# End of Intermission (Chimes)



## scoreed

Our recall amp recently blew and had to be replaced, after searching for the old model our stage manager decided to buy a different amp. However this amp requires you to press chimes each time you would like the bell to sound so to recall the audience after intermission we are required to sit and continually press this button. We have decided that this is impractical so we have decided to create a CD with the different chimes and play that through the amp. Does anybody know where free digital files of the chime SFX can be found? I have searched Google for the last half hour and have found nothing


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## Studio

If you have a mac look around in iMovie sound effects and garrageband.

Or you could try here freesound :: home page


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## shiben

Record your own. Download some free audio software, record some chiming noises, then burn them to a CD.


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## museav

Maybe I'm just not understanding. Finding the sounds, burning a CD, putting it in the CD player, selecting the right track, starting the CD, etc. is easier than having to push a button? And why do you need to push the button for any length of time, are you trying to play the chimes multiple times?

If you can tell us the equipment involved and what you are trying to do then maybe someone can come up with another option as well.


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## venuetech

Perhaps you could explain how the old amp operated.
I take it that you set some sort of timer for the length of intermission and it automatically chimed the audience back in?


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## Les

Most audience recall chimes I have worked with would ding when you pressed the button, and by holding the button down, it would ding about once per second until you let off. Maybe this is what scoreed is after?

Usually the only times we would chime at my community theatre were 5, 3 and 1 minute warnings.


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## Studio

At my theater we shut of the outer ring of lights, and then dim the lights a few times, then fade to black, and start the show.


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## Les

Studio said:


> At my theater we shut of the outer ring of lights, and then dim the lights a few times, then fade to black, and start the show.



Absolutely no offense intended, but in most cases I find flashing lights, etc a little tacky (and sometimes disorienting). But I suppose that if one doesn't have a chime it isn't a bad alternative. Your procedure of systematically fading out groups of lights is a lot better than the alternative below:

One time I was running lights for a dance show and at the 1 minute warning during intermission the stage manager/dance instructor said "okay, go ahead and flash the house lights a few times". Ugh, noooo.

The ding is far superior of course, and patrons always get the hint. [Otherwise some might just think someone is playing with the lights or there are some weird power surges going on]. 

My high school (graduated in 04) had an "Audience Recall Chime" that we never used. Why? Because it sounded like a foghorn! $9mil space and we ended up with a chime that went WHOOOOOMPHH!!!


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## Studio

Les said:


> Absolutely no offense intended, but in most cases I find flashing lights, etc a little tacky (and sometimes disorienting).
> The ding is far superior of course, and patrons always get the hint. [Otherwise some might just think someone is playing with the lights or there are some weird power surges going on].



I totally agree that flashes are bad, however the shutting off of the outer florescent, leaving only flood light style bulbs lowers the room's light level a ton and people seem to get it.

So I guess what I am saying is try fading out parts of the house and see if the room gets a lot dimmer, and audiences seem to get it.


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## Les

Studio said:


> I totally agree that flashes are bad, however the shutting off of the outer florescent, leaving only flood light style bulbs lowers the room's light level a ton and people seem to get it.
> 
> So I guess what I am saying is try fading out parts of the house and see if the room gets a lot dimmer, and audiences seem to get it.



Sounds like a good workaround given the equipment available. By far better than repeatedly bumping houselights to full from 60% (which is usually what I keep the house at for preshow/intermission). I refuse to do that because it seems so unprofessional and 'Disco Dan' like.


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## derekleffew

Les said:


> ... By far better than repeatedly bumping houselights to full from 60% ... I refuse to do that because it seems so unprofessional and 'Disco Dan' like.


Not to mention it's not the audience members IN the auditorium who need to be alerted to the end of the intermission, it's the people in the lobby!


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## museav

Les said:


> Most audience recall chimes I have worked with would ding when you pressed the button, and by holding the button down, it would ding about once per second until you let off. Maybe this is what scoreed is after?


Except he mentioned that it does chime when they push the button and that they currently do have to hold it, it almost sounded like the previous system somehow chimed at the proper time without them doing anything.

I'm designing a community theater right now and I'm using the old, reliable TOA 900 series mixer amps with a program input and a chime module for the Lobbies. Depending on the input used the chime module can play the tones once for every button push, even of held down, or continuously for as long as you hold the button down. Via jumpers on the module you can also select from eight different tones. In this case I am running the button to a control system and having that trigger the chimes so you could actually program the control system and chime module to have a button push to play the chimes once, multiple times or for a set time.


