stupidly young, naive, and overly influenced by technology and metal boxes with blinking lights on them.

It'll be interesting to see if we get an increase in complaints once our other two houses get digital (the new DA-20's arrived on Thursday. Needless to say, when I arrived at work, I kissed them gently.)
 

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Posted by Aaron Garman (Member # 1653) on 12-20-2003, 06:55 PM:
 
That's really odd about ROTK popping back to SR because the two prints I built are doing the same thing! I'll have to check to see if the MPAA is spliced on because I don't remember it being that way. I just found it odd when I was in the theater after the film and heard the tail go through. As for what you said way earlier Darryl, we do have Jax lights. I was saddened again today when I walked into that theater and all I heard was "hummmmmmmm". It's been like this for over a year, and amazingly, one complaint. Even so, this complaint still hasn't gotten it fixed. I'm just so tired of it all!!

AJG
 

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Posted by Darryl Spicer (Member # 711) on 12-20-2003, 07:15 PM:
 

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As for what you said way earlier Darryl, we do have Jax lights. I was saddened again today when I walked into that theater and all I heard was "hummmmmmmm". It's been like this for over a year, and amazingly, one complaint. Even so, this complaint still hasn't gotten it fixed. I'm just so tired of it all!!

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That's really odd about ROTK popping back to SR because the two prints I built are doing the same thing!

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Digital sound for 35mm was, for all intents and purposes, the 'magic bullet' that KILLED the 5-perf 70mm format for theatres.

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While digital sound certainly played a role, there were MANY other factors, including but not limited to:
- the consolidation of theater chains
- the rise of real-estate values and the resulting difficulty in achieving profit
- the demise of first-run theaters and the associated first-run marketing concept (show the movie in a few large city theaters first, then roll out to the rest of the country.)
- multiplexes - with much smaller screens
- the emphasis on opening weekend and short runs
- the short film to cable/DVD windows.

And in any case, aside from the fact that relatively few theaters were able to play 70mm (and even fewer of those decently), from 1976 to 1994, there were only about 279 70mm releases (by my count), which averages less than 15 per year. The peak year was 1985 (32 films), a full five years before the advent of digital sound.

I haven't seen ROTK yet, but in my movie attending experience, only on a very few occasions have I ever heard digital drop back to analog and in those cases, it was always at a splice and lasted no more than a second or two. And this includes neighborhood theaters in the boroughs, not just at supposedly decent Manhattan theaters.

IMHO, digital sound has led to a far better overall movie-going experience at theaters because with optical analog, everything really had to be perfect to achieve a decent level of performance (clean, crisp sound with a perceptible high-end and decent separation). With digital, as long as the A-chain is working well enough to not drop out of digital, the sound is usually decent. I think we sometimes forget how decent, until the sound does drop back to analog and we're kind of shocked at the difference.

That's not to say that there isn't a lot of bad digital sound (the same few theaters that I would usually attend to see 35mm analog or 70mm mag are pretty much the same theaters I'll go to see digital sound films). And it's true that my best theater experiences were 70mm 6-tk mag. But even if we still didn't have digital sound for theaters, I still don't think that we'd be seeing much in the way of 70mm, although ROTK is probably one series of films that would have been released in 70mm.
 

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Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 12-21-2003, 02:46 PM:
 
Lord of the Rings actually sufferes from the lack of 70mm release...the grains are huge. I would imagine that with the extensive use of forced-perspective that filming in 65mm would have been a big challenge. However, it should have been available (as all other big films) in 70mm release prints.

Steve
 

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Posted by Aaron Garman (Member # 1653) on 12-21-2003, 05:48 PM:
 
If I ever get back in booth this week (I'm ushering all week) I'll check that out Jack. Darryl, the house the HUM is in is in Dolby Digital. I had a thread about it months ago. Try this link to get to the thread or just search for "subwoofer humming". I never could figure it out and our tech thinks nothing is wrong at all. In fact, their are only a few that think there is a problem yet fail to acknowledge it as "important". UGH!!!!!!

AJG
 

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Posted by Dominic Case (Member # 1830) on 12-21-2003, 11:42 PM:
 
OK, here's a word from the labs (yes I work in one AND I follow film-tech!).

