What am I hearing? (in some 5.1 remasters)

[takearushfan]

Hi all,
I noticed that when I compare the original mono mix to the 5.1 remastered mixes in some movies, there are times when certain pieces of dialogue will have an effect on it, but I can't pinpoint what it is. For instance, certain screams from a character in a horror film, Fred Kruger's grunts, etc. It's sounds cool, but it's so subtle that I can't tell what it is! Maybe delay?
Does anyone know what I'm referring to or am I losing my mind?
- Justin

[guns1inger]

Phase shifting is one technique when building surround fields from lesser channel masters. Depending on who is doing the remastering, and how much effeort/budget they have to expend, they may use different audio effects altogether in order to get the effect they need.

[takearushfan]

Hm,
Well it's New Line Cinema and, obviously, A Nightmare On Elm Street that I was referring to. So, they probably had a rather large budget and, considering that it's Wes Craven's "baby", there was most likely a ton of effort as well.
So, based on that... I guess there's really no way to tell what effect was used.
I often wonder what software/hardware they might've used. For instance, what would've been available/most popular in '98? (when this particular remaster was done). Any ideas?
- Just

[takearushfan]

*bump*
Here's what I was talking about... despite being folded down, you can still hear the difference between the two files.
Mono: http://www.rogepost.com/dn/x1gi
Surround: http://www.rogepost.com/dn/fxle

[guns1inger]

First, the remaster has had a lot of clean up work done on it. It sounds much clearer, with a lot less hiss. It is possible to build a 5.1 from original elements, if the masters still exist, and even from a mono track if that is all you have. a couple of years ago there was a restoration done of The Good, The Bad and The Ugly. This included a general cleanup of the negatives, insertion of 14 minutes of footage removed after the Rome premiere (including recording dialogue with Clint and Eli that had never been recorded in English - many Italian films were shot silent until the end of the '60s) and creating a new 5.1 audio mix. Most of the original elements didn't exist, so they had to use mono masters. There is a short doco on the DVD about how they went about it, but mostly it was good, old fashioned audio editing and mixing, including adding extra gunshots etc to hide things they couldn't really fix.

[takearushfan]

Darn... I thought I had good ears, but I didn't notice a difference in the amount of hiss. I'll have to take a closer listen...
For a comparison where anyone would be able to hear the difference, check out The Terminator 1!
I know a bit about films that might not have the original elements to work with. I've been talking to someone else about the original When A Stranger Calls. I'm a bit peaved that there wasn't a 5.1 remaster, but the materials might be just too worn out to use *shrug*

[guns1inger]

Or the effort simply too great. Time is money. To work from mono to multi-channel without original elements means cutting the mono track into all the separate elements (every effect, dialogue, music etc), then treating each element and reassembling and remixing. That's a lot of work on top of standard DVD production costs. Unless the release is a true classic likely to pull in a lot of $$$s, no-one is going to pay for the work.

[takearushfan]

Yeah. I have a feeling that they felt the demand wasn't anywhere near "acceptable"... unfortunate. When listening to the film, it sounds like it'd be a great remaster.

[Soopafresh]

Speaking of remasters, the "new" release of The Beatles "Love" DVD was mastered in 5.1. Comes with AC3 and DTS. Sounds fantastic - Like getting to listen to the original 4 and 8 multitrack tapes with a mixer. They even placed individual instruments and vocals on separate tracks.