[gooomz]

i know some people calibrate their system correctly with a sound meter and then after setup and everything being equal, they turn up the deicbal 1 or 2 on the center channel for dialogue, and some people turn up the surrounds 1 or 2 decibals to get them more involved.


i was just wondering if you guys do the same or have your own personnal preferences


i know everyone has their own preferences,but just curious to know what the pros enjoy. thanks. newb.

 

[Tnilsson]

It depends on your system and how you set it up. If you have the same speaker all the way around, you may want to leave it all "correctly" calibrated. If you have a different center or surrounds, or have any of your speakers in less than optimum positions, you may have to tweak your settings to something other than as "correct." For example, my center is timbre-matched to my fronts. But my fronts are full-range 5' tall speakers and my center is essentially just the top half of my fronts. In my case, I have found that my fronts move so much more air than my center that I have to turn my center up a bit over what my SPL meter says is correct in order to get everything to sound even.


Audio is part science, part personal preference, and part voodoo science for all too many. You have to juggle science and preference (hopefully avoiding voodoo science) to get what you think sounds best. I don't even know of any professional sound engineer who relies solely on readings and does not also use their ears for final tweaking.

 

[CAVX]



Quote:
Originally Posted by gooomz /forum/post/0


i know some people calibrate their system correctly with a sound meter and then after setup and everything being equal, they turn up the deicbal 1 or 2 on the center channel for dialogue, and some people turn up the surrounds 1 or 2 decibals to get them more involved.


i was just wondering if you guys do the same or have your own personnal preferences


i know everyone has their own preferences,but just curious to know what the pros enjoy. thanks. newb.

It kind of defeats the purpose of the calibration with a SPL meter if you randomly adjust the trims after.


Film soundtracks are mixed precisely under controlled conditions - a part of that control is equal SPL from all channels so that the mix plays back on all systems, not just the system it was mixed on...


Personally, I use the SPL meter, adjust each trim to +75dB/C/slow, and except what I hear as correct...


Mark

 

[Tnilsson]



Quote:
Originally Posted by CAVX /forum/post/0


It kind of defeats the purpose of the calibration with a SPL meter if you randomly adjust the trims after.Mark

Yes, but that assumes a really good room, really good speaker placement, and the same speakers all the way around. I don't know many people with that type of set up. Most seem to have had to make some compromises in their room, their placement, or their speakers. Given that, it seems unlikely to me that they will be able to rely on calibration alone.


Calibration is obviously necessary. And you should try to stick as close to the calibrated readings as possible. But small changes from the calibrated settings can sometimes be helpful rather than harmful, especially since no two people seem to like exactly the same sound.

 

[bud16415]



Quote:
Originally Posted by Tnilsson /forum/post/0


It depends on your system and how you set it up. If you have the same speaker all the way around, you may want to leave it all "correctly" calibrated. If you have a different center or surrounds, or have any of your speakers in less than optimum positions, you may have to tweak your settings to something other than as "correct." For example, my center is timbre-matched to my fronts. But my fronts are full-range 5' tall speakers and my center is essentially just the top half of my fronts. In my case, I have found that my fronts move so much more air than my center that I have to turn my center up a bit over what my SPL meter says is correct in order to get everything to sound even.


Audio is part science, part personal preference, and part voodoo science for all too many. You have to juggle science and preference (hopefully avoiding voodoo science) to get what you think sounds best. I don't even know of any professional sound engineer who relies solely on readings and does not also use their ears for final tweaking.

That's the reason I opted for a 4.2 setup and phantom center.


With 2 large full range fronts and not a huge distance between them and not wanting to sit to close to my 120 screen. My thoughts were why try and push all that center dialog thru a smaller speaker when the fronts can share the work and give me the same sound image. My theater is not that wide and at least to my ears no matter where I sit the phantom image is coming right from the correct location on the screen.


I know this issue is widely debated and might not work for everyone but to my untrained ear it sounded better and I didn't have to deal placement or AT screen for the center channel.


The added side benefit I guess is there is no balancing act to try and get the center matched to the fronts.

 

[legierk]



Quote:
Originally Posted by Tnilsson /forum/post/0


Yes, but that assumes a really good room, really good speaker placement, and the same speakers all the way around. I don't know many people with that type of set up. Most seem to have had to make some compromises in their room, their placement, or their speakers. Given that, it seems unlikely to me that they will be able to rely on calibration alone.


Calibration is obviously necessary. And you should try to stick as close to the calibrated readings as possible. But small changes from the calibrated settings can sometimes be helpful rather than harmful, especially since no two people seem to like exactly the same sound.

Very well said.