this post was submitted on 18 Dec 2023
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[–] [email protected] 53 points 10 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 13 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Secret i learned on my raspberry pi running stereo speakers on Kodi is you can set a seperate volume for the dialogue channel so i just bumped it up like 14 decibels and now it matches the action fairly well. You can set it from the audio settings inside the movie and its called something like center channel downmix i cant remember exactly

[–] [email protected] 5 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

Center channel downmix boost or something is the name. Iirc the phenomenon with quiet dialogue is due to most streaming content being delivered with surround audio. The shitty cheap video players used by the streaming services will do a cheap flat downmix to stereo which results in the center channel being too low when split into two mono channels for playback on stereo speakers compared to if it would be played on a dedicated center speaker. This is due to maths or something.

Back in the day dvd and even vhs movies had proper stereo mixes where the center channel would be boosted to audible levels.

Tl;dr: just pirate shit and use a proper video player instead of the cheapass players used by netflix, disney, etc.

[–] [email protected] 42 points 10 months ago (2 children)

That's why subtitles became so popular in the recent times

[–] [email protected] 32 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Yeah it's bad... It's gotten to the point that I have unironically said "Wait! Where are my subtitles? I can't hear without my subtitles!"

[–] [email protected] 12 points 10 months ago (1 children)

You said that watching a video or in a real life conversation?

[–] [email protected] 14 points 10 months ago
[–] [email protected] 5 points 10 months ago (1 children)

As a HoH person I secretly love this trend and hope it never dies

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[–] [email protected] 34 points 10 months ago (4 children)
[–] [email protected] 13 points 10 months ago

BWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH

[–] [email protected] 9 points 10 months ago (4 children)

The problem is that he masters his audio to top of the line theaters, so it sounds muddy on anything other than that. Very snobby.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 10 months ago

I've read his sound mix is shit on top of the line IMAX too. Plenty of complaints since the days of The Dark Knight, He is just high on his own supply and can't admit that he is shit at sound mixing dialogue. That or some contractor lied to him when they built whatever he mixes on.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 10 months ago

I genuinely think he's suffered hearing damage at some point during The Dark Knight Rises, and can no longer tell.

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 10 months ago

Me and dad saw Oppenheimer in the cinema, the sound was almost unbearable at times...

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[–] [email protected] 27 points 10 months ago (4 children)

no , it's just that almost all streaming services think you have dolby atmos surround sound

[–] [email protected] 26 points 10 months ago (5 children)

I have it, still need subtitles because mumbling is cool yo

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[–] [email protected] 25 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

Atmos won't save you from shitty sound mixes, I have a pretty nice speaker setup and still have to turn on captions if I want to hear a conversation without my neighbors calling the cops during the next action sequence.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

Not just that, they assume you have an IMAX Dolby system installed in your theater sized living room, that everyone obviously has. Bad mixes are inexcusable and sound mixing snobbism is a symptom of the pompous pretentiousness that is the rotten core of Hollywood. Yes, Hollywood, most foreign films with DTS have perfectly good and serviceable mixes that sound nice in both Stereo and Surround..

[–] [email protected] 7 points 10 months ago

I do.

I still have subs on.

[–] [email protected] 24 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I hate it.

Windows has a great feature called Loudness Equalization, which you can enable on about every sound device in the properties.

It lowers the volume on loud sounds and increases on soft sounds.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 10 months ago (3 children)

Hell yeah PREACH brotha!

My partner and I use it for watching ANYTHING. Turn it off for music and games, and on for any possible watching thing. It’s MAGIC.

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[–] [email protected] 18 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I already fucking struggle with understanding English since it's my second language, and with this new shit sound, it's now fucking worse. I used to be able to do without subtitles most of the time, but now I can't watch shit without it.

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[–] [email protected] 17 points 10 months ago (4 children)

Every damn time! As someone who is not a video editor or sound engineer, isn’t it pretty easy to equalize all the sound?

