Re: What Can We Hear?

[Gary Eickmeier]

ScottW wrote:
> On May 17, 3:48 am, "Gary Eickmeier" > wrote:

> The conversation is going to break down into hyperbole (or perhaps
> already has).
> Speaker design is a series of compromises and each design path has a
> different set. Many of these are to address characteristics of
> different rooms and/or listener preference.
>
> I would agree that the choice of compromise is worthy of debate. I'm
> not sure I would agree that the "perfect speaker" is omnidirectional
> given the objective is to recreate a sound of an event in one location
> in a completely different (acoustically) location.

Thanks Scotty. This is, at least, the beginnings of a conversation about a
difficult and controversial topic. Audio Empire is a great source - at least
it seems that way, from his writing, but I know not who he is, what
credentials he has, if that matters so much to him - but he seems to be
figuratively sticking his fingers in his ears, shutting his eyes, and
erecting Engineers Club, Members Only signs all around his cubicle. That is
not constructive, and avoids a lot of discussion that I was hoping he could
handle. I have run into this time and time again.

Maybe I am Chicken Little, making waves about a completely unimportant or
nonexistent problem. Maybe not. I do not have an engineering degree - but
that hasn't stopped a lot of "experts" in the field of audio who are making
products that have no real merit. Audio is a funny subject. It's like, it's
invisible and completely subjective, so you can say almost anything you want
about various aspects of it and you might sell something. I realize that I
need to "do the work" and prove some of my ideas with experiments with
armies of college students filling out forms, blind listening tests, and
testimonials from other "experts."

I tried mightily last year, when Siegfried Linkwitz asked a few innocent
questions, questions that should have been answered maybe 60 years ago and
have not. It was called The Linkwitz Challenge, and was asked in an AES
paper at a convention a couple of years ago.

www.linkwitzlab.com/AES-NY'09/The%20Challenge.pdf

Our audio club responded, so I had my chance and took it. I almost achieved
some street cred with the preliminary result of

http://home.provide.net/~djcarlst/SLReport10.05.pdf

but then they went on and somehow got the Behringer speakers to come out on
top of even the Orions. I tried to point out some flaws in the test
procedures, but they would have none of it, declared me a lunatic and a
wacko for my ideas, so I resigned from the club and have been trying other
paths ever since. Those cheezy Radio Shack speakers were actually the third
prototypes that I have made, but I am not very good at speaker building (the
engineering part of it), so I am not ready to parade them in front of my own
test subjects or take them to the next AES convention yet.

Even if I did, even if I made the perfect mousetrap, what would happen? They
may make a splash for a year or two, then the industry at large would be
****ed because I have shown them how to make better sound for a lot lower
price and profit margin, and I would be badmouthed by all the high end
dealers and villified in the press.

So if I have been once again shot down, I apologize and will shut up again
unless and until poked by some other questions that someone wonders about in
some area of speaker imaging or realism of reproduction. Audio Empire has
been very communicative and forthcoming, and I believe he allowed me to send
some papers and read them and maybe some of my experimental recordings, for
which I thank him. I have enjoyed this discussion and a brief soapbox and
will answer anyone who writes to me, but I guess I better get off the pot
for a while again and go back into my cave.

Gary Eickmeier

[Audio Empire]

On Fri, 18 May 2012 16:27:58 -0700, Gary Eickmeier wrote
(in article >):

> ScottW wrote:
>> On May 17, 3:48 am, "Gary Eickmeier" > wrote:
>
>> The conversation is going to break down into hyperbole (or perhaps
>> already has).
>> Speaker design is a series of compromises and each design path has a
>> different set. Many of these are to address characteristics of
>> different rooms and/or listener preference.
>>
>> I would agree that the choice of compromise is worthy of debate. I'm
>> not sure I would agree that the "perfect speaker" is omnidirectional
>> given the objective is to recreate a sound of an event in one location
>> in a completely different (acoustically) location.
>
> Thanks Scotty. This is, at least, the beginnings of a conversation about a
> difficult and controversial topic. Audio Empire is a great source - at least
> it seems that way, from his writing, but I know not who he is, what
> credentials he has, if that matters so much to him - but he seems to be
> figuratively sticking his fingers in his ears, shutting his eyes, and
> erecting Engineers Club, Members Only signs all around his cubicle. That is
> not constructive, and avoids a lot of discussion that I was hoping he could
> handle. I have run into this time and time again.
>
> Maybe I am Chicken Little, making waves about a completely unimportant or
> nonexistent problem.

