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Comment by octobus2021 | Hacker News Reader

octobus2021

I'm very much outside of the age range mentioned in the article but +100 for crappy audio mixing.

When my family was going through all the Marvel movies at first I tried to control the volume by making it higher during the dialog and lower during the battles etc but it was an exercise in futility, as I'm only human and there would be some delay in volume change and we would still miss what the guy/gal said or my house would start noticeably shaking from the unexpected explosion happening during a scene where a guy was intensely whispering his rescue plan to his compatriots or whatever. Plus it started feeling like I'm working instead of enjoying the movie. So lower volume and subtitles it is.

I have home theater with 5.2 and 5 speakers, all it does is that when stuff in the movie goes boom my house starts to shake.

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> when stuff in the movie goes boom my house starts to shake.

That’s how it’s supposed to sound. Explosions are loud.

This is not a problem with the source material, it’s a problem with the setup of the playback equipment. The source contains all the original data, it’s the playback equipment’s job to render that information in the appropriate way considering the space and circumstances where it’s played.

The ‘problem’ is that the sound is mixed to a cinema-level dynamic range. If you don’t want the full dynamic range you can compress it at playback. They store it at the full range since you can’t exactly un-compress it and the exact amount of compression depends on your setup and situation anyway.

Any half-decent A/V receiver has this capability. If your receiver has Audyssey you may want to look into the “dynamic eq” and “dynamic volume” settings.

Apple TV had to introduce a feature that makes exactly that for you. Apparently this problem is that systematic. Movie makers ruin sound that the streamer device have to correct.

(https://support.apple.com/en-gb/guide/tv/atvba773c3c9/tvos> "Reduce Loud Sounds")

> Movie makers ruin sound that the streamer device have to correct.

It’s not the movie maker’s job to adjust the sound to your particular environment and taste. That is the job of the playback equipment and the person configuring it. The movie should be, and is, stored at the highest fidelity and with as much information as possible. This includes the original intended dynamic range. If your situation or taste calls for a smaller dynamic range you can easily adjust that at playback.

You can hardly expect movies to include hundreds of different soundtracks to cover all possible playback scenarios.

Previously movie makers found the ways good for most of the people, sound effect and discussions being in balance so to enjoy the work, lately they lost their way in many cases (not all) and instead of enjoying the movie the adjustments of volume is required or just turning on the subtitles.

The problem is that dialouges are incomprehensible, inarticulate, while the sound effects and the musics blow your head off in the next second. Lately, not that much previously. Previously this was not a problem, recently they lost their ability to make it well. Many of the movies became not entertaining but agitating this way.

It was never a requirement that everyone will have their own particular personal taste satisfied and that is not something that is missed. More like the ability to be able to follow the story! Which is ruined in more and more cases by bad sound.

When I had a 5.1 setup, I had the center channel volume set higher than the side/rear channels and it made speech understandable while explosions weren't overpowering. Maybe the receiver you have allows the same?

I do this too. It works decently as long as the media supports 5.1

Have you tried night mode? It compresses the dynamic range.

The problem with night mode is that it compresses the dynamic range of the audio which undermines one of the main benefits of having a home theater system. It's a poor compromise for bad audio mixing.

Most home theater systems are in a home where the noise floor is significantly higher than a theater, which the audio mix was targeting. Dynamic range compression is often appropriate and when applied correctly improves the experience in homes.

Manually turning the volume up and down is literally compressing the dynamic range; that's the goal here.

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