GoodSoundClub - Romy the Cat's Audio Site

09-27-2010

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Romy the Cat

Boston, MA
Posts 10,143
Joined on 05-28-2004

Post #:	1
Post ID:	14568
Reply to:	14568

The Opera Room

I have a room in my house that I have no use and I kind of considering converting it to The Opera Room. Generally it might be consider video rooms but I have no interest to watch movies in there, which is regularly associated with video – I have a long standing disapproval of HT films watching. My interest in video room is primary in DVD and BlueRay stage events that are wildly available nowadays and become more and more available. U hope as time goes by the live or live-to-tape performances will be available more and more over higher bandwidth internet… So, this way the name of my video room come about – the Opera Room.

So, in this thread I will be dumping up my thoughts and commentary about progress in my Opera Room. Do not expect it to be too active as I will do it slowly, still at this time it would be worth if I investigate what is out there and solicit some help. I was familiar with HT back in 90s and there a whole new world out there since then – I do feel a bit ignorant in this new environment.

The room I have for video is very good, size and location wise. I was thinking about 72-75 inch high, and about 100 inch wide retractable screen, some kind of projector and two channels audio. I have absolutely no interest in multi-channels. I would like the things to be amplified by some kind of consumer level receiver – no fancy stuff. The installation will be completely separated from my main audio system…

Again, it is not about saving money but I do not want to have anything sophisticated in my Opera Room. I know sound too well and do not to have any advanced objectives in sound in my Opera Room. I might go away with a pair of modified Altec 19. The video shall be OK, but at this point I have no advanced demands to video quality.

While I am in planning stage, if someone is using own version of my Opera Room then, please, share your thoughts about yours “dos” and “don’ts”.

Rgs, Romy 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

09-27-2010

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Romy the Cat

Boston, MA
Posts 10,143
Joined on 05-28-2004

Post #:	4
Post ID:	14575
Reply to:	14574

Quintilius Varus, give me back my legions....

Yes, George , what I learned that today’s video sources do not have 2ch tracks and they need to be “downmix to 2.0” – how sad! I truly do not want to many any attempts even try any better sound then $500playbac. I heard plenty OK sounding $500 HT setups but I never hear any good sounding $50K setups. With better quality of AV sound the horrible mixing techniques of TV sources sound too annoying, at least it is how it was in 90. At that time I had a fine sounding AV 5.1 setup with 5 Lamms driving my audio - what is wrong moved was it! I think this Oppo players that others recommend with onboard digital volume control and some kind of external 2 amps to drive my two speaker is all the I would go.

I need to decide how I can deal with receding screen. I have a fine–working fireplace behind the screen and I do love to use it in winter – I love the smell of fireplace. I wonder if the screen will be just above the fireplace then it might get smoked. I need to investigate the beams on my attic as I think I can hide the screen’s frame/box and the screen’s motor on attic. It means to cut the ceiling in another room… Well, my carpenter when he hears my new project will run to buy a boat….

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

09-29-2010

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George
Posts 26
Joined on 03-23-2005

Post #:	5
Post ID:	14592
Reply to:	14575

The Screen

Stewart screens are probably the most highly regarded screens. Their website has a lot of detail including measurements of the "cans" that hold motorized screens. The cans are not all that big so you may be happy with flush mounting to the ceiling. You could also build a simple soffit for the can to blend in with the ceiling. Might be easier than cutting the ceiling. Stewart screens are among the most expensive. You could find competitor's screens at half the Stewart retail.

The other thing to bear in mind is how much gain you want the screen to have. This will depend on how bright the projector is (lumens) and how big the screen is, the final measurment being foot-lamberts. Will you be watching with ambient light or will you be in a bat-cave?

