27 replies to this topic

[Ralfi]

Noticed a couple of posts mentioning muffled, low volume or poor quality dialogue on some titles, whilst also stating their centre channel usually handles things ok (on most BD's)

I've also had this - where the dialogue seems to have been mixed at a much lower volume than the surround channels.

It's annoying because you don't want to adjust the centre channel just for that once-off dud, & then restore it for properly mixed discs.

I'm struggling to remember which titles i've had this with (might have to go over my reviews), but if others want to mention titles with poor dialogue mixes, I can list them here. People can then rest assured it's not their system, but the disc itself.

[victortubeman]

Hi Ralfi,

I have approx 250 BD movies and have never experienced this.Most systems that have this complaint,if asked have not been set up with test disc or internal test tones at all.ie set up and/or placement issues.

  Having sub level set correctly and (eq if running large subs) will also help.I do run more power than most systems on the front stage (1000watts plus) ,speakers all set small with 4 subs.At -15db to -10db from ref 75db (for movies.)

Ralfi,your system is calibrated so I am interested in movies you have had trouble with?

Cheers Victor.

Edited by victortubeman, 01 March 2012 - 01:49 PM.

[709er]

As per my review of Drive, I found it's mix to be a "mixed bag". Fantastic for the most part - great use of all channels and an immersive, mobile soundtrack, but the dialogue was definitely low, especially that of Ryan Goslings.
My system is calibrated (just with the calibration mic supplied with the amp) and the low dialogue levels were when there was no other sounds in the mix
I have far too many discs to admit to and I have never noticed it as badly as watching this film!

[Mjr69]

709er, on 01 March 2012 - 03:21 PM, said:

As per my review of Drive, I found it's mix to be a "mixed bag". Fantastic for the most part - great use of all channels and an immersive, mobile soundtrack, but the dialogue was definitely low, especially that of Ryan Goslings.
My system is calibrated (just with the calibration mic supplied with the amp) and the low dialogue levels were when there was no other sounds in the mix
I have far too many discs to admit to and I have never noticed it as badly as watching this film!

709er, on 01 March 2012 - 03:21 PM, said:

As per my review of Drive, I found it's mix to be a "mixed bag". Fantastic for the most part - great use of all channels and an immersive, mobile soundtrack, but the dialogue was definitely low, especially that of Ryan Goslings.
My system is calibrated (just with the calibration mic supplied with the amp) and the low dialogue levels were when there was no other sounds in the mix
I have far too many discs to admit to and I have never noticed it as badly as watching this film!

I have to agree - I ended up siting with the remote in my lap - turning down the action bits and turning up the sound when he was mumbling. He was just so slow at delivering his dialogue I felt sure I was missing something he said and so had to keep rewinding... thanks for mentioning this movie as being problematic.

[709er]

Mjr69, on 01 March 2012 - 03:31 PM, said:

I have to agree - I ended up siting with the remote in my lap - turning down the action bits and turning up the sound when he was mumbling. He was just so slow at delivering his dialogue I felt sure I was missing something he said and so had to keep rewinding... thanks for mentioning this movie as being problematic.

I'm glad I'm not the only one.
After reading many Drive reviews, there were none that mentioned low dialogue levels. Thought I must be going mad!
I have very good hearing and do not listen to films at ridiculouly high levels to get the "forced immersion", but needed to up the amp volume to way more than normal to pick up on certain sections The scene where Gosling's character was talking to Mulligan's in the hallway explaining what happened with her husband....for one, but there were many more.

[crtlover]

You could always do what I did with this movie - turn on the subtitles

BTW did you know that Ryan Gosling's character suffered from Asperger's Syndrome?

'From Wikipaedia - Asperger syndrome, also known as Asperger's syndrome or Asperger disorder, is an autism spectrum disorder
(ASD) that is characterized by significant difficulties in social interaction, alongside restricted and repetitive patterns of behavior and interests.'

His role makes a lot more sense knowing this and I was surprised that it wasn't mentioned
anywhere in the movie itself.

[yorac]

Ca 't s y I' e  ver  ad t is  ro lem  ith  ny  m v e or  wit  a yth ng  lse.. ...  ..

[Ralfi]

I think one was Robin Hood (Ridley Scott), where I needed to turn up the volume now & then to catch what was said.

But i've got a feeling the Yamaha calibration tool may be to blame with my set-up. I've just re-set it for the first BD viewing in months over the weekend, & noticed the dialogue was low initially (this is on Scarface), but after increasing the centre channel volume by a few notches, it did the trick.