That's not it at all. Your problem is, and I have said this before. From what
you have written, I have no confidence that you have even the slightest clue
about what you are talking about. You remind me of the guy on an "alien
encounters" type TV show who was trying to convince the viewers that an alien
atomic explosion, not a meteor, wiped out the dinosaurs. As "proof" he said
that the mounted skeletons of dinosaurs found in museums were all painted
with "lead paint" so that the museum's patrons wouldn't get a dose of the
radiation left over from that explosion. When he made that comment, I knew
that the guy had no credibility. First of all, and probably most importantly,
the mounted skeletons in museums are not the actual fossils anyway, because
being rock (not bone) they would be too heavy to stand-up in a mount. Display
skeletons are fiberglass "bones" made from the casts of the original fossils
(and the older ones are likely shellacked papier mache). Secondly not being
bone (it having long since disintegrated while being replaced with minerals)
would no longer be radioactive even if it WERE when the animal died. And
finally, were the "bones" radioactive, no coating of "lead paint" would
shield the patrons from the radioactivity. No, I don't know the guy who made
these outlandish claims, he might be a nice guy and a smart guy, but just
that from WHAT HE SAID, I know that he had no knowledge of the subject upon
which he was pontificating.

> Maybe not. I do not have an engineering degree - but
> that hasn't stopped a lot of "experts" in the field of audio who are making
> products that have no real merit.

But you aren't selling a product. You are "selling" a theory, that from what
I have gleaned from you posts and your posted "white paper", you lack the
knowledge to actually be able to formulate.


> Audio is a funny subject. It's like, it's
> invisible and completely subjective, so you can say almost anything you want
> about various aspects of it and you might sell something.

Sure, people sell green pens and funny looking free-form wooden sculptures
that when placed in the listening space, supposedly tame the room. People
also sell digital clocks that "miraculously" clean up the power line, and
exotic wooden blocks that, when set on top of components make them sound
"better." And the gullible buy these things and convince themselves that it
was money well spent. But people like me don't buy them because we know that
they have no scientific basis behind them and that they not only don't work,
they CANNOT work. Pretending that we don't know everything there is to know
about sound as a basis for these magic nostrums, might fool the untutored,
but those of us with a solid background in engineering and physics simply
know better.

> I realize that I
> need to "do the work" and prove some of my ideas with experiments with
> armies of college students filling out forms, blind listening tests, and
> testimonials from other "experts."

It might help if you could show a mathematical model of your "theories" and I
encourage you to do so.
>

[Andrew Haley]

Gary Eickmeier > wrote:
> ScottW wrote:
>> On May 17, 3:48 am, "Gary Eickmeier" > wrote:
>
>> The conversation is going to break down into hyperbole (or perhaps
>> already has).
>> Speaker design is a series of compromises and each design path has a
>> different set. Many of these are to address characteristics of
>> different rooms and/or listener preference.
>>
>> I would agree that the choice of compromise is worthy of debate. I'm
>> not sure I would agree that the "perfect speaker" is omnidirectional
>> given the objective is to recreate a sound of an event in one location
>> in a completely different (acoustically) location.
>
> Thanks Scotty. This is, at least, the beginnings of a conversation
> about a difficult and controversial topic. Audio Empire is a great
> source - at least it seems that way, from his writing, but I know
> not who he is, what credentials he has, if that matters so much to
> him - but he seems to be figuratively sticking his fingers in his
> ears, shutting his eyes, and erecting Engineers Club, Members Only
> signs all around his cubicle.

I don't think that's it exactly. He's saying look, you have all these
opinions, and these guys over here have opinions too, but they also
have data and reserach studies. It's not about who is qualified to
have an opinion; everyone is.

> That is not constructive, and avoids a lot of discussion that I was
> hoping he could handle. I have run into this time and time again.
>
> Maybe I am Chicken Little, making waves about a completely
> unimportant or nonexistent problem. Maybe not. I do not have an
> engineering degree - but that hasn't stopped a lot of "experts" in
> the field of audio who are making products that have no real
> merit. Audio is a funny subject. It's like, it's invisible and
> completely subjective, so you can say almost anything you want about
> various aspects of it and you might sell something. I realize that I
> need to "do the work" and prove some of my ideas with experiments
> with armies of college students filling out forms, blind listening
> tests, and testimonials from other "experts."

Well, yes.

The questions I have to ask are: what kind of evidence would it take
to convince you that you were wrong? How would you design an
experiment that has the best chance to refute your own theories as
convincingly as possible?

Andrew.

[Gary Eickmeier]

Andrew Haley wrote:

> I don't think that's it exactly. He's saying look, you have all these
> opinions, and these guys over here have opinions too, but they also
> have data and reserach studies. It's not about who is qualified to
> have an opinion; everyone is.

What data and research studies? I have pointed out that no one has answered
Linkwitz's questions in all of audio history yet. He asked about what I call
"The Big Three" of radiation pattern, speaker positioning, and room
acoustics. The simple question was, which radiation pattern is most correct,
which room positioning of speakers, what sort of room treatment is most
correct for the establishment of the most realistic AS, or Auditory Scene
(as compared to live sound). I have also pointed out that there is little or
no agreement among the "experts" about any of these things. There is no
basic stereo theory, or paradigm or model of how it should be done in
systems with the highest goals - namely, the realistic reproduction of
auditory perspective.

