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09-15-2008 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
CO
Posts 37
Joined on 11-18-2005

Post #: 41
Post ID: 8281
Reply to: 8248
Recording of playback and phase issue.
Hello Andy,

I like your recordings although i am listening on headphones which i normally do not use. My Main setup is not operational right now.
They do sound clean, clear and dynamic.

Can you let us hear a recording of the live vs playback? This would be very interesting i think. How educated are these people sound wise that they cannot tell the real from playback? I'm also curios as to what kind of horns you are using to fool them.

Also what distances are you using for mics to source ? are they right in front of the people that undergo the test ?
Are the musicians completely quiet before the jury is seated and blindfolded not to give away the reverberation of the venue?

It seems like my VLC player is reversing the polarity incorrectly. It sounds more spacious and less in your face, less harsh when i reverse the polarity on this player.
On two other players it sounds better in the regular position (these can not be flipped though)
Never tested it on headphones and did not know it was so apparent.. Perhaps because of the flat phase resp of the ribbon mics that it is so obvious ?

Do you always respect absolute polarity?

Regards,

Collin
09-19-2008 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Andy Simpson
Posts 42
Joined on 10-21-2007

Post #: 42
Post ID: 8335
Reply to: 8281
Absolute polarity?
Hi Collin,

 CO wrote:
Hello Andy,

I like your recordings although i am listening on headphones which i normally do not use. My Main setup is not operational right now.
They do sound clean, clear and dynamic.


If you get your main setup operational, please post your impressions and perhaps we will see differences. I would generally consider the headphone as a direct-radiator, so if your main setup is horn you should hear greater performance there.


Can you let us hear a recording of the live vs playback? This would be very interesting i think. How educated are these people sound wise that they cannot tell the real from playback? I'm also curios as to what kind of horns you are using to fool them.


Next time I have the chance I'll try to remember to make a recording of the recording. I have done similar things on occasion, simply to illustrate that there is no fundamental loss in perceived resolution where acoustic impedance is maintained.

With regards to my testing, I use a pair of Mackie SRM450 speakers, which are portable, reliable and designed for 'flat' frequency response (not tuned to taste). They sound horrible with conventional recordings.

For choirs, orchestras & large sources, the speakers are located either side of the source/stage, so that the approximate height of the speaker is similar to the height of the source.

There are occasions where the 130dB @ 1m is not enough headroom (large room + loud orchestra), but for less extreme sources these are not too bad.

I also use these in the workshop or outdoor and they are more effective on smaller sources.

For example, piano, voice, guitar, drums, tambourine, etc will usually sit between the speakers and the comparison will be made with the speaker-height approximately the same as the height of the source. This kind of test has the best success rate.

In the workshop, the listening subjects tend to be anybody who happens to be around at the time - friends, family, musicians, engineers, etc.

On location, the tests are far less comprehensive and the subjects are anybody who is not playing at the time.


Also what distances are you using for mics to source ? are they right in front of the people that undergo the test ?
Are the musicians completely quiet before the jury is seated and blindfolded not to give away the reverberation of the venue?


Usually the microphone pair is setup where the subjects are seated or close by, so that the distance is similar. In the case of the location testing, this is rarely so formal as to require total silence between stimuli, and is not so critical as you might think in the larger venues.


It seems like my VLC player is reversing the polarity incorrectly. It sounds more spacious and less in your face, less harsh when i reverse the polarity on this player.
On two other players it sounds better in the regular position (these can not be flipped though)
Never tested it on headphones and did not know it was so apparent.. Perhaps because of the flat phase resp of the ribbon mics that it is so obvious ?


I have not listened to the recordings with reversed polarity - I will try it when I have the time.

I would expect that if you are sensitive to exact polarity, the improved mechanical performance would most likely make this more obvious, but since the sources in question are not particularly asymetrical (unlike the trumpet/trombone/etc), I would not expect a drastic difference in perception.

Also, the Model A is not a ribbon mic.


Do you always respect absolute polarity?


By design yes, but consciously in a recording situation no. I assume that polarity is maintained without checking!

Andy
10-23-2008 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Andy Simpson
Posts 42
Joined on 10-21-2007

Post #: 43
Post ID: 8611
Reply to: 8335
The subject of 'Excessive HF' and implications
fiogf49gjkf0d

Romy,

In response to your response to what I did not say but implied....I decided to put the question here instead, where the light of enquirey might shine upon several different facets of investigation.

Firstly, I'm still interested to know if you are able to run your system 'flat'?