Though, not having problems with >95% of discs, the odd one which had me reaching for the remote seemed strange.

I'm sure I had more, but they were probably on my BigpondMovies rental list, of which I can't get now, as that account was cancelled.

EDIT.......

Ok, just had a quick look through the magnificent reviews thread, & noticed the first couple of films I came across that i'd commented on contained these points:

The Fighter - had to turn subtitles on a couple of times as dialogue was slightly drowned out by effects.

Children of Men - Some dialogue sounded a little soft, but upping the AVR from -8 to -6 helped that.

Se7en - My only complaint was that some dialogue wasn't as clear in parts.

Edited by Ralfi, 05 March 2012 - 09:48 PM.

[MACCA350]

Actually watched Drive today and had no problem with dialog.........listening at -5dB from reference level.

One thing to remember here is that movies are not like music, or atleast the well mastered ones, in that they have a great dynamic range.  Dialog is mixed primarily on the basis of listening at reference level, so if you generally listen at levels say -20dB dialog will be quite low and the softer spoken scenes may be unintelligibly low. The only way to counter this is to raise the volume nearer to reference and (dare I say it) if the dynamics are too loud use some dynamic compression.

The point is that the mix seems fine and makes some great use of dynamics(ie when the husband gets shot I near cr@ped myself), you're likely just listening to it at lower volumes then it was designed to be heard.........like old grandpa Simpson says "turn it up, TURN IT UP"

What we don't want is studios destroying dynamic range for those that use it to make mixes more intelligible at lower volumes. We all have the power to do that in our playback devices and/or avr's and preamps by making use of the various dynamic range compression techniques in said devices. Please studios don't go down the music industries road of some form of loudness war.

Cheers

[Mjr69]

I disagree Macca - at the end of the day it is always a compromise and as the dialogue/centre channel is probably most important the level is very important to get right. My neighbours would not be happy to me listening to movies at reference level just to be able to hear the dialogue and endure WWIII when the car chase starts.
I am sure that if I watched Drive again at reference level I could hear what Ryan was saying but the sound engineer has pumped up all the rest of the mix to make it a less enjoyable experience. I don't have the luxury of a dedicated cinema and we have common walls. Hence the constant up and down of the volume...

[ajm]

If you're not listening at reference levels (and I doubt many would) then there's not much point in calibrating to reference levels and not budging from them.

If the dialogue is too quiet then push up the volume on the centre channel until it's acceptable and leave it there.

[GaryCook]

lMy ears are not as good as they used to be, no doubt, but they aren't that bad, lost a tiny bit of top end, but dialogue is hardly in that range.  My solution has always been to run the centre speaker hot.   Enough to bring the dialogue up, but no so much that it's out of proportion with the others.  With the old centre speaker I used to run it at +5db, but with the new Adelaide Speakers centre I've dropped that to +3db.   Nothing annoys me more than missing an important piece of dialogue and/or having to rewind to pick it up.

In regards to reference leveI, it's a large room but the viewing/listening area is smaller and for decent BD sound tracks reference level is beyond me.  I'm OK at -10db, but the WAF runs out around -15db.  For example, keeping in mind that it's summer time and the windows are open, Thor at reference level could be easily heard across the road and 4 houses down the street.  Which my neighbour reminded me of when I was mowing the lawn the next day.


Cheers
Gary

[:)]

Guys have not watched drive. But to be honest I have not had the problems with any movies being mentioned.

Macca I dissagree to, I don't watch at reference. -22 loudest typically these days.

I too love that we have the dynamic range that sounds preserved at relative levels to sound as they should. God help us if we did have loudness wars compression. Because then I think we would have trouble descerning dialog. With everything pushed to the max making hard to pick out or appreciate anything with just a mush of sound with no dynamic range !

[fawlty99]

MACCA350, on 06 March 2012 - 01:01 AM, said:

Actually watched Drive today and had no problem with dialog.........listening at -5dB from reference level.

One thing to remember here is that movies are not like music, or atleast the well mastered ones, in that they have a great dynamic range.  Dialog is mixed primarily on the basis of listening at reference level, so if you generally listen at levels say -20dB dialog will be quite low and the softer spoken scenes may be unintelligibly low. The only way to counter this is to raise the volume nearer to reference and (dare I say it) if the dynamics are too loud use some dynamic compression.

The point is that the mix seems fine and makes some great use of dynamics(ie when the husband gets shot I near cr@ped myself), you're likely just listening to it at lower volumes then it was designed to be heard.........like old grandpa Simpson says "turn it up, TURN IT UP"

What we don't want is studios destroying dynamic range for those that use it to make mixes more intelligible at lower volumes. We all have the power to do that in our playback devices and/or avr's and preamps by making use of the various dynamic range compression techniques in said devices. Please studios don't go down the music industries road of some form of loudness war.