George

09-29-2010

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Romy the Cat

Boston, MA
Posts 10,143
Joined on 05-28-2004

Post #:	6
Post ID:	14593
Reply to:	14592

Some bitching about everything…

This is a whole point with the screens. I spoke with the guys who practice HT and the gave a whole lot of information about screens p I kind of find it ridicules that they are expensive and I find it not true that they are “difficult to made”. The most likely the screens are expensive because the people who but they have some extra cash and do not question why the pay so much. The folks who know HT told me that the light force of projector must be matched with gain of my screen and if the ratio is off for a few Lux then my roof will collapse. Another ridicules thing in my view is the evenness of the screen – it cost reportedly zillion dollars to make the screen to reflect here and 3 feet away with same density. Sorry, I think it is ridicules BS. Sure, the screen gain to a degree needs to be related to protector force but I can bet million dollars that the people who too much stress it will not read light density from screen. I know it because I can – the amount of light and color temperature - 30 years of Photography and custom printing career is not wasted, and I know that this is very seldom skills and a normal person would have a huge amount of comfortable light tolerability. Trust me, I sole in my life a huge amount of green, red, yellow, fried and underexposed crappy photographs and I know how easy people might be confused with culture of imagery.

Anyhow, stop bitching, as I understand there are two approaches: get a combination of screen/projector or to get a screen that would do a perfect fit to my room decor and then to look for a projector that will handle the screen.

The room that I am planning to set up the thing is naturally very-very dark, a pure cave. It is not even friendly for being there but it getting much better. I think it will be very good for Opera Room. A guy I know advised me to set up a high power TV antenna in the roof as according to him open air TV quality is very good. I can’t stress how much I do not care about TV in my Opera Room. On TV the only thing that I watch religiously and pretty much continuously are “Jon Stuart’s Show” and “The Golden Girls”. I use to watch Animal Channel but they not show as many Cheetahs and they use to…. So, the TV feed to my Opera Room is out of question. Well, the WGBH sometimes shows some MET and other opera houses performances, some concerts… perhaps it will makes sense to get it but I get it via dish and the sound that WGBH has via the dish is horrible.

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

09-29-2010

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George
Posts 26
Joined on 03-23-2005

Post #:	7
Post ID:	14594
Reply to:	14593

Screens

The folks who know HT told me that the light force of projector must be matched with gain of my screen and if the ratio is off for a few Lux then my roof will collapse.

This really can't be true because you will lose some 50% of the light output from the bulb in the first 500 hours. Plus if you are really obsessive the color spectrum will change and constant recalibration will be required. Myself, after an initial calibration, I just watch until the picture seems too dim and then buy a new bulb, but I am far from a videophile.

The motor for a Stewart retractable screen is some $1000 wholesale. They are made for retractable awnings. Other motors will cost correspondingly less and be of lesser reliabiltiy. For your purposes a manual pull-down screen would seem to be just fine. For your excellent room a 1.0 or 1.3 gain should be fine. Check out Da-lite.

Anyhow, stop bitching, as I understand there are two approaches: get a combination of screen/projector or to get a screen that would do a perfect fit to my room decor and then to look for a projector that will handle the screen.
Several of today's projectors have aperture settings that will allow you to control the light output and adjust for dimming bulbs and the type of movie you are watching. There many other controls available, gamma, grey scale, RGB, primaries, secondaries, brightness, contrast, etc. There is a lot of flexibility to tailor the projector to what you like and not all DVDs are properly mastered.

George

I have not read this link but maybe you will find it useful.

http://www.meridianunplugged.com/ubbthreads/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=116666#Post116666

09-29-2010

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oxric
Posts 194
Joined on 02-12-2010

Post #:	8
Post ID:	14595
Reply to:	14593

HT contenders

Romy the Cat wrote:
This is a whole point with the screens. I spoke with the guys who practice HT and the gave a whole lot of information about screens p I kind of find it ridicules that they are expensive and I find it not true that they are “difficult to made”. The most likely the screens are expensive because the people who but they have some extra cash and do not question why the pay so much. The folks who know HT told me that the light force of projector must be matched with gain of my screen and if the ratio is off for a few Lux then my roof will collapse. Another ridicules thing in my view is the evenness of the screen – it cost reportedly zillion dollars to make the screen to reflect here and 3 feet away with same density. Sorry, I think it is ridicules BS. Sure, the screen gain to a degree needs to be related to protector force but I can bet million dollars that the people who too much stress it will not read light density from screen. I know it because I can – the amount of light and color temperature - 30 years of Photography and custom printing career is not wasted, and I know that this is very seldom skills and a normal person would have a huge amount of comfortable light tolerability. Trust me, I sole in my life a huge amount of green, red, yellow, fried and underexposed crappy photographs and I know how easy people might be confused with culture of imagery.

