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First of all, by 1955 Fox was recording on mag, not optical. They would typically use two sets of three-track 35mm for six-track sound. Unfortunately the original mags were in bad shape by the time we did the CD. We salvaged what we could. When I read the original post, I noticed it was inaccurate about mag vs. optical, and inaccurate about whether the original elements survived (some did, some didn't) and there didn't seem to be any acknowledgment of our album which is still available. It just seemed odd that someone would like this score enough to want it and yet not acknowledge our CD from the OST masters from 15 years ago.
Lukas
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Posted: |
Jan 31, 2015 - 12:51 PM
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By: |
manderley
(Member)
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First of all, by 1955 Fox was recording on mag, not optical. They would typically use two sets of three-track 35mm for six-track sound. Unfortunately the original mags were in bad shape by the time we did the CD. We salvaged what we could. When I read the original post, I noticed it was inaccurate about mag vs. optical, and inaccurate about whether the original elements survived (some did, some didn't) and there didn't seem to be any acknowledgment of our album which is still available. It just seemed odd that someone would like this score enough to want it and yet not acknowledge our CD from the OST masters from 15 years ago.
Lukas
Lukas......those of us who love Friedhofer's SOLDIER score were thrilled with your release, now so many years ago, and still count it as one of our favorites. But stroppy's post about this wonderful Friedhofer score, and now your informative reply brings up a question I've always had about this material.
You have often referred to some of this original material as being in "bad shape" or some such other kind of reference. That's how we referred to these disappointments 15 years ago, about this score and others, so it's understandable.
But with the development of more modern electronic and digital technologies in the intervening years (like CAPSTAN) which go a long way in "saving" bad shape materials which were simply re-vaulted and not thrown away, do you think it would be possible for someone to re-visit the original elements as was recently done with RIO CONCHOS and a few others???
In other words......what does the "bad shape" of the original SOLDIER OF FORTUNE elements (as with other Fox and other studio mag material of the period, MGM, Paramount, etc) consist of (if you recall)?
Is it a singular effect of mag "flaking" where most of the mag surface is deteriorated, causing exceptional dropouts.....is it a problem of de-magnetization over time, causing highs (particularly) to deteriorate.....is it a problem of the stretching or shrinking of the mag base film stock, causing "wow" and "flutter".....is it a problem of "vinegaring" of the unstable base stock.....or is it a combination of ALL of these effects?
Some of this might be correctable in 2015, but not all, I believe. But.....if the original material still exists, it might be worth taking a decades-later look at the sound rolls and seeing if something might be done utilizing new restoration developments and technology.
As a purely unfounded and unproven personal guess, I'm suspecting that someone---or various someones---are even now looking back into some of these flawed original elements with an eye toward restoration and retrieval of more material. But who knows? Only time will tell. I hope I still have time left to enjoy the fruits of these possible developments.
(As a sidelight to this.....after 12 years here on the FSM Board it is still a wonder to me how little filmmusic fans know of the filmmusic recording formats and their history and usage in different periods of time. That kind of information goes a long way in knowing how recoverable and restorable old score material is and what it might sound like if it can be restored. Sadly, one of the failures of this board has been the absence of a "sticky" category of topics which would remain in place to summarize historical facts or lists referring to filmmusic and its recording, composer lists, lost and found scores, dubbers, engineering techniques, who owns what scores, who composed the multi-composer scores, and many more...... This kind of topic category could clear out the endless re-hash clutter that goes on year-after-year on this board and the endlessly repeated misinformation.)
Incidentally, Lukas.....thanks for keeping this FSM Board alive through your monetary assistance. It remains a very special place in all of our lives.
.....and, by the way.....have the twins started listening to filmmusic yet? 