I searched all through Floyd Toole's new book and found nothing on this
subject, nothing that answered Linkwitz's questions.



> Well, yes.
>
> The questions I have to ask are: what kind of evidence would it take
> to convince you that you were wrong? How would you design an
> experiment that has the best chance to refute your own theories as
> convincingly as possible?

That one is simple Andrew. Just construct a test that shows that the Big
Three are not audible. You might have a variety of speakers from dipoles to
omnis to direct firing, you might place them up against the wall, out into
the room, or in the corners. You might have a room that is highly reflective
at the speaker end, or highly absorptive. If you can show that none of these
factors is audible, then I would have to go back into my cave and admit
defeat.

Gary Eickmeier

[Gary Eickmeier]

"Audio Empire" > wrote in message
...

> That's not it at all. Your problem is, and I have said this before. From
> what
> you have written, I have no confidence that you have even the slightest
> clue
> about what you are talking about.

That doesn't advance any argument whatsoever. What did I say to make you
feel that way? Argue the subject, if you are so knowledgeable.

> But you aren't selling a product. You are "selling" a theory, that from
> what
> I have gleaned from you posts and your posted "white paper", you lack the
> knowledge to actually be able to formulate.

AE, I don't think you have been able to follow this subject. I have said
nothing erroneous, or even all that controversial. I have explained in
greater detail what William Snow said, that stereo is a field-type system,
in which we attempt to reconstruct the fields that existed in the original.
The basic idea is that you place speakers around the room where you want the
sounds to come from. Have you heard about surround sound? Three speakers are
placed up front, arranged in geometrecally similar positions to the
positions of the instruments that were recorded. Surround speakers are
placed where ambient fields belong. Image Model Theory goes into greater
detail about the frontal soundstage, explaining how to arrange the radiation
pattern, room positioning, and reflective qualities of the walls to mimic
the spatial patterns of the original. The main point is that the spatial
qualities of speakers and rooms are audible, such as between corner horns
and MBLs or Quads pulled out from the walls. I suggest a model that you can
use to determine which arrangement is more realistic, that the answer to
what causes perceptual qualities of stereo does not come from the direct
sound alone, as has been thought by most writers in the past. I encourage
you to study auditory perspective theory from the standpoint of the total
horizontal acoustical situation, illustrated by what is called the image
model of the room and speakers. All of these things have been talked around
in the past, but not tied together into a cohesive theory to explain why
something sounds the way it does in more visual terms.

See if you can go over it all again and tell me anything I said that is
wrong.

> Sure, people sell green pens and funny looking free-form wooden sculptures
> that when placed in the listening space, supposedly tame the room. People
> also sell digital clocks that "miraculously" clean up the power line, and
> exotic wooden blocks that, when set on top of components make them sound
> "better." And the gullible buy these things and convince themselves that
> it
> was money well spent. But people like me don't buy them because we know
> that
> they have no scientific basis behind them and that they not only don't
> work,
> they CANNOT work. Pretending that we don't know everything there is to
> know
> about sound as a basis for these magic nostrums, might fool the untutored,
> but those of us with a solid background in engineering and physics simply
> know better.

> It might help if you could show a mathematical model of your "theories"
> and I
> encourage you to do so.

STOP IT! This is not mathematical! It is conceptual! You have just GOT to
get this material. Or at least talk to me so I can tell what step is missing
from my explanation.
>>

OK, you stopped short again. I told about an experiment that I participated
in that helped answer Linkwitz's very basic questions, in which I was quite
successful.

Talk to me.

Gary Eickmeier

PS - suggestion, to throw the ball back into your court so you can
straighten me right out:

YOU tell ME what are the answers to Linkwitz's challenge questions. What is
the corrct radiation pattern, speaker positioning, and room acoustical
qualities for the greatest realism in the reproduction of the Auditory
Scene, or AS? Why? How do you know? Have you thought about it much before,
or do you think that "The Big Three" are not audible?

[Andrew Haley]

Gary Eickmeier > wrote:
> Andrew Haley wrote:
>
>> The questions I have to ask are: what kind of evidence would it take
>> to convince you that you were wrong? How would you design an
>> experiment that has the best chance to refute your own theories as
>> convincingly as possible?
>
> That one is simple Andrew. Just construct a test that shows that the Big
> Three are not audible.

Excuse me! No-one is claiming that radiation pattern, speaker
positioning, and room acoustics are not audible. That is something
about which there is no disagreement.

> You might have a variety of speakers from dipoles to omnis to direct
> firing, you might place them up against the wall, out into the room,
> or in the corners. You might have a room that is highly reflective
> at the speaker end, or highly absorptive. If you can show that none
> of these factors is audible, then I would have to go back into my
> cave and admit defeat.

So, nothing short of proving that radiation pattern, speaker
positioning, and room acoustics are not audible will make you doubt
your theories. But we already know that thse things are audible, so
there is no experiment that could be done by anyone that would make a
diference to you.

Andrew.