Anyhow, stop bitching, as I understand there are two approaches: get a combination of screen/projector or to get a screen that would do a perfect fit to my room decor and then to look for a projector that will handle the screen.

The room that I am planning to set up the thing is naturally very-very dark, a pure cave. It is not even friendly for being there but it getting much better. I think it will be very good for Opera Room. A guy I know advised me to set up a high power TV antenna in the roof as according to him open air TV quality is very good. I can’t stress how much I do not care about TV in my Opera Room. On TV the only thing that I watch religiously and pretty much continuously are “Jon Stuart’s Show” and “The Golden Girls”. I use to watch Animal Channel but they not show as many Cheetahs and they use to…. So, the TV feed to my Opera Room is out of question. Well, the WGBH sometimes shows some MET and other opera houses performances, some concerts… perhaps it will makes sense to get it but I get it via dish and the sound that WGBH has via the dish is horrible.

The Cat

Hi Romy:

Whilst I fully agree that there is something rather revolting regarding the pricing strategy of Stewart Filmscreens, I must say that although I have seen a number of other companies' products, my standard screen is actually a Stewart Studiotek 130 (i.e 1.3 gain) that I match very successfully with a Sim2 HT500 projector. This combination is to my mind close to perfection and in fact I was so happy with the quality that I recently bought a second Stewart Electrimask screen that masks down to 2.35:1 to use with an anamorphic lens.

BUT GIVEN WHAT YOU SAID ABOVE, I would strongly recommend a a JVC RS1U (or pricier RS2) that is excellent and can nowadays be picked up for considerably less that its $7000 retail a few years ago, or else try the current JVC DLA-HD550 the cheaper option from their new range. I would match it with a good screen from Da-Lite or Vutec and as someone suggested above you can get a pull down version or if room decor is not too much of an issue, buy a fixed one that will of course give you superior picture quality at a lower price.

If you are going fixed, then you may want to consider the Stewart fixed Studiotek with 1.3 gain, at maybe a savings of 50-65% over the price of a motorised version.

By the way, if you would not mind buying outside your local area, I can recommend someone in the US who mainly sells screens and projectors who has always saved me a considerable amount on Stewart's and others' official retail prices.

All the best
Rakesh

09-29-2010

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oxric
Posts 194
Joined on 02-12-2010

Post #:	9
Post ID:	14596
Reply to:	14595

A qualifier to my advocacy of the Studiotek 130

oxric wrote:

Hi Romy:

....

If you are going fixed, then you may want to consider the Stewart fixed Studiotek with 1.3 gain, at maybe a savings of 50-65% over the price of a motorised version.

All the best
Rakesh

Hi Romy:

Just in case my recommendation of the fixed Studiotek 130 appeared unqualified, I must add that you must be careful of course, to carefully match screen, projector and ambiant light level during use. In an ideal world you actually want less not more gain I would say. For a room like yours, which you can have completely dark (as in pitch black ideally), then the Studiotek 130 is hard to beat if it is matched with a projector that does not offer offer light levels but concentrates on quality instead as with the Sim2.

Regards
Rakesh

09-29-2010

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Paul S
San Diego, California, USA
Posts 2,650
Joined on 10-12-2006

Post #:	10
Post ID:	14597
Reply to:	14596

The Eyes Have It...

Sure, I am a total audio 'ho, and I'll take a musical fix when and where I find it. But I want to be sure no one thinks that I think this can really be done on the cheap. It would have been more honest (and more helpful) to say earlier that I am not sure exactly how much my brother spent on his A/V system, except it was between 50 and 100k (USD), for the A/V system, alone. In the meantime, I have tried various amounts of booze to go with the PBS/Ovation/TV operas on my own and others' "big screens" with nowhere near the hit I got from the grand, high $$$$$$ system. Maybe there is a "Bang-for the Buck" way to do this, but I believe there IS a sensory threshhold that must be crossed, here; and since we, as humans, are over 80% dependent on our eyes for information, I would not underrate the visual components, here.