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Yes, the new technology is very impressive and I am glad to see new editions of things like Rio Conchos making use of it. We're done making CDs so it won't be me doing any reissues. In the case of Soldier of Fortune I don't remember there being much more of it surviving than we used. The main title so completely fell apart that the track on the album is half from the music mag, half from the composite audio from the film itself (you can hear the sonic difference). Maybe there was a cue or two where only the close-up or long-shot 35mm stem was usable, and that could be improved today. The new technology can make barely deteriorated music sound sort of normal, and can make moderate wow sound only a little bad. But if the mag is unplayable, that's the end of it—and most of that mag was tossed out of necessity once it was transferred to 24 track analogue 2" protection, so it's not like it can be transferred again. As the mag ages, it's on a one-way ticket to oblivion—it only gets worse, never better. If the mag is so far gone it sounds chewed to pieces in the transfer, I don't see the technology making it miraculously normal. So you can expect improvements but not miracles.
Lukas
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Posted: |
Jan 31, 2015 - 3:43 PM
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By: |
PFK
(Member)
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Yes, the new technology is very impressive and I am glad to see new editions of things like Rio Conchos making use of it. We're done making CDs so it won't be me doing any reissues. In the case of Soldier of Fortune I don't remember there being much more of it surviving than we used. The main title so completely fell apart that the track on the album is half from the music mag, half from the composite audio from the film itself (you can hear the sonic difference). Maybe there was a cue or two where only the close-up or long-shot 35mm stem was usable, and that could be improved today. The new technology can make barely deteriorated music sound sort of normal, and can make moderate wow sound only a little bad. But if the mag is unplayable, that's the end of it—and most of that mag was tossed out of necessity once it was transferred to 24 track analogue 2" protection, so it's not like it can be transferred again. As the mag ages, it's on a one-way ticket to oblivion—it only gets worse, never better. If the mag is so far gone it sounds chewed to pieces in the transfer, I don't see the technology making it miraculously normal. So you can expect improvements but not miracles.
Lukas
Thanks for the reply Lukas. It sort of looks like Soldier of Fortune is a lost cause. The reason I asked is I know you have ended the FSM CDs but you are a CD producer for other labels. Well, maybe the new technology can be used for other scores. Thanks for the very interesting information.
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Posted: |
Jan 31, 2015 - 8:14 PM
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By: |
Joe Caps
(Member)
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Sad, Fox has done some restoration miacles with some of the older Herrmann releases, The Robe, Demetrius and the Gladiators, and especially on The Egyptian.
I was hoping they could do the same with Soldier of Fortune and Freidhofers In Love and War.
However, Fox does have the mono up and down tracks for the mono master mags for these films.
I've wondered why they have never been used.
Soldier seems to be cursed. For years, the film ran on AMC in stereo.
Then Fox did a film restoration and released it on dvd. the cover says it is 5.1 and a lite lights up on my amp telling me that is so, but the film is MONO using only one of the 5.1 channels. Fox says the mags are either missing or no longer usable.
Why could theynot tale the stereo tracks off of the old Vid master on AMC. In fact, a freind of mine, who is good at this sort of editing, did just that for me.
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Reading this I can only say...I am so glad this is no longer my problem!
On the several hundred titles I worked on...I really tried to do them as best we could.
Lukas
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I just listened to the Soldier of Fortune portion of our CD, it's 25 minutes and absolutely lovely. You know I love you guys, and I am one of you, but sometimes the complaining is too much!
Lukas
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Lukas, your perfectionism in getting every release as good as it could be is the main reason that FSM is the only film music label I'm doing my best to get a complete collection for. Even titles that weren't so much my thing I enjoyed chiefly for the hard work you put in. Your amazing booklets made music I wouldn't normally try to like suddenly interesting to me. I don't think anyone is questioning the job you did really. I think there's just some hope that a reissue of Soldier of Fortune could be improved since there have been a number of new technologies that have facilitated improved versions of other FSM titles (which at the time were the best they could be).
If we can get an amazing-sounding and mostly-stereo Rio Conchos, that makes people wonder if this one is possible too, and if so, whether it would be considered viable enough for a re-release. But I think you're the wrong person to bother about it -- wouldn't it be more appropriate to ask Mike Mattesino, who is the one who restores so many of these?
Yavar
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