slimdude

What is the problem with Warner Brothers who've been periodically encoding movie soundtracks on Blu-ray with only Dolby TrueHD 2.0, and not fully utilizing 5.1-7.1 HD audio on Blu-ray? This is unacceptable! First there was: Falling Down, and now the new release of Dead Calm. Both of these movie would've significantly benefited with 5.1 HD audio. I'm afraid, there will be more titles from Warner Brothers with Dolby TrueHD 2.0 soundtracks in the near future. It doesn't make sense!

obispo21

Surround sound in movies is a very recent innovation. Dolby Digital, DTS and SDDS only first showed up in theaters about 15 years ago... 1993 or so. I think Batman Returns and Jurassic Park were two of the first.

Falling Down and Dead Calm might not have even had surround sound tracks produced. Back then they had four channel surround sound based on "Dolby Stereo", but I think it was just 2 discrete stereo audio channels, with matrix processing.

If that's true, 2.0 channel TrueHD would give you everything that's possible unless the studios decided to produce a new soundstrack. I don't know if the "Pro Logic" processing we have in homes electronics today will replicate the original theatrical matrixing though.

HumanMedia

Even worse is the new release of Creepshow with Dolby Digital 2.0 at 192kbps. Yes Dolby Digital not Dolby TrueHD. And yes this is the new Blu-ray release. !!??

Superman07

^ And? Just because a title is on blu-ray doesn't mean it gets all the bells and whistle, or for that matter that the source material can support creation of those 'standards'. It's just another example, in my opinion, why I'm confused by the actions of the studios to release Sunday afternoon material on blu-ray. I guess they can support the decision based on analysis that shows they will be bought even though the $5 dvd copy will work just as well.

RocShemp

If the original mix was 2.0, I have no problem with a 2.0 mix on BD as long as it's still a lossless mix and none of that 192kbps crap. At the very least gimme 640kbps. Likewise for 1.0 mixes.

slimdude

But Dead Calm, and Falling Down were originally recorded in 4 channel Dolby Surround theatrical, equivalent to Dolby Pro-Logic for Home Theater use. Both movies are encoded in Dolby Surround on the DVD, including Creepshow.

RocShemp

Just because they were encoded in 4 channel surround, doesn't mean they deserve to be downgraded to 192kbps. Look at Grumpy Old Men. It was mixed in stereo and the BD got a 2.0 Dolby True HD track.

Unless you feel that Falling Down should have had a 5.1 remix. If it's a 4 channel Dolby Surround, that's achieved through matrix decoding. In which case, a 2.0 mix is correct.

Gizmo

Its TrueHD. Don't believe everything you read. Revisit that thread and you will see others have posted pictures of the title playing in TrueHD.

Josh Z

The Dolby SR (Spectral Recording) theatrical format was encoded in 2 channels, not 4. The surround information is extracted from the main two channels by a matrixing process, like ProLogic. A Dolby TrueHD 2.0 track run through Dolby ProLogic or ProLogic II processing will give you the same results. These movies did not have discrete surround channels.

Any attempt to author these movies in 5.1 format will involve remixing the soundtracks. That's pretty common these days, but didn't happen in these cases for some reason. 5.1 remixes sometimes sound pretty good, but just as often sound gimmicky and artificial. It's very possible that the studio went through the motions of remixing these particular movies and didn't like the results, and so decided to stick with 2.0 format.

Nick Martin

So many sound mixes for older films on disc sound exactly like Pro Logic, only done in advance for the home release and called 5.1.

Neat trick...

Mr. Salty

Well, no. Surround sound dates back a hell of a lot further than that. Dolby Digital, DTS and SDDS are recent formats, but I was listening to movies in six-track surround sound back in the 1960s.

Qui Gon Jim

Geezer.

Jonathan Little

It makes sense if the film has a stereo/Pro Logic soundtrack. And 1.0 make sense if the film is mono. Would you feel better if they filled 7.1 channels with the center channel material so it uses all your speakers and shows "7.1" on your receiver? That would sound like crap, but at least they'd be "fully utilizing" the channels available.

Nick Martin

Of course receivers have 'all channel stereo' as an option. I use it for audio commentaries.

RocShemp

But don't you love it when it's already done for you? Like that 5.1 mix in the Sony DVD release of Transformers: The Movie. Well, at least they didn't rotate the sound of each channel this time around, like the equaly horrible 5.1 mix of the Rhino DVD.

Nick Martin

I've never heard a movie sound like what you're describing, and I'll count that as a good thing

The one big downside to having these things done in advance is that you can't play around with DSPs and matrix effects. They all give different results and it's fun to listen to the differences between them. At least I think it is.

RocShemp

Consider yourself truly blessed.

We are certainly in the minority. I enjoy using the DSP options of my receiver. And several times I find rather pleasing results. I know many argue that I am altering the original intended sound effects but, as long as the original unaltered audio is there on the disc for me to go back to whenever I like, I fail to see the problem. It's my copy of the movie so I should be allowed to listen to it as I please.