FYI, my brother said his A/V contractors had done recent local "concert hall" and University Music Hall "Reinforcement" systems; and IMO, it sounded like it...

Yes, I am currently biased against hall "reinforcement" that I hear; but I have to say, his home opera sounded "authentic", in the "modern" sense, and the vivid imagery somehow combines to put it "over the top"; "better" than seats I can afford, anyway, not to mention the "captured" epic performances!

Best regards,
Paul S

09-29-2010

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Romy the Cat

Boston, MA
Posts 10,143
Joined on 05-28-2004

Post #:	11
Post ID:	14598
Reply to:	14596

Can I have my Opera Room and do not worry about HT quality?

Guys, thanks. I do not really look forward for an advice what specific brand of model to buy. I am rather trying to conceptualize what functional elements I might need and what expectations I might have for each of them. Listening you and some other guys let me to feel that I am a true dinosaur. I truly have no referenced between the technologies you mentioned and the actual results. I am so accustomed the in the end Casablanca when Louis and Rick walked into their infamous fog I see on the screen instead of fog a pile of garbage that I never care HOW it was done. Saying it I made two months ago a visit to Bill from NH who played for me his Opera video and it was very good- surprisingly lash and natural. I have no idea what he used and a few days I called him and ask what type of efforts takes to get this image. Bill told me that his use some kind of that costs in vicinity of $40K. I guess I need to visit more video rooms to develop a reference what kind of video quality correspond to which equipment. I did see a number of video room in past but I did not even ask what was used in there and did not paid attention to quality of imagery. I am not sure but I might need to continue doing it…

"I wish I could score everything for horns." - Richard Wagner. "Our writing equipment takes part in the forming of our thoughts." - Friedrich Nietzsche

09-30-2010

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George
Posts 26
Joined on 03-23-2005

Post #:	12
Post ID:	14603
Reply to:	14598

Basic A/V

I truly have no referenced between the technologies you mentioned and the actual results.

A wise man on this forum once said (actually he said it many times), "Do not attempt to replace a component until you have identified a problem with the sound" (or something like that).

As you clearly stated you have to video baseline. In my opinion you need a very basic system to get started. I learn better and faster when I am doing rather reading about a task, and video today has many details. You can buy a brand new Blu Ray player for $125. The video will be fine but I don't know about the DACs. You can buy a used fixed frame screen for a few hundred dollars. See example in link. A 3-year old projector will be about $500 and 75% as good as today's $3000 projector.

Once you get your feet wet in today's technology you will be able to visit video salons and complain about video dither and black crush.

No charge for advice.

George

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/vbclassified.php?do=ad&id=14220

10-01-2010

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Romy the Cat

Boston, MA
Posts 10,143
Joined on 05-28-2004

Post #:	14
Post ID:	14610
Reply to:	14607

I do not know yet....

Serge wrote:
Romy, I'd agree that it is not really exciting to have the 5.1 for watching classical music videos in the Opera room. It is hard to obtain good sound from 2 speakers, 5 or more is then ridiculous. The downmix to 2.0 option is a bit of an enigma to me. To my understanding it is either a special code in the DD stream or the player's chip which provides instruction for downmixing. The 'chip thinking' is suspicious in terms of artistic value, isn't it?
The question is how to maneuvre the sound out of surround stupideness? May be L-C-R in front will do the trick? What do you think?

Yes, it is exactly how I feel and to me it was a HUGE surprise to learn a few days back that the contemporary video sources have no 2ch outputs. I did think about the L-C-R configuration already – I do not know, I would like to know what and how then end up with 5ch and how they encode and then downcode it back to 2ch. A guy I spoke who experimented with it, explained to me that all downmixing produce different results, sure if possible I would like to avoid any downmixing. It would be very said if just because of it I will be forced to go multichannel. I wonder what kind information exist on R and L channels if there is no 2Ch downmixing. I guess it would be greatly depend from how the given material was mixed. I also guess that all programs are recorded for 2 final channels and then just digitally sliced for 5 channels, the same as they did in 90s… I do not know, as I said I need to learns what is going on nowadays but for from my 50000 feet of ignorance the idea to use L-C-R looks reasonable to me.

