[Arkansan Raider]

Pass the popcorn, please.

---Jeff

[geoff]

William Sommerwerck wrote:
"geoff" wrote in message
...
William Sommerwerck wrote:

I started watching the "collector's" cut of "Avatar" last night,
after having watched the terrific Blu-ray of "King Kong". (The
films are thematically similar.)

The dialog sounded rather distant and lacking in presence. Raising
the overall level a few dB fixed this, without causing the music and
effects to be unduly loud. (I do not use a Dialog speaker, and I
don't generally have this "problem" with other films.)

Would anyone care to comment on this?

Clearly the 5.1 soundtrack is mixed to necessarily use the CF
speaker. You either need to invest in a real 5.1 system, or listen
tio a 2-channel soundtrack (or downmix), for this and many other
current movies.

It's amazing that, no matter how many times I repeat it, no one pays
attention to what I actually said (above).

People did, and offered the explanation that Avatar is unfortunately mixed
in a manner requiring a CF channel.

It is a fault of Avatar, but given the content of the dialogue , is barely
important.

geoff

[geoff]

William Sommerwerck wrote:
"Ty Ford" wrote in message
al.NET...
On Sat, 31 Dec 2011 11:43:51 -0500, William Sommerwerck wrote
(in article ):
with the center missing?

How stupid could I be, Scott?

No, the system is configured for no Dialog speaker -- center front
is split through left and right front.

Will,

I don't think Scott was saying you were stupid. The pinwheel of
different multitrack PB options on my receiver amp do amazing things
to plain old dialog. If you have one, give it a spin and see if
another seting works better.

I'm not sure what you're talking about. All my equipment -- including
my SACD player -- is set for four large speakers, no Dialog speaker,
and separate woofer. There are not alternative options for my speaker
setup.

Apart from maybe purchasing an addtional speaker (etc), if you wish to take
advantage of the way 5 (and the .1 if you wish) was intended.

Me - I'm sticking with a simple 2.

geoff

geoff

[William Sommerwerck]

"None" wrote in message
...

You're trying to play 5.x material on a 4.x system. Numerous
suggestions have been given, including deploying a center
channel speaker, and learning how to adjust the settings on you
(very good, of course, very good) equipment. But you just don't
seem to get it.

No, YOU don't get it.

My question was about why A SMALL NUMBER of recordings didn't sound right. I
spelled this out in so many words, but most readers ignored it. Only a few
bothered to read what I actually wrote, and gave insightful answers.

READ THE ORIGINAL POSTING.

[hank alrich]

William Sommerwerck wrote:

"None" wrote in message
...

You're trying to play 5.x material on a 4.x system. Numerous
suggestions have been given, including deploying a center
channel speaker, and learning how to adjust the settings on you
(very good, of course, very good) equipment. But you just don't
seem to get it.

No, YOU don't get it.

My question was about why A SMALL NUMBER of recordings didn't sound right. I
spelled this out in so many words, but most readers ignored it. Only a few
bothered to read what I actually wrote, and gave insightful answers.

READ THE ORIGINAL POSTING.

Read the replies....

You are ASSuming that that small number of recording were mixed the same
as others, and even the same as each other. You are meeting the result
often met by assumption.

--
shut up and play your guitar * http://hankalrich.com/
http://www.youtube.com/walkinaymusic
http://www.sonicbids.com/HankandShaidri

[William Sommerwerck]

"hank alrich" wrote in message
...
William Sommerwerck wrote:

"None" wrote in message
...

You're trying to play 5.x material on a 4.x system. Numerous
suggestions have been given, including deploying a center
channel speaker, and learning how to adjust the settings on you
(very good, of course, very good) equipment. But you just don't
seem to get it.

No, YOU don't get it.

My question was about why A SMALL NUMBER of recordings didn't sound
right. I
spelled this out in so many words, but most readers ignored it. Only a
few
bothered to read what I actually wrote, and gave insightful answers.

READ THE ORIGINAL POSTING.

Read the replies....

You are ASSuming that that small number of recording were mixed the same
as others, and even the same as each other. You are meeting the result
often met by assumption.

I was assuming no such thing. I asked for comments on my observation that a
handful of mixes just didn't sound right. Several people understand exactly
what I was asking, and responded accordingly.

