Depth Poll - Where is your image located?

[E-Stat]

I think the size thing is an artifact of your speakers. Human voices are neither line sources, nor large radiating surfaces.

A single voice is a comparatively small source of sound as compared with the overall stage or sound field. Just don't blow them out of proportion! Distant miking retains that natural balance.

Think about it for a sec. Use a visual analogy. Remember the stereo GAF viewers? Two images taken from slightly different perspectives. Wonderful apparent depth. Now think of how multi-track recordings using dozens of close mikes are captured. Take an up close picture of someone's mouth. And one for every instrument in the orchestra and collect them as slides. Stack all of them together and view them simultaneously through light. Got perspective? Are you kidding?

I find with my speakers that voices to be startlingly lifelike, with appropriate energy, height, and dimension.

I've yet to hear a sub four foot tall box even begin to suggest a lifelike sized image. Which corresponds to the height of the New Advents in the garage on stands that are the same as 936s. The Grand Utopia is about seven feet tall or only slightly shorter than my stats. I'm thinking they understand the concept, too. I don't attend concerts in Munchkinland.

I have the same objection with Quad 57s. They are coherent and transparent with a wonderful midrange, BUT - similarly you listen down to them. Something that never occurs when I'm at the symphony.

In live acoustic performances I make it a point to sit in the first 10 rows. It avoids hearing much of the room and allows me to hear the people on the stage with clarity.

My season tickets are a bit further back at row O. It is the hall acoustic I seek and have no difficulty with clarity midway back in the orchestra.

 

[Guest159]

A single voice is a comparatively small source of sound as compared with the overall stage or sound field. Just don't blow them out of proportion! Distant miking retains that natural balance.

Think about it for a sec. Use a visual analogy. Remember the stereo GAF viewers? Two images taken from slightly different perspectives. Wonderful apparent depth. Now think of how multi-track recordings using dozens of close mikes are captured. Take an up close picture of someone's mouth. And one for every instrument in the orchestra and collect them as slides. Stack all of them together and view them simultaneously through light. Got perspective? Are you kidding?


I've yet to hear a sub four foot tall box even begin to suggest a lifelike sized image. The New Advents in the garage on stands are about the same height as 936s. The Grand Utopia is about seven feet tall or only slightly shorter than my stats? I don't attend concerts in Munchkinland.

I have the same objection with Quad 57s. They are coherent and transparent with a wonderful midrange, BUT - similarly you listen down to them. Something that never occurs when I'm at the symphony.


My season tickets are a bit further back at row O. It is the hall acoustic I seek and have no difficulty with clarity midway back in the orchestra.

I don't like classical enough to buy a ticket, much less a season ticket.

What you're describing graphic-wise is pretty much how modern movie effects work. It looks a LOT more real and convincing that the simpler filming techniques used in the 1970 prior to Star Wars. The first Star Wars obviously set a new standard with how it compiled images to get both the detail and the scale. Nobody ever looked back from that when it came to special effects.

No doubt the FGU is an enormous speaker, but it is a point source with conventional dynamic drivers that basically do what my 936 does.

The problem with distantly mic'ing a point source and a line source like a cello is that the the line source projects sound much further with maybe 1 or 2dB of decay by the square of the distance, whereas a point source like a voice falls off at about 6dB per squaring of distance. Even in a fairly close far field mic'ing technique, the point source is going to lack most of it's energy and dynamics where a cello will power right on through.

 

[E-Stat]

I don't like classical enough to buy a ticket, much less a season ticket.

Then any artifice should be sufficient for you.

The first Star Wars obviously set a new standard with how it compiled images to get both the detail and the scale. Nobody ever looked back from that when it came to special effects.

Dykstra's "move the camera" rather than "move the model" motion control has nothing to do with stacking multiple flat images on top of each other.

INo doubt the FGU is an enormous speaker, but it is a point source with conventional dynamic drivers that basically do what my 936 does.

On a far greater scale. They get it. I get it. Why don't you?

The problem with distantly mic'ing a point source and a line source like a cello is that the the line source projects sound much further with maybe 1 or 2dB of decay by the square of the distance, whereas a point source like a voice falls off at about 6dB per squaring of distance.

Problem? Line sources decay by distance in a linear fashion. Just like we hear naturally in an ambient environment. Unless your reference is a sound reinforcement system.

 

[Guest159]

Then any artifice should be sufficient for you.


Dykstra's "move the camera" rather than "move the model" motion control has nothing to do with stacking multiple flat images on top of each other.


On a far greater scale. They get it. I get it. Why don't you?


Problem? Line sources decay by distance in a linear fashion. Just like we hear naturally in an ambient environment. Unless your reference is a sound reinforcement system.

