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Loudness (2007)

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Re: Loudness (2007)

#11

Post by trevyn »

morecoffee wrote: post #4

Tangential, but for the longest time I couldn't figure out why VLC always played music / DVDs at such low volume. Setting the system volume to max and overdriving VLC's volume slider was the only way I could actually hear the soft parts. Recently I found out about the volume compressor, which with a single check box does exactly the right thing. I asked myself "why the heck isn't this box checked by default?" I think…

Movies generally have a wide dynamic range so that loud action scenes are very loud. You don't want your normal dialogue to be at the same volume as your explosions, unless you're watching at home with the volume down.

Re: Loudness (2007)

#12

Post by tnecniv »

santoshalper wrote: post #3
amelius wrote: post #2

Was there any way we could have prevented the "loudness war"?

There is research that shows that on a casual listen, people believe louder music sounds better. Similarly, people tend to find brighter pictures more appealing at a glance, even though both of these can be fatiguing and cause discomfort. That's why stereo stores (in so much as they still exist) crank up the music to very loud volumes and all the TVs at Best Buy are grossly mis-calibrated. Unfortunately, most musicia…

> Unfortunately, most musicians are just hoping you will notice their song when it comes up on the radio, pandora, a friends iPhone and so everyone is incentivized to crank their song to the max.

Most people also just aren't listening through good equipment that emphasizes good dynamics. Tons of people are happy listening to compressed songs through the earbuds they got for free with their phone.

Re: Loudness (2007)

#13

Post by mortenjorck »

For practical listening, I actually prefer modern brickwall mastering techniques to more traditional mastering with a high dynamic range, for one reason: what the author sees as "hijacking the volume control from the listener" I would consider the opposite.

With a high dynamic range, a headphones listener may feel the need to adjust the volume several times in a song to boost the clarity of softer sections or to make louder sections more comfortable to the ears, depending on the listening environment. With a "loud," low dynamic range, however, the listener need only adjust the volume once, as the whole track is roughly the same volume. In other words, the listener is in control of the volume, rather than the engineer.

Re: Loudness (2007)

#14

Post by agumonkey »

santoshalper wrote: post #3
amelius wrote: post #2

Was there any way we could have prevented the "loudness war"?

There is research that shows that on a casual listen, people believe louder music sounds better. Similarly, people tend to find brighter pictures more appealing at a glance, even though both of these can be fatiguing and cause discomfort. That's why stereo stores (in so much as they still exist) crank up the music to very loud volumes and all the TVs at Best Buy are grossly mis-calibrated. Unfortunately, most musicia…

Because it's consumerism. You want quick and deep stimulus. Not subtlety. When you're "educated" [1] you start to look the other way around. I remember understanding the value of a good DAC chip on a smartphone, even with a crappy mp3, I could rediscover songs that I've listened to a thousand time on bad DACs.

Same goes for photography, poetry etc etc.. mass market doesn't mesh well with that.

[1] whether by society or by your own passion

Re: Loudness (2007)

#15

Post by nathanasmith »

mortenjorck wrote: post #13

For practical listening, I actually prefer modern brickwall mastering techniques to more traditional mastering with a high dynamic range, for one reason: what the author sees as "hijacking the volume control from the listener" I would consider the opposite. With a high dynamic range, a headphones listener may feel the need to adjust the volume several times in a song to boost the clarity of softer sections or to make…

Just give me the option. When I'm in the car, I like the "wall of sound" since it's a noisy environment, so I have a head unit with a built-in compressor I can control. When I'm at home, I prefer the dynamic range. The problem comes when the engineer takes that option away from me (quite often) clipping and distorting everything to the nth degree. Like the article mentions, this creates ear fatigue and I end up, eventually, just not wanting to listen to the CD at all which colors my perception of the band. So I'm less likely to go to their concerts and give them money. That's just me though.