[Scott Dorsey]

Clearly the 5.1 soundtrack is mixed to necessarily use the CF speaker.
You either need to invest in a real 5.1 system, or listen tio a 2-channel
soundtrack (or downmix), for this and many other current movies.

It's amazing that, no matter how many times I repeat it, no one pays
attention to what I actually said (above).

There is some discussion of how panning changes when you change the number
of speakers on page 215 ("Loudspeaker behaviour in rooms") of _Loudspeakers
for Music Recording and Reproduction_ by Philip Newell and Keith Holland.
Incidentally this is by far the best overall book on monitoring systems that
I have ever read.
--scott


--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[Frank Stearns]

"William Sommerwerck" writes:

- snips -

You are ASSuming that that small number of recording were mixed the same
as others, and even the same as each other. You are meeting the result
often met by assumption.

I was assuming no such thing. I asked for comments on my observation that a
handful of mixes just didn't sound right. Several people understand exactly


For a number of reasons not really relevant to the discussion, I rarely watch movies
in the mix room here because setting up the appropriate video playback is a PIA
(and, frankly, I tend to think of video like a lot a video guys think of audio -- a
necessary annoyance in my sound-centric existence w).

But recently I've watched a couple of movies in the room, and might do a few more,
just to see what the movie mixes sound like in what can be a very revealing forensic
environment. (I do go to movie theaters now and then but they're often so damned
loud that I bring my 30 dB shop earplugs, and that messes with HF.)

What I've noticed with movie playback in the room here is that some dialog seems
sonically poor: sprectrally imbalanced EQ, sub-optimal microphone location
for the voice, poorly adjusted gating, etc.

The music will often sound good, but the dialog sometimes seems murky compared to
the vocal quality and clarity I get putting together solos and choirs in music
productions. With some dialog on newer movies, I keep wanting to do a wide-Q, -2dB
or -3dB @ 300, or so.

It's usually the animation guys who really seem to understand how to get good and
sometimes even stunning dialog, perhaps because it's where they start and dialog is
such a critical element of their productions. (Sometimes the clarity is over the
top in its cartoonishness -- no pun, honest -- but whew, talk about clarity and no
distraction from sub-optimal room tone.)

Particularly with room tone, stage or location, is seems possible that some of the
film/tv guys forget that at least for home use, they're shoe-horning the original
room tone into another room (and this includes an ADR room that might not have
sufficient treatment). And while that room tone (reverb) might be 40 or 50 dB down,
it ought to be way lower to maintain cleanliness all the way through.

If the scene calls for reverb, might be better to start with a super dry track and
reconstruct the reverb that's needed, but then also tailor that reverb so as not to
mess with intelligibility.

If it's concert-hall reverb, not such a big deal; nothing is really correlated
between that really big room and the small living rooom. But take the short decay
reverb of one relatively small room and push it into another (untreated) small room
and yeah, you can have clarity issues, especially in that low mid area.

Anyway, I'm up to $0.04 on this now.

Frank
Mobile Audio
--

[William Sommerwerck]

"Frank Stearns" wrote in message
acquisition...

What I've noticed with movie playback in the room here is that some dialog
seems sonically poor: sprectrally imbalanced EQ, sub-optimal microphone
location for the voice, poorly adjusted gating, etc.

The music will often sound good, but the dialog sometimes seems murky
compared to the vocal quality and clarity I get putting together solos and
choirs in music productions. With some dialog on newer movies, I keep
wanting to do a wide-Q, -2dB or -3dB @ 300, or so.

That's a pretty accurate description of what I thought I heard.

We might even discuss the "fact" that dialog is sometime more understandable
on cheap equipment. I noticed that decades ago, and have never figured it
out.

[Les Cargill[_4_]]

William Sommerwerck wrote:
"Frank wrote in message
acquisition...

What I've noticed with movie playback in the room here is that some dialog
seems sonically poor: sprectrally imbalanced EQ, sub-optimal microphone
location for the voice, poorly adjusted gating, etc.

The music will often sound good, but the dialog sometimes seems murky
compared to the vocal quality and clarity I get putting together solos and
choirs in music productions. With some dialog on newer movies, I keep
wanting to do a wide-Q, -2dB or -3dB @ 300, or so.