The lighting effects that ILM used to film one shot of the starship Enterprise took 4 passes by itself. There was the green screen sillouette, then lighting on the model, then sillouette + windows lit, then sillouette + nacelles and deflector lit. 2001 was filmed in a similar way. I'm not sure how Lucas did it exactly, but I'd be very surprised if the death star was shot on one pass. I'd be surprised if your cell phone shot a picture in a single exposer. Mine doesn't. The product of that is a much better picture with richer colors and contrasts.

Artifice? Absolutely. It's unavoidable and so I embrace it with love. I don't let it bother me in the slightest so long as I'm well entertained. And you do too! We all do. There is no perfect mic, mic'ing technique, mixing and mastering techniques, storage medium, pre-amp, amp, or speaker in any objective sense. I appreciate why you like what you like and I applaud you for articulating it well.

At this point I'm calling it quits on this thread as I feel I've said all that's worth saying on my part. I hope present and future onlookers learn something here and realize that E-stat and I aren't at odds so much as we're discussing different approaches with different goals in mind. It's been fun and I hope this makes people think about their options. Were my tastes and priorities different, I might have a rig like his.

 

[E-Stat]

I'd be surprised if your cell phone shot a picture in a single exposer. Mine doesn't. The product of that is a much better picture with richer colors and contrasts.

But such is not an overlay of completely different images stacked one upon the other completely devoid of any relevance.

Artifice? Absolutely. It's unavoidable and so I embrace it with love.

Not unavoidable when using live, unamplified music as the arbiter. I enjoy listening to Gary Lewis & the Playboys as much as I enjoy Ginastera. But I would never use the former to judge the quality of an audio system.

It's been fun and I hope this makes people think about their options. Were my tastes and priorities different, I might have a rig like his.

Have a great weekend!

 

[SPOautos]

No... It actually is real. It's the actual sound the microphones pick up. It's the sound you get when you don't have a lot of color added to the sound through reflections and diffractions. If the pin point accurate information isn't in the recording, then it won't be in the reproduction. It really depends on what's in the recording.

Im no sound engineer but it seems like the recording process does not really pick up spacial sound at all. For instance, I saw a video where they used a mic right up close to a person speaking, then 10 feet away from the person speaking. Obviously the recording between the two sounds completely different. But which of those recording is more like how it would be if you were standing in the room? Maybe neither, I wasnt in the room so cant say. But what it makes me think about is microphones are not picking up how it sounds to someone sitting live in the room, you do not get the spacial sound....for instance the sound of the guitar is recorded directly from the pickups not from where a audience would be sitting, so it doesnt sound the same as live.

I think what some people are getting at is while the spacial attributes were not really captured, some speakers play recordings back in a way that sounds more like how it would sound live. Now we might say it's a coloration, but I dont know...the recordings typically dont sound like how they would live anyway, so there is fault and compromise in the entire system from recording to playback. So if the end goal is to feel like your listening to it live then you may benifit from a speaker that produces that sound.

That's my worthless opinion anyway. LoL

 

[Soundork]

In my case it depends on the speakers for the most part: With the Harman Kardon (hk330c, 430, 730 and A402) gear and the Denon PMA-1060, my Polk Audio S60s send me somewhere in the middle of the symphony hall, while the Heresy's almost in between the orchestra members.
I also have a Marantz 2220B which sends me little closer to the orchestra with the Polks. I have never used it with the Heresy's.

Best

Soundork

 

[Guest159]

Im no sound engineer but it seems like the recording process does not really pick up spacial sound at all. For instance, I saw a video where they used a mic right up close to a person speaking, then 10 feet away from the person speaking. Obviously the recording between the two sounds completely different. But which of those recording is more like how it would be if you were standing in the room? Maybe neither, I wasnt in the room so cant say. But what it makes me think about is microphones are not picking up how it sounds to someone sitting live in the room, you do not get the spacial sound....for instance the sound of the guitar is recorded directly from the pickups not from where a audience would be sitting, so it doesnt sound the same as live.

I think what some people are getting at is while the spacial attributes were not really captured, some speakers play recordings back in a way that sounds more like how it would sound live. Now we might say it's a coloration, but I dont know...the recordings typically dont sound like how they would live anyway, so there is fault and compromise in the entire system from recording to playback. So if the end goal is to feel like your listening to it live then you may benifit from a speaker that produces that sound.

That's my worthless opinion anyway. LoL

They are captured. The near field and far field are mixed to get a representative balance. Guitars aren't recorded straight from the pickup. The cabs are usually mic'd or the signal is run through a cabinet simulator and then recorded, but the latter is pretty unusual. There's no question the spacial information is there.

 

[bluesky]

My image is on my drivers license.

 

[E-Stat]

My image is on my drivers license.

That's better than being on the post office wall.

 

[bluesky]

That's better than being on the post office wall.

No doubt about THAT!!

 

[justjed2]

I don't know, that kinda depends on how you feel about whatever it was you did to get there.