ATTN JMS: PTEN/WB/SOMEBODY are screwing up B5's audio.

[B5JMS Poster]

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From: tbetz at panix.com (Tom Betz)
Date: 18 May 1997 02:36:25 -0400
Lines: 40

Over the last few weeks, the audio I receive has been horribly 
"noise-gated" -- in quiet passages, much of the audio simply 
disappears when there is no dialog, blanking out the soundtrack
music and foley.

This started happening occasionally last season, and has been 
CONSISTENTLY awful in the last three weeks.

Perhaps it is being done by my local station (WWOR 9 in NYC)
but I doubt it, as I only hear the problem when I watch B5, 
never on any of their other programming.

This leads me to believe that somebody up the transmission 
chain is sloppily applying maladjusted noise gates to the 
audio feed in a misguided effort to "clean up" the sound track -- 
and instead they are f***ing it up horribly.

I know that you devote much time and effort to getting your 
fine program's audio mixes just right -- it's a damn shame 
that some noodlehead along the line is undoing so much of 
your good work before we get to see it.

It was so bad tonight that I considered not bothering to
watch the whole episode, or the rest of the broadcast eps,
and to wait ten years for the DVD box set.
 
My cooler head prevailed, but it's really annoying, Joe.

I hope there is something you can do about it.

If there's someone *I* can complain to about it, please 
let me know.

-- 
|We have tried ignorance       |            Tom Betz, Generalist               |
|for a very long time, and     | Want to send me email? First, read this page: |
|it's time we tried education. | <http://www.panix.com/~tbetz/mailterms.shtml> |
|<http://www.pobox.com/~tbetz> |   I mock up my reactive mind twice daily.     |



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From: jmsatb5 at aol.com (Jms at B5)
Date: 18 May 1997 19:31:57 -0400
Lines: 14

WB switched to a new company to do its uplink of episodes.  The new
company is somewhat cheaper, and uses *analog* transmissions rather than
digital when uplinking to satellite.  The result is that the audio tends
to have phasing problems and other anomalies can creep in.

We have been...discussing...this with them for some time.



 jms





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From: tbetz at panix.com (Tom Betz)
Date: 18 May 1997 20:35:34 -0400
Lines: 19

Quoth jmsatb5 at aol.com (Jms at B5) in <19970518233001.TAA09449 at ladder02.news.aol.com>:
|WB switched to a new company to do its uplink of episodes.  The new
|company is somewhat cheaper, and uses *analog* transmissions rather than
|digital when uplinking to satellite.  The result is that the audio tends
|to have phasing problems and other anomalies can creep in.
|
|We have been...discussing...this with them for some time.

Next time you have a ...discussion... on this subject, please take along 
a baseball bat for use as a persuasion device.

<sigh>

-- 
|We have tried ignorance       |            Tom Betz, Generalist               |
|for a very long time, and     | Want to send me email? First, read this page: |
|it's time we tried education. | <http://www.panix.com/~tbetz/mailterms.shtml> |
|<http://www.pobox.com/~tbetz> |   I mock up my reactive mind twice daily.     |


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From: George Johnsen <ndeiprod at earthlink.net>
Date: 19 May 1997 22:14:51 -0400
Lines: 14

Tom-

We have recently seen an improvement in the head end service quality of
the uplink due to getting the uplinkers to switch out a couple of
offensive processors (trying to get 10 lbs of show into a 5 pound
satellite).  The analog to digital conversion of said vendor is slated
to occur in June.  If this actually happens, you *should* see a marked
improvement in Q.

George Johnsen
CoProducer, B5



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