Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Which audio format were most 70mm trailers and snipes recorded?

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Posted by Sean Weitzel (Member # 244) on 12-08-2008, 12:30 PM:

I have a couple of 70mm trailers form the 80's as well as a Pacific theaters snipe and a Los Angeles times snipe (spliced together). Which Dolby audio format would most likely correctly reproduce these? I'm guessing they are probably format 42? or was format 43 more widespread?

Posted by Gordon McLeod (Member # 33) on 12-08-2008, 03:20 PM:

42 was the common format

Posted by System Notices (Member # 2357) on 03-25-2015, 02:29 PM:

It has been 2297 days since the last post.

Posted by Sean Weitzel (Member # 244) on 03-25-2015, 02:29 PM:

Were most 70mm trailers mixed in stereo or were there mono trailers in 70? Would a 35mm trailer that was exclusively mono be remixed for the 70mm?

Posted by Stephan Shelley (Member # 8587) on 03-25-2015, 04:55 PM:

I have some split surround 70mm mag trailers. Fantaisa is one of them from early 90s release.

Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 03-26-2015, 06:31 AM:

Post Dolby era? Format 42 was more than just a common format...we are in the 99% range here. Yes, you can pull up the odd SR or 43 or whatever format but they would be one-offs. Note, 43 is 100% backwards compatible to 42 so it was a safe format to use. I could believe that SR would have been used on trailers post Lawrence of Arabia restoration as that is the pivotal issue when SR seemed to take hold on 70mm magnetic. But are talking at being at the tail end of magnetic's run on 70mm. Hoffa was the last big release I recall in 70mm magnetic and I recall it being SR and format 43 (definitely format 43...the "slate" even said it as "split surround.")

I would believe that people making the trailers in the day would have used the format for the movies in current release since that is where the trailers are going to be used.

Posted by Michael Coate (Member # 757) on 03-26-2015, 01:52 PM:

I'm not sure this answers Sean's question or not, but during the 1980s, when 70mm was used the most, I recall seeing countless 70mm trailers that I thought sounded spectacular, whereas, in my experience, most 35mm trailers during that era were mono. Many of those 70mm trailers were promoting movies that ultimately were released only in 35mm-mono. "Full "Metal Jacket" (which I saw with a 70mm presentation of "Lethal Weapon") and "Summer School" (seen with "The Untouchables") come to mind.

It would be interesting to seek out some 70mm trailers, such as those I just cited, and run them to confirm if they in fact had any stereo spread. It's plausible they were mono just like their 35mm counterparts (i.e. sound recorded only on mag track #3, the center channel) and what I recall may have been just the improvement in fidelity due to them being magnetic.

Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 03-26-2015, 05:18 PM:

They definitely were NOT mono...not that you couldn't find a case in point...but the vast majority had at least 3 or 4 channels going with something.

Posted by Paul Gordon (Member # 3320) on 03-26-2015, 08:38 PM:

I have a 70mm trailer of the Fly and Frantic. I'll give them a play and see how they sound in format 42.

Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 03-26-2015, 11:30 PM:

One of my favorite 70mm movie trailers was the first teaser for Total Recall. It had a really good screen to back fly-by surround effect. But I can't remember for sure whether it was mixed only in Format 42 or had a Format 43 mix. It really sucks that the teaser trailer and its discrete surround mix has never been properly duplicated on any home video format.

Posted by Michael Coate (Member # 757) on 03-27-2015, 01:36 AM:

quote: Paul Gordon
I have a 70mm trailer of the Fly and Frantic. I'll give them a play and see how they sound in format 42.

Those titles were attached to "Aliens" and "Empire of the Sun," respectively, and I'll bet they were in the same sound format as the feature they were sent out with, which was 42, I believe, for both of them. The question for Sean seems to be whether these things were 42 or 43; my question is more about whether there's any perceptible stereo spread.

The best-sounding 70mm trailer I can recall, by the way, would have to be the first "Top Gun" trailer, which I saw with "Young Sherlock Holmes" at the National in Westwood Village. Definitely not mono!

Posted by Jesse Skeen (Member # 586) on 03-29-2015, 09:11 PM:

Sort of on the same topic yet maybe not- for a while in the 90s, 35mm Scope trailers from Fox and Buena Vista were in stereo, while the same trailers in Flat format were mono. Anyone know the reason for that? (Also remember for a while, Buena Vista had their scope trailers for flat movies presented properly at 1.85, but later they were cropped a bit on the top and bottom, still with black side bars but not as big as they were before.)

For a while after that, they started doing ALL trailers in mono until they decided to do every trailer with all digital sound formats (and there were a handful of analog-only SR stereo trailers prior to that.)

Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 03-30-2015, 06:10 AM:

Michael..."attached" trailers in 70mm were VERY VERY rare (I can't remember any 70mm titles where a trailer was physically printed on the head of R-1 of the 70mm print...not saying it didn't happen but I don't recall any). Now we did receive some trailers in the cans with the 70mm print but that would mean that the sound format may NOT follow the feature format.

Posted by Bill Gabel (Member # 1105) on 03-30-2015, 03:51 PM:

The 70mm trailers that we ran in Westwood and in Hollywood and the rest of the Los Angeles market were added by the projectionist. So the 70mm print of title X playing the Mann's National Theatre and the same film at Pacific's Roxy in Glendale would be playing different trailers on the head. The trailers most of the time came loose from the theatre chains booking office or district office. I worked for Mann, Pacific, GCC, Cineplex and Edwards and that's how we got our 70mm trailers 95 percent of the time. The other 5 percent direct from the studio.

Posted by Michael Coate (Member # 757) on 04-08-2015, 02:08 AM:

Just a few months ago the American Cinematheque here in L.A. screened a 70mm print of "The Untouchables" and, sure enough, a trailer for "Fatal Attraction" was still intact on the print...and they ran the trailer ahead of the feature just for kicks even though they weren't scheduled to screen "Fatal Attraction" (and because they wanted to be able to return the print in same condition as received). "Aliens" is another one I've seen in 70mm since its original release, and the trailer for "The Fly" was still attached to the print. (I might be mistaken about "Frantic" being attached to "Empire of the Sun," though.) If a splice could've been detected at the transition of the trailer and the feature, I'd back off on my belief that at least some 70mm prints had an attached trailer.

Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 04-08-2015, 05:40 AM:

Are you telling me that there was NO splice at the transition or that you couldn't detect one from the theatre vantage point? The leader would also normally indicate if a trailer was printed on reel 1 too.

Note, even if a preview came attached, we would have still spliced in a policy snipe between the previews and the feature...no exceptions.