Yeah, I think it's safe to say that most of the 1950s mags are shedding pretty badly these days, unless they were stored in absolutely perfect conditions (low temp, low humidity, etc.). The mag track I worked on was for 20th Century-Fox's Prince of Players (a Bernard Herrmann score), and it was clearly labeled "magnetic master," with the session mix dates and notes all in the box. Pretty amazing. I had rejected a previous 1970s Dolby A dub because it had sounded pretty muddy. The 1954 original was clear as a bell... provided you stopped and cleaned the heads every few minutes. I kept a 4-track copy of that and played it as a demo to show people how great a 50-year-old recording could sound -- just stunning. You don't necessarily have to throw away deteriorating mag tracks like this. Companies like Chace and Novastar in LA are set up to handle "problem" tracks, and they know how to stabilize and get them to play back. Rich Chace told me years ago that he's had to process mag tracks where the oxide was literally peeling off the acetate in sheets, and they barely got the sound transferred to digital before the whole thing disintegrated. They were using Perfectone mag reproducers, which are very gentle and extremely precise in terms of film handling.
^^^^^Were the music stems recorded 4-track (maybe including a surround element, right on the raw tapes????) or 3-track? Or were you working with a 4-track master with effects, dialogue, et al? Regardless, pretty cool stuff, and I'm glad you were able to save it. I may have to seek out the dvd to give that a listen! Matt
I have two copies of the Classic Records 33rpm LP The Litte Train of the Caipira by Villa-Lobos and both came not only with the "Everest 35mm Magnetic Film Recording" banner printed across the top of the sleeve but also with a detachable white paper strip that ran all around the LP stating: " This longplay record was cut directly from the original 35mm magnetic film using an "all tube" cutting system for maximum fidelity." (My italics.) I'm not saying I believe it or disbelieve it - I'm not qualified to judge - but for what it's worth this is what Classic was saying at the time.
Reminds me of that "Technicolor's Three-Strip Process Festival" in Hollywood several years back. I saw a couple of the musicals, "The Music Man" was one of them. I did notice that the upper area of sound, the flutes and piccolos were shinning through nicely. It might have taken some EQ to get them just right, but they were all there clearly. Sound being so important in film and in musicals as well, this is a big deal.
This was how most (all?) records were cut on Mercury? Somewhere I have read Wilma Cozart Fine supervised the cutting. MLutthans: Please keep digging in your archives
I bought the SACD versions but when you say it like that, maybe I should buy the 45's as well, keep them shrinkwrapped and sell them the day I retire.
Back then they used to rehearse........ Before the days of Rock n Roll Record (punch in) this and meticulous record sheets prepared by the editor were the only way. When I was in Mag Dubbing 35mm 3 track, the transports had no erase head or Rock n Roll record. 10 mins of mag was erased in a huge degausser (The Fish Frier) ,leadered up and laced on to the machine which stood 6' high. The sync cross on the leader was arranged on the record head, and projection buzzed, they aligned their sync crosses on picture and sound playback tracks. A warning klaxon annouced selsyn lock when all 3 phase motors were locked together and all ran up in sync while the mixer and his asst did the biz, any cock up and start from scratch... Sometimes a long tedious business..... Even bloody Once I was late loading and selsyn lock came in whilst by fingers were in the chunky sprocket drive. Blood over the mech and walls Luckilly got to the talkback before the mixer rolled the selsyns. Off work for a week. The record room was seperate from projection and mixer Later with Punch in record it was adjacent to to the mixer.
Re: Cinerama sound I saw and heard Cinerama back in Dayton 15 years ago, with original equipment, including vintage Technicolor dye transfer prints. I found the sound more impressive than the picture. I couldn't get quite past the join lines, but the sound was wonderful, smooth, detailed, very much like Fifties Living Stereo or Mercury sound, only with more channels.
This was a final print master, so it was left, center, right, and surround (for CinemaScope) -- dialog, music, and effects already mixed. I'm not sure if all the separate stems still survive. Playing back old optical or magnetic tracks is very quickly becoming a lost art. I know of quite a few video post houses in LA that can't do sound at all -- you have to farm it out to another company. I don't think more than five or six post companies can play back optical, for sure. And most of the mag machines are in vague states of disrepair.
Yes, and the sound was actually (IMO) best on the titles that were only available on severely faded prints: Cinerama Holiday, Search for Paradise. The two IB tech titles (THIS IS CINERAMA and HOW THE WEST WAS WON), while still good sounding, were not AS good to my ears. Who knows....maybe you and I were at some of the same shows. Did you spot a geek in the audience when you were there? Matt
I was at 20th Century Fox in the late 1980's working on THE ROBE & stuff. At that time they had all the original stereo scores still in their cans. All takes of 35mm three channel from 1953 and Len found all the stereo optical from 1936 including the "B" movie stuff like Charlie Chan, etc. Truly wonderful. Amazing to hear THE ROBE opening titles played back. Gave me chills. I sincerely hope they didn't ash can that stuff..
Picked up these two Command 35mm LPs for .25 each yesterday. I was not familiar at all with this ancient technique. Did a search here to learn more about 35mm recording and found this current thread. (must have been subliminal) The liner notes for Vol. 1 have extensive detailed information on the recording process.
I rcm cleaned and listened to Vol. 1. For what they were trying to achieve back in 1961, it appears they were successful. The sound is quite clear, clean , open, dynamic. The one obvious flaw to me is this recording lacks some "fullness" and heft. Its the "digital" LP of its day. From reading the liner notes, this LP was made specifically for "Audiophiles"---50 yrs ago! Everyone would check a big chuckle/grin if they read these liner notes. They mention pretty much all of the audio descriptive terms . Here are some of the words: Perfect, unadulterated sound. ultimate purity. hiss. distortion. raspiness. not quite as clean. noise level. absolute separation of channels. unheard of dynamics. tremendous peaks and transients. amazingly clean. no background noise whatsoever. musical color. natural sound. precision, impact and intonation of the instruments. every single sound can be heard clearly. startlingly real
Different materials, different set of problems. (Normal tape reels of certain vintages get "sticky." Mag film flakes apart and sheds.) Matt
Cool article; thanks for posting! By the way, Bert Whyte of Everest and Bob Fine of Mercury were good friends. Everest sold their custom-built mag machines to Fine, who then used them at both Mercury and Everest, so the mag film albums for all three labels were done on the same machines. Matt
For anyone who may not have checked it out yet, here is the Everest and Command section from Sound Fountain.
Just be warned....it's an interesting article, and there is some good info there, but there's some heavy-duty hooey mixed in! Matt
True, but at least we can chalk that up to pure hucksterism/salesmanship, as opposed to being presented as fact on the interwebs. Matt
I hate keeping this stuff private, but I promised the person who sent it to me that it would not be released publicly, so again, you'll just have to trust me, but I am going to cheat just a little bit. I have photos of the cutting room at Bayside, New York, that was designed for Everest by Westrex. This facility cost a fortune to assemble, no joke. Each of the mixers? $20k in 1958 dollars! Calculate for inflation, and that's $158,000 for one mixer!!!!!!!! We're talking big time dough for a studio control room! Anyway, clearly the mag film recorders were kept a long way away from the cutter because of all the racket they created. Next to each Scully lathe, however, were two racks of Westrex and Pultec equipment, and next to those, an Ampex 1/2-inch tape recorder. I can't share the whole picture, but here's a little piece of detail that shows the Ampex on the left, two Westrex racks in the middle, and the Scully lathe on the right. Matt
