Showmen's Trade Review (Jan-Mar 1941)

January 4, 1941 SHOWMEN'S TRADE REVIEW Page 25 To Standardize New Type Sound Recording pLANS for the complete revolution of theatre sound equipment, somewhat along the lines of the "Fantasia" sound installation described in these pages last month, are rapidly maturing in Hollywood. Recording will be different, and will enable every theatre properly equipped to reproduce to a greater or less degree the new realism and special effects used in "Fantasia." It is not expected that the full facilities of that system will be installed in every theatre, at any rate for the present. The plans under consideration also envision a modified recording technique that will permit the new films to be played on present-day apparatus to produce today's quality of sound. Transferred to another theatre, which is fitted with the new equipment, the identical print will produce the new, superior sound. Sensational Advance in Quality The basic superiority of the new reproduction, as it is heard by the audience, includes first of all greater volume range, more nearly approaching the dramatic differences of volume heard in nature. Also, and equally impressive to the audience, the new sound will come from more than one point behind the screen, and its audible source will shift with the action. These advantages combined impart a new liveliness and dramatic effect, unforgettable when heard, almost impossible to describe. Some readers will remember the flat, insipid, flavorless taste of their first drink of ordinary water after an hour or so of swimming in salt water. That is the impression ordinary sound creates after one has heard the new sound. The developments now under consideration have relatively little to do with the accomplishment of the new results. That problem has been solved. The difficulty now is two-fold : (a) to get those results, or a fair approximation of them, at the lowest possible cost to the theatre and a minimum cluttering of the projection room with additional apparatus ; (b) the adoption of recording method which will not require a special sound film (as in "Fantasia") and will not prevent the same film being played on ordinary equipment. Hollywood Experts Weigh Systems The benefits and disadvantages of three new techniques are now being weighed by Hollywood experts, and an announcement of standardization on one or the other is expected in the near future. The elaborate "Fantasound" system described in last month's issue is one of those three, and some of its features will doubtless be retained, but the entire system will not. Readers will recall that it utilized four soundtracks recorded on a second 35 mm. film which was played synchronously through a special soundhead located on a different pedestal. This feature will probably be abandoned, except perhaps for special roadshows. The use of more than one set of amplifiers will be retained, and is necessary. The same is true of an increase in the number of loudspeaker assemblies used behind the screen. One of the proposed systems calls for two sets of amplifiers and two sets of loud speakers ; another, which gives more complete results, is based on the principle of three amplifier and speaker sets, serving the right, center and left of the screen area respectively. Loudspeakers to be placed in the body of the theatre can be added to any Success of "Fantasia" Spurs Adoption of New System, Plan Is to Use Method Best Suited To ExistingTheatre Equipment of these systems, and switched into service by the projectionist according to cue. From the point of view of the showman, this means that the theatre, now equipped with one amplifier system and one backscreen speaker system, will have to buy double or triple that equipment. Houses which now have a fullpower emergency amplifier will be able to use it as part of the new facilities, and can reduce their expenditure accordingly. Slight Modifications to Equipment In addition, the soundhead must be modified to enable it to respond to the new control tracks, but will not need to be replaced ; and a small amplifier-control panel must be added. The new recording will be based on either one or two soundtracks identical with the present tracks, and identically located on the film. (Where two soundtracks are used, each will be of half the width of the present record.) There will be a special control track located right in the line of the sprocket holes. In one of the new systems, the sprocket holes themselves constitute a part of the control record, since light shining through them onto a photo-cell produces a 96-cycle signal, and the control record merely changes the space between sprocket holes from opaque to transparent as required. The 96 cycle signal is strongest when the region between the holes is opaque and weakest when that region is transparent. Picked up by a separate photo-cell installed in the modified head, this signal is amplified, rectified, and used to control the performance of the two amplifiers. In the alternative system, which utilizes two half-width soundtracks and three amplifying and speaker channels, the control track consists of three separate, pure frequencies recorded in the soundtrack area, and operating on the same principles as the special control track in the "Fantasound" system. Overcomes Previous Limitations The function of the control tracks, in all these systems, is two-fold. First, by automatically varying the amplification of the sound supplied to the different sets of stage speakers, the speakers located behind one part of the screen are silenced, while others in a different place operate at increased volume, thus causing the sound to originate in different locations and to shift to and fro with the action. The second function is even more important, but a little more difficult to understand. Theatre sound hitherto has never faithfully duplicated the extremes of volume that are heard in nature, and much dramatic intensity has had to be sacrificed. The difficulty lay in the soundtrack, which could record only a limited difference of volume. This limitation of the soundtrack is not removed by the new techniques, but it is compensated for. The control track, by actuating a type of automatic volume control in the projection room amplifiers, makes possible any degree of variation in loudness that may be desired, including variations that exceed those of nature. The effect of this improvement cannot be described in print. It must be heard. Equipment Ready for the New Sound Tracks Equipment to provide the necessary technical facilities for utilizing the full sound values of the new recording which gives "dimensional" effect, will be available for theatres generally when the improved sound tracks come into use at the Hollywood studios. The necessary reproducing equipment is, as outlined in the article on this page, more a complement to the apparatus now commonly in use at theatres rather than anything new or different. Leading manufacturers of sound equipment are working on the new development and it is known that the necessary steps to supply demand not alone for equipment but the exact servicing of the new sound have been taken, international Projector Corp. is ready with the equipment and the technic for adapting Simplex 4-Star systems now installed and to supply new installations completely equipped for the new sound. RCA announced some time ago its new "Panoramic Sound." Both of these companies await only the establishment of film standards by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which action must precede general release of the new equipment. Thus, theatremen will face no serious problems in adapting their equipment to take advantage of the finer quality of sound. Many industry observers feel that while the greatest care must be taken to reach standards that will work out best for the industry as a whole, and particularly the adoption of methods which will permit showing the pictures with the new recording on existing as well as improved equipment, there is good reason to have the industry take advantage of the advances made in sound technic as quickly as possible. The general public is becoming accustomed to greatly improved sound from radio receivers, and this condition is expected to widen appreciably during 1941, because radio engineers and sales heads are predicting a greatly accelerated sale of FM receivers and extension of the new type of broadcasting known as "staticless" and generally hailed as a decided improvement in broadcast reception. Also, radio receivers equipped with dual loudspeakers in models selling in the popular-price range may be expected to make the public more critical of sound quality — a field in which the pictures consistently have proved superior to radio in both speech and music.