When did dual inventory (Mono/Dolby A Stereo) prints cease to be a thing.

[Marcel Birgelen]

What prompted me to chime in to this discussion was the fact no one had mentioned “Dragonslayer.” And now you’re acting as if you knew all along about “Dragonslayer” and the correct timeline. Sigh... And I call bullshit on the “Raiders” in Vistasonic claim. I think we deserve a better source than some anonymous internet posting.

Yes, I knew about it, because the information is out there... partly due to the information YOU posted on-line yourself... and hey, it's right in there, in that same anonymous post you're lamenting about. And yes, like I mentioned myself, the original source has long since gone, or at least I'm not able to find it. Still, the information in that very post is highly specific, which is at least a sign the poster knew a thing or two about the subject, which lends it some credibility in itself.

But if you can actually elaborate why you think it's b.s. and add a bit into the reconstruction of the history of this very particular sound system, then feel free to do so. But please, keep your personal attacks at bay, because... why?

[Michael Coate]

Yes, there were just two releases in Vistasonic: Popeye as the debut of the format and it was also used for a 35mm release of Dragonslayer. But it was apparently envisioned to be used for Raiders too

What prompted me to chime in to this discussion was the fact no one had mentioned “Dragonslayer.” And now you’re acting as if you knew all along about “Dragonslayer” and the correct timeline. Sigh... And I call bullshit on the “Raiders” in Vistasonic claim. I think we deserve a better source than some anonymous internet posting.

[Marcel Birgelen]

I was inspecting some films today for an upcoming event. These sound track
markings are on the head & tail leaders of a vintage 1992 print of "Sister Act" .
(So, based on this and the simple "Dolby Stereo" logo in the end credit roll,
I guess I'm safe in assuming this print is not SR)
Really nice print too- - never plattered. (That explains it! )

I've found those logos in the end credit roll to be pretty misleading. Dolby A prints were a pretty common up to the mid 90s, even though there might be a "Spectral recordinG" logo present in the credits, at least around here. I suspect a lot of houses only upgraded to "SR" when SRD came along...

[Brad Miller]

If it doesn't explicitly state SR, then it is A.

Platters don't damage prints. Idiot projectionist damage prints regardless of the method of film transport.

[Jim Cassedy]

I was inspecting some films today for an upcoming event. These sound track
markings are on the head & tail leaders of a vintage 1992 print of "Sister Act" .
(So, based on this and the simple "Dolby Stereo" logo in the end credit roll,
I guess I'm safe in assuming this print is not SR)
SisterAct_1-R2.jpg

SisterAct_R2YCM.jpg

Really nice print too- - never plattered. (That explains it! )

[Sam Chavez]

You could write digital info the dye, cause it to fluoresce and read it back with a scanner. Did not get much further than that.

[Marcel Birgelen]

Thanks for sharing the image, it's a little hard to see, but yeah, it looks like 6 tracks.

Sorry, just out of curiosity, what would fluorescent dyes have done? Some attempt at noise reduction?

[Sam Chavez]

There was no shortage of ideas. One was to put fluorescent dyes on the base side of the film. Back to the mundane for a moment. Here is what Cat. No. 566 looks like. I count 6 tracks out of 8 possible.

[Marcel Birgelen]

two different patents one ws a bilateral track with noise reduction one being french the other english the second system had a camera and a laser to scan the track

Both somehow feel horrible... but not horrible enough...

Imagine the following concoction that just came to mind after you mentioned lasers:
With a really tightly focused laser, you could, maybe, read a very narrow VD track, embedded in the core of the VA track, this being the "alternative version", then you could even compensate the VA track in relation to the VD track. Recording such a mess to film would be quite the challenge too.

[Gordon McLeod]

two different patents one ws a bilateral track with noise reduction one being french the other english the second system had a camera and a laser to scan the track

[Marcel Birgelen]

In that era there was the proposal by the national film board of canada to use a ccd camera to read multiple optical tracks that just the outer edge of the modulation was recorded with a UV dye superimpossed over a regular VA track. Also at that time they with RCA was propossing the dual language print

So, the idea was to superimpose or maybe even modulate a "different language" version on top of the original bi-lateral variable area track, but color it in dye that would only be transparent for UV light? I wonder how you would construct such a film with the recording technology available at that moment.

[Marcel Birgelen]

Paramount abandoned Vistasonic after using it on “Dragonslayer,” which was released two weeks after “Raiders.”

https://www.in70mm.com/library/engag...ayer/index.htm

Yes, there were just two releases in Vistasonic: Popeye as the debut of the format and it was also used for a 35mm release of Dragonslayer. But it was apparently envisioned to be used for Raiders too:

"Raiders sound was mixed to be played in the VistaSonic Sound system that Paramount had previously used on Popeye and Dragonslayer. Unlike Dolby Stereo that used a matrix to encode 4 channels to 2 optical tracks, VistaSonic used 4 discrete optical tracks in the place of the normal 2. Since they were much smaller tracks, they were noisier, so a noise reduction system was used to improve fidelity. Stereo surrounds could also be employed by use of the SQ Quadraphonic matrix system - the stereo surrounds were encoded onto the Left and Right front channels with SQ - the discrete mono surround track then wasn't used. The playback head used a CCD based reader instead of a photodetector to keep the tracks and their phase response aligned better. The system was invented by Terry Beard who is also the inventor of the theatrical DTS system - while he owned NuOptix, a company that built much of the equipment used to record optical soundtracks, he also worked for Paramount's sound department as a technician in charge of research. There were many problems with VistaSonic during the Popeye and Dragonslayer showings (it had to be turned off during Popeye's premiere at the Chineese theater), so Raiders was switched to Dolby Stereo at the last minute - some minor remixing had to be done to accommodate the limitations of the Dolby logic decoding. The 70mm prints used the 4-track discrete VistaSonic mix unaltered except for the addition of Baby Boom subs. The DVD's 5.1 mix is the original VistaSonic mix so it's slightly different than the Dolby Stereo mix used on LaserDisc. The VistaSonic system was never used again - it had a nice logo though."

This is a quote from this forum. Unfortunately, the link to the original forum post doesn't point to the actual, original post and I've been too lazy to look it up, so it's unclear who came up with this information, but despite the unverifyability, he/she seems to be informed.

The information above also indicates that a rather aggressive noise reduction system has been used, which could've been dbx, which was far more "aggressive" than Dolby A.

I'm wondering however, how you could possibly turn it off mid show? Maybe if you're running changeovers, you could switch-over to a version with normal optical soundtracks or do you just switch over to analog sound, pretend it's mono and hope for the best? Especially with the aggressive noise cancelling being used, that must have sounded beyond awful.

[Gordon McLeod]

I vaguely also remember Kintek being involved in a system called Colortek

[Steve Guttag]

That film sound correct.

[Sam Chavez]

Thanks Mike,

I recall that the film in question at Regency 11 was in fact Dragonslayer. Last gasp of this format I believe.