It's not a question of the labs "rushing things" or getting greedy. It's a question of the time we are given to make prints. As you've probably noticed, releases are wider and wider these days, and with an increasing number of world-wide simultaneous releases. The labs are expanding their facilities as fast as they can be built, but we still only get literally a few days to complete orders of up to several thousand prints. To make it worse, there are often last-minute editorial or visual effects changes long after the film should have been locked off, so we are still waiting on a negative for one spool when complete copies should already be shipping.

That's why the theatres receive their prints so late (another pet theme on film-tech), and why QCing is so difficult. Reprinting copies simply means that the order will be shipped later still. Believe it or not, labs really are putting in more and more systems to try to prevent any errors or at least pick them up while there's still time.

That's where the move to cyan dye analogue tracks will be a big advantage, if the distributors ever follow through on it. One of the biggest time-losers and reasons for reprinting reels is faulty redevloper application on the analogue track. That will be eliminated when there's no need for redevelopment. Also, to bring it back to the original point of this thread, it will renew the need for theatres to instal the correct analogue system (red LED reader). This thread proves that the "we don't need to change the analogue system, we play digital" argument won't wash.

Finally, why are there frequently problems with digital sound, but rarely problems with picture, as someone asked? Simple - minor errors in picture (colour cast, slight slippage, dirt, or any number of projector misalignments) cause a slight deterioration. Lesser problems in digital systems correct themselves, giving a perfect result. However, equivalent problems cause catastrophic failure of the system. With digital, you can't be "a little bit off". It's either perfect or non-existent.
 

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Posted by Gordon McLeod (Member # 33) on 12-22-2003, 01:03 AM:
 
Having serviced many labs equipment and seen the scheduling nightmare I have often said more credit is do to them for delivering what they do at the relatively high quality they do.
That said if they were to have to slow down or have complete negatives to work with there would be few prints struck and many smaller markets would be denied a print for the opening week and I can already hear the hue and cry if that were to happen
I doubt in fact that the reject rate from the labs is any higher than any other industrial manufactureing process has
 

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Posted by Will Kutler (Member # 770) on 12-22-2003, 02:45 AM:
 
I was a projectionist for a major 20-plex first run cinema that utilized all three digital formats, at least one format per screen at any one time. Consequently, rarely were digital formats swapped between screens, rather prints were swapped on almost a daily basis.

While the digital formats can provide some awesome sound, this theatre would have been at a major loss w/o analog to back-up each screen!

More often than not, the notorius SDDS would skip in and out of digital. Occasionally, we would have SRD problems, and in many cases we would show "sneak previews" and special runs prior to the "official" release date and the needed DTS discs would not have been sent with the print!

What I found is this: if a print skips in and out of digital on a regular basis, then run the print in analog until the technical problem, whatever it may be, is resolved. If you have a properly maintained and aligned analog system, chances are the audience will not notice. As a projectionist, sometimes I would be forced to run a digital print in analog due to a technical problem. I would then make it my business to ask patrons comming out of the problem theatre at shows end for their opinion of sound quality, and rarely did they notice that the print was in analog! What they would notice, and subsequently complain to management about, is if a print would skip between digital and analog...which is always very noticeable!
 

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Posted by Manny Knowles (Member # 1171) on 12-22-2003, 11:21 AM:
 
Just curious if the Dolby CP650 error log keeps track of reversions to analog?
 

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Posted by Thomas Procyk (Member # 1170) on 12-22-2003, 12:15 PM:
 
Okay, my turn I guess...

In my opinion, it may not be the lab's fault or the theater's fault or the projectionists' fault all the time. Usually it's corporate's or management's.

I've worked at a few places where we would get a horrible reel or two in a print, first-run. Sometimes the SRD track was printed a few mm off of the sprockets, or there was a milky "rain" effect on the image. Any requests to management to arrange for a replacement reel was either ignored or denied because "we don't want any trouble with the studio" or "they'll think we did it and charge us." WTF?!?! We got the print TODAY! It would take us AT LEAST a week to reprint the SRD track incorrectly! Same would happen if we informed them we didn't get the DTS discs, or that they were damaged. So we would end up running prints that would drop out of digital, or be forced to play in analog. Luckily, all our analog systems were up to par at the time. And God forbid the projectionist call Technicolor themselves with the number conveniently printed on the film cans -- that got one of our projectionists a write-up!!!

