Michael 'Bink' Knowles wrote on Sun, 30 March 2008 04:55 |
I know Cerwin Vega constructed the Sensurround subwoofers in '73 and '74 for the movie "Earthquake" but those Universal-designed boxes only reproduced a simple triggered noise track. What about subwoofers that were expected to reproduce music and actual sound effects? Who made the first ones? -Bink |
Mac Kerr wrote on Sun, 30 March 2008 07:03 | ||
Mac |
Michael 'Bink' Knowles wrote on Sun, 30 March 2008 13:54 |
At the bottom of Meyer's 650-R2 Operating Instructions there's a printed date of September 1994. I wonder how much earlier the product came out... I think I was using R2s as early as 1992. |
Al Limberg wrote on Sun, 30 March 2008 18:37 |
I recall reading an article regarding Meyer subs vs. the CV 'Earthquakes' years ago in Mix Magazine. Meyer was only slightly less than flabbergasted that a theatre full of typical viewers being used as test subjects repeatedly picked the CVs as 'louder' even though actual test results showed the opposite. Perhaps that was what lead to the 'added' distortion solution to the problem. ?;o) Al |
Mac Kerr wrote on Sun, 30 March 2008 21:47 |
I don't know what were in the CV W "Earthquake" subs... |
Michael 'Bink' Knowles wrote on Sun, 30 March 2008 04:55 |
I know Cerwin Vega constructed the Sensurround subwoofers in '73 and '74 for the movie "Earthquake" but those Universal-designed boxes only reproduced a simple triggered noise track. What about subwoofers that were expected to reproduce music and actual sound effects? Who made the first ones? -Bink |
Mike {AB} Butler wrote on Mon, 31 March 2008 05:00 |
Bink, The first true sub I saw was in late 1979, and it was John Meyer's box - I'm only guessing it was his first. It was an 18" EV-looking driver inside a very nondescript grey large ported box, and had a 1U processing unit to go with it (of course). The shop spent like 2 days rattling everything in the shop.. and I never saw it again.. but I think they ended up getting some. I remember the comments that it was hard to justify a 30 hz box.. when the JM-3's already were going that low.. HTH, |
Iain Macdonald wrote on Mon, 31 March 2008 10:19 |
Hi Craig, The pic is an 8182 Altec dedicated cinema sub from 1981/82. THX research started in 1982 at Lucasfilm before the name THX was incorporated. Design work was done specifically for Return of the Jedi, #3 in the series. Iain. |
Craig Hauber wrote on Tue, 01 April 2008 15:07 |
8182 Altec, -thats exactly the one I couldn't remember. Some audiophiles were using them too -They went quite low, but weren't very powerful but who cares because they out-did everything else in that 25-30Hz range... |
Bob Leonard wrote on Thu, 03 April 2008 22:38 |
For all the kids I would have to beleive the first dedicated sub used in a theatre may well have to be the Sheerer horn. http://www.audioheritage.org/html/profiles/lmco/shearer.htm |
Mac Kerr wrote on Thu, 03 April 2008 20:37 | ||
Mac |
Tim McCulloch wrote on Fri, 04 April 2008 12:58 |
Hi Bink- 35mm film runs at 90 feet per minute, which works out to 18ips. IIRC the width of the optical track and limitations of the phototube and film grain led to a bandwidth spec of about 80Hz-3k.. The variable density soundtrack was a hissy beast, even with a 3k top end. I found a nitrate reel in storage at a theater I worked at while in highschool, and the head projectionist ran it for me... Noisy as it could be, and I got a demonstration of nitrate's combustion. Magnetic tracks arrived in 1953 (CinemaScope 4 track stereo) and extended the bandwidth to 50Hz on the low end and 6k on the top end IIRC... Magnetic heads wore quickly, and many smaller exhibitors went back to the variable area optical tracks rather than spend the money to relap or replace the mag heads. Reproduction was also limited by the A-7s behind the screen and the 20-30 watt Altec tube amps that warmed the booth (along with the arc lamps). I'd imagine that any contemporary low end would send the amps well into clipping and blown rectifier tubes and launch cones as the required LF drops below resonance. Nowadays the digital tracks are optical, too. Kids these days! For a close up look click here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:35mm_film_audio_macro.jpg Audience expectations have changed, much has been done to meet those expectations with audio on silver-based imaging. With the continual conversion to digital cinema, there are nagging questions about how to archive new digital content, and how to deal with "remastering" archived movies that are sitting down in a salt mine 40 miles from me... Maybe silver ain't so bad after all? Probably best left to a Basement discussion. Thanks for the memory jog, Bink! Tim Mc |
Art Welter wrote on Wed, 30 April 2008 00:26 |
Mark, Please check out the brochure again, though I never have seen the actual specs I would think the 30W could put out 113 or even 123 dB at 4 foot. With 100 watts and a refrigerator size cabinet, those units could certainly make way more noise than 93 dB max. Cone sag was a problem for the 30W long term, a lot of styrofoam hanging on a little voice coil in a narrow gap. Interesting to look at older specifications, the 1987 EV brochure for the EVM-18B shows: 30 feet at .001 watt input: 51 dB 10 feet at 1 watt input: 91 dB 4 feet at 200 watt input: 122 dB Takes some math to convert those figures to the 1 watt one meter standard! Anyway, I have seen unintentional errors in EV brochures, but the 30W was basically an SRO with a humongous flapping cone, so I would expect it to be in the mid 90 dB range at one watt one meter like most of their cones. Someone on the Lansing Heritage site posted a much higher figure than that, FWIW. Have not heard any good things about the cone, other than it went damn low, but it was one of the few cones from that era that was able to get down to the low pipe organ notes with appreciable level and efficiency. |