[Gary Eickmeier]

Andrew Haley wrote:

> So, nothing short of proving that radiation pattern, speaker
> positioning, and room acoustics are not audible will make you doubt
> your theories. But we already know that thse things are audible, so
> there is no experiment that could be done by anyone that would make a
> diference to you.
>
> Andrew.

Er - excuse ME, but then you agree with me. I have said that those factors
are audible and we should study the reproduction problem from the standpoint
of what those do to the sound. Linkwitz asked the same question, is there a
way to distinguish which variations of those factors lead to greatest
realism in the reproduction.

But there is a way to visualize the whole situation, a method that is time
honored and not controversial, and it is called image modeling. My
contribution is to propose that we study the reproduction problem from the
standpoint of comparing the image model of the live event to that of the
reproduction system of speakers and room. Most studies about stereo have
dealt with only the direct sound radiated from a pair or a line of speakers.
I point out that this approach sees the problem as a "windowing" or
portaling process, but that it might operate more like a model of the real
thing in which we should pay attention to the sound patterns produced in the
room by the full model, not just the direct field.

I relate my success with this approach both in my own system and in an
experiment conducted by my audio club.

I fully realize that all the talk in the world will not prove any of it to
you just by reading what I have written, but you may have already
experienced the effect that I am talking about in your listening experience.
Writers and audiophiles talk about the "floating" of images, depth of
soundstaging, and speakers disappearing. These are some of the effects that
Linkwitz experiences in his system, with its highly reflective room and his
equi-omni radiation pattern and his speakers pulled out into the room.

The speaker disappearing act is caused by a simple image shift toward the
reflected sound from behind the actual speakers. An aerial image is formed
in the region behind the speakers, getting the sound OUT of the speaker
boxes and creating the unmistakable impression of the musicians being right
there in front of you performing in your room, rather than sounding like
they are flat cartoons coming from the speakers and strung on a clothesline
between the speakers, with no depth or dimensionality. When done right, the
reflected sound that was recorded can seem to come from a broad set of
incident angles that are wider than the separation of the actual speakers,
lending the spaciousness that direct and reflecting speakers are famous for.
The combined effect gives the impression of the performers in front of you
along with turning your room into a model of the original hall, especially
when surround speakers are incorporated. If it is a tight and dry recording,
they are here. If it has some hall ambience recorded, they are here and so
is most of the acoustical environment of the original, displayed where it
belongs deep behind the performers and super wide beside and behind you.

You may have heard this effect with Quads, Martin Logans, MBLs, or even yes,
Bose 901s if placed correctly. I don't know if audiophiles think that this
effect is caused by point sourcedness, time alignment, or magic, but I am
here to tell you what does cause it and how to incorporate that into basic
stereo theory and perfect it.

Without an understanding of what causes all this three dimensionality and
speakers disappearing, you are just as liable to place your speakers right
up against the walls, or in the corners of your room, and never experience
what I am talking about.

I discovered it by accident and have been studying it for close to 30 years
now. You can fight me about it or study it further and try it youself, I
don't care, I'm just trying to explain something about genuinely audible
effects from an angle that has not been examined this closely before.

Thank you for your patience!

Gary Eickmeier, aka Chicken Little

[Andrew Haley]

Gary Eickmeier > wrote:
> Andrew Haley wrote:
>
>> So, nothing short of proving that radiation pattern, speaker
>> positioning, and room acoustics are not audible will make you doubt
>> your theories. But we already know that thse things are audible, so
>> there is no experiment that could be done by anyone that would make a
>> diference to you.
>
> Er - excuse ME, but then you agree with me.

Insamuch as I agree that these factors change the sound, yes. If
that's all that your theories amount to, we're done. But I don't
think it is.

> I have said that those factors are audible and we should study the
> reproduction problem from the standpoint of what those do to the
> sound. Linkwitz asked the same question, is there a way to
> distinguish which variations of those factors lead to greatest
> realism in the reproduction.
>
> But there is a way to visualize the whole situation, a method that
> is time honored and not controversial, and it is called image
> modeling. My contribution is to propose that we study the
> reproduction problem from the standpoint of comparing the image
> model of the live event to that of the reproduction system of
> speakers and room. Most studies about stereo have dealt with only
> the direct sound radiated from a pair or a line of speakers. I
> point out that this approach sees the problem as a "windowing" or
> portaling process, but that it might operate more like a model of
> the real thing in which we should pay attention to the sound
> patterns produced in the room by the full model, not just the direct
> field.

I think you're arguing against a straw man. Nobody disagrees that you
have to model the room. Toole, with whom you say you have some
disagreement, does not disagree with this, and talks at length about
the beneficial effects of room reflections, particularly on apparent
source width.

> Without an understanding of what causes all this three
> dimensionality and speakers disappearing, you are just as liable to
> place your speakers right up against the walls, or in the corners of
> your room, and never experience what I am talking about.

Well, yes. But no-one with a clue does that.

