K.I.T.T.'s voice box.

Andela · Post by **Andela** » Thu Dec 30, 2004 10:43 am

You only see K.I.T.T.'s voice box from a distance in three episodes. Was it really that hard to work out? In Knight Of The Drones and Ten Wheel Trouble it's not even following what K.I.T.T. is saying. But the one in The Rotten Apples is real good.

MIKEMAC · Post by **MIKEMAC** » Thu Dec 30, 2004 11:45 am

Actully I just watched Kitt vs Karr and the part were Karr gets Mandy to get in the car and it's all black inside and when Karr closed the door if you look at the far left you can see Karr talking with the voice box insync before the camera goes to his voice display when he says "I'm afriad he couldn't make it" so there were good on that part at least.

KOPP · Post by **KOPP** » Thu Dec 30, 2004 2:43 pm

KITT or KARR's voices were added in post-production, which means that the actors, when pretending to hear the car's voice, were actually listening to nothing. The voicebox would have to be perfectly synchronized with something that would be added later, and would thereby be expensive and difficult. To simply have the KITT talk on set, and recording what was being said through a microphone would mean that KITT or KARR's voice would have a very bad sound quality. If you watch "Trust Doesn't Rust," in the scene where KARR tells the Rev and the other dude that he needs repairs, you can see the light of a flashing light on his seats that is supposed to represent the light from his voicebox. You will also notice that the flashes are not in sync with KARR's voice.

MIKEMAC · Post by **MIKEMAC** » Thu Dec 30, 2004 3:58 pm

That's true. I forgot about that part, it always cracked me up.

Lost Knight · Post by **Lost Knight** » Thu Dec 30, 2004 4:11 pm

The episode "Hills Of Fire" shows K.I.T.T.'s voice modulator from a different angle as well. More specifically, the part where the bum is trying to withdraw money from an ATM machine and KITT asks him what he's doing. The modulator doesn't look quite in sync with KITT's voice, but at the angle the camera is at, the display does not look as effective as staring at it head-on. It's kind of the same thing if you look at the numbers on a calculator holding it at a different angle; the numbers appear to fade, but looking straight at it they are normal. This may have been the case in other episodes. So in "Hills Of Fire," while it may not have looked like the modulator was working properly, it actually was.

Andela · Post by **Andela** » Thu Dec 30, 2004 6:04 pm

KOPP wrote:KITT or KARR's voices were added in post-production, which means that the actors, when pretending to hear the car's voice, were actually listening to nothing. The voicebox would have to be perfectly synchronized with something that would be added later, and would thereby be expensive and difficult. To simply have the KITT talk on set, and recording what was being said through a microphone would mean that KITT or KARR's voice would have a very bad sound quality. If you watch "Trust Doesn't Rust," in the scene where KARR tells the Rev and the other dude that he needs repairs, you can see the light of a flashing light on his seats that is supposed to represent the light from his voicebox. You will also notice that the flashes are not in sync with KARR's voice.

It's a red light, K.A.R.R.s voice box is yellow. It must be a varning signal of something like that.

KOPP · Post by **KOPP** » Thu Dec 30, 2004 9:36 pm

The flashing light was kinda yellow; any yellow light that's shown from a distance and in the dark with the kind of film that they had in the early-to-mid 1980's looks reddish, but it looked yellow to me. Sort of a dark yellow. But I don't want to argue, let's move on, shall we?

Andela · Post by **Andela** » Sat Jan 01, 2005 8:58 am

I've noticed one more. In Custom Made Killer when K.I.T.T. stands on the street. It's probably the best one. How could I forget that one?

Garthe Knight · Post by **Garthe Knight** » Sat Jan 01, 2005 2:49 pm

KOPP wrote:The flashing light was kinda yellow; any yellow light that's shown from a distance and in the dark with the kind of film that they had in the early-to-mid 1980's looks reddish, but it looked yellow to me. Sort of a dark yellow. But I don't want to argue, let's move on, shall we?

It was a red light. And the light was red because it was Kitt's voice box.
For TDR they never build a KARR car with a KARR dash, so whenever you see the car it's one they used for KITT. The yellow voice box was only build on a piece of wood and these scenes were shot seperately.

For KITT vs KARR they changed the voicebox in the car, because KITT now had the new dash.

Oh, and by the way...what does the driver say when he leaves your car?
"Mach den KOPP zu?"

Sorry, no offensive. Just a joke

Reissuleipa · Post by **Reissuleipa** » Sat Jan 01, 2005 3:32 pm

OK, enough about the mistakes in the "voicebox scenes". Let's get some discussion going on about what people think is their favourite voicebox of the series.

The candidates are of course the flashing red rectangle voicebox in the 1st season KITT. Then there is the 1st/2nd seasons voicemodulator with the three dotted lines going up and down (sometimes even in synch with the speech

). There is also the slightly altered 3rd/4th season voicebox, this time with more dots or what the hell they are called. And last but not least there is the yellow voicebox that KARR had that was quite similar to KITT's 1st/2nd season box.

For me personally, the best of them all is the 3rd/4th season voicebox with the earlier 1st/2nd season version a close second. I really didn't like KARR's scanner that much but it is way better than the really lame voicebox that KITT had in the first episodes of the series.