Rgs, 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

10-01-2010

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Paul S
San Diego, California, USA
Posts 2,650
Joined on 10-12-2006

Post #:	15
Post ID:	14613
Reply to:	14610

Instant Ambience

Probably like everything else, there have been better and worse attempts at capturing the Gestalt of a given performance. Maybe the best thing is to watch/listen to some performances via a few systems and decide if it might actually be less expense and hassle to just go with the flow, as it were. I am not so sure this type of "performance" requires the same level - or even the same type - of "reproduction" we want from our "stereo". Obviously, there must be some sort of suspension of disbelief, so the question becomes at what point and how you are disposed to let go enough to immerse in a performance of this nature. There have been times when I sat in a hall hearing nothing but the screwed-up reinforcement, and there have been times when HT with 5.1 "ambience" simply carried me away. It sounds absurd coming from me, but I think there may even be a sort of "danger" in getting too critical with this sort of thing. I think optimal performance is just at the point where one can let go.

Best regards,
Paul S

08-03-2011

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Romy the Cat

Boston, MA
Posts 10,143
Joined on 05-28-2004

Post #:	16
Post ID:	16779
Reply to:	14568

It was a devilish pleasure!

I do not do anything with my Opera Room, and I am not sure if I will. Still, from time to time I pick from the tree of possibilities some very kinky fruits. My love to Mussurgsky is know and last weekend I visited my local audio guy who has a very good Opera Room. He has some kind of old and big projector, big screen and all setup for playing music with film. I brought my opera. It was 1954 production of Boris Godunov. I tell you have so much fun from this session. Here is the fragment with celebrated "clock" scene only imagine it with loud playing 5-ch multidriver horn speakers with midbass horns, driven by 12 single-ended amps and with the screen of the size of entire wall. It WAS a devilish pleasure! THAT is how opera must be shut!

"I wish I could score everything for horns." - Richard Wagner. "Our writing equipment takes part in the forming of our thoughts." - Friedrich Nietzsche

08-24-2011

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Romy the Cat

Boston, MA
Posts 10,143
Joined on 05-28-2004

Post #:	17
Post ID:	16859
Reply to:	14568

A HT? I do not know.

A few local audio guys temporarily donated to me some gear that completely out of blue made me to have my Opera Room operational. I have a big screen, some kind of a good projector, in few days I will have a good player. The sound is the Altec 19 and I have a local friend who even contributions his big couch. I stent zero efforts and I have the Opera Room up and running.

I have absolutely no objectives at this point in sound or video quality and I just would like to see how the presence of what they call “home theater” in my house would appeal to me. So far my feeling is not as thrilling as I do not see so far the HT as some kind of solution provider. However, the events encourage me to remodel my Opera/Fireplace Room, something that I will take upon the coming days.

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

08-25-2011

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Romy the Cat

Boston, MA
Posts 10,143
Joined on 05-28-2004

Post #:	18
Post ID:	16867
Reply to:	16859

Tweaking the room comfort…

I spent today few hours in the house of my local guy with quite nice and elaborate HT. To my surprise I am absolutely not overcome with good quality of image or good sound from video system. In fact the more I observe the result that HT delivers the more I feel that pursue for better sound or better video is not necessary. However, what I do feel is superbly important in HT installation is the comfort of engaging the video experience. The comfort of the listening position, the comport and the location of the screen, the comport of engaging lights and manage the equipment, the compostable room ventilation… Those any many others purely habitual factors make the HT experience pleasurable or not.

I am not sure how I feel about the HT in my fireplace room but I do know that I will rearrange the room at the different level of comport. Ironically the HT ideas make me to realize what and how I would like to have in this room.

