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I'm trying to think of something technical to ask.....meanwhile, do you have any good stories about working on Altered States, or 1978 Lord of the Rings?

Thx!
 
What kind of reverb do you use? I programed one on my Eventide that took a whole processor but it as close to analog that I ever heard. Lush, smooth, real...
I typically either use my DAWs built in multichannel reverb or use Valhalla Reverb and put a seperate instance on each channel and modify delays/wetness levels on each.
 
Haha! I guess I was asking about any specific sound challenges you had to resolve?
I came up with an idea for the sound in the trip scenes reading the script. I wanted thing to spin around the room but I had only mono surrounds. I did have a Pet computer and wrote software the was able to spin and do other movement effects.

I put a speaker and a stereo mic in my pool to record the the bubbles for the opening scene. I had the mics hung from a lawn chair hinging over the edge. One had twisted so I crawled out on the lawnchair. Past the center of gravity. Yes I had my wallet in my pocket :)
 
Hilarious!!

How is your H series upmix setup configured? Do you feed it stereo source material, or just 5.1? And if so, does it work with matrix surround encoded stereo?

Also can we get your C-3PO voice story? Did you use a vocoder?

Thx again!
 
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Upmix - my family room is configured as 9.1.4. It all runs through the Eventides and Pro Tools.

I have created different sessions and presets each are optimized for music and film.

C3PO - Old Hollywood sound wanted Dolby to go away. As I represented Dolby many of the old time mixers were not very nice. (There were some really incredible ones that made Dolby happen in Hollywood we can talk about later.)

On the first day of dialog pre-mixing Star Wars, this one mixer said to me, "I know who you are. Go sit on that couch and I don't want to hear a word from you!"

A big mistake from him as you shouldn't talk that way to a New Yorker :)

The first dialog in the film was C3PO.

George gave, as always, brilliant direction. "C3PO is an older model droid, been through a lot. Not in the best of shape.

So the mixer who banished me went to work, using very old style Hollywood techniques, which were, filters, filters, filters, and for good measure lots of peak EQs.

What they came up with was frankly offensive to the ears, it hurt, and certainly was not going to help establish what Dolby could do for films.

At the end of the day the mixers had all left to clock out.

I walked up to George, figuring I had nothing to lose, I said, "Is C3PO supposed to be a lovable character?" He nodded, Yes." I continued, "The sound these mixers came up for C3PO's voice will drive people out of the theater in the first reel." George glared at me.

The next day when George came in, the head mixer asked if they should keep working on C3PO's voice. They had already spent a whole day on it. George answered that they better move on and he will deal with it later.

I spent that day in isolation on my couch thinking of how I would process C3PO... to be continued...s
 
I would ask if he has any tales to share about creating the second Blood, Sweat, and Tears album, one of my favorites.

Just kidding. Welcome, Steve! And thank you for sharing your expertise and experiences.
 
I came up with an idea for the sound in the trip scenes reading the script. I wanted thing to spin around the room but I had only mono surrounds. I did have a Pet computer and wrote software the was able to spin and do other movement effects.

I put a speaker and a stereo mic in my pool to record the the bubbles for the opening scene. I had the mics hung from a lawn chair hinging over the edge. One had twisted so I crawled out on the lawnchair. Past the center of gravity. Yes I had my wallet in my pocket :)

What is it about mono surrounds that keeps sounds from spinning around the room? I did it in 1989 with a 4-bus mixer, my insert encoder for back encodng, and a Dolby Surround amplifier. I could pan any sound to any direction and hear it in that direction.
 
What is it about mono surrounds that keeps sounds from spinning around the room? I did it in 1989 with a 4-bus mixer, my insert encoder for back encodng, and a Dolby Surround amplifier. I could pan any sound to any direction and hear it in that direction.

I built a 4-channel digitally controlled panner. On my, would you believe, Commodore Pet computer, I wrote a program that would pan across the front 3-speakers but when it got to the surround the front (say right) would stay on. The I kept the surround on and panned across the front going back to the left speaker. Believe it or not it worked and I was able to spin effects and music around the room.
 
Really enjoying the stories. I'm just listening in 7.1 and using the AVR upmixing, but cool to hear how the tech developed and how we got the soundtracks to these movies.

I haven't heard the ATMOS mix of Star Wars, but I wonder if they use more of the "baby boom" than the .1 track did previously.
 
I built my own upmixer to 9.1.4 and listen through it. I also augment and/or create my own .1 channel.

I don't know if they used the Goldwyn 4-track master or the Todd 6-Track 70mm print master for the 5.1 DVDs.

There was no Baby Boom on the 4-track and I derived it from the front channels of the 4-trk when we made the print 70mm master.
 
I built my own upmixer to 9.1.4 and listen through it. I also augment and/or create my own .1 channel.

I don't know if they used the Goldwyn 4-track master or the Todd 6-Track 70mm print master for the 5.1 DVDs.

There was no Baby Boom on the 4-track and I derived it from the front channels of the 4-trk when we made the print 70mm master.

From what I remember they used the 6-track 70mm print masters for the 1997 Special Edition re-releases of the 3 films, digitally remastered. A couple of things were changed for Episode IV (lines of dialogues, some sound effects...)
For the 2004 DVDs they made entirely new mixes with stereo surrounds for 6.1 (I think this was the last time Ben Burt worked on these films, sadly). The stereo on the surrounds was actually accidentally reversed for Ep.4.
This was corrected for the 2011 Blu-Ray reissue along with a new remix, again, for Ep.4...

Then all films in the saga were remixed in Atmos for the latest 4K and Blu-Ray reissue.
 
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From what I remember they used the 6-track 70mm print masters for the 1997 Special Edition re-releases of the 3 films, digitally remastered. A couple of things were changed for Episode IV (lines of dialogues, some sound effects...)
For the 2004 DVDs they made entirely new mixes with stereo surrounds for 6.1 . The stereo on the surrounds was actually accidentally reversed for Ep.4. (I think this was the last time Ben Burt workd on these mixes.) This was corrected for the 2011 Blu-Ray reissue along with a new remix, again, for Ep.4...

Then all films in the saga were remixed in Atmos for the latest 4K and Blu-Ray reissue.
I have the original version of the original film. For me it is about memories...s

PS do you know what they used to create the Stereo Surround for the DVD?

Did they take the Baby Boom off of the 6-Track? There was a lot on there and I rode the fader while making the print master so it has dynamics.

I don't know anything about any of the subsequent versions or films...s
 
I have the original version of the original film. For me it is about memories...s

PS do you know what they used to create the Stereo Surround for the DVD?

Did they take the Baby Boom off of the 6-Track? There was a lot on there and I rode the fader while making the print master so it has dynamics.

No idea how they did it in 1997, I can only speculate. :)
 
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