That's a pretty accurate description of what I thought I heard.

We might even discuss the "fact" that dialog is sometime more understandable
on cheap equipment. I noticed that decades ago, and have never figured it
out.




Distortion and bandlimiting can improve intelligibility. Think of
a megaphone...

--
Les Cargill

[John Williamson]

William Sommerwerck wrote:

We might even discuss the "fact" that dialog is sometime more understandable
on cheap equipment. I noticed that decades ago, and have never figured it
out.


Restricted response, tailored by the maker of the equipment for
intelligibility? The extreme being the phone system.

The cheaper the gear I listen on, in general, the clearer the vocals on
songs become, while the bass and treble disappear.

--
Tciao for Now!

John.

[Ty Ford]

On Sun, 1 Jan 2012 18:38:02 -0500, Marc Wielage wrote
(in article ):

The problem is endemic to the business. Many, many, MANY films are mixed in
such a way that their dynamic range is too wide for home video. This has
been an issue for a decade or more.

I wrote about it in a trade mag article years ago. The BOOM of explosions
versus intimate dialog had home DVD viewers diving for their remotes.

At Skywalker, their mixing stages were so quiet it made sense, but the
ambient noise in most homes was high enough to mask the dialog unless you
turned it up . Then the explosions would kill you.

Same problem with classical music stations and car radios. Set the level for
the 1812 overture so you could hear the quiet parts and when the cannons went
off it blew the doors right off you're BMW.

This is a bit different, though. I think it's more about the many different
ways the receiver can be made to output the sound and that lack of center
channel. We skipped the sub-woofer in our living room, but don't really miss
the big lows.

Regards,

Ty Ford


--Audio Equipment Reviews Audio Production Services
Acting and Voiceover Demos http://www.tyford.com
Guitar player?:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yWaPRHMGhGA

[Arny Krueger[_4_]]

"William Sommerwerck" wrote in message
...
"Peter Larsen" wrote in message
k...
William Sommerwerck wrote:

I started watching the "collector's" cut of "Avatar" last night, after
having watched the terrific Blu-ray of "King Kong". (The films are
thematically similar.)

The dialog sounded rather distant and lacking in presence. Raising
the overall level a few dB fixed this, without causing the music and
effects to be unduly loud. (I do not use a Dialog speaker, and
I don't generally have this "problem" with other films.)

Would anyone care to comment on this?

1) Deploy a center-speaker, say something KEF Coax.
2) After setup eq it + 2dB, q1.4 at 2.5 kHz

1) There is no room for a center speaker in front of my display.

Usually, the center speaker ends up being above or below the display.
Those people with acoustically-transparent screens can put the center
speaker behind the screen.

The big advantage of the center speaker is that it makes the system more
tolerant of things like this. For years I used a center channel speaker with
my 2-channel system for that reason.

2) As I said, this problem does not generally occur with other films.

Given that raising the level a few dB "fixed" it, it must not have been all
that severe. It was probably more a matter of taste than actual
functionality.

If I wanted to be really critical, I could probably find something wrong
with every mix and/or mastering of everything I ever listen to. However
I've been around long enough to know that just because people don't do
things *exactly* my way, I don't necessarily have good reason to complain.

[Frank Stearns]

Ty Ford writes:

On Mon, 2 Jan 2012 12:42:17 -0500, Frank Stearns wrote
(in article isition):

The music will often sound good, but the dialog sometimes seems murky
compared to the vocal quality and clarity I get putting together solos and
choirs in music productions. With some dialog on newer movies, I keep wanting

to do a wide-Q, -2dB or -3dB @ 300, or so.

Something else not mentioned here is the speaking level of the actors. The
digital age seems to have allowed morre mumbling (big name) actors to make a
living. There's only so much you can do to dig them out of the mud.

Or their wardrobe literally gets in the way. Caps or hats with brims can
really make a mess out of dialog.


Good points.

Something else, too. Perhaps the digital age has made some mixers a wee bit lazy. In
the olden days, with system noise and other fidelity limits throughout the signal
chain, the audio folks had far less to work with from the start. They had to be
extra vigilant about levels and tonality.

These days you can degrade a bit and in your mix room, no harm, no foul -- your
monitoring gives things a pass. Unless you're very experienced -- or perhaps have a
musical ear that might be well-applied to getting the proper tonality from speech
*for the application* -- you don't really hear the potential problems, at that
point.