[–] [email protected] 42 points 10 months ago (6 children)

It is and they used to.

There's something called dynamic range, which is essentially the difference between the loudest and quietest sounds. With a low dynamic range explosions and whispers are just as loud as each other.

There has been a recent trend for filmmakers to want a high dynamic range. This makes explosions, car crashes, and gunshots feel extra impactful. The problem is that that means other things become more quiet by comparison. Those "other things" include dialogue.

This leads to people not in a movie theatre or with a home audio setup that costs more than my car not being able to hear a goddamned word.

I fucking hate modern movies.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 10 months ago (1 children)

This. They really need to start including both low dynamic range AND high dynamic range audio options in home/streaming releases of movies, and TV should exclusively be LDR if they can't simulcast the the different audio signals.

HDR audio sounds amazing and is totally worth it when you have the right audio equipment, so it shouldn't stop existing entirely, but it's bullshit that people that don't have that equipment get an even worse experience than LDR as a result.

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 10 months ago (1 children)
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[–] [email protected] 14 points 10 months ago (4 children)

On Windows, right click the sound icon, go into sound options, playback, double click on your default playback device, and go to the Enhancements tab.

LOUDNESS EQUALIZATION

is fucking awesome and more people should be aware of it. It’s baked into Windows 10!

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[–] [email protected] 16 points 10 months ago (4 children)

Ok it can't just be me. It feels like at a certain point sound levels got messed up. When I watch older stuff it's fine the new stuff I feel like I am skipping backwards to catch what they said.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 10 months ago

This has driven me crazy for a long time too. It really feels like this picture and takes something away from any enjoyment.

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[–] [email protected] 16 points 10 months ago

This should be illegal. I'm so tired of having to turn the TV up to hear the dialogue and then all the sudden the loudest noise you ever heard in your life. Then you turn it down .. But here's the next dialogue where you have to turn it back up again.

It really ruins the experience for me personally

[–] [email protected] 15 points 10 months ago (1 children)

This is why I turn on the audio normalization on my TV. It makes the explosions sound super weird but it's impossible to watch movies with kids sleeping otherwise. The mixing is so bad.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 10 months ago (1 children)

The mixing isn't for your home. Which it obviously should be.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 months ago

Watching TV is also shit. When an ad break comes, I have to mute the sound or turn down the volume, regardless of normalization. That should be illegal in my opinion but it's the status quo.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 10 months ago (1 children)

That's why I love Star Trek. I never have trouble understanding dialogue.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Older TV shows generally have a more even audio mix, because they were mixed for clear dialogue on TV speakers. Nowadays even TV shows have movie theater mixes, despite the fact that no one will ever see these shows in the cinema. I think TV execs just assume way more people have a Dolby Atmos system in their living room than they do in reality. It's pretty stupid.

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 10 months ago (2 children)

I personally like high dynamic range. Most receivers, and I'm guessing most smart TVs, have some form of dynamic range compression if you don't. Bad quality, "realistic" voice recordings are a different issue. Having a center channel speaker also helps a lot.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 10 months ago

Most TVs seem to default to playing the surround audio track, which is a terrible idea when you only have stereo speakers, but I guess the TVs do it in case you decide to hook up a multi speaker system mid movie?? Choosing the down mixed stereo audio instead, makes for a much better experience for most people.

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I have tinnitus and I have a hard time hearing low volume audio .... so yes subtitles are a requirement now.

The funny part to that is if I decide to watch some dumb action flick ... I set the sound for the explosions and I really don't care if I can hear the dialogue because I know it will be stupid

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[–] [email protected] 6 points 10 months ago

Yeah I have ‘em on by default now

[–] [email protected] 6 points 10 months ago

Someone in my family calls this "whispering explosions" which I'm pretty sure comes from something, not sure what

[–] [email protected] 5 points 10 months ago

There are ways around that, for example I watch my Plex server on an Apple TV and there is an option that will reduce loud sounds so I can hear dialogue without being blasted away at other parts

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