audiophile... ??

[Sheer Noise]

Hey,

I got sent an interesting email during the week... and seeing as Rick mastered the album in question, I thought I'd share it with you all for your input.

I'm still trying to work out exactly what the guy means, if he is indeed serious.

Dave
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Dave,
When mixing "Speaking of Sarah - Seven Hundred Seasons", how did you mix it/intend for it to be heard.
I ask because I have just graphically EQed my system (to have a 'flat' response using a db level meter) , and the sound-stage appears to have shifted in the process (I don't understand why - neither does <insert>)
Speaking of Sarah is one of my source CDs.

To me, the soundstage has shifted from being a large arc stepping back (pre) to (now) a relatively flat line between the speakers.
Tk3 (eg) sounds as if the vocals were standing centred mid-to-back of the stage, and after EQ standing centred at the front of the stage.

Where was the intended 'sitting' of the vocals??

I'd love to hear from you about this, as I want to hear it as intended.

Matthew

[Kris]

Is he using it on a stage? Like, with a PA system????

Politely explain to him that he is never going to hear it the way you intended it to be heard in an auditorium running through a graphic eq which has been designed to flatten the room not the music on the cd.

[Sheer Noise]

:P

I think he's talking about his loungeroom... um, and I think he's serious... I'm not - not that serious anyway.

D

[Chris H]

You might tell him that introducing the graphic into the signal path could create more problems than it solves as the eq would introduce phase distortion.... ....
and ask what gear he uses for his audiophile system.

[Howard Jones]

Acoustics 101:

You cannot solve time-domain problems with frequency-domain solutions. And vice versa.

Clients 101:

There are plenty more like this one out there. Up to you how you solve it; ranging from simply asking him to POQ through to taking him in hand and leading him through a long, probably arduous process of education.

[Howard Jones]

P.S. Send him a link to this thread, if you're feeling game...

[Sheer Noise]

dare I add "dweebs 101"?

He's actually not a client... he's referring to a CD I did a few years ago that he's bought, really likes and thinks is good enough quality to use as a reference CD for his new system... a choice I seriously doubt proves he knows anything!

Next installment:

--------------
> Yamaha 657 Amp (straight - no DSP)
> Orpheus Aurora 2 speakers (floor standing) bi-wired
> Berhinger 31 band, 2 channel - graphic EQ
>
>
> Do you understand what I'm trying to explain?? (difference between the two)
>
> My prupose and intention with the EQ is to even out the peaks and troughs in
> the room.
> Are some speakers designed to boost/cut particular areas of sound to give a
> different impression of the music? - that is, why do speakers differ in the
> sound they produce from the same source (and (room) set up)?
>
>
> Matt

----------------

I think I'll just stop emailing him... I don't have time for this!

Dave

[Howard Jones]

Dave,

You got yourself a real live one, there. Don't know 'bout you, but I'm due back on Planet Earth.

Howard

[Sheer Noise]

I took your advice and sent him a POQ email... thanks Howard! haha

Dave

[chris p]

I especially like the idea of evening out a room using a Deadringer EQ. Oh gosh, somehow it seems flatter and has lost its 3 dimensionality! Funny, when you first posted I was going to ask about the EQ unit: if it makes something sound worse, why persist?

Still, I guess we've all been there on the long, expensive road to audio education.

Acoustics 101:

You cannot solve time-domain problems with frequency-domain solutions. And vice versa.

I'd agree that a graphic EQ applied to a stereo mix is unlikely to solve time-domain (=stage depth or phase) problems. But I think the infamous Fletcher (Joe Meek, Legendary Audio) might disagree with the above as a general proposition. He's written that EQ was originally developed in the movie industry precisely to solve perceived soundstage depth issues (well, at least that's my understanding of what he wrote: with Fletcher, its not always entirely straightforward). Something to do with the air attenuating high frequencies more than low. I'd be the last one to challenge HJ on any technical issue, but Howard if you'd be willing to expand a little I'd be grateful for the lesson.

[Howard Jones]

Hi Chris,

Interesting question and not my area of expertise. I will happily defer to anyone who has more experience in this subject. However, I’ll outline what I understand of it. Before doing so, I should point out that using graphic EQs for this purpose is somewhat moot: in 20 odd years of being involved in control room builds and remodelling, I’ve only ever installed a graphic across the monitor chain once and that was at the client’s direct instruction.

It’s also not apparent to me that it matters much – if Dave’s contact thought he needed an EQ (any EQ, let alone a Deadringer) – then he doesn’t know what questions to ask in the first place. The leap to using an EQ is misguided – he would have been better putting the money so spent towards better monitors (always and still the greatest single weak spot in any studio or lounge room) or paying an acoustic consultant to check out his room. I think of graphic EQs as being used mostly in live sound applications.

To me, the time-domain encapsulates the totality of sound travelling through a 3D space over time, as heard by a listener. Thus, sound emerges from the monitors and travels by paths direct & indirect to the listener’s ears. From there, the human auditory and psycho-acoustic systems take over to present us with our overall perception of the sound in that particular space.

Now, there are many points along this chain deserving of comment. Firstly, who can say which frequencies at what amplitudes are emitted by the speakers? What are the interactions between these frequencies right at the baffle board? From the speakers, these frequencies with their various amplitudes travel across the space to your ears. Some of these frequencies will be attenuated more than others on that journey. Meanwhile, these same frequencies with their various amplitudes are reaching the boundaries of the listening space – walls, floor, ceiling, small & large surfaces – and are being reflected towards your ears. Some of this sound will have been absorbed or attenuated. Some frequencies, however, may be augmented. Of course, over time, the amplitude of different frequencies will decay at different rates and the direct & reverberant fields will decay at different rates also. Then, right at the listener’s ears, all these different sound sources are taken into the auditory system.