But start stacking all the various little issues that have been noted in this thread
and at the far end of the chain you might cause some annoyances or outright
problems.

Frank
Mobile Audio
--

[Marc Wielage[_2_]]

On Sun, 1 Jan 2012 18:21:11 -0800, William Sommerwerck wrote
(in article ):

I don't altogether follow. If the Dialog speaker is used solely for dialog,
and Lf/Rf solely for music/effects, how would splitting the dialog to Lf/Rf
create phasing effects?
------------------------------snip------------------------------

Because the center channel speaker doesn't just carry dialog. There's all
kinds of music and effects going on there, too.

You have to grasp that just because a 4-speaker system works for you doesn't
mean the industry follows this convention. Everything you hear will always
be compromised, and you'll never hear what you're supposed to hear using this
method. The center channel speaker is, in many ways, the most important in
the entire mix.

Read Tom Holman's book on surround:

SURROUND SOUND: UP AND RUNNING
by Tomlinson Holman
published by Focal Press [ISBN #0240808290]

This will explain in more detail why what you're attempting will not work.

--MFW

[Marc Wielage[_2_]]

On Mon, 2 Jan 2012 09:14:43 -0800, Scott Dorsey wrote
(in article ):

There is some discussion of how panning changes when you change the number
of speakers on page 215 ("Loudspeaker behaviour in rooms") of _Loudspeakers
for Music Recording and Reproduction_ by Philip Newell and Keith Holland.
Incidentally this is by far the best overall book on monitoring systems that
I have ever read.
------------------------------snip------------------------------

There's a newer book that I think is better:

Sound Reproduction:
The Acoustics and Psychoacoustics of Loudspeakers and Rooms
by Floyd Toole
published by Focal Press [ISBN #0240520092]

Very, very interesting book, both on loudspeakers and acoustics. Surround is
a big part of Dr. Toole's discussion, and he also covers issues like panning,
phase cancellations, listener position, and other sonic problems that come up
with surround sound.

--MFW

[Marc Wielage[_2_]]

On Mon, 2 Jan 2012 10:23:35 -0800, Ty Ford wrote
(in article ET):

Something else not mentioned here is the speaking level of the actors.
The digital age seems to have allowed morre mumbling (big name) actors
to make a living. There's only so much you can do to dig them out of
the mud.
------------------------------snip------------------------------

Yes, that's very true. But note that much of the dialog on AVATAR was
looped, especially the CG motion-capture creatures. So that was all done in
a studio.

I think there's been a trend in recent years to try to salvage original
production sound at all costs, regardless of background noise, camera noise,
compromised microphone positions, and so on. In some cases, things like
iZotope can kill background noise to the point where the dialog is audible,
but it's often less then optimum. I hear this a lot on TV shows; the miracle
to me is that it sounds as good as it does.

--MFW

[Ty Ford]

On Mon, 2 Jan 2012 19:05:13 -0500, Marc Wielage wrote
(in article ):

Yes, that's very true. But note that much of the dialog on AVATAR was
looped, especially the CG motion-capture creatures. So that was all done in
a studio.

but could still have been done too low.

Regards,

Ty Ford

--Audio Equipment Reviews Audio Production Services
Acting and Voiceover Demos http://www.tyford.com
Guitar player?:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yWaPRHMGhGA

[Ron Capik[_3_]]

On 1/2/2012 8:17 PM, Ty Ford wrote:
On Mon, 2 Jan 2012 19:05:13 -0500, Marc Wielage wrote
(in ews.com):

Yes, that's very true. But note that much of the dialog on AVATAR was
looped, especially the CG motion-capture creatures. So that was all done in
a studio.

but could still have been done too low.

Regards,

Ty Ford

--Audio Equipment Reviews Audio Production Services
Acting and Voiceover Demos http://www.tyford.com
Guitar player?:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yWaPRHMGhGA

Or maybe more properly limiting:
" but could still have been done too low" for some
home viewing environments.

Later...
Ron Capik
--

[geoff]

Frank Stearns wrote:
Good points.

Something else, too. Perhaps the digital age has made some mixers a
wee bit lazy.


