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Sound-on-film refers to a class of sound film
Sound film

A sound film is a film with synchronization, or sound technologically coupled to image, as opposed to a silent film. The first known public exhibition of projected sound films took place in Paris in 1900, but decades would pass before reliable synchronization was made commercially practical....
 processes where the sound accompanying picture is physically recorded onto photographic film, usually, but not always, the same strip of film carrying the picture. Sound-on-film processes can either record an analog
Analog signal

An analog or analogue signal is any continuous function Signal for which the time varying feature of the signal is a representation of some other time varying quantity, i.e analogous to another time varying signal....
 sound track or digital
Digital

A digital system uses discrete values, usually but not always symbolized numerically to represent information for input, processing, transmission, storage, etc....
 sound track, and may record the signal either optically
Optics

Optics is the study of the behavior and properties of light including its optical phenomena with matter and its imaging by optical instruments....
 or magnetically
Magnetism

In physics, magnetism is one of the phenomena by which materials exert attractive or repulsive forces on other materials. Some well-known materials that exhibit easily detectable magnetic properties are nickel, iron, cobalt, and their alloys; however, all materials are influenced to greater or lesser degree by the presence of a magnetic fiel...
.

most prevalent modern method of recording sound on a film print is by stereo variable-area (SVA) recording, encoding a two-channel audio signal as a pair of lines running parallel with the film's direction of travel through the projector.






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35mm Film Audio Macro
Sound-on-film refers to a class of sound film
Sound film

A sound film is a film with synchronization, or sound technologically coupled to image, as opposed to a silent film. The first known public exhibition of projected sound films took place in Paris in 1900, but decades would pass before reliable synchronization was made commercially practical....
 processes where the sound accompanying picture is physically recorded onto photographic film, usually, but not always, the same strip of film carrying the picture. Sound-on-film processes can either record an analog
Analog signal

An analog or analogue signal is any continuous function Signal for which the time varying feature of the signal is a representation of some other time varying quantity, i.e analogous to another time varying signal....
 sound track or digital
Digital

A digital system uses discrete values, usually but not always symbolized numerically to represent information for input, processing, transmission, storage, etc....
 sound track, and may record the signal either optically
Optics

Optics is the study of the behavior and properties of light including its optical phenomena with matter and its imaging by optical instruments....
 or magnetically
Magnetism

In physics, magnetism is one of the phenomena by which materials exert attractive or repulsive forces on other materials. Some well-known materials that exhibit easily detectable magnetic properties are nickel, iron, cobalt, and their alloys; however, all materials are influenced to greater or lesser degree by the presence of a magnetic fiel...
.

Analog sound-on-Film recording

The most prevalent modern method of recording sound on a film print is by stereo variable-area (SVA) recording, encoding a two-channel audio signal as a pair of lines running parallel with the film's direction of travel through the projector. The lines change area (grow broader or narrower) depending on the magnitude of the signal. The projector shines a light or LED
Light-emitting diode

A light-emitting diode , is an electronic light source. The LED was discovered in the early 20th century, and introduced as a practical electronic component in 1962....
, called an exciter, through a perpendicular slit onto the film. The image on the small slice of exposed track modulates the intensity of the light, which is collected by a photosensitive element, a photodiode
Photodiode

A photodiode is a type of photodetector capable of converting light into either electric current or voltage, depending upon the mode of operation....
 or CCD
Charge-coupled device

A charge-coupled device is an analog signal shift register that enables the transportation of analog signals through successive stages , controlled by a clock signal....
.

Commonly, the audio signal recorded onto an SVA track is encoded through a phase matrix
Matrix decoder

Matrix decoder is an audio technology where a finite number of discrete audio channels are decoded into a larger number of channels on play back ....
, which allowed the two-channel format to record a center and surround channel, and companding noise reduction
Companding

In telecommunication, signal processing, and thermodynamics, companding is a method of mitigating the detrimental effects of a channel with limited dynamic range....
, which allows a constant signal-to-noise ratio
Signal-to-noise ratio

Signal-to-noise ratio is an electrical engineering measurement, also used in other fields , defined as the ratio of a signal power to the noise power corrupting the signal....
 to be delivered over a wide dynamic range.

Earlier processes, used on 70mm film
70 mm film

70 mm film is a wide high-resolution film gauge, with higher resolution than standard 35 mm List of film formats. As used in camera, the film is 65 mm wide....
 prints and special presentations of 35mm film
35 mm film

35 mm film is the basic film gauge most commonly used for both still photography and motion pictures, and remains relatively unchanged since its introduction in 1892 by William Dickson and Thomas Edison, using film stock supplied by George Eastman....
 prints, recorded sound magnetically on ferric oxide
Iron(III) oxide

Iron oxide?also known as ferric oxide, Hematite, red iron oxide, synthetic maghemite, colcothar, or simply rust?is one of the several oxide Chemical compounds of iron, and has Paramagnetism properties....
 tracks bonded to the film print, outside the sprocket holes.