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## techfreek

As a back up until you get another system set up, you can do what our theater does (they never installed speakers in the lobby) which is turn the lights off and on a few times in the lobby.


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## rochem

The summerstock theatre I'm currently working at doesn't have any kind of lobby speakers - instead, a few ushers just start ringing bells that they can carry around and everyone gets the message. Might not work in a space that seats 2000+ people, but it works great for our modest sized theatre.


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## museav

I don't think we ever received any clarification on the basic problem. It sounds like they have a button that sounds the chimes and if having to push that button either momentarily or for some set time is not acceptable then having to manually flash lights, ring bells, etc. would seem to likely also be unacceptable.


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## CrisCole

I can't stand using a chime. I don't know about yours, but ours sounds like a Texan-triangle ringing pigs for dinner. It's awful. 

We always dim the lights in the lobby to half, and the lights in the house to three-fourths. Either that, or we play our trademark Entr'acte that's associated with our theatre.


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## marmer

Buy some inexpensive dinner chimes from a percussion dealer (usually less than thirty bucks, with beater.) Have your usher(s) ring them at the specified time. Works great and sounds great in our thousand-seat house. Also, ushers can walk around near concessions, restrooms, etc.


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## JonasA

Marmer and Rochem - love your ideas; this is a problem we have in our 850-seat school auditorium where the audience seems almost scared to go inside and leave the foyer. We've got a bell, but it's annoying and I'm waiting for the day when someone leaves it on by accident and everyone thinks it's a fire alarm and evacuates...


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## marmer

JonasA said:


> Marmer and Rochem - love your ideas; this is a problem we have in our 850-seat school auditorium where the audience seems almost scared to go inside and leave the foyer. We've got a bell, but it's annoying and I'm waiting for the day when someone leaves it on by accident and everyone thinks it's a fire alarm and evacuates...



This is what we use. It sounds lovely, not like a triangle at all, and it's not very expensive.
Trio Zenergy Chime - For Small Hands


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## DrPinto

marmer said:


> This is what we use. It sounds lovely, not like a triangle at all, and it's not very expensive.
> Trio Zenergy Chime - For Small Hands



I like that a lot. Low tech, inexpensive, and effective. I found this on YouTube:


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## tdeater

I am in the process of fitting one of these to our lobby PA system for chimes:
Velleman Single Message Record/Playback Module Kit 320-203
I have a single chime recorded into it right now, and it has an option for a continuous repeated playback by holding the button, or you could record however many seconds of chimes into it. My challenge right now is finding nice clean power to run the thing, other than a battery, but I might just go with the battery to get it running and deal with a power supply later. I am hookign it up to an unused line input on the amp. I got a nice chrome fancy looking push button to mount in the lobby to set off the chimes.


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## Nelson

The simplest power supply you could use is an extra "wall wart" plug-in transformer of the correct voltage. Just find an extra wall wart, make sure it outputs DC, and hook it up.

Did you have any trouble interfacing the module to the amp considering that the module output is speaker-level 8 ohm and the amp input is line-level?


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## tdeater

I haven't actually finished the project yet, but the playback module also has a line out on it. All of the wall wart supplies I have tried so far introduce buzzing power supply noise.


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## macwhiz

tdeater said:


> I haven't actually finished the project yet, but the playback module also has a line out on it. All of the wall wart supplies I have tried so far introduce buzzing power supply noise.



I would try a filtered DC supply, you can get one at radioshack for around $20


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## GradyH

There's another thread talking about this

http://www.controlbooth.com/forums/...audience-intermission-recall-bell-effect.html

In this thread, there's a link to a page with sample tones on it. I found exactly what I was looking for, and there are many, many options to choose from. My theatre has 64 seats, and I would have to go in to the lobby to turn the lights on and off- something I hated, not to mention the light switch is located right next to the theatre entrance. Awkward! Then our house manager decided a bell is the way to go, which was another method that turned my stomach. Found ascending and descending tones on the link below, and added them to my Qlab list. While the intermission bgm is playing, I just hit the cue and these nice, pleasant chimes play clearly above the music and voila! The audience usually gets it. Sometimes I have to hit it again a few minutes later. Now my house loads in about 3 minutes from chimes, rather than 6 or 7 awkward, corralling minutes.