Now, like the human visual system, none of us can experience how and exactly what another person’s brain is telling them about what they are seeing or hearing. We do tend to reach broad agreement about what looks good or what sounds good. There is still wide scope for individual variation, however. If a room is agreed not to sound too good and we decide to institute some graphical EQing to fix the problem, then we set up a reference microphone in the mix position and feed the output into a device that can perform a spectrum analysis on the input signal i.e. it gives us a breakdown of the amplitude of different frequencies at the moment of sampling. The frequency points are typically 1/3 octave apart.

We observe this display and see that, relative to a nominal reference point usually labelled 0dB, that some frequencies will have a higher amplitude than the reference and that some will be lower. Some may even be the same as the reference! We then arm ourselves with a 1/3 octave graphic EQ (with the frequency points the same as those used by the spectrum analyser) and we set each fader up with the equal and opposite amplitude to that derived by the analyser. We are applying the exact mirror-image of the frequency curve shown by the analyser. This then means that, when we repeat the spectrum analysis, we should derive a flat frequency response.

This undoubtedly works, up to a point. However, using a graphic EQ for this purpose is surely an admission of defeat. The best the graphic can do is alter the frequency-domain characteristics of the signal at the point just prior to it entering the amplifier. And to achieve this, we have replaced human ears and the associated, complicated human psycho-acoustic system with a microphone. To say nothing of the effects due to the room acoustics: the microphone will not experience those acoustics the same way as a pair of ears will.

No, to fix problems with room acoustics, we shouldn’t have those problems in the first place. What am I saying? I am saying that we should exhaust every possibility in terms of room design, acoustic treatment, speaker selection, speaker placement etc etc when we are building the room in the first place. After the room is built, we analyse and listen to see what we have and how far from the design concept we have fallen. And, of course, we will fall short of the ideal. This is the joy and pain of building rooms. But plenty of rooms these days are excellent and very workable. The understanding of room design has come a long way in the last 20 years, but a graphic is still just a graphic.

I would think that most people on this forum would know and accept that it is vital to understand their own room/speaker combination inside out, including any weaknesses. These weaknesses are then compensated for during mixing and mastering. This compensation is performed in the brain and, in my experience, many people perform this fairly well once they have figured out what the limitations of their room are and done some reference listening.

The totality of room design, acoustic treatment, speaker selection, speaker placement and the listener’s perception constitute the time-domain of the audio. I hope I have given some idea of why a frequency-domain solution is a poor second-choice when dealing with acoustic problems. Perhaps a final point will help explain this: if you take a well-designed room that is generally agreed to sound good, then you should be able to place a number of different speaker models in there and have them all sound acceptable. If you take a room that has a graphic EQ in the monitor chain and swap out the speakers, you’ve got to perform the spectrum analysis and EQing all over again. It’s a one-off deal.

Cheers,
Howard

[rick]

umm , i dont want to get involved with audiophile questions


however i just thought i would pull up the point chris started about "fletcher"
having met him and dealt with him a fair bit including driving him around sydney chasing NEVES long before the internet and having heard a bunch of his audio war stories i can assure you he is not the same flectcher as the"ted fletcher" that did the joe meek gear
fletcher is the owner of mercenary audio and the big cheese on the big audio forums and is a different beast altogether to the joe meek dude

[chris p]

Thanks for the clarification Rick.

And Howard - great post. I think Dave's listener should be pointed at this thread for that post alone.

[Kris]

Audiophile my a$$!!!

What audiophile worth their salt would insert a be!@#$%^& product anywhere in the chain?

The guy is clearly an audio idiot. Just tell him that your time is valuable and that any further questions will need to be invoiced at an hourly rate.

[Sheer Noise]

done.

[Sheer Noise]

He won't understand the first thing about Howard's post... thankyou though - it's an excellent summary of everything this guy's trying to do wrong!

I've given up trying to be technical... please excuse any blasphemy in the following reply I sent him... I think it'll still be a revelation to him. Happy to leave it there and not waste any more time trying to understand these kinds of people!

Dave




----------------------------

Mate,

To be honest, I think that inserting a piece of be!@#$%^& equipment anywhere in ANY audio chain is not worth 1/4 of what you're spending on it. And a graphic EQ should probably be the last resort for fixing your listening area, be it a studio, loungeroom, bedroom... Whatever.

To do what you want to do you need a fairly sophistocated set of equipment and computer software, and even then, when you're measuring how different frequencies behave in your listening environment, you're taking a "mic's" word for it, not an extremely complex listening device like your own ears.

For mine, the best thing to do is to sit in the middle of the room, make sure the speakers are placed on the two other points of an equilateral triangle to where you are sitting, and turn it up bloody loud. That's the best way for you to hear what's on the CD correctly... And that's pretty much how it was intended to be heard... On big speakers, turned up real loud!

NOTE: although I'd always like music I've worked on be heard on big speakers turned up real loud, given current popular listening trends, I probably should have mixed it on very small speakers turned up INCREDIBLY loud and then had the mastering engineer compress the file to a 64kps mp3 file.

Enjoy... Hope I've been helpful.

Dave