Again, I'm going to ask the question: what experimental results would
it take to convince you that Toole at al are right, and you are wrong?
Note that Toole goes to some length to explain why dead rooms are far
from ideal, the recordiong indistry's preference for them is a
historical mistake. The difference, as far as I can see it, is that
you prefer a greater amount of reflected sound, and you have some
uncommon theories about speaker placement.

Andrew.

[Audio Empire]

On Mon, 21 May 2012 07:30:33 -0700, Gary Eickmeier wrote
(in article >):

> The speaker disappearing act is caused by a simple image shift toward the
> reflected sound from behind the actual speakers. An aerial image is formed
> in the region behind the speakers, getting the sound OUT of the speaker
> boxes and creating the unmistakable impression of the musicians being right
> there in front of you performing in your room, rather than sounding like
> they are flat cartoons coming from the speakers and strung on a clothesline
> between the speakers, with no depth or dimensionality.

You speak as if this is a characteristic inherent in the speaker itself.
Well, I agree that the speaker must be able to image well and "throw" a wide
and deep soundstage, BUT - and this is all important - if the information is
NOT there on the recording in the first place, even the world's best imaging
speakers won't be able to produce the illusion to which you refer. Take most
any classical recording from the mid-sixties to the late eighties and the
great majority of recordings made since then, and there is NO imaging
information on the recording. Most are, as you so aptly put it, a series of
"flat cartoons" 'Strung on a clothesline." This is because most recordings
are multi-miked, multi-track travesties and sound simply dreadful from an
imaging perspective. I believe that one of the reasons that audiophiles still
revere recordings made more than 55 years ago by the likes of Lewis Layton,
and Richard Mohr at RCA Victor, Bob Fine, Wilma Fine and Bob Eberenz at
Mercury, and Bert Whyte for Everest is because these recordings were made
with simple, two or three mike setups directly to tape with no electronic
"futzing" between the mikes and the tape. Many of these recordings have the
soundstage information that allows for good, realistic imaging (assuming that
the playback system is up to the task).

Now, it's true that today's audiophile is more likely to listen to rock music
than he is to listen to classical, and I've always found this to be amusing.
They talk of imaging while listening to recordings which not only don't have
any imaging, they CAN'T have any because the instruments themselves are
individually recorded, not the space which the instruments inhabit. In fact,
in many rock and pop recordings, all of the acoustic instruments (saxes,
horns, woodwinds, strings), if any, are "frapped" (recorded using a contact
microphone where the microphone is designed to be attached directly to the
body of the instrument and therefore picks-up the sound of the instrument
through the instrument itself, not through the air) and then laid down on
it's own isolated track to be mixed into the finished recording later. In
these cases, the individual tracks are pan-potted into the final mix so that
the instruments ARE lined up as if on a clothesline. and due to the extreme
close-up perspective afforded by "frapping" are cartoon cut-outs of the
instruments in question because the space that the instrument occupies wasn't
captured along with the instrument itself.

"Classic" stereo jazz recordings fare little better. Each instrument is
again miked separately, then mixed-down to three tracks. right, left, and a
phantom center channel (where the soloist or principle player (instrumental
or vocalist) is invariably placed). There's no real imaging here either. One
of the things that drove me, originally, to start recording was my desire for
"real" stereo recordings, done right. Since one couldn't rely on the major
labels to do it right, I figured I'd be better off "rolling my own". The
results have been pretty spectacular over the years, and I've rarely heard
anything that sounds as good or images as well on commercial releases. One
would think that with all the resources at the disposal of the major record
companies that they could do at least as well as I can with my modest
resources, but the don't.

[Gary Eickmeier]

"Audio Empire" > wrote in message
...
> On Mon, 21 May 2012 07:30:33 -0700, Gary Eickmeier wrote
> (in article >):
>
>> The speaker disappearing act is caused by a simple image shift toward the
>> reflected sound from behind the actual speakers. An aerial image is
>> formed
>> in the region behind the speakers, getting the sound OUT of the speaker
>> boxes and creating the unmistakable impression of the musicians being
>> right
>> there in front of you performing in your room, rather than sounding like
>> they are flat cartoons coming from the speakers and strung on a
>> clothesline
>> between the speakers, with no depth or dimensionality.
>
> You speak as if this is a characteristic inherent in the speaker itself.
> Well, I agree that the speaker must be able to image well and "throw" a
> wide
> and deep soundstage, BUT - and this is all important - if the information
> is
> NOT there on the recording in the first place, even the world's best
> imaging
> speakers won't be able to produce the illusion to which you refer. Take
> most
> any classical recording from the mid-sixties to the late eighties and the
> great majority of recordings made since then, and there is NO imaging
> information on the recording. Most are, as you so aptly put it, a series
> of
> "flat cartoons" 'Strung on a clothesline." This is because most
> recordings
> are multi-miked, multi-track travesties and sound simply dreadful from an
> imaging perspective. I believe that one of the reasons that audiophiles
> still
> revere recordings made more than 55 years ago by the likes of Lewis
> Layton,
> and Richard Mohr at RCA Victor, Bob Fine, Wilma Fine and Bob Eberenz at
> Mercury, and Bert Whyte for Everest is because these recordings were made
> with simple, two or three mike setups directly to tape with no electronic
> "futzing" between the mikes and the tape. Many of these recordings have
> the
> soundstage information that allows for good, realistic imaging (assuming
> that
> the playback system is up to the task).