900 Series Special Function Modules

Just add the cue to your list (if possible) and you're all set! No extra anything to buy, set up, or run. Hope this helps.


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## memoguy

Hi All!

I have been told to find a audience call bell system for my theater. They want a standalone system which can be easily activated from both the control both and the intermission waiting area. Just wondering if anyone could recommend anything? I know that there are several DIY solutions (laptop with SFX and PA system), but we are really looking for a fully integrated standalone system. 

Thanks!


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## memoguy

memoguy said:


> Hi All!
> 
> I have been told to find a audience call bell system for my theater. They want a standalone system which can be easily activated from both the control both and the intermission waiting area. Just wondering if anyone could recommend anything? I know that there are several DIY solutions (laptop with SFX and PA system), but we are really looking for a fully integrated standalone system.
> 
> Thanks!



We do have a paging system in the lobby, so if we could find a box with a button on it which would output a bell sound effect via XLR when pressed, then we could plug that into our system.


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## BillConnerFASTC

3 trumpeters and a cell phone.


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## Chris15

I'd go for something like this as the playout solution; http://www.altronics.com.au/index.asp?area=item&id=A1740
Then it's down to getting a pleasant chime to play on it...


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## mikefellh

Sorry to bring this topic back to life after four years, but I've been struggling with this very subject. No one pays attention when I announce through the mic, "please return to your seats", and in the past we have flashed the lights but as someone said that's "tacky" plus it shortens the life of the lights.

Then I thought of doing some chimes with MP3 as suggested earlier in the thread, but that gets too complicated if someone else had to do it.

Then I thought why not just go with a wireless doorbell system...can get one that we can have multiple receivers (bells) that can be triggered by a single transmitter, one bell near the snack area and one bell in the gallery.

And then I can have two transmitters (one in the booth and one at the podium) that will trigger both bells at once.

How's that for a K.I.S.S. solution at 3am in the morning?


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## BillConnerFASTC

I love it.


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## TimMc

These old threads bring back fond memories... in this case seeing posts from Brad Weber (museav) who passed away suddenly a couple years ago. Brad, I miss your help and wisdom...


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## Les

I know this goes against your K.I.S.S. philosophy, but if you ever want to get a little more fancy, I found a good product that is reliable and easy to use. It's called a Large Home Annunciator, and it has several N/O inputs that can be triggered by switches, buttons, motion detectors, etc. You can also record your own MP3's to play when a certain input is triggered. It connects to a sound system via a single RCA connector. You could technically run it through an Aux on your board or just through a monitoring/paging system if you have one.

I don't use it for theatre - I installed one at the office which also has a 4-bay loading dock. I have buttons at the front desk, each dock, the side door, etc, and corresponding tones for each, which I created with the help of an online piano and Audacity. I've had mine online for about two years with no problems.

Of course, you would have to run bell wire (or any type of wire, really) for your buttons, which is where it gets tricky. Just thought I'd throw this out there either way.

The only 'issue' with the unit is that it plays an internal file on boot-up, which says "Where's the kaboom?!" I haven't found a way to turn that off, but ours is tied in to the 70v PA, so I only hear it maybe once a year if we have a power outage. Otherwise it runs 24/7.


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## mikefellh

Les said:


> I know this goes against your K.I.S.S. philosophy, but if you ever want to get a little more fancy, I found a good product that is reliable and easy to use. It's called a Large Home Annunciator, and it has several N/O inputs that can be triggered by switches, buttons, motion detectors, etc. You can also record your own MP3's to play when a certain input is triggered. It connects to a sound system via a single RCA connector. You could technically run it through an Aux on your board or just through a monitoring/paging system if you have one.
> 
> ...
> 
> Of course, you would have to run bell wire (or any type of wire, really) for your buttons, which is where it gets tricky. Just thought I'd throw this out there either way.



And while I was reading through the threads I was thinking of a solution like that (and we already have the wiring in the walls if I make use of the pre-existing Kodak carousel projector remote wall sockets we no longer use), but as I was reading all the posts from several messages the wireless doorbell idea popped into my head...with anything that can tie into a mixer the volume may be adjusted, or the channel muted...with the wireless doorbells I set the volume at the unit for each area, and they will stay at that volume no matter what.

Anyway, I already ordered a wireless doorbell set with three receivers and two transmitters.


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