Stage 7 at Todd-AO West features one of the Santa Monica facility's five Euphonix System 5 consoles.
The Santa Monica location also has Euphonix boards on Stages 1, 2, and 7. Todd-AO's CBS/Radford facility in Studio City houses a newly-installed System 5-F on Stage R, while yet another console resides on Stage 3 of the company's Hollywood location.
Stages 3 and 4 will be dedicated to feature film pre-dubs and mark the completion of an upgrade program that puts the entire facility on a common platform.
"We very much wanted the same console in every room for compatibility purposes," explains Bill Johnston, Todd-AO's senior VP of engineering for Ascent Media Creative Sound Services. "We started with Stages 1 and 2, and have been very happy with Euphonix ever since. Last year, we added a System 5 to Stage 7. With the addition of Stages 3 and 4, this will complete our project."
Johnston considers the Euphonix console's I/O architecture as well as the PatchNet routing system to be key among the System 5's many attributes.
"The MADI flexibility was very important to us," he notes. "By having 12-in and 12-out MADI on the system, we're able to split out our I/O, so that all inputs show up on both of the console's engines. With the System 5's PatchNet system, it's very easy to configure your signal routing requirements and the system integrates well with Soundmaster's ION studio operating environment."
All five Todd-AO West consoles are dual-engine models with 32 faders per side.
"There's a simplicity of design to the System 5 we really like," says Johnson. "This, combined with an excellent display screen and metering system, makes it very easy to keep track of what's going on. It's easy to gain access to and track the hundreds of signals being mixed."