Technology’s Shortfall
Posted on | April 25, 2010 | No Comments
My wife and I just got a new home theater system: a Sony BDV-E500W. After an initial setup we watched part of a movie. It sounded great.
The next day, to try an fine-tune things, I used the included calibration microphone to run the “auto setup” audio function. Basically, you put the mic where you sit (or, in an average seating area) and test tones generated from each of the 6 speakers feed info to the mic about distance and frequency balance.
That night we watched the rest of the movie and I noticed that the dialog was much less discernable and the low-end was REALLY boomy. The following day I opened the audio controls on the menu and noticed that the auto-calibration had reduced the center channel by 3db and boosted the subwoofer by 2.5db.
The concept of auto-calibration in sound is similar to something like auto balance in Photoshop. For minor adjustments it can work well, but it can also create really bad results as it makes decisions from a limited perspective. All of these algorithms take samplings of information and make decisions, but there’s no substitute for being able to see (or hear) the big picture with knowledge and discrimination on your side.
Comments
Leave a Reply
About This Blog
From Ohm to Om reflects the opinions of mastering engineer Paul Abbott, owner of San Diego's ZenMastering.
We welcome comments from readers...pro or con!
