Tone on Reels

[Cheesehead]

Hi There,

I'm currently chugging through a massive list of deliverables I've been asked for.

Previously I've only delivered continuous final mix, M&E, DME etc, because continuous is the way we work.
But they want everything in reels and continuous.

I always put line up tone at the head of the continuous deliverables of course.
But when delivering audio chunks for reels would anyone put tone at the head of each file?

I was told by the DCP creation guys it was not necessary as they just chop it off anyway.

At the moment my reel files run from the leader start of the reel QT's supplied by the Edit house. With 2 pops and end pops on each file.

Thoughts gratefully received?

[Craig F]

But when delivering audio chunks for reels would anyone put tone at the head of each file?

yes, never underestimate the carelessness of the next person
when they call and say it's 3 dB hot you can tel them to pan it out
it's much harder to check these things w/o the tone

[8dB.co.uk]

They probably want it in reels in case of printing to film. In which case there will be a DMU master made, which will have a separate tone reel / file, which will be referenced to your tones. Don't forget to make the LFE tone 100Hz so it survives ac3 encoding (125Hz LPF).

[8dB.co.uk]

Do a set of tone files, clearly labelled and send it with the delivery, with a note alerting the recipient to its existence. That way if anyone down the line requests it, you can safely say it's been delivered.

[Cheesehead]

Thanks Guys,

8db, do you mean provide a different file with the tones in?
Or is it safer to have tones at the head of each reel file?

I agree the 5.1 is to cover if a printmaster needs to be made down the line,
but they've even asked for the stereo elements to be delivered in reels, which seems odd to me.

[8dB.co.uk]

Safer, and indeed required by the likes of the Dolby Xfer bay, to put tones at the head of each reel. However you are likely to piss off your DCP delivery facility, so I would supply a very clearly labelled set of tone files separately, with a large print strongly worded note alerting whoever receives them to their existence. Back in the nineties, I used to get mixes bouncing back, and when I asked them if they'd read the record report they always replied in the negative and then had to go back and do it again in their own time. If you don't deluver clear instructions you can't complain if someone makes an assumption - usually wrong.

[8dB.co.uk]

People like Sky also demand a very specific GLITS tone, at very specific timings (to match the bars) and fail it if there's any tone over the clock.

[Cheesehead]

It is definitely the pain in the proverbial of the whole process.

I bit the bullet in the end and put tone on all the files.

Thanks for the advice.