I would guess that the more discerning ear would have great difficulty with flat presentation of the abominations that pass for recorded music - both from now & the past.

For example, the majority of professional microphones have huge problems in the range (>5k) you describe.

In the workshop & on location I use quite brutal PA type speakers, which are 106dB/w/m horns on the top.

These are designed for 'flat' response and while though they do not come particularly close (to flat) they are not designed to compensate for upper-register distortions in microphones.

When I listen to direct-radiator recordings I find the results extremely harsh, dirty, fatiguing & compressed if I listen above a very low level.

If I had equalised or damped these 'aggressive' speakers to best suit the average conventional recording, I would certainly find my own recordings to be 'excessively dull' via the same treatment.

When I first prototyped a horn-loaded microphone, I was amazed to find that these 'aggressive' speakers were actually capable of sounding both soft & hard according to source - in other words, it was not the speakers that sounded aggressive but that they were reproducing the aggression of the source distortion in all previous cases.

By this, I mean to imply that I would expect you to have better results with my recordings if your system was run flat.

Andy

10-23-2008 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Romy the Cat


Boston, MA
Posts 10,049
Joined on 05-27-2004

Post #: 44
Post ID: 8616
Reply to: 8611
Flat over 10kHz?
fiogf49gjkf0d
Andy, I do not think that my system runs “flat” in the way how you understand it. It is with 2db precession flat up to ~10K approximately and then it rolls off quite aggressively. In fact, I very much intentionally try to not even know about the objective flatness of my playback over 10K. There are many reasons why.


"I wish I could score everything for horns." - Richard Wagner. "Our writing equipment takes part in the forming of our thoughts." - Friedrich Nietzsche
10-24-2008 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Andy Simpson
Posts 42
Joined on 10-21-2007

Post #: 45
Post ID: 8617
Reply to: 8616
Aggressive roll-off?
fiogf49gjkf0d
 Romy the Cat wrote:
Andy, I do not think that my system runs “flat” in the way how you understand it. It is with 2db precession flat up to ~10K approximately and then it rolls off quite aggressively. In fact, I very much intentionally try to not even know about the objective flatness of my playback over 10K. There are many reasons why.


I'd be interested in those reasons. Also, how aggressive roll-off?

Having said that, there is a big difference between roll-off at 5-6k and at 10k, so I'd say this is not so critical as when I thought you were rolling off at 5-6k.

Can you run it 'flat' - did you ever try?

Andy
10-24-2008 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Romy the Cat


Boston, MA
Posts 10,049
Joined on 05-27-2004

Post #: 46
Post ID: 8621
Reply to: 8617
A whole another subject.
fiogf49gjkf0d

Andy,

I do not know how aggressive roll-off on obsolete values as I never cared to calibrate my analyzer/microphone above 10K. Well, it was calibrated a few years back but I never trusted to it as I do not see needs for above 20K lineriarity from listening position. Be advised that I am talking about reproduction not about recordings.

Yes, I did try to run the playback flat in 2001-2002, it was minus 1dB at 20kHz. I think I have now minis 6-8dB at 20kHz, but those number are not firm. You, when we talk about running flat at 20kHz then the first question become not “how flat?” but by “virtue of what?”. In many case the problems that we subjectively hear at 20kHz are not overly excessive amount HF but the pure quality of HF. The question is: can you produce at necessary quality let say above 12kHz? If you do (and very few truly can) then you can drive HF much harder with no negative consequences. With my playback my tweeters do very well, my HF amp is optimized for HF as radical I ever seen (air-cap filter, single stage RF amp direct-coupled via very fact core to HF optimized ribbon), however my electricity is not good for HF. At the good electricity day I might drive tweeter much herder, but this is whole another subject…

The Cat


"I wish I could score everything for horns." - Richard Wagner. "Our writing equipment takes part in the forming of our thoughts." - Friedrich Nietzsche
Page 3 of 3 (46 items) Select Pages:  « 1 2 3
   Target    Threads for related reading   Most recent post in related threads   Forum  Replies   Views   Started 
  »  New  The elusive “absolute tone”...  Breeze......  Playback Listening  Forum     24  227764  07-28-2005
  »  New  Tweeter for Vitavox S2. High-sensitively ribbons?..  Correction: Townshend Ribbon and sensitivity....  Horn-Loaded Speakers Forum     64  816584  10-19-2006
  »  New  The best audio system: my secrets are partially out...  Kin-Dza-Dza's review.......  Playback Listening  Forum     1  27769  07-06-2007
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