Or maybe they are mixing with the assumption that most listeners have the
current SOTA equipment - stereo or 5.1 .

It would never even occur to them the possibility that people still had
quadraphonic setups (or did many, ever ?).

geoff

[Frank Stearns]

"geoff" writes:

Frank Stearns wrote:
Good points.

Something else, too. Perhaps the digital age has made some mixers a
wee bit lazy.


Or maybe they are mixing with the assumption that most listeners have the
current SOTA equipment - stereo or 5.1 .

It would never even occur to them the possibility that people still had
quadraphonic setups (or did many, ever ?).


What I've found odd in a few cases is how incongruent movie audio elements can
sound.

For example, perhaps the elegant meal, with beautifully colorful vegetables
sparkling with freshness, and meats, steaming with perfection (the music), are
accompanied by a big lump of cold, day-old oatmeal right in the middle of the plate
(the dialog).

In some instances the music is hi-fi while the dialog is mid- or even lo-fi, and
this transcends whether it's stereo or 5.1 or even some other downmix.

Makes me wonder whether there's any concern or even an ear aware of the "music" of
speech, and how it ought to be crafted as carefully as the music mixers handle their
stuff (assuming, of course, the music mix is good -- been some weird stuff in that
realm of movie sound as well).

"But hey," the dialog mixer might say, "it's just talking; as long as you can
understand it, so what?"

Welllll, methinks I want the tonality of those voices to be more considered and
nuanced to maximize their "music," just like a superb music mix has had all its
elements carefully crafted -- but that's just me.

Frank
Mobile Audio

--

[Peter Larsen[_3_]]

Marc Wielage wrote:

On Sun, 1 Jan 2012 18:21:11 -0800, William Sommerwerck wrote
(in article ):

I don't altogether follow. If the Dialog speaker is used solely for
dialog, and Lf/Rf solely for music/effects, how would splitting the
dialog to Lf/Rf create phasing effects?
------------------------------snip------------------------------

Because the center channel speaker doesn't just carry dialog.
There's all kinds of music and effects going on there, too.

You have to grasp that just because a 4-speaker system works for you
doesn't mean the industry follows this convention. Everything you
hear will always be compromised, and you'll never hear what you're
supposed to hear using this method. The center channel speaker is,
in many ways, the most important in the entire mix.

Exactly that was my observation when addressing this problem on the
mentioned (very good!) Yamaha + Klipsch setup, spatial perspective got
right, room ambience realistic and a wealth of detail got audible. It went
from "being at the movie" to "being in the movie".

If we take this to the direct vs. reflected considerations the fact that 4
planars are used suggests - depending on whether there is absorbing baffles
behind them or or the wall behind hem - that the actual system has a larger
amount of reflected energy present in the room than a conventional
loudspeakers have.

A dedidated sub for the low frequency effects channel may btw. also add
clarity even if using a sub is not indicated - or even would be
detrimental - for stereo playback.

Kind regards

Peter Larsen


Read Tom Holman's book on surround:

SURROUND SOUND: UP AND RUNNING
by Tomlinson Holman
published by Focal Press [ISBN #0240808290]

This will explain in more detail why what you're attempting will not
work.

--MFW

[Peter Larsen[_3_]]

Frank Stearns wrote:

Makes me wonder whether there's any concern or even an ear aware of
the "music" of speech, and how it ought to be crafted as carefully as
the music mixers handle their stuff (assuming, of course, the music
mix is good -- been some weird stuff in that realm of movie sound as
well).

My age-old Decca stereo test record comes to mind, imo it is actually
colored but it has also precense not as a coloration but as intended, ie. as
"being there". And who but Decca could come up with including as well
concert grand dropping as feather dropping in a realism test?

Frank
Mobile Audio

Kind regards

Peter Larsen

[William Sommerwerck]

"geoff" wrote in message
...
Frank Stearns wrote:

Something else, too. Perhaps the digital age has made some mixers a
wee bit lazy.

Or maybe they are mixing with the assumption that most listeners have the
current SOTA equipment - stereo or 5.1 .

It would never even occur to them the possibility that people still had
quadraphonic setups (or did many, ever ?).

Few audiophiles did. I have, since 1970.