Also, I like the 3rd season model of the car itself best, but the discussion about this should be in another thread so nothing more about that....

corlando52 · Post by **corlando52** » Sat Jan 01, 2005 5:47 pm

From what I've heard, there was a script person off screen reading KITT's lines into a microphone that would make the voicebox respond in kind. This was done during filming and later William Daniels would dub in his voice over the script person's. This would allow David to react and at the same time have the voicebox work similar to what you'd expect.
Later on, when they had a lot of c/u of the voicebox, they would just used any take and dub Mr. Daniel's voice over that. That's why, in a lot of the later ones, it didn't match well. But that's just what I understood to be the MO of KR.
As for my favorite voice box, it's got to be Second Season. I've made my own and you can see it here:

http://home.att.net/~corlando52/kittvoxsound.wmv
Chris

TurbomanKnight · Post by **TurbomanKnight** » Sat Jan 01, 2005 7:00 pm

Reissuleipa wrote:. this time with more dots or what the hell they are called. .

L.E.D.S. man

KOPP · Post by **KOPP** » Sat Jan 01, 2005 9:17 pm

"Mach den KOPP zu?" I don't get it. I'm sure it would be a good joke, if only my slow mind would catch on...I have a hard time "getting" jokes, for some reason.

Reissuleipa · Post by **Reissuleipa** » Sun Jan 02, 2005 1:38 pm

Thanks for the info TurbomanKnight

Garthe Knight · Post by **Garthe Knight** » Wed Jan 05, 2005 4:39 pm

KOPP wrote:"Mach den KOPP zu?" I don't get it. I'm sure it would be a good joke, if only my slow mind would catch on...I have a hard time "getting" jokes, for some reason.

Well....KOPP is a german slang word for "kopf", means "head".
So "mach den Kopp zu" means "close the head" which means "stop talking".
but in your case it also means "close KOPP (doors or something)". It loses during translation

Sorry, I couldn't resist, I find it funny. Never mind.

rhdaussiekitt · Post by **rhdaussiekitt** » Thu Jan 06, 2005 11:10 am

ive always been a fan of the pilot voice box

KITTfan · Post by **KITTfan** » Thu Jan 06, 2005 1:06 pm

I too like the solid red voicebox, look at my avatar...

-KITTfan-

Lost Knight · Post by **Lost Knight** » Thu Jan 06, 2005 4:00 pm

I'm a fan of the season 4 voice box as well as the season 4 dashboard. Even though the only difference between that one and the season 3 box is the word "Cruise" removed from Normal Mode. To me I guess it's more pyschologically satisfying knowing that every function K.I.T.T. had (aside from the ones never used again, namely season 2's) was included in the season 4 dash, including the "C" button.

Reissuleipa · Post by **Reissuleipa** » Fri Jan 07, 2005 2:36 pm

Yeah that C-button was a nice add-on, but how exactly can a T-top be converted into a convertible and still keep the T-top?!! But then again, how is Turbo Boost possible...

Post by **neps** » Sat Jan 08, 2005 10:39 am

I'm a fan of the fourth season box as well, I just find it more visually stimulating. And can't the season 1 box give some people headaches from blinking to much?

I used to think I liked the 4th season dashes better as well, but any forth season dash I saw in person didn't feel right. In person I liked the first season dash much better. Maybe if I was to ever do my replica I'd do some hybrid.

KOPP · Post by **KOPP** » Sat Jan 08, 2005 4:15 pm

Hey, Garth Knight, I thought your KOPP comment was funny! It was also just cool to hear someone else talk about my car that I will (hopefully) build someday...

Paul · Post by **Paul** » Sat Jan 08, 2005 11:01 pm

Definitely the season 3-4 dash/voice box, and it's slightly lesser season 1-2 "prototype." See avatar.

Having just watched the beginning of season 1 again on DVD, somehow the original flashing box just doesn't look right.

Speaking of which, when I first saw Trust Doesn't Rust, I always wondered why KARR had a cooler looking voice box than KITT. Since KARR was the first and KITT was essentially a carbon copy of him (at least visually) if KITT had a red flashing light, shouldn't KARR have had a yellow flashing light?

Lost Knight · Post by **Lost Knight** » Mon Jan 10, 2005 3:05 am

I've thought the same thing myself before, Paul. K.A.R.R. is the prototype and has the more advanced looking voice modulator, so why would the newer model have a less high-tech modulator? My guess is that K.I.T.T. wasn't fully completed in "Knight Of the Phoenix" (and wasn't completely updated until 12 episodes after the pilot [nor the semi]) and as a result of the "rush job" the F.L.A.G. engineers were forced to do on the Knight 2000.

Granted, you could say that KITT never was fully completed because he always received upgrades, but I mean more in terms of being completed officially. I think a lot of ideas were first incorporated in KARR but the FLAG engineers weren't able to incorporate all of them in the deadline they had been given (probably because of the anticipation of Wilton Knight's death), and one of these features was a more high-tech modulator.

K.I.T.T.'s voice box.

K.I.T.T.'s voice box.

My 2 cents

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