RMS or Just BS?

[venuestudio]

Friedemann, thanks so much for dropping by and clearing things up for us. I am always impressed when a quick email to a company results in a personal reply!! Kudos on being one of the good guys.

[garww]

I more than like this .
For me, it reinforces the FACT that meters in audio (and photography) are pragmatic tools not dogmatic ones, andf that the ultimate arbiter has to be what you hear/see.

(PS Ain't it sad about folks not under standing fnumbers and shutter speeds!)

The basic problem is energy levels of light and audio waveforms vary as you move from one end of the spectrum to the other. So, where do you calibrate your meter ? And, how do you apply that to frequencies outside that calibration. You can't let a meter do your thinking for you. A camera meter, will expose the telephoto shot of the flaming sun the same way as the inside of a cave at night - attempting to give both shots the same brightness level. We know that the sun should be very bright and the cave should be very dark - so the meter failed, because it didn't have a weighted compensation. With practice, you can wing it without a meter(but much more difficult with digitals lack of headroom/latitude)

[Stan_Halen]

Well, perhaps that may be true, but as I have stated many times now, I'm chiefly talking about the same tool The TT Plugin vs the TT standalone. Same tool, same section of music, presumably same algorithms - different readings. Why?

This is from the DR Pleasurize Music site directly, page 2 of the PDF (see link below). The "live" meter and Offline Meter measure differently just by their nature. The Offline Meter measures the whole song *statically*.

"Measuring with the TT DR Offline Meter

In order to determine the official DR value, a song or entire
album (16 bit, 44.1 kHz wave format) is scanned. A
histogram (loudness distribution diagram) is created with a
resolution of 0.01 dB. The RMS – an established loudness
measurement standard – is determined by gathering
approximately 10,000 pieces of loudness information within
a time span of 3 seconds (dB/RMS). From this result, only
the loudest 20% is used for determining the average
loudness of the loud passages.
At the same time, the loudest peak is determined.
The DR Value is the difference between the peak and the top
20 average RMS measurements (top 20 RMS minus Peak =
DR).
The top 20 RMS value is not displayed separately. It can be
easily calculated in the head by adding the displayed stereo
(plus decimal place) DYNAMIC RANGE value with the peak
headroom."

http://www.dynamicrange.de/sites/def..._1-English.pdf

[garww]

It should be 0 db Peak. but -7db RMS.

RMS is an average of the volume at a given time, something like that. peak is volume at a given time.
So your loudest moment should have an RMS of about -7db which is still super loud.
If you had an rms of 0 db it would sound like distorting white noise lol.

Attachment 23861

I just tried the TT as a plug and decided to load up Heep's Look at Yourself from 1971 off the record with ticks. About the same but 8-9+ DR. They were really stuffing it back then

[Mackanov]

I just tried the TT as a plug and decided to load up Heep's Look at Yourself from 1971 off the record with ticks. About the same but 8-9+ DR. They were really stuffing it back then

Awesome album btw.

[rook2c4]

I just tried the TT as a plug and decided to load up Heep's Look at Yourself from 1971 off the record with ticks. About the same but 8-9+ DR. They were really stuffing it back then

At that time, the "Look at Yourself" album was a bit of an abnormality in that respect; most progressive rock albums in that era had a lot more dynamics going on.

[garww]

Ha ! That was also part of(another) the who can sing the highest note era. My bro gave me the LP when I turned 21 that year(might of been the next year?) In the early part of the century, he asked me to put it on cd for him.

Ya, we have spoke about it's range before a couple times. When I was preping the files for the CD, I tried some pop/tick removal, but it actually kicked the perceived dynamic range down a bit. With so little to work with, anyway, I left it noisy. I still listen to those wave files often on the computer. They ride the distortion

[fHumble fHingaz]

I just came across this. I haven't tried it yet, but I thought it may be interesting... or just confuse matters futher

TB EBULoudness

[garww]

I can tell you I like the Time Plot ! But Broadcast has been around a long time. They do pretty good on classical and rock radio. Commercials just need some taming. Anyway, 50,000 watts must be some kind of power trip. I kinda miss hearing the jocks riding the level controls

[rook2c4]

I just came across this. I haven't tried it yet, but I thought it may be interesting... or just confuse matters futher

TB EBULoudness

Nice!
And for 15 Euros, at a reasonable price. The fact that there's a demo available is attractive as well.

[shackman]

The EBU loudness meter matters much more if you want your music broadcast on European stations!

That's becoming law (may even have become law) in order to level off the huge differences in the loudness of radio stations and (the more annoying) differences between TV shows and TV advert loudness.
And DON@T PAY for that meter. Pick up the free on from Melda (I think) it's part of their free software bundle.

MeldaProduction MLoudnessAnalyzer, free audio effect

[garww]

Not me, for sure. Magic Eyes are much more fun.

[brandondrury]

I just have finished a 3h10 min. video tutorial on metering and loudness measurement which is targeted to broadcast companies. This means that USD 199 for that training will be too much for non professional users.

Wow! I'm glad I don't work for a broadcast company. I'll let the chemical engineers figure out how to make gas. I'll just drive. I have no problem letting others work their tale off so I can use the fruits of their labor for my world domination plans.

I do find it interesting how topics like this (where digging deep is clearly more optional than other areas of this gig) can get way out of hand. Even measurements of things like miles per hour or the concept of weight get murky when viewed from a quantum physics point of view. When real work needs to get completed it's often better not to dig excessively deep.

Brandon

[garww]

As we know, commercials need to be 2dB( or 6dB) higher than regular broadcast, so they have to reduce regular media levels, anyway : ) Just kidding. It's possible that end user appliances will have some sort of level reducer, range expander, content resortation process - I think Dolby has some products. With Classical radio, you can still find some really low levels