Music Into Noise: The Destructive Use Of Dynamic Range Compression part 2

People listen to and watch things for different reasons.

Emma has difficulty recognising some actors from one film to the next; I have difficulty predicting lionear plot developments unless they're signposted texturally. It leads to us each being 'fooled' by different kinds of twists - Em was UTTERLY BAFFLED by the reveal in The Prestige, whereas I recognised Bordon from the first moment I saw him. People and their braisn are very different. None of us are necessarily 'wrong'.

this is all true, so why all the "better listener"/"what you enjoy is dogshit" implications underlying your arguments? and the refusal to accept that some people don't notice it or don't care?

I honestly am not reading any "what you enjoy is dogshit" under anyone's arguments. What I'm reading is that some people, itt, are rightfully arguing that there is a huge difference between "don't hear it" and "don't care". You are hearing it, but your not caring about it isn't wrong.

shakey mo and aerosmith have both explicitly equated liking compressed music to eating dogshit, and deej flat-out refuses to believe that anyone doesn't notice it

I missed shakey's post, but I think you're reading too much into aero's dogshit reference, tbh.

this is all true, so why all the "better listener"/"what you enjoy is dogshit" implications underlying your arguments? and the refusal to accept that some people don't notice it or don't care?

Dynamic change really enhances/improves music! I don't think you would argue against this?

yeh i don't like this "better listener" "you should hear this if u r a critic" stuff

i think one of the reasons i enjoy reading lex's stuff is that he talks about things i never notice, don't know anything about

lex you have argued on this thread that DRC basically doesn't exist, that it cannot be discerned/distinguished/noticed. This is wrong.

Yeah, lex, I think you'd be better off planting your flag in the "I DON'T CARE ABOUT DRC" than trying to argue that it isn't noticable or w/e.

haha i remember someone once saying that they'd heard sting's dreary and trite new album as it sounded on the original playback in the studio, and it sounded AMAZING, and i remember thinking I DON'T WANT TO LISTEN IN A WAY THAT MAKES STING'S RECORD AMAZING

lol

hahaha

lex, i feel like you might be conflating "music" + "recordings" a little bit? no one is slighting your taste, just the way some of these recordings are presented to the listening public. i like & listen to lots of records where i don't like the mastering job, it doesn't ruin the music for me but i might still like to hear a different master.

xxxxp

lex you have argued on this thread that DRC basically doesn't exist

no wonder that team always lost the rugby match on boxing day

shakey mo and aerosmith have both explicitly equated liking compressed music to eating dogshit, and deej flat-out refuses to believe that anyone doesn't notice it

― lex pretend, Friday, October 28, 2011 10:32 AM (2 days ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

?? i just said that you hear it, you just dont know what it is that you're hearing

like, you might not recognize it AS drc but it is nonetheless, drc

Thinking that the movie analogy could be extended out a bit to explain why this is an issue to some. Lots of people love, say, The Blair Witch Project for the story/concept, but at the same time just LOATHE the production on it. Does the production get in the way of the story? Probably not. But is it hard for people to watch? For many people, absolutely. Or, to use an example that's a bit less glaring, same with a bunch of J.J. Abrams movies - once you're attuned to his lens flare technique, you might start noticing it more, and for some people it's an irritation. But a lot of people will watch his films and never ever notice that as say that they're absolutely great, and not get why some people look at them and shake their damn heads every time it happens on the screen.

I suppose a more direct analogy would be the increasing use of the cyan/orange colour correction in so many films these days. Most people won't be consciously aware of this when they're watching the films, but guaranteed that there are a number of people out there that find them absolutely unwatchable. The people that enjoy the films aren't wrong, but to deny that it's happening is ridiculous.

BTW before anyone pounces I realize that these examples aren't perfect - the camera work in Blair Witch is probably more akin to miking, and lens flares are probably more akin to an effect that's applied to an audio signal. The colour correction is probably closest but not exact, because it'd probably be more akin to a part of the mixing process. Maybe someone else knows a more exact analogy here because the closest I'm coming here is bumping the picture saturation level all the way to the top, which would obviously look like shit to everyone, not just the attuned.

cropping the frame so it fits on tv

That's a good one.

bumping the picture saturation level all the way to the top, which would obviously look like shit to everyone

I don't know dude, Godard rocked heavy saturation hard in parts of In Praise of Love. It looked pretty good to me.

Anyway, there's nothing wrong with compression, it's really nice to thicken up a mix but it does get abused to the point where it's just limiting sonic potential imo, that's the only thing to lament really.

color saturation rules fuiud

Anyway, there's nothing wrong with compression, it's really nice to thicken up a mix but it does get abused to the point where it's just limiting sonic potential imo, that's the only thing to lament really.

