Through the LA Area Home Theatre Group, I got the chance to visit the Todd-AO Hollywood studios last Sunday. It was a rare treat, which I will share here.
I'll supplement the thread with photos, some stock from Todd-AO, some from other LAHTG members, and some lousy ones of my own.
If we could keep the chatter down until I get things posted over the next 24 hours, that would be great. But if you must post, I'll just ignore any questions or comments until I'm done.
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We arrived at the Hollywood facility around 10 AM. It's on a side street, and if you didn't know where to go you'd never find it.
Stock photo:
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Our host was Marc David Fishman, re-recording mixer and group member. His list of credits includes John Adams (2008 TV Emmy), Crash, Bucket List, Never Back Down, one of my favorites: Superbad, and recently Law Abiding Citizen.
He used Law Abiding Citizen, Never Back Down, and Sorority Row (yes, really) to demonstrate the equipment, techniques, different mixes, etc.
(pic to be added)
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Our first stop, after checking in with security, was in Studio 1. If you locate the table with three seats, I planted myself in the left-most seat.
Stock photo:
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That’s a common name Glen Glenn that I’ve noticed over the years on the end credits of the original Star Trek TV show and Star Trek II the Wrath of Khan.
Dome I know you, had some pictures you, craft ole bugger you.Yeah keep those pictures coming alone there. I hope you have hundreds of them I like a peek inside around the mixing desk behind the screen the surrounds oh, yes keep them coming.
Okay you mentioned in of the other threads they have JBL stage fronts presumably five screen to handle the SDDS8 mixes and Bag End for the sub bass. So what are the surrounds on the sidewalls and most likely rear wall as they are not JBL from the looks of them?
Bet the noise level in that dubbing stage is many db lower than my room lol! I guess they have whispery air condition system keeping the room freshly breathable.
Marc David Fishman
Oh, a young lad younger than me.
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0279892/
Well there is only one film that I’ve heard on JBL sound system and that’s Disclosure (1994) (supervising sound editor)
That is very nice of him to show you around the Todd-AO facility.
That $1,000,000+ console is really four consoles in one. It's a Euphonix S5 Digital Mixing Console, with over sound 500 inputs available. Most everything is done with Macs running ProTools.
Here's one corner of the console.
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Here's a close of of the screen. Every single sound is on a different track.
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Those names are common like the Euphonix S5. In most cases there are hundreds or thousands of tracks playing at the same time on some mixes. Pro-Tools I’ve only seen it once working at college it wasn’t the only one as the other was QueBase.
A million so in some sense most modern soundtracks cost a million bucks!
I trying to resist but I’d like to keep the continuity of the text in correct proportions to the thread. Wow I almost feel off the chair dizzy that’s a bundle of tracks laid up there.
The studio had a couple of these portable, self-contained Mac Pro Tools on either side.
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The giant mixing suite is supported by a dedicated equipment room and projection booth above and behind the theatre. Tons of gigabit Ethernet connects everything.
Here's the four racked Euphonix units.
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Stacks
Of Macs
In the racks
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All of these units are synced by a single clock, keeping everything on time. One of Marc's comments was that most HT set ups do not have a unifying clock, thus introducing delay between units that creates sync problems.
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Making my Synthesis® stack look like a toy, the racked gear just keeps coming. Compared to the equipment rooms of the past, of course, this is a small space. Nonetheless it outperforms anything that came before it.
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Okay, I'm not going to show every last bit of racked equipment, so here's a final shot. Out good friends at Lexicon are represented.
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Just behind that bank of equipment are the projectors. It has one of the few 35mm cameras and perhaps the only 70mm camera still in use in a mixing studio.
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