Re: Loudness (2007)

#16

Post by Qantourisc »

mortenjorck wrote: post #13

For practical listening, I actually prefer modern brickwall mastering techniques to more traditional mastering with a high dynamic range, for one reason: what the author sees as "hijacking the volume control from the listener" I would consider the opposite. With a high dynamic range, a headphones listener may feel the need to adjust the volume several times in a song to boost the clarity of softer sections or to make…

In my opinion this is a software problem, you just need some automatic gain control (automatic volume adjust).

Re: Loudness (2007)

#17

Post by xkcd-sucks »

mortenjorck wrote: post #13

For practical listening, I actually prefer modern brickwall mastering techniques to more traditional mastering with a high dynamic range, for one reason: what the author sees as "hijacking the volume control from the listener" I would consider the opposite. With a high dynamic range, a headphones listener may feel the need to adjust the volume several times in a song to boost the clarity of softer sections or to make…

It's easier to remove dynamic range on playback than to add it back in... don't many stereos have a "loudness" function which brickwalls the audio?

Re: Loudness (2007)

#18

Post by golergka »

Since Youtube and most streaming services started to automatically balance tracks based on their average perceived loudness (not all of them use the same metric, but the purpose is the same), loudness war is almost dead. If you brickwall your song, it will not be played louder than competition anymore.

Re: Loudness (2007)

#19

Post by pdkl95 »

mortenjorck wrote: post #13

For practical listening, I actually prefer modern brickwall mastering techniques to more traditional mastering with a high dynamic range, for one reason: what the author sees as "hijacking the volume control from the listener" I would consider the opposite. With a high dynamic range, a headphones listener may feel the need to adjust the volume several times in a song to boost the clarity of softer sections or to make…

> boost the clarity of softer sections or to make louder sections more comfortable to the ears

You can create these effects during playback with a compressor, which are available in many players[1]. Knowledge about compressors isn't as widely known as it should be; it's an important feature that would help a lot of people, especially anyone dealing with hearing loss.

> headphones

Maybe try better headphones (or a different type, such as enclosed headphones with good room attenuation)? Many cheap[2] headphones have terrible response to different volumes; quieter parts may be overly attenuated, for example. Cheap/bad headphones also tend to have a highly variable frequency response, which can sometimes sound like volume problems. If this is the case, spending some time with a highly configurable EQ might help (possibly in addition to a compressor).

[1] also available in some audio systems (e.g. jack) and as a feature in some drivers/soundcards

[2] and some "name brand", such as older Bose, anything Beats or other brands sold as fashion statements.

edit: re-added sentence that died during a bad copy/paste

edit2: Appendix for anybody that isn't familiar with dynamic range compression.

> need to adjust the volume several times

This is literally what a basic compressor is automating[3] for you. It turns down the output volume when the input level is over a threshold. There are a lot of (often configurable) details like how much to reduce the volume as the input level increases past the threshold, how quickly[4] it responds to a loud transient, and how quickly it returns to normal when the input becomes quiet again. Really nice compressors even smooth[5] the changes near the threshold so the whole effect is less noticeable.

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamic_range_compression#Desi...

[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamic_range_compression#Atta...

[5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamic_range_compression#Soft...

Re: Loudness (2007)

#20

Post by TheNewAndy »

mortenjorck wrote: post #13

For practical listening, I actually prefer modern brickwall mastering techniques to more traditional mastering with a high dynamic range, for one reason: what the author sees as "hijacking the volume control from the listener" I would consider the opposite. With a high dynamic range, a headphones listener may feel the need to adjust the volume several times in a song to boost the clarity of softer sections or to make…

As an analogy, how about if all text was served to you as .png files where the person writing the text has guessed what size text you want?

This is vaguely equivalent - it is difficult to go from image->text, just as it is difficult (or impossible) to go from low dynamic range -> high dynamic range. The reverse direction is cheap (and possible).

In fact, some compression codecs even have well defined compression curves to use - so your codec isn't just "bitstream in, pcm out" it is "bitstream+listening environment in, pcm out".

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