KVR Audio

Compyfox · Post by **Compyfox** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 9:03 pm

"Ruft der Berg scho?!".

No really, not sure if... you know the meme.

Tricky-Loops · Post by **Tricky-Loops** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 9:07 pm

Compyfox wrote:"Ruft der Berg scho?!".

"Da Hosnträger is ma abgrissn!"

t3toooo · Post by **t3toooo** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 10:01 pm

Still i try to see what this all has to do with music production.

One explanation could be that archiving loudness or fullness using analog gear simply works differently than using digital gear (for example in the digital world often you need a limiter to cut peaks).

To sums it up (imo).
I'm really happy that over-compressed commercials are much lower compared to some years ago.
I always needed to lower (or mute) them with the remote.
I think the advertisement industry was aware about pissing the people rather off,lol.

(shortly before) 0 db is the absolute maximum i can use,
how i use it is my personal taste.
If i want anything dynamically i can produce it like that,
Like in a movie,i can force the listener to use a certain volume,eg. voices are lower than ,lets say, car crash scene,
ideally i won't need to correct the volume during the movie,Many people listen at lower volumes so that is to consider too.

How it sounds is a question of production and taste,some people want to listen to a squashed waveform and if the squashed waveform is lower or louder doesn't matter,the signal is still squashed.

Tricky-Loops · Post by **Tricky-Loops** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 10:09 pm

t3toooo wrote:I think the advertisement industry was aware about pissing the people rather off,lol.

The main problem was that people always went to the toilet during the advertisement blocks. So they made it louder that people could even hear the advertisements on the toilet!

Compyfox · Post by **Compyfox** » Thu Mar 27, 2014 11:13 pm

t3toooo wrote:Still i try to see what this all has to do with music production.

That is the thing... this meter is not for "during production", it is meant for mastering music (K-System v2), and the EBU R-128 meter is for broadcasting - which can be used for music as well if you think a bit different.

While recording and mixing, it's still(!!!) recommended to go the good old VU/Peak meter route and not exceed certain limits. Like: -3dBFS peak maximum, -18dBFS = 0VU. Some even go as high as -12dBFS = 0VU, which still give you a dynamic range of 12dB until you hit 0dBFS/clipping. It's not my cup of tea though.

t3toooo wrote:(shortly before) 0 db is the absolute maximum i can use,
how i use it is my personal taste.
If i want anything dynamically i can produce it like that,
Like in a movie,i can force the listener to use a certain volume,eg. voices are lower than ,lets say, car crash scene,
ideally i won't need to correct the volume during the movie,Many people listen at lower volumes so that is to consider too.

How it sounds is a question of production and taste,some people want to listen to a squashed waveform and if the squashed waveform is lower or louder doesn't matter,the signal is still squashed.

That is definitely one aspect. But the idea behind EBU R-128 was to have a consistent stream over a specific course of time. This is why it has three meters.

One for "Momentary" (400ms), which gives you an overview of the momentary signal strength. Like: short noise bursts, short but loud bridges in a song, etc. This can easily exceed +9LU, sometimes even up to +12LU, though most of the time it will be within a 9LU range, and higher would influence the Short Term measurement anyway.

Then one meter is for "Short Term" (3s), which gives you a more relaxed overview of your stream. While it is true that our ears can be like "funk that's loud" if it recognizes a loud burst over short period of time. But after a short while, we adapt. And this meter shows how strong the shift is actually taking place.

It's not mentioned in the official ITU-R BS.1770/EBU R-128 whitepapers where the ideal hotspot is during broadcast. But on the well known TC radar meter, it looks like as if the "average" signal hovers between -29LUFS (mezzoforte) and -23LUFS (forte fortissimo) - note: this can be manually set up(!), I go by most videos I've seen of this device. Now port that over to the K-System v2, we have -3LU (mezzoforte) and +3LU (forte fortissimo) at whatever given reference level. Example at -16LUFS, it'd be -19LUFS (mezzo forte) to -13LUFS (forte fortissimo) - ideally barely going into the positive area (+1LU to +3LU), but rather hovering between -3LU and +/-0LU (0LU can be considered for Forte parts - ideally!).

The "Integrated" loudness then gives a certain overview over a specific course of time in whether or not you're within the right spot or not. Good for broadcasting, pretty much moot for individual music tracks. However good again if you want to analyse a complete CD.

Of course you can mix how you feel like, and as dense (which results in a smaller Dynamic Range/Crest Factor) or as relaxed as like. But the perceived loudness measured over a specific time is important. If all songs, or streams for that matter, you listen to hovers in the the same area (+/-3LU at say K-16v2 = -16LUFS), you don't need to reach for the remote anymore. That is the whole trick.

It's too quiet for you (i.e.: -16LUFS, raise the volume on your amp.

But you still have two benefits of going the EBU R-128/K-System v2 route:
1) Content with a (depening on your mix/genre) high dynamic range and healty transients. On the plus side: also no strong needed limitation, just mere peak clipping (which sounds great on analog gear, not so great on digital!).
2) a consistent and not too prominent perceived loudness

EBU R-128 meets K-System v2, a possible future for the loudness debate (Loudness War)