When SACD came in, I altered my layout to the IRT configuration -- and
discovered what I'd been doing wrong. At least with respect to ambience, the
brain responds most strongly to lateral sound -- so the "rear" speakers
should actually be at the sides, and only slightly behind the listener. This
effected a big improvement.

The overwhelming majority of home systems have a Dialog speaker. Why should
the mixologists worry about whether the mix works correctly when there is no
Dialog speaker?

[Peter Larsen[_3_]]

William Sommerwerck wrote:

The overwhelming majority of home systems have a Dialog speaker. Why
should the mixologists worry about whether the mix works correctly
when there is no Dialog speaker?

In my opinion too few mixes get checked in mono, I recall someone explaining
that with the increased detail audibility of a 5.1 mix mixing had gotten a
lot less critical.

Kind regards

Peter Larsen

[Arny Krueger[_4_]]

"William Sommerwerck" wrote in message
...
"geoff" wrote in message
...
Frank Stearns wrote:

Something else, too. Perhaps the digital age has made some mixers a
wee bit lazy.

Or maybe they are mixing with the assumption that most listeners have the
current SOTA equipment - stereo or 5.1 .

IOW, systems with a center channel.

It would never even occur to them the possibility that people still had
quadraphonic setups (or did many, ever ?).

Few audiophiles did. I have, since 1970.

Most of us figured out that 4 speakers is generally suboptimal since then.
Having experience with center channel speakers helped some of us to figure
it out almost instantly. There is a widely held opinion that the absence of
a center channel virtually guaranteed the failure of 4-channel.

The overwhelming majority of home systems have a Dialog speaker.

Most of them think of it as being a center channel and have listened to it
long enough to realize that it carries far more than just dialog.
Furthermore, it is common for the sound of dialog to follow the image of the
speaker when he traverses the screen from left to right or right to left.

Why should the mixologists worry about whether the mix works correctly
when there is no Dialog speaker?

2 channel compatibility?

[Ty Ford]

On Tue, 3 Jan 2012 08:14:18 -0500, Peter Larsen wrote
(in article ):

William Sommerwerck wrote:

The overwhelming majority of home systems have a Dialog speaker. Why
should the mixologists worry about whether the mix works correctly
when there is no Dialog speaker?

In my opinion too few mixes get checked in mono, I recall someone explaining
that with the increased detail audibility of a 5.1 mix mixing had gotten a
lot less critical.

Kind regards

Peter Larsen


I think it probably had more to do with budgets, e.g. How much more will it
coat to pay that sort of attention?

Regards,

Ty Ford



--Audio Equipment Reviews Audio Production Services
Acting and Voiceover Demos http://www.tyford.com
Guitar player?:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yWaPRHMGhGA

[William Sommerwerck]

"Arny Krueger" wrote in message
...

Few audiophiles did. I have, since 1970.

Most of us figured out that 4 speakers is generally suboptimal since then.
Having experience with center channel speakers helped some of us to figure
it out almost instantly. There is a widely held opinion that the absence
of
a center channel virtually guaranteed the failure of 4-channel.

It depends on what you're feeding the speakers.

As I noted in a previous post, the use of a center-front channel in a
matrixed recording (notice the qualification!) degrades the imaging.

[Arny Krueger[_4_]]

"William Sommerwerck" wrote in message
...
"Arny Krueger" wrote in message
...

Few audiophiles did. I have, since 1970.

Most of us figured out that 4 speakers is generally suboptimal since
then.
Having experience with center channel speakers helped some of us to
figure
it out almost instantly. There is a widely held opinion that the absence
of
a center channel virtually guaranteed the failure of 4-channel.

It depends on what you're feeding the speakers.

And that's the problem - avoiding a center chanel makes your listening
satisfaction far more dependent on the program material.

As I noted in a previous post, the use of a center-front channel in a
matrixed recording (notice the qualification!) degrades the imaging.

I would call making my enjoyment excessively dependent on the quality of the
mix an example of degraded imaging.

[William Sommerwerck]

And that's the problem -- avoiding a center chanel makes your
listening satisfaction far more dependent on the program material.

annoyed growling noises


As I noted in a previous post, the use of a center-front channel in a
matrixed recording (notice the qualification!) degrades the imaging.

