Soundhound,

I think that your skill level when it comes to discriminating listening, is probably an order of magnitude better than mine, and most everybody else's in this forum. The next time I visit an IMAX I'll try to be less bowled-over by the experience, and to focus exclusively on the sound.

Jeff Mackwood

Well, I wouldn't ignore the picture totally! It's pretty common for audio quality to be less of a focus when there is a picture to look at. The IMAX sound path is no different than any theatrical release: they are mixed in the same dubbing facilities with the same equipment. The quality of the master material is actually very good, usually starting with 24 bit digital master recordings - it's just the playback chain that is made for high volume levels and high reliability rather than fine sound quality. If for instance the center dialog channel speaker failed, the entire house would have to be refunded.

Your home speakers can do much better with detail, although they of course won't go nearly as loud without risk of damage. The large-format (4") compression drivers and constant directivity horns used in all high-SPL theater systems for the frequencies above 500Hz sound harsh, which is a tradeoff for their high SPL capability.

[This message has been edited by soundhound (edited June 02, 2004).]

I think the fact that studios make more money from DVD's now than box office sales, say's it all.

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MeanGene's Home

I did enjoy watching the third Matrix release in IMAX. My opinion of the audio was favorable in that it seemed less strained in those portions that required high output, and that would make sense based on IMAX system specs.

Speaking of screen images, there is a large screen theater format, not as widely known as IMAX, by a company called Showscan in Culver City, CA. Their film production is meant to accompany motion rides. They not only use 70mm film, but they shoot and project at 60 frames per second instead of 24 for ‘flicker-free’ viewing. More expensive film stock and more of it, not something likely to be used for feature films. Then again, no ‘pull-down’ needed for needed for regular television and transfer to HD is a one-to-one ratio.

my comment on why not make everything into IMAX was sarcasm. sarcasm falling on deaf ears it seems.

i just saw "day after tomorrow" at the movies, and it was pretty good, audio included.

so since movie theaters are so crappy, what exactly would professional musicians use while performing on tour? seems to me every local ampitheatre ive been to has something on the order of jbls. so live music is crappy too? oh no wait, we are all trying to recreate that live sound. perhaps we are chasing our tails in the fact that that live sound is not ideal, so we are never going to get closer to it with better gear... i am speaking in the musical sense, with no direction towards films... but the correlation could be drawn between the two.

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This post has been brought to you by curegeorg, thanks for reading.

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That home THX is pretty just marketing stuff. Installation requirement is totally different compare it to cinema THX.

Don't you have to set all that HT equipment in the exact places in order for it to be THX? Once you move (or change) something it's no longer THX certified.

curegeorg

Now you have to know this. No matter how great your system is, you still can not recreate live sound. The feeling is totally different. Moreover, CD only 44.1K; what do you expect from it?

Remember the silent movies? I can’t say I do because it was before my time but some of you may. I think the theater audio technology has come a long way since those days. What are we complaining about?

curegeorg, music’s been around long before loudspeaker was invented.