Yes, sure, I agree with most of that, but with some caveats.

As I mentioned, if it is a tight and dry recording it gives a "they are
here" impression. In other words, no original acoustics recorded, it places
the instruments right in the environment of your listening room, like a
player piano or something. Those images will take a position the closest up
front that your system is capable of displaying, but still should not EVER
come from the speaker boxes themselves.

At the audio club I demonstrated this with the dry, mono recording of the
human voice outdoors. I transferred it to my laptop and processed it with
Audition so that it would pan from extreme right to extreme left chennel.
This was with my experimental speakers that were entered in The Challenge.
Most audio people would expect such a dry sound to image from one speaker to
the other and come from the speaker itself when at the channel extremes. So
to prove my point, I obtained an orange cone from Home Depot so that I could
place a visual where the audience perceived the sound to be coming from. I
started the recording at stage right, and when it got to the center I asked
them where the voice was. I placed the cone as directed until everyone
agreed. It ended up centered but a foot or two back behind the line of the
speakers. Same question when it got to stage extreme left. To their surprise
the voice was coming not from the speaker but from a foot behind the
speaker - unmistakably. To me, this proves the image shift, which slightly
defies the precedence principle. But even the textbooks say that if the
reflection is strong enough there will be an image shift.

This principle can be a very powerful tool in setting up your speaker system
for imaging, but if done wrong can be a disaster of Consumer Reports vs Bose
proportions. Bose did not give correct speaker positioning instructions in
the owner manual for the 901s, inviting disaster with a strongly negative
directivity speaker (strong reflected portion of its output). CR reported a
hole in the middle and stretched soloists, as did many audiophiles. If
correctly placed by accident, they could be impressive, but if you put them
too close to the walls all of the criticisms rear their ugly heads.

Draw an image model of the problem and you can see easily what is happening.
Move the speakers closer to the front wall and depth diminishes because the
reflected image speaker gets closer to the actual one. Move the speakers
wider, and the total image (or soundstage) becomes narrower! Place them
within a foot or two of the corners, and you get a "clustering" of acoustic
images that causes this hole in the middle and six foot wide soloists. I
threw caution to the winds one fine day and pulled my speakers out from the
walls and in to about 1/4 of the room width, and all of a sudden the sound
focused itself like a camera lens and there in front of me was the answer to
many questions.

I don't know where Andrew got the impression that I disagreed with Floyd on
something. What I said was that I read all through his book for the answers
to Linkwitz's very basic questions but couldn't find specific
recommendations on radiation pattern, speaker positioning or room acoustics
except to the extent that he agreed that reflected sound was necessary in
any audio setup. In fact, I wrote to him several times and asked him
directly about these questions, and also noted the many areas in his book
that supported my IMT. I was hoping for some sort of endorsement of my
writings, but it was not forthcoming. I have found that the well-known and
respected engineers will not commit themselves on paper to any outside
unsolicited ideas, especially off the beaten path ones like mine. I had a
nice, long talk on the phone with Siegfried, but he would not write that my
ideas were answers to his questions.

Same with Dr. Bose, in case you were wondering. I have tried to get him to
come out with an advanced, audiophile class 901 speaker with a slightly
different radiation pattern, but he is more interested in the mass market
than the small group that classifies themselves as audiophiles. And of
course it is the same as with unsolicited manuscripts sent to Hollywood
producers - they will not even be opened or acknowledged, for fear of
lawsuits if they use any of your material without paying you.

So I remain a voice crying in the wilderness. So fine.

Gary Eickmeier

[Audio Empire]

On Tue, 22 May 2012 18:51:10 -0700, Gary Eickmeier wrote
(in article >):