Then you got these control freaks who MUST do the auditorium assignments and NO ONE can question their placement. Even if a DTS-only print is going into a Dolby house or vice-versa, that didn't matter because their decisions were based on "the flow of traffic into the lobby." Nevermind the two houses are across the hall from each other. Projectionists should have the final say in ALL auditorium assignments in my opinion. And ESPECIALLY none of this "auditorium assignments were decided by the blue-haired dick that sits behind oak desk in Ducktown, Mississippi and who's never been to our theater" crap.

As for digital sound killing 70mm, I don't think that was directly the case. The need for dual-inventory prints is what killed 70mm. Any multiplex theater running a 70mm print of something needed a 35mm "backup" for when the print moved to the smaller house. When digital sound came out, (at least, digital sound after CDS) it was seen as a way to eliminate the need for dual-inventory = less money spent.

When Regal was building the flagship I started my "theater career" at, I asked them if they were installing any 70mm setups for their huge screens. I was told that it was too much hassle, that with the current advances in 35 (whatever those advances may be) there was no need for it, and that it was a greater cost that wouldn't generate any more profit. Hell, we were the only game in town with stadium seating! We didn't need 70mm to bring the people in...

=TMP=
Happy Holidaze!
 

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Posted by Jack Ondracek (Member # 1466) on 12-22-2003, 12:52 PM:
 

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Projectionists should have the final say in ALL auditorium assignments in my opinion. And ESPECIALLY none of this "auditorium assignments were decided by the blue-haired dick that sits behind oak desk in Ducktown, Mississippi and who's never been to our theater" crap.

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As for digital sound killing 70mm, I don't think that was directly the case. The need for dual-inventory prints is what killed 70mm. Any multiplex theater running a 70mm print of something needed a 35mm "backup" for when the print moved to the smaller house. When digital sound came out, (at least, digital sound after CDS) it was seen as a way to eliminate the need for dual-inventory = less money spent.

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Projectionists should have the final say in ALL auditorium assignments in my opinion.

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You bring me such JOY!

(Falls off chair, laughing.)
 

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Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 12-22-2003, 04:02 PM:
 
Jack has a great attitude toward auditorium placement. I do understand Tom's frustration though. There really is nothing worse than having a top masking auditorium with SDDS and a side masking auditorium with SRD where both have identical quantity of seats and are both at the end of the hallway across from each other being booked where the non-SDDS scope film gets played in the SDDS house and the multi-format flat film gets played in the SRD house. Stupid, stupid, stupid!

Still the difference is based purely upon the quality of the manager vs. the projectionist. I've seen equal amounts of theaters where the projectionist doesn't have a clue as to the downstairs operation and would do a lousy job in placement vs. a clueless manager that doesn't want to spend any time on placing things where they should be for presentation as well as crowd control.

Of course during new construction no theater should ever be built with top masking and SRD should be the standard format in every house. (SRD is on every print, there are no discs to worry about not showing up with the print and people who shoot flat movies suck anyway...for they are throwing away roughly half of the resolution on 35mm film as well as a large chunk of the available light, also magnifying any registration errors.) That puts an end to such nonsense and makes the crowd control the only real issue when scheduling.
 

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Posted by Gordon McLeod (Member # 33) on 12-22-2003, 04:52 PM:
 
No brad the only scheduling issue is providing sufficient tie in points to the soundsystem for high quality audio on the bootlegs
 

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Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 12-22-2003, 05:08 PM:
 
You mean all theaters don't have that already pre-wired up and ready to go???
 

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Posted by Gordon McLeod (Member # 33) on 12-22-2003, 07:02 PM:
 
No that is why in you photo it shows you making the connection

 

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Posted by Bruce Hansen (Member # 281) on 12-23-2003, 11:29 AM:
 
The picture does get printed out of place at times. I had a print where the picture was printed out of place, and the frame lines (clear film on the negative) were printed into the DTS time code, darking parts of the DTS bits, makeing them unreadable. This was about the same time as the DTS problems with Bruce Almighty, and Seabiscuit. I did not get to look at prints for the other two films, but it would be my guess that these film had the same problem. How can so mush badly printed film get past the labs? They just don't care, and don't even bother to just LOOK at what is comeing out of the printer, otherwise they would have seen this problem, it was not that hard to see. As I said before, it is greed, the route of all evil. Well that's my rant for today.
 

