Technicolor Film Services

MINUTES OF A MEETING TO DISCUSS THE INTRODUCTION OF CYAN DYE ANALOGUE SOUNDTRACKS 23 March 2001

Present:
Dave Rogers, Technicolor (Chair)
Graham Edmondson, Dolby
Andrew Wales, Technicolor (Minutes)
Bob Quinn, Fuji
Terry Lown, Agfa
Clive Ogden, Kodak
Max Bell, B.T.S.
Steve O'Pray, Pathè
Ray Perry, B.V.I.
Paul Collard, Soho Images
Angela Garton, C.S.A.
Steve Southgate, Warner Bros.
Dave Allen, Deluxe

1. Report from ShoWest
   Graham Edmondson reported from the American Dye Tracks Committee meeting he attended at the ShoWest conference. It is estimated that there are around 85 percent of North American theatres converted to red light readers. Graham took a copy of Red Alert, which he showed, to interested parties. Although the feedback was positive about the film, it was felt that some of the dialogue was not suited to the American audience and that the large number of theatres would result in only a certain number of projectionists being able to see the film.
2. High Magenta
   There still appear to be problems persuading some of the distributors to convert to high-magenta soundtracks. Following an exhaustive series of tests between Technicolor and BVI, Ray Perry reported that Disney in the US was still not convinced about high-magenta and that no conversion date had yet been set. There are still some issues regarding the high-magenta performance of Éclair and LTC in Paris. Since the meeting Andrew Wales has been in touch with Éclair and is awaiting feedback from their technical department. Current distributors printing high-magenta include Warner Bros., Fox, Miramax (Bridget Jones Diary), and some independent distributors. There are ongoing discussions with Carlton Screen Advertising. There are no sign of Columbia switching and Pathè are still using normal tracks. Angela Garton indicated that CSA would be willing to include a short questionnaire with their correspondences to establish the current UK cinema inventory. A copy of a suggested questionnaire is supplied with these minutes.
3. Sound Negative Can Labelling
   A copy of a document written by Jean Burtin of Agfa regarding the standardisation of optical soundtrack can labels was circulated. At the moment, each transfer house and laboratory has its own method of identifying normal and high-magenta optimised soundtrack negatives. The possible examples Jean had designed were felt to be a step in the right direction but each facility would prefer to have their own logo, contact information etc. on the label. Terry Lown to supply a copy of Jean's document to all attendee's for further consultation.
4. Red Alert
   Following the completion of Red Alert, a discussion was held on the requirements for distribution. Before any prints can be sent out, a letter must be sent to each of the chief engineers of each cinema chain. Graham Edmondson circulated a draft of a document that included a section on loudness of commercials. For clarity, it may be better to split up the two subjects and circulate individual notes for each topic. A revised copy is attached with these minutes. Once the preliminary information had been circulated, the process of distributing the prints can begin. The NSS has been approached by to organise the circulation. Once the number of prints required has been decided, although Technicolor will do the printing and processing, each print requires a pos splice. This can become a time consuming process and options should be sought on how to do the splices in the easiest (cheapest) way possible. Steve O'Pray offered to approach David DeWilde of FMS. It may also be possible to split the large order into batches of a few hundred thereby minimising the amount of work required by each party at any one time. On the 3rd May, the BKSTS is holding a dye track information evening that will include a screening of Red Alert. The evening is being held at BVI headquarters in Hammersmith.
5. Variable Density Soundtrack Tests
   Following a show of Red Alert, Andrew Wales presented some examples of variable density analogue tracks printed normally, with high magenta, and cyan dye. For each track type there were three examples at slightly different densities. The subject matter was Moulin Rouge dating from the early 50s and the tests were played using a red light reader. As expected the normal tracks sounded particularly poor, with very quiet, distorted, and spitty sound. There was also quite a difference between the three tests even though the difference in density was only approx. 0.15 between the three tests. The high-magenta prints showed a distinct improvement in sound quality and a reduction in variability in the three levels. The cyan dye example sounded better than the normal track but not quite good as the high-magenta but could have been printed slightly heavier to improve the reproduction slightly.