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

09-05-2011

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Romy the Cat

Boston, MA
Posts 10,143
Joined on 05-28-2004

Post #:	19
Post ID:	16948
Reply to:	14568

The video room is done and Altec 21S is up

It is funny that as I bought the house I did not have any use for this room, in fact I did not even liked this room but with recent event I truly developed appreciation of the room. I totally rebuilt the decor of the room, converting it to the very accurate observation of a friend of mine: “the room that reminds you your old city room at Marlborough Street”. I admit I love those dark l brown- yellow-green rooms with decadent dilapidating colors. It is what it is and the style-color reference for my new Video room is the Altec 19. Ironic, isn’t it? It is not surprise that like the appearance of the Altec 19 so much.

Even those I do have a good projector, good screen and good played (projector and screen are borrowed) I still am not sure if I like the whole film experience in HT format. Perhaps later on in this moth a local friend if my will donate me his large sofa and I will like it more but I am not sure. What however I do like is to spend time in my new room, to spend time outside of using video installation – would never guess…

Audio wise I got rid of Altec MF horn and driver and put in use the multicell with S2 driver. I think it all that I will do with audio setup in this room. I will probably run tuner in there as I use that setup more and more. My large Macondo playback is tube-based and it has fine sound mostly in listening room. For whatever reasons when my Altec 21S plays (Altec 21 = Altec 19 + 2S) is fills the whole house with sound and I have no idea why by even the HF do not get lost. Now I ma listening Mahler 6 sitting 75 feet away in my deck with 3 room between me and Altec 21S and the sound is surprisingly not corrupted. In addition it is SS – it can run all day long….

Anyhow, I do not know if I end up with a good Opera/Video room but so far I accidently acquired a very pleasant addition to my house. I even enjoy eating in my new Video room whath the projector is off and the screen is rolled up. Perhaps I need to find a stimulating good material to play in my new video room. If you guys have any recommendation of any interesting opera/concert performances then please pitch me something.

Rgs, Romy 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

09-06-2011

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Romy the Cat

Boston, MA
Posts 10,143
Joined on 05-28-2004

Post #:	21
Post ID:	16957
Reply to:	16956

Some thoughts about listening room vs. video room.

In response to my post above a friend of my wrote to me: “Soon you'll be spending more time there than the listening room :-)”. This is a very interesting concept and I would like to share my thoughts about it.

A listening room and a video room are different animals. I am not taking the requirement to equipment and setup but rather they deliver totally different experiences. The mechanisms of forming and delivering of metaphors from video rooms and audio rooms are very different and in a way they server different needs and different interests. I do feel that listening room deliver stronger imagination injection in contrary to a video room that delivers stronger motor reaction. It is not that say that musical art is less capable then cinematographic art. Let face it in video room we do not deal with cinematographic art. For sure we can play in video room some great films and great performances but the greatness of those performances might be equally appreciated at 30” TV of at 130” screen with large sound.

I did find 2 DVD that in my mind give worthy experience of large video room. I do like the contribution to these video performances that fully setup video room gives. Still, I do recognize that the added values of the better image and larger sound sever in way self-gratifying purpose. It never happens with listening room. In the better listening room with better playback the better Sound elevates awareness of performance. In video room the better sound/video do extend the responsiveness to the event but to a much lesser degree.

Rgs, Romy 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

09-07-2011

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Paul S
San Diego, California, USA
Posts 2,650
Joined on 10-12-2006

Post #:	22
Post ID:	16960
Reply to:	16957

Exactly

Well said. I think the idea with the audio/video matrix is to just get it "over the hump". Too much ambient light, not enough or too much booze, etc., etc. and the whole thing implodes. It is stupid, of course, but still we persist in comparing "live" and "reproduced" sound. But NO ONE EVER confuses video with life. by which I mean that "the gap" is not only apparent to everyone but it is so apparent that it is never even discussed as such. Not saying it is "verisimilitude" that makes our juices flow, but clearly evolved hi-fi and HT are different animals.

Best regards,
Paul S

"...their delight in music [is] the sure symptom of manly tenderness and native elegance of soul."
-- Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass, 1855

09-07-2011

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Romy the Cat

Boston, MA
Posts 10,143
Joined on 05-28-2004

Post #:	23
Post ID:	16963
Reply to:	16960

This it truely huge and great subject.