Sound-on-film formats

Almost all modern motion picture sound formats are sound-on-film formats, including:

Optical analog formats

  • Fox/Western Electric
    Western Electric

    Western Electric Company was an United States electrical engineering company, the manufacturing arm of American Telephone & Telegraph from 1881 to 1995....
     (Westrex) Movietone
    Movietone sound system

    The Movietone sound system is a sound-on-film method of recording sound for motion pictures which guarantees synchronisation between the sound and the picture....
    , are variable-density formats of sound film
    Sound film

    A sound film is a film with synchronization, or sound technologically coupled to image, as opposed to a silent film. The first known public exhibition of projected sound films took place in Paris in 1900, but decades would pass before reliable synchronization was made commercially practical....
    . (No longer used, but still playable on modern projectors.)
  • RCA Photophone
    RCA Photophone

    RCA Photophone was the trade name given to one of four major competing technologies that emerged in the American film industry in the late 1920s for synchronizing electrically recorded audio to a motion picture image....
    , a variable-area format now universally used for optical analog soundtracks - since the late 1970s, usually with a Dolby encoding matrix.


Encoding matrices
  • Dolby Stereo
    Dolby Stereo

    Dolby Stereo,Dolby A was the original analog optical technology developed by Dolby for 70mm film and 35mm film film prints in 1976. The Dolby mix was first used on the movie Logan's Run ....
  • Dolby SR
  • Ultra Stereo
    Ultra Stereo

    Ultra Stereo is a cinematographic sound system that was developed by the year 1984Film Journal International August 1999, p. 34 in competition to the predominant format, Dolby Stereo, by former employees of that company....


Optical digital formats

  • Dolby Digital
    Dolby Digital

    File:Dolby-Digital.svgDolby Digital is the marketing name for a series of lossy data compression technologies developed by Dolby Laboratories....
  • Sony Dynamic Digital Sound
    SDDS

    SDDS stands for Sony Dynamic Digital Sound, which is a movie theater sound system developed by Sony. Digital sound information is recorded on both outer edges of the 35 mm film release print....


Obsolete formats

  • Fantasound
    Fantasound

    Fantasound was an early stereophonic sound process developed by sound engineer William E. Garity and sound mixer John N.A. Hawkins for The Walt Disney Company in 1938-1940 for the motion picture Fantasia , making Fantasia the first commercial film with multichannel sound....
    , where sound and picture were recorded on separate strips of film, introduced for initial release of Disney
    Walt Disney

    Walter Elias Disney was a multiple Academy Award-winning American film producer, film director, screenwriter, voice actor, animator, entrepreneur and philanthropist....
    's Fantasia
    Fantasia (film)

    Fantasia is a 1940 in film List of animated feature-length films produced by Walt Disney, and is the third film in the List of Disney theatrical animated features#official canon....
     (1940)
  • Phonofilm
    Phonofilm

    In 1919, Lee De Forest, inventor of the audion tube, filed his first patent on a sound-on-film process, DeForest Phonofilm, which recorded sound directly onto film as parallel lines....
    , patented by Lee De Forest
    Lee De Forest

    Lee De Forest was an United States inventor with over 180 patents to his credit. De Forest invented the Audion tube, a vacuum tube that takes relatively weak electrical signals and amplifies them....
     in 1919, defunct by 1929
  • Cinema Digital Sound
    Cinema Digital Sound

    Cinema Digital Sound is a multi-channel surround sound format used for theatrical films in the early 1990s. The system was developed by Eastman Kodak and Optical Radiation Corporation....
    , an optical format which was the first commercial digital sound format, used between 1990 and 1992


Further reading

  • Movietone
    Movietone sound system

    The Movietone sound system is a sound-on-film method of recording sound for motion pictures which guarantees synchronisation between the sound and the picture....
  • Sound film
    Sound film

    A sound film is a film with synchronization, or sound technologically coupled to image, as opposed to a silent film. The first known public exhibition of projected sound films took place in Paris in 1900, but decades would pass before reliable synchronization was made commercially practical....
  • Vitaphone
    Vitaphone

    Vitaphone was a sound film process used on features and nearly 2,000 short subjects produced by Warner Bros. and its sister studio First National from 1926 to 1930....
  • RCA Photophone
    RCA Photophone

    RCA Photophone was the trade name given to one of four major competing technologies that emerged in the American film industry in the late 1920s for synchronizing electrically recorded audio to a motion picture image....
  • Phonofilm
    Phonofilm

    In 1919, Lee De Forest, inventor of the audion tube, filed his first patent on a sound-on-film process, DeForest Phonofilm, which recorded sound directly onto film as parallel lines....
  • Photokinema
    Photokinema

    Phono-Kinema was a sound-on-disc system for motion pictures invented by Orlando Kellum. The system was used for a small number of short films, mostly made in 1921, of subjects such as actor Frederick Warde reading an original poem, labor leader Samuel Gompers speaking on labor issues, Judge Ben Lindsey on the need for a separate juvenile...
  • sound-on-disc
    Sound-on-disc

    The term Sound-on-disc refers to a class of sound film processes utilizing a phonograph or other disc to record or playback sound in sync with a film....
  • List of film formats
    List of film formats

    This list of film formats catalogues formats developed for shooting or viewing motion pictures, ranging from the Chronophotographe format from 1888, to mid-20th century formats such as the 1953 CinemaScope format, to more recent formats such as the 1992 IMAX#IMAX_HD format....
  • Joseph Tykocinski-Tykociner


See also

  • Optigan
    Optigan

    The Optigan was an early electronic keyboard instrument designed for the consumer market. It is best remembered today for its reputation of frequent failure and its cheap appearance and sound....