Kinoton FP30 / DP70 reader update

Analog reader now switchable between white and IR light.

In the mid nineties, Kinoton developed an optical sound reader for reading both Dolby
Digital and analogue soundtracks. For both pickups, red high power LED bars were used. The color of the light source is not critical for digital lending. A red light has been deliberately chosen for the analogue part because the film industry made the switch from blue track to cyan-dye analogue soundtracks. Unfortunately, this choice for older sound tracks has turned out to be less favorable. Most of these sound tracks are displayed with this red light source but are accompanied by very high distortion. The reproduction of the low frequencies sounds very poor. Rosbeek Techniek has developed a modification in which all soundtracks are displayed as they were intended. Since the white LED under 700Nm (IR) emits hardly any energy, this light source can be used for cyan dye tracks and virtually all variable area tracks with an excellent reproduction. Some variable density tracks on color stock can only be displayed properly with a light source of 850Nm.

The variable area blue tracks including the early Dolby A tracks are also displayed excellently. In practice the IR source can be used for every non-cyan dye track with a maximum result.
With the modified reader it is possible to choose between white light and IR by simply turning a button.
As two of the pictures shows, with the up-date of the reader, we place a specially constructed mask that prevents unwanted modulation from snapping into the reading aria due to reflections caused by scratches.