> "Audio Empire" > wrote in message
> ...
>> On Mon, 21 May 2012 07:30:33 -0700, Gary Eickmeier wrote
>> (in article >):
>>
>>> The speaker disappearing act is caused by a simple image shift toward the
>>> reflected sound from behind the actual speakers. An aerial image is
>>> formed
>>> in the region behind the speakers, getting the sound OUT of the speaker
>>> boxes and creating the unmistakable impression of the musicians being
>>> right
>>> there in front of you performing in your room, rather than sounding like
>>> they are flat cartoons coming from the speakers and strung on a
>>> clothesline
>>> between the speakers, with no depth or dimensionality.
>>
>> You speak as if this is a characteristic inherent in the speaker itself.
>> Well, I agree that the speaker must be able to image well and "throw" a
>> wide
>> and deep soundstage, BUT - and this is all important - if the information
>> is
>> NOT there on the recording in the first place, even the world's best
>> imaging
>> speakers won't be able to produce the illusion to which you refer. Take
>> most
>> any classical recording from the mid-sixties to the late eighties and the
>> great majority of recordings made since then, and there is NO imaging
>> information on the recording. Most are, as you so aptly put it, a series
>> of
>> "flat cartoons" 'Strung on a clothesline." This is because most
>> recordings
>> are multi-miked, multi-track travesties and sound simply dreadful from an
>> imaging perspective. I believe that one of the reasons that audiophiles
>> still
>> revere recordings made more than 55 years ago by the likes of Lewis
>> Layton,
>> and Richard Mohr at RCA Victor, Bob Fine, Wilma Fine and Bob Eberenz at
>> Mercury, and Bert Whyte for Everest is because these recordings were made
>> with simple, two or three mike setups directly to tape with no electronic
>> "futzing" between the mikes and the tape. Many of these recordings have
>> the
>> soundstage information that allows for good, realistic imaging (assuming
>> that
>> the playback system is up to the task).
>
> Yes, sure, I agree with most of that, but with some caveats.
>
> As I mentioned, if it is a tight and dry recording it gives a "they are
> here" impression. In other words, no original acoustics recorded, it places
> the instruments right in the environment of your listening room, like a
> player piano or something. Those images will take a position the closest up
> front that your system is capable of displaying, but still should not EVER
> come from the speaker boxes themselves.

Unless you "frap" the instrument, or record in an anechoic chamber, that's
impossible.

> At the audio club I demonstrated this with the dry, mono recording of the
> human voice outdoors. I transferred it to my laptop and processed it with
> Audition so that it would pan from extreme right to extreme left chennel.
> This was with my experimental speakers that were entered in The Challenge.
> Most audio people would expect such a dry sound to image from one speaker to
> the other and come from the speaker itself when at the channel extremes. So
> to prove my point, I obtained an orange cone from Home Depot so that I could
> place a visual where the audience perceived the sound to be coming from. I
> started the recording at stage right, and when it got to the center I asked
> them where the voice was. I placed the cone as directed until everyone
> agreed. It ended up centered but a foot or two back behind the line of the
> speakers. Same question when it got to stage extreme left. To their surprise
> the voice was coming not from the speaker but from a foot behind the
> speaker - unmistakably. To me, this proves the image shift, which slightly
> defies the precedence principle. But even the textbooks say that if the
> reflection is strong enough there will be an image shift.

That can also be attributed to a frequency suckout in the voice range of the
speakers used. Conversely, a peak in that range would put the voice forward
of the speaker. Another variable would be room acoustics. A subtractive phase
anomaly could move the voice backwards or and additive one could move it
forward .
>
> This principle can be a very powerful tool in setting up your speaker system
> for imaging, but if done wrong can be a disaster of Consumer Reports vs Bose
> proportions. Bose did not give correct speaker positioning instructions in
> the owner manual for the 901s, inviting disaster with a strongly negative
> directivity speaker (strong reflected portion of its output). CR reported a
> hole in the middle and stretched soloists, as did many audiophiles. If
> correctly placed by accident, they could be impressive, but if you put them
> too close to the walls all of the criticisms rear their ugly heads.

Bose speakers and systems are lousy. Always have been.

[Sebastian Kaliszewski]