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Posted by Gordon McLeod (Member # 33) on 12-23-2003, 12:08 PM:
 
Bruce said"They just don't care, and don't even bother to just LOOK at what is comeing out of the printer, otherwise they would have seen this problem, it was not that hard to see. As I said before, it is greed, the route of all evil. Well that's my rant for today."
As the film leaves the processor it passes a viewing box that at high speed shows the image so if anything was seriously wrong then it would get caught and most labs will pull random reels for extra QC
Remember the labs do what they are told so get off there backs they usually get the printing negative on a monday with a requirement to have in the theatres by thursday 2000+ prints
And if that couldn't be done then most smaller markets just wood not get a print at all and have to wait for one after the opening break
 

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Posted by John Pytlak (Member # 331) on 12-23-2003, 12:46 PM:
 
Gordon is correct. Most print film processing machines have a prismatic or video projection device at the end of the dryer that allows the machine operator to view the picture and soundtrack area of all the prints being processed, looking for obvious defects. A percentage of reels are also inspected off-line by actual projection or on inspection devices similar to an editing table with a viewer and analog sound playback device. Digital sound QC is done for each of the digital tracks using statistical sampling methods. With many thousands of prints now typical of a large release, the labs cannot inspect each and every reel in real time. The percentage of replacement reels requested is usually quite low, and the cost of replacing defective reels is incentive for labs to "Do Film Right" the first time.
 

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Posted by Bruce Hansen (Member # 281) on 12-23-2003, 05:17 PM:
 
With all due respect, I don't want excuses, I want it done right the first time; and I don't understand why some people think sloppy work is OK, and should just be exceped. If the labs are putting out defective product, it is time for changes. Slow down the printer, or do some REAL QC. If there is so much defective product comeing out of the labs, then the QC they are now doing is not working! As for studios sending reels late, give them a deadline, after which they will not make their release date. Let's face it, the studios will keep playing around untill they hit some sort of a deadline, just give them a real deadline.
 

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Posted by Gordon McLeod (Member # 33) on 12-23-2003, 05:26 PM:
 
Well Bruce you appear to be a very pigheaded unrealistic person
If you want to bash the labs go ahead and maybe they will just ignore you. If you do the math a film like LOTR3 is 10 reels and probably 2500 prints struck at one lab that is 25000 reels of film printed in several days In most industrial manufactureing a defect rate per industry is the norm well I don't think I have heard of 100 bad LOTR3 reels so that would make it far less than 1%
This is a business the studio if was told sorry you didn't meet our deadline would just go to lab y instead. The economic fact whether you can grasp it or not is maybe monday probably tuesday the last of the bits will start printing and thursday night your theatre expects a print to show

The alternate would be fewer prints as none of the studios would tolerate a delayed opening so it would be the return to the old days where select theatres open a title on break and it goes wide a few weeks later (probably wasn't a bad way of doing it anyway)
 

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Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 12-23-2003, 05:54 PM:
 
Gord,
Man, Please try to be more diplomatic in these threads . You're not mormally this way... no reason to jump on the guy. Defective reels have also created far away service calls I've had to go on more than once!! I look at it as a money maker for us though.

Wouldn't it be nice if the whole world could just slow down a notch or two....Since the high speed world we live in creates the gravity that holds us all down I sometimes think if that actually happened gravity would no longer hold us in place.... One good thing is that processing machines would be going slow enough for the inspectors to check every reel if they didn't float away!!
Mark
 

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Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 12-23-2003, 06:28 PM:
 
Yes, and then everyone and their dog wouldn't HAVE TO see the movie on the opening weekend and we could make some money in weeks 2, 3, 4, 5, etc.
 

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Posted by Gordon McLeod (Member # 33) on 12-23-2003, 08:08 PM:
 
Diplomacy is not always one of my better traits but nothing burns my but more than when a reason is explained to someone they continue to tiraid saying that isn't good enough I gues one thing he hasn't understood is it would be easier to get someone else to run the prints that maybe didn't feel the world entitled him to an always perfect print than re do the current post production process

The number of theatres that would have to close would be astranomical if wide breaks could not be provided for. None of the bankers financing a film would accept waiting another week to supply a wide release considering that in relality on a few markets represent a signifigant portion of a films return
 

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Posted by Steve Kraus (Member # 476) on 12-23-2003, 11:04 PM:
 
In the case of LOTR that was locked at least by Nov. 25 if not much earlier.
 

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Posted by John Pytlak (Member # 331) on 12-24-2003, 07:16 AM:
 

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In the case of LOTR that was locked at least by Nov. 25 if not much earlier.

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In any case, setting those priorities and making a screen placement decision is not something I would hand over to the projectionist.

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