I would call making my enjoyment excessively dependent on the
quality of the mix an example of degraded imaging.

additional annoyed growling noises

Many years ago, when I tested logic-directed decoders for "Stereophile", I
noticed that the use of Dialog speaker diminished the sense of air and space
in the recording. I assume this was due to slight level changes created when
cancelling the "center" information from the left and right channels. You
can hear the same effect in a dynamic-range expander (such as the Pioneer)
which expands the channels independently.

[Arkansan Raider]

mcp6453 wrote:

The Alan Parsons quad mix is the one to get, apparently. I assume that it was
only available on vinyl. Hopefully someone will do a discrete channel transfer
one day and make it available. DSOTM is not one of my favorite albums, but it
was very neat to be in Studio 2 at Abbey Road, where it was recorded. The video
on the making of DSOTM is great, as well, as is the footage in The Abbey Road Story.

http://www.quadraphonicquad.com/foru...09a25f52d80b18

Evidently, the Alan Parsons quad mix has been released as a part of the
recent "immersion" release:

"News has been spreading around the internet today about the newly
announced Pink Floyd massive box sets of their most popular albums with
outakes, alternate versions, and much more. These $100+ releases are set
to include multiple versions of all released 5.1 mixes.

For the first time in the same package, Dark Side of the Moon will be
available in both the James Guthrie SACD mix and the original Alan
Parsons 1973 Quadraphonic mix!

The Wish You Were Here album will included the unreleased James Guthrie
SACD 5.1 mix as well as the 1975 Quadraphonic Mix!!"

It's pretty dang pricey, though.

$100+ per immersion release project.

http://www.amazon.com/Dark-Side-Moon...5607343&sr=8-2

---Jeff

[Scott Dorsey]

William Sommerwerck wrote:
"Arny Krueger" wrote in message
m...

Few audiophiles did. I have, since 1970.

Most of us figured out that 4 speakers is generally suboptimal since then.
Having experience with center channel speakers helped some of us to figure
it out almost instantly. There is a widely held opinion that the absence
of
a center channel virtually guaranteed the failure of 4-channel.

It depends on what you're feeding the speakers.

As I noted in a previous post, the use of a center-front channel in a
matrixed recording (notice the qualification!) degrades the imaging.

Depends on your matrix and how it's mixed. If it's a Dolby Stereo mix,
you really need the center channel. If it's a QS or SQ mix, it will
definitely degrade things.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[Scott Dorsey]

William Sommerwerck wrote:

Many years ago, when I tested logic-directed decoders for "Stereophile", I
noticed that the use of Dialog speaker diminished the sense of air and space
in the recording. I assume this was due to slight level changes created when
cancelling the "center" information from the left and right channels. You
can hear the same effect in a dynamic-range expander (such as the Pioneer)
which expands the channels independently.

Steering logic has improved a lot since then, although mind you there are
still theatres out there with old Dolby CP-50s in use. dsp allows you to
do the nulling without having to continuously adjust things today.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[[email protected]]

On 2012-01-03 said:

Why should the mixologists worry about whether the mix works
correctly when there is no Dialog speaker?
In my opinion too few mixes get checked in mono, I recall someone
explaining that with the increased detail audibility of a 5.1 mix
mixing had gotten a lot less critical.

OF course, and it's quite obvious. these days my lady's
daughter has left a television with a dvd player, and so
she's been watching a lot of them.

Seems to me when passing through the living room now and
then that nobody pays any attention at all to the mono mix,
which one would hear on the tv itself. Dialogue buried
behind sfx and bg music, coming out of a ****ty sounding box
with a small speaker, lots of rumble from the plastic
cabinet of this tv set. Nobody ever seems to check their
work and see how it would be heard when watching/listening
without all this 5.1 crap.

but then I always feel that's one of the major thigns i have
to do, no matter what the project, is listen in mono and see
how things will work there.




Richard webb,

replace anything before at with elspider



Great audio is never heard by the average person, but bad
audio is heard by everyone.

[Arny Krueger[_4_]]

"William Sommerwerck" wrote in message
...
And that's the problem -- avoiding a center chanel makes your
listening satisfaction far more dependent on the program material.

annoyed growling noises


As I noted in a previous post, the use of a center-front channel in a
matrixed recording (notice the qualification!) degrades the imaging.