Cheers

I hear what you're saying (pun intended) but unfortunately listening at -5 would not be acceptable to the neighbours. Short of boosting the centre channel or using a "loudness" feature we are often left with dialogue that is just too soft. The fact that most titles are fine means that a good mix for average home viewing is certainly achievable without detriment to the overall soundscape.

[MarkTecher]

Guys, you should be calibrating to 75dB (using an SPL meter set to C and SLOW) with your master volume at 00dBFS (Full Scale) even if you listen to soundtracks at a lower level.  The level of the all channels (including the centre channel) will (electrically) remain remain in balance to the rest of the system.

What does happen (acoustically, and why people often run their surrouds/subs hot) is that at lower levels than reference, you hear the levels differently.  They may seem to be lower than desirable.  THX addressed this with LOUDNESS PLUS which drops the levels of the LCRs by 1dB at -10dBFS, 1.5dB at -15dBFS and 2dB at -20dBFS.  You have to remember that soundtracks are mixed at 00dB reference and are intended to be played back at that level.  Of course, for many, it is too loud and quite often in the home, you simply can not do so.

Other issues that may make dialogue unintelligable is phase (acoustic as well as electrical) and sometimes something as simple as aiming a speaker can correct this.

[Ralfi]

ajm, on 06 March 2012 - 08:45 AM, said:

If you're not listening at reference levels (and I doubt many would) then there's not much point in calibrating to reference levels and not budging from them.

If the dialogue is too quiet then push up the volume on the centre channel until it's acceptable and leave it there.

Yeah, thanks, ajm. I've been happy with the centre channel tweak on the one BD i've watched since. Just hoping it doesn't distort other BD's (which were fine in the past), though I think it should be right now.

MarkTecher, on 06 March 2012 - 10:39 AM, said:

Other issues that may make dialogue unintelligable is phase (acoustic as well as electrical) and sometimes something as simple as aiming a speaker can correct this.

Thanks, Mark. As of around the end of last year, i've tilted my centre channel up toward head height, & thinking back on films i've watched since then, haven't had any that sounded too bad, as compared to earlier. So proof of that suggestion helping. Also proof that my system aint the greatest, hence the assistance required to find that sweet spot.

[blybo]

I think people have to come to terms with Drive and the way Ryan Gosling was meant to sound. He was meant to be overtly softly spoken and mumbling. Notice you didn't have issues with other characters? Yes I had to rewind 1 sequence (can't remember off the top of my head) to hear him too as we don't get anywhere near reference level with my daughter asleep directly above but the awesome overall sound mix is what gives Drive such fantastic atmosphere and makes the dramatic scenes all the more jaw dropping.

Loved it

It's the crystal clear blockbusters like Transformers trilogy that become a yawn fest for me.... once I've got over how good some sub rattling can be

[Bosch]

Yeah...totally agree with the OP.

If the dialogue levels change between one movie and another without you changing the channel levels or master level, then it's the mix and/or the original recording and/or the actor's enunciation.

Because this bugs me, my centre channel is up louder than the other levels (set via SP meter), but I still play titles with dialogue that is more difficult to understand than normal. I usually up the master. I find any film by Scorcese, Tarantino, George Lucas etc. have GREAT dialogue mixes. I don't know all the techy ins and outs, but once it's DD or DTS, to me any problem lies with the original mixing choices.

As for DRIVE, the dialogue was OK to me in the cinema, though Gosling's line readings were subdued, in keeping with his character. Have not seen the Blu yet.

[Ralfi]

Bosch, on 07 March 2012 - 12:13 PM, said:

Yeah...totally agree with the OP.

If the dialogue levels change between one movie and another without you changing the channel levels or master level, then it's the mix and/or the original recording and/or the actor's enunciation.

Because this bugs me, my centre channel is up louder than the other levels (set via SP meter), but I still play titles with dialogue that is more difficult to understand than normal. I usually up the master. I find any film by Scorcese, Tarantino, George Lucas etc. have GREAT dialogue mixes. I don't know all the techy ins and outs, but once it's DD or DTS, to me any problem lies with the original mixing choices.

Cheers, Bosch.

Unfortunately, the next disc I played (Star Wars ANH) had over-bearing dialogue (with the upped centre channel setting from the last viewing), so had to reduce it by a couple of notches.