Gary Eickmeier wrote:
> "Audio Empire" > wrote in message
> ...
>> On Mon, 21 May 2012 07:30:33 -0700, Gary Eickmeier wrote
>> (in article >):
>>
>>> The speaker disappearing act is caused by a simple image shift toward the
>>> reflected sound from behind the actual speakers. An aerial image is
>>> formed
>>> in the region behind the speakers, getting the sound OUT of the speaker
>>> boxes and creating the unmistakable impression of the musicians being
>>> right
>>> there in front of you performing in your room, rather than sounding like
>>> they are flat cartoons coming from the speakers and strung on a
>>> clothesline
>>> between the speakers, with no depth or dimensionality.
>> You speak as if this is a characteristic inherent in the speaker itself.
>> Well, I agree that the speaker must be able to image well and "throw" a
>> wide
>> and deep soundstage, BUT - and this is all important - if the information
>> is
>> NOT there on the recording in the first place, even the world's best
>> imaging
>> speakers won't be able to produce the illusion to which you refer. Take
>> most
>> any classical recording from the mid-sixties to the late eighties and the
>> great majority of recordings made since then, and there is NO imaging
>> information on the recording. Most are, as you so aptly put it, a series
>> of
>> "flat cartoons" 'Strung on a clothesline." This is because most
>> recordings
>> are multi-miked, multi-track travesties and sound simply dreadful from an
>> imaging perspective. I believe that one of the reasons that audiophiles
>> still
>> revere recordings made more than 55 years ago by the likes of Lewis
>> Layton,
>> and Richard Mohr at RCA Victor, Bob Fine, Wilma Fine and Bob Eberenz at
>> Mercury, and Bert Whyte for Everest is because these recordings were made
>> with simple, two or three mike setups directly to tape with no electronic
>> "futzing" between the mikes and the tape. Many of these recordings have
>> the
>> soundstage information that allows for good, realistic imaging (assuming
>> that
>> the playback system is up to the task).
>
> Yes, sure, I agree with most of that, but with some caveats.
>
> As I mentioned, if it is a tight and dry recording it gives a "they are
> here" impression. In other words, no original acoustics recorded, it places
> the instruments right in the environment of your listening room, like a
> player piano or something. Those images will take a position the closest up
> front that your system is capable of displaying, but still should not EVER
> come from the speaker boxes themselves.
>
> At the audio club I demonstrated this with the dry, mono recording of the
> human voice outdoors. I transferred it to my laptop and processed it with
> Audition so that it would pan from extreme right to extreme left chennel.
> This was with my experimental speakers that were entered in The Challenge.
> Most audio people would expect such a dry sound to image from one speaker to
> the other and come from the speaker itself when at the channel extremes. So
> to prove my point, I obtained an orange cone from Home Depot so that I could
> place a visual where the audience perceived the sound to be coming from. I
> started the recording at stage right, and when it got to the center I asked
> them where the voice was. I placed the cone as directed until everyone
> agreed. It ended up centered but a foot or two back behind the line of the
> speakers. Same question when it got to stage extreme left. To their surprise
> the voice was coming not from the speaker but from a foot behind the
> speaker - unmistakably. To me, this proves the image shift, which slightly
> defies the precedence principle. But even the textbooks say that if the
> reflection is strong enough there will be an image shift.

Sorry, but for me it proves nothing except your own confirmation bias :)
First It's wihin error circle from the speaker anyway (our senses are not that
precise). Second it has all the drawbacks of sigthte evaluations). Third while
effect could be real afrer all, its cause could be completely different, as
Audio Empire pointed out


> Draw an image model of the problem and you can see easily what is happening.

Well, that exemplifies the trouble I have with what you call a theory. This is
your apriori assumption how things works, but it lacks any physical or
psychoacoustical explanation. Nice simple drawings are not an explanation.


> Move the speakers closer to the front wall and depth diminishes because the
> reflected image speaker gets closer to the actual one. Move the speakers
> wider, and the total image (or soundstage) becomes narrower! Place them
> within a foot or two of the corners, and you get a "clustering" of acoustic
> images that causes this hole in the middle and six foot wide soloists. I
> threw caution to the winds one fine day and pulled my speakers out from the
> walls and in to about 1/4 of the room width, and all of a sudden the sound
> focused itself like a camera lens and there in front of me was the answer to
> many questions.

But how you excluded other possible causes like (subjectively) better frequency
response due to particular cancellation and reinforcement caused by room modes,
etc.? How about that depth increase/reduction has nothing to do with simple
geometrical reflections but due to particular changes in ratio between direct
and reverberant sound?

Usable theory must explain things, should also describe limitations of it's
applicability.

Without that it's not a theory, its just a trick recipe.

> I don't know where Andrew got the impression that I disagreed with Floyd on
> something. What I said was that I read all through his book for the answers
> to Linkwitz's very basic questions but couldn't find specific
> recommendations on radiation pattern, speaker positioning or room acoustics
> except to the extent that he agreed that reflected sound was necessary in
> any audio setup. In fact, I wrote to him several times and asked him
> directly about these questions, and also noted the many areas in his book
> that supported my IMT. I was hoping for some sort of endorsement of my
> writings, but it was not forthcoming. I have found that the well-known and
> respected engineers will not commit themselves on paper to any outside
> unsolicited ideas, especially off the beaten path ones like mine. I had a
> nice, long talk on the phone with Siegfried, but he would not write that my
> ideas were answers to his questions.
>
> Same with Dr. Bose, in case you were wondering. I have tried to get him to
> come out with an advanced, audiophile class 901 speaker with a slightly
> different radiation pattern, but he is more interested in the mass market
> than the small group that classifies themselves as audiophiles. And of
> course it is the same as with unsolicited manuscripts sent to Hollywood
> producers - they will not even be opened or acknowledged, for fear of
> lawsuits if they use any of your material without paying you.
>
> So I remain a voice crying in the wilderness. So fine.

You should look into the physics and physiology and conduct some well controlled
experiments (the ones you described above were certainly not well controlled).

If you look at Siegfried Linkwitz page you'll see a lot of physical
explanations, you'll see real hard numbers, you'll see references to
psychoacustcs, etc. For example. when SL tell us that his Plutos should be
listened at closer distance than his Orions (in a same given room), then it's
explained why and supported by hard physics.

rgds
\SK
--
"Never underestimate the power of human stupidity" -- L. Lang
--
http://www.tajga.org -- (some photos from my travels)