I would call making my enjoyment excessively dependent on the
quality of the mix an example of degraded imaging.

additional annoyed growling noises

Many years ago, when I tested logic-directed decoders for "Stereophile", I
noticed that the use of Dialog speaker diminished the sense of air and
space
in the recording.

...and of course there have been no changes in our understanding or execution
of surround sound technology since way back then.

LOL!

BTW when was that, 1995?

You are aware that modern multichannel recordings use no logic steeering at
all, and instead rely on discrete and separate channels, no?

[William Sommerwerck]

"Arny Krueger" wrote in message
...
"William Sommerwerck" wrote in message
...

Many years ago, when I tested logic-directed decoders for "Stereophile",
I noticed that the use of Dialog speaker diminished the sense of air and
space in the recording.

...and of course there have been no changes in our understanding or
execution of surround sound technology since way back then. LOL!
BTW when was that, 1995?

More like 1989.

The principal improvement in logic-directed decoding was the introduction of
what might be called "non-causal" decoding. That is, the decoder figures out
what was supposed to happen, then executes it "after the fact". In theory,
this reduces the audible artifacts of decoding.


You are aware that modern multichannel recordings use no logic steeering
at all, and instead rely on discrete and separate channels, no?

Duh... So did open-reel tapes. You forget who I am. And note what I wrote
(above).

I had surround sound before a fair percentage of people in this group were
born.

By the way, Ambisonic recordings have never required logic steering.

[Peter Larsen[_3_]]

William Sommerwerck wrote:

"Arny Krueger" wrote in message
...

Few audiophiles did. I have, since 1970.

Most of us figured out that 4 speakers is generally suboptimal since
then. Having experience with center channel speakers helped some of
us to figure it out almost instantly. There is a widely held opinion
that the absence of a center channel virtually guaranteed the
failure of 4-channel.

It depends on what you're feeding the speakers.

As I noted in a previous post, the use of a center-front channel in a
matrixed recording (notice the qualification!) degrades the imaging.

Discrete quad and 5.1 are very different animals with very different
objectives.

Kind regards

Peter Larsen

[Arny Krueger[_4_]]

"William Sommerwerck" wrote in message
...
"Arny Krueger" wrote in message
...
"William Sommerwerck" wrote in message
...

Many years ago, when I tested logic-directed decoders for "Stereophile",
I noticed that the use of Dialog speaker diminished the sense of air and
space in the recording.

...and of course there have been no changes in our understanding or
execution of surround sound technology since way back then. LOL!
BTW when was that, 1995?

More like 1989.

The principal improvement in logic-directed decoding was the introduction
of
what might be called "non-causal" decoding. That is, the decoder figures
out
what was supposed to happen, then executes it "after the fact". In theory,
this reduces the audible artifacts of decoding.

You are aware that modern multichannel recordings use no logic steeering
at all, and instead rely on discrete and separate channels, no?

Duh... So did open-reel tapes. You forget who I am. And note what I wrote
(above).

I know of no commercial open reel tapes with discrete center channels. Do
you?

One other thing. Open reel tape is not capable of stable operation within
+/- 0.1 dB or anything like it. At higher frequencies, +/- several dB is in
question.

[William Sommerwerck]

"Arny Krueger" wrote in message
...

You are aware that modern multichannel recordings use no logic steeering
at all, and instead rely on discrete and separate channels, no?

Duh... So did open-reel tapes. You forget who I am. And note what I wrote
(above).

I know of no commercial open reel tapes with discrete center channels. Do
you?

No. There weren't any. But all quadraphonic matrixing systems -- SQ, QS, EV,
etc -- require logic steering for good subjective separation, even though
they don't have center channels.

[Scott Dorsey]

William Sommerwerck wrote:

No. There weren't any. But all quadraphonic matrixing systems -- SQ, QS, EV,
etc -- require logic steering for good subjective separation, even though
they don't have center channels.

Actually, I have never seen an SQ or QS matrix system with steering. The
ones I saw all required pretty precise level setting to get good separation
and they all drifted a bit.

The first generation of Dolby Stereo had no steering, and really none of
the theatrical Dolby Stereo decoders have ever had analogue steering. They
just assumed everyone would do the A-chain alignment properly enough that
the separation would be good. Sometimes they did, sometimes they didn't.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."