So now, the centre channel sits 2 notches above what the auto-calibration (YPAO) set it to. & I hope this is the sweet spot for all titles from now on..

Which brands' auto-calibration tool is regarded as the most accurate? I notice, apart from the above centre channel setting, I also have to change the size of the main speakers from large to small, & the subs' crossover down to 80 (from 90 or 100) after every calibration over the years..

[victortubeman]

Hi Ralfi,

Most auto calibration on AVR,s are not very accurate,and check then with a test disc for surround levels.I have found even internal tones for bluray players are also not at correct levels.

Movies have very strict rules on mixing and all do adhere to it.Music Blurays are mixed at various levels as a result are all over the place db level wise.

To people who are having trouble,has system been set up with auto cal,and checked manually?Speaker settings(large or small etc  and if sub,s are used?

  I have not got, Drive yet but I will and check in on my systems.

   Cheers Victor.

[:)]

Ralfi, on 10 March 2012 - 12:31 PM, said:

Cheers, Bosch.

Unfortunately, the next disc I played (Star Wars ANH) had over-bearing dialogue (with the upped centre channel setting from the last viewing), so had to reduce it by a couple of notches.

So now, the centre channel sits 2 notches above what the auto-calibration (YPAO) set it to. & I hope this is the sweet spot for all titles from now on..

Which brands' auto-calibration tool is regarded as the most accurate? I notice, apart from the above centre channel setting, I also have to change the size of the main speakers from large to small, & the subs' crossover down to 80 (from 90 or 100) after every calibration over the years..

thats the problem with bumping up levels I guess. though I wouldnt think minor tweaks would impact too greatly.

not sure about most accurate ralphi, but I think where some years ago I wouldnt have bothered wiht inbluilt level, setup and eq, for the last 4 years of avrs/processor in the denons with audyssey with 4308/avp and 3808 and 3311 have owned and setup I have found them to be pretty accurate in this regard. cant comment re other makes.

often to be fair I think eq systems can only go so far ralphi. a lot is physical setup and location in my experience. I would use the method posted in the ht sticky - ie mark techers thread there. verify what the auto eq/setup has done. also perhaps worth posting some pics of your setup, maybe some suggestions people might have too. Often that is where biggest gains to be made, and I say that understanding that in home setups theres always compromises. know that all too well myself

[Ralfi]

:), on 10 March 2012 - 06:54 PM, said:

often to be fair I think eq systems can only go so far ralphi. a lot is physical setup and location in my experience. I would use the method posted in the ht sticky - ie mark techers thread there. verify what the auto eq/setup has done. also perhaps worth posting some pics of your setup, maybe some suggestions people might have too. Often that is where biggest gains to be made, and I say that understanding that in home setups theres always compromises. know that all too well myself

Thanks, smiley.

I'll check out that thread if the problem pops up again....UPDATE: Going of this post which I stumbled on yesterday, I changed the equaliser settings (from "natural" to "flat" - which is the recommended setting when speakers are of equal quality, which mine are) in the AVR before running YPAO, & noticed the centre channel was set to a higher level than previously.

Watched The Empire Strikes Back & things sounded great. All channels were balanced nicely. Hopefully this keeps up. Though, if not, at least I know where to go for extra tips.

[victortubeman]

Watched DRIVE yesterday on small system (no centre speaker) at-20db from Ref and all dialog is easy to hear(this room is very quiet <25db NC.

Today watched it on main HT at -15db And -10db (even tried -25db on scenes too).As others have pointed out Ryan,s dialogue  not as cystal clear as all other characters but is still very easy to make out.

What surprised me was I thought maybe bass room modes may be the problem with subs and no Eq used,but this movie dialogue has no other sound to mask it etc.

So I think the problem is fronts, centre rears are not correctly set( relative to each other)
The room Ht is in has a high NC db level,and is masking parts.
  Now I do use a electrostatic centre, but it does use a tweeter and woofer too and is not as efficient as conventional speakers. But is a large centre 103cm wide.

Cheers Victor.

[:)]

watched DRIVE some days ago myself too and posted my thoughts in the review thread
http://www.dtvforum....dpost&p=1789519

I was quite impressed with the movie overall. had no probs with the dialog. I'd give the movie 5/5 for the audio actually. in these times of audio compression, compressed dynamics to win the loudness war and the boom crash of the block buster action flicks. Id say this one goes against that trend being a quiet movie. and the quietness of scnes and of people talking at what are normal levels is preserved. and yet the dynamics of say gun shots or mayhem of the car scene or the depth/slam of the bass at times are presented in what is a swing of dynamics from this quietness for full effect and impact. I loved it