― historyyy (prettylikealaindelon), Sunday, October 30, 2011 4:38 PM (14 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

you're confusing things. there is something wrong with 'dynamic range compression' which is what we're talking about

cropping the frame so it fits on tv

― zvookster, Sunday, October 30, 2011 3:39 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

That's a good one.

― Tim F, Sunday, October 30, 2011 4:25 PM (28 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

this is the most OTM comparison -- pan & scan cinema is the movie equivalent, if there is one.

i mean i suppose the real equivalent would be streaming netflix on a bad connection

I don't know dude, Godard rocked heavy saturation hard in parts of In Praise of Love. It looked pretty good to me.

Sure, it CAN look good in doses (or as you say, "in parts"). But would you want everything you watch to always have the levels cranked ALL of the time? And even if you thought you DID, would your eyes and brain appreciate it?

color saturation is definitely something you can want all of the time

http://languages.oberlin.edu/courses/2011/spring/cine299/mmeyer/files/2011/02/in-the-mood-for-love2.jpg

xp Actually I think pan and scan is partly back to data compression, i.e. losing parts of the data that aren't seen as important to get the gist across. So I'm not sure it's really the analogue of DRC here.

What I like about the "cropping" analogy is that both are a pragmatic solution to the demands of modern modes of consumption. Obv. there is a basic advantage to cropping the frame if you are watching a film on TV; just as heavy DRC makes sense for commuter and radio listening.

It's less cropping and more like stretching a 4:3 image to fit a widescreen tv. Many, many people don't care at all but it drives me batty.

Yeah, that's probably closer to the nub of it - all data is still there but it's distorted somehow. I'm not sure there's a perfect analogue here because with visual media it's pretty clear there's something up, and with audio it's far less obvious.

I don't agree. Altering volumes over the course of a mix is not a distortion like stretching an image.

And I'm not clear on deej's distinction. "Compression" is "dynamic range compression" as far as I know.

I don't agree. Altering volumes over the course of a mix is not a distortion like stretching an image.

― timellison, Sunday, October 30, 2011 5:22 PM (10 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

dynamic range compression is not the same as 'altering volumes'...

its 'altering them so that they distort'

No, there was a problem with clipping in some cases of mastering with extreme compression, but the use of compression does not necessarily entail an introduction of distortion.

fwiw my use of "distorted" in previous post is referring to distorting the original dynamics, not distortion as in peaking.

Right, but when I'm mixing my own music and I alter the volume level at a particular point on a given instrument, I don't feel like I'm "distorting the original dynamics." In fact, I only care about the original dynamics to the extent that they sound good to me.

"Compression" is "dynamic range compression" as far as I know.

yes, not sure what deej is getting at here.

its 'altering them so that they distort'

I guess if you were clipping then you'd be distorting, but that's not compression.

or rather i should say not the aim of compression.

I get what you're saying Tim but there's a difference between making those decisions during mixing, where you're consciously making the choice to make certain things quieter than others (or louder than others) at specific points in time, and just taking a blanket algorithm and making even the "quiet" parts sound as loud as the loud ones, no?

Saying "compression is fine" or whatever you said in your original post is missing the point;we are talking about boosting levels so they become compressed in the mastering stage - not as a tool of production, but a way of mastering something LOUDLY. That isnt fine at all, it's pretty uniformly an awful choice

Dynamic range compression does cause distortion...thats what makes it bad. It flattens relative dynamics, distorting the sound of a track. It's not the same as using compression as a tool in production

there's a difference between making those decisions during mixing, where you're consciously making the choice to make certain things quieter than others (or louder than others) at specific points in time, and just taking a blanket algorithm and making even the "quiet" parts sound as loud as the loud ones, no?

Absolutely, but I'm a little conflicted on it. On the one hand, I think flatness in dynamic range can be a positive in pop records - that was why I brought up Spector and Motown the other day. I tend to think I'd like to see something like that arrived at organically rather than "applying an algorithm," but I guess I'm open to the idea that applying that algorithm could make it sound better than what I came up with when I mixed it.

xp, I think you're using the term distortion quite liberally, it's not actual distortion. Compression makes tracks as loud as possible up until clipping starts to occur, technically I don't think it qualifies as distortion. Compression is a tool used by mastering engineers and musicians, in both cases it flattens dynamics, it's the same thing. I think we agree that the issue is the trend that governs how mastering engineers employ it.

clipping is digital distortion

I'm not convinced reviving this thread is the best idea I've ever had, but this Monolake example made me chuckle:

http://soundcloud.com/monolake/mastering-a-step-by-step-guide