Paul S wrote:
It is stupid, of course, but still we persist in comparing "live" and "reproduced" sound. But NO ONE EVER confuses video with life…

I disagree with this statement. I would argue that it “in a way” reversed. I said “in a way” as it is very loaded subject and I can write 100.000.000 words book about it and still would say nothing about the complexity of the subject.

The whole idea of cinematographic or theatrical presentation is not to persuade the viewer that depicted is live. When you watch a good cartoon do you feel a temptation to compare it to life? The reason I brought cartoons is because it is in a way a highest form of cinematographic/theatrical presentation, the pure metaphor engine with no boundary to reality. Let take a classic example, where do you see any reference to reality in here?

Well, the reference to reality to reality is there but it is not in the presentation of sound of image but in your own live experiences, would it be real or imaginary.

So, the approximation to “live” in cinematography is not done by quality of image or sound but by other means. This is a big lie that HT owners and HT traders perpetrate – hey feel that better screen, more resolution projector or more channels of surround speakers would give more connection between video show and live experiences. I feel the reality is that better performance of video equipment is great but it serves juts better performing video room, nothing else. Yes, there are very few video shows that might be benefited from “video room greatness” but the benefits are not in consummation of artistic messages but in pure recreation and amusement. BTW, I have nothing against amusement but I would like do not confuse it with mechanism of artistes enrichment, something that I find pure audio is.

By using audio creatively it is possible to mitigate artistic message. I can invite two hypothetically -identical people in my house, play to them the identical set of material but with different audio presentation and those hypothetically -identical people will have very different reaction to the performed music. I do speak the language of audio and I do know how to felicitate it. This is the whole point of interpretive force of audio and audio can convert a listening event of the very same performance from life-changing experience to a regular waste of time. In contrary I do not think that better Video event can do it. Of because the Video events can be superbly powerful but the power of the delivery in video room would not wary SO MUCH from lumens of your projector, reflection of your screen of finesse of video sound.

Rgs, Romy 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

09-07-2011

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Paul S
San Diego, California, USA
Posts 2,650
Joined on 10-12-2006

Post #:	24
Post ID:	16965
Reply to:	16963

Immersion vs. Expectations

If the HT opera idea involves "immersion", then what is it that facilitates this immersion? I think image quality can be exploited with HT, just like any other quality. As for "Fantasia", it is a great example of a film that simply exceeded everyone's expectations, in pretty much every way. Not so long ago I had a similar (for this discussion, at this point) experience with the I-Max ,3-D "Avatar". Certainly this film does not play out the same way on my big screen TV. Nor does the same DVD "La Boheme" performance play out the same way on my TV screen vs. my brother's theater.

Now that I'm thinking about it, I wonder if vid-opera would "work" in a less "intimate" setting, at all, regardless of screen size. etc; I'm thinking of watching in a pubic theater. And maybe to get the most from vid-opera visuals, the staging should be done with video in mind from the beginning. No doubt editing is huge here. But I think the screen versions of "Westside Story" and "Camelot", etc. were better on screen because they were staged for film from the beginning, and they were able to draw from what is now a fairly long tradition of film making, which has included "film-centric" sound for some time now.

Best regards,
Paul S

09-07-2011

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clarkjohnsen
Boston, MA, US
Posts 298
Joined on 06-02-2004

Post #:	25
Post ID:	16967
Reply to:	16960

My (unique) P.O.V.

Interesting discussion, guys. My own view on HT opera is simple: While the productions can often be extraordinary (the Barcelona Ring for instance) the singing can truly suck. For Wagner one must go back to the brilliant Keilberth and Krauss Bayreuth recordings of the early fifties. Or, before.

Still I can with considerable pleasure -- and even awe -- watch some of the videos. I believe there's a sort of synesthesia that sets in, whereby our enjoyment of visual participation convinces our ears that more music is happening than is actually the case.

Now a word about movies: In my Great Room with an 8 foot screen and JVC projector, they come to life as well as in the theatre. Last night we watched The Wind That Shakes the Barley and it made a terrific impact, aesthetically and sonically. (Fine, fine movie too.) But see, movies are conceived for the screen, which opera is not.

By the way, my Great Room's walls are lined with 78s -- which to my mind may well lend a sort of high-spirit contribution to the proceedings.

clark

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