is room tone real?

[themanwhoknows]

I was wondering about how sometimes in the beginning of a lot of movies before there is any audio at all, and maybe the production logos are shown, you hear a room tone. Was that intentionally put in, or is that just the sound coming from the speakers when there is no audio?

[dougspice]

I think maybe you're misusing the term "room tone"? There are movies that begin playing audio over the production company logos, but I'm not sure I'd call that room tone. I guess I'm not clear on what your question is.

[SMuir]

Well... by definition you'll always hear "room tone" before a movie starts or at any other time you're in a room that hasn't been specially disigned to absorb all sound. If what you're hearing is actually coming out of the speakers, it could be a number of things: noise produced by the amplifier, RF noise picked up by the audio cabling, noise from the playback equipment (especially if it's analogue), or noise from any number of sources that wound up on the master recording itself. On top of that, "room tones" and "atmospheres" are important elements in sound design, so they may have been cut in there by the sound editors for any of a number of practical or creative reasons.

Is there a particular film where you noticed this phenomenon, and under what conditions (eg. DVD, 16mm, 35mm, theater, home theater, lecture hall) did you experience it?

[tyreeford]

That's not room tone. That's the residual noise of your system.
Room tone is specifically recorded on location during shooting so that dialog can be edited without audible differences.

Regards,

Ty Ford