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In the Forum: Playback Listening
In the Thread: Attention Sound Engineers (compression and loudness)
Post Subject: Right amount of wrong notes?Posted by Andy Simpson on: 4/22/2009
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 Romy the Cat wrote:
Andy,
 
my mind does not operate by the categories you employ, I rather think about nature of Sound not about harmonic/non-harmonic distortions. The whole subject about the distortion is intricate, not to mention that it is not know if we in fact are able to recognize and adequately react to distortions. What I am saying that your explanation might explains something but nothing that I have practical or sensual experience with. The feeding system of sinewave tones and observation of introduced of harmonic or non-harmonic tone doe not proved to me anything about compression.  First, are you sure that the harmonic or non-harmonic problems come from compression itself but not from a wrong ways to inflict compression? You saddest to take my favorite digital compressor and set it up for some 'reasonable' amount of compression. Are you sure that in this case the sound will be ruined by compression but not by the DSP processing or by somthing else? Second, if you subtract the source from output during your “feeding system” experiment and hear juts distortions without the souses then what will you hear? I know what you will be hearing but the question is what would you be hearing that would allow you to make a cultural judgment about Sound? The answer is nothing. Therefore I do not tend to think about sound as compellation of original sound and distortion but I rather look at the whole sound, and I really know what to look for. Therefore I think that the proof in the pudding and what I observe is that a right amount and properly applied compression do not hurt sound, and in some cases very much improves it perception. Now, what would be the “right amount” and the “properly applied type” I have no idea.

The caT


Of course the perception is the most interesting part and informs us why it can be dangerous to 'trust' our perception.

Generally, I hear most forms of compression simply as the sound of dynamic 'restriction' or 'stress', but there is an underlying 'dirty' 'unpure' 'unmusical' aspect, which becomes very obvious in the comparison with a real source.

If the musicians are playing a 3 part chord of C major, is there any right amount of dischordant notes for the microphone/speaker/compressor to add? Sharp, flat, off-key tones?

Perhaps, we could say that where the amplitude compression provides a subjective 'improvement' and the distortion products remain below the threshold of audibility or masking, a 'useful' compromise is reached - perhaps a reason for prefering a high noise-floor in a compressed recording.

If compression is used to make up for inadequate gain in playback it could also be argued to be 'useful' but it is a slippery slope to compromise for the worst case.

You might prefer compression for reasons of insufficient system gain, system/acoustic noise-floor or even subjective musical reasons (the musicians played with too much dynamics)....

How do your experiences differ with (sealed) headphones differ from that of the loudspeaker?

Andy

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