Submitted 2 days ago by LadyButterfly@piefed.blahaj.zone to memes@sopuli.xyz
https://piefed.cdn.blahaj.zone/posts/Md/V8/MdV84j2YDsHPUen.jpg
The sound is often so fucked up. Music, explosions, guns, cars etc are so fucking loud, but conversations are very dim, as if people are almost whispering. It’s often very hard to hear what people are saying, especially when eating crisps.
I always use English subs, even when watching stuff in my own language (Dutch)
If you have a soundbar or sound system turn the night mode or quiet mode setting on. It compresses the dynamic range of the audiotrack basically lowers the sound levels of the loud sounds
So, the solution to completely fucked up sound is to use a device to mangle that sound back into something which isn’t complete shit?
And yes, I understand it’s about the director wanting the loud sounds to be loud. But, when your art direction means that a major (if not majority) of your audience is going to have to “fix” your artistic direction, your artistic direction is the problem.
p.s.: don’t mean to jump down your throat, this is just one of those things that grinds my gears. Along with the “let’s make everything too dark to possibly see” art direction which has become popular.
I don’t have that. I’m an audiophile, I have a proper tube amp stereo sound system. I don’t want to have my sound compressed and filtered.
We use subtitles because the sound mixing is fucking terrible in most media now. It’s set up for massive theatres where dialogue sounds normal and gunfire or explosions sounds realistically loud. But I’m not trying to have realistically loud explosions in my living room on my Vizio, so the volume is set accordingly, meaning you can’t make out words half the time.
I’ve got a decent 5.1 system. It brings the boom boom when needed.
Still need subtitles. I blame the lack of theatre trained actors. The Hollywood gang mumble.
In the early days of television, directors really only had the choice of using theater trained actors since those were all that existed. Theater actors are trained to speak in that way so that they can be clearly understood on stage even without mics. But people don’t actually speak that way, and modern directors seem to have a preference for “natural performances” so I wouldn’t necessarily blame the actors. They may just be doing what they’ve been directed to do.
A long time ago my dad bought a full blown surround sound set-up, and I got so tired of not being able to hear that I spent days fiddling with the settings to no effect. Went online to do deep dive research and people just kind of hand-waived with a generic “buy a better setup and try different settings”. Completely gave up on good audio and leaned into the subtitle life.
Maybe if someday I could afford a bigger place I’ll try again. I did get some high quality speakers for my PC, but the years of disappointment lowered my standards so much that I didn’t even notice the left speaker was off because I didn’t slot the copper wires correctly for many months.
In the show Andor, there is a character named “Kleaha” But until about halfway through season 2, I thought it was Princess Leaha. It was only that I saw the subtitle that wrote her name out that let me know it was a different person.
Several times in the new fantastic 4 movie, sue storm called her kid, frankling. That’s not a name. It’s Franklin.
For fucks sake, can we just get releases that have separate audio tracks for dialogue, music, and effects that we the viewer can decide how we want to hear it?
Video games figured this out
I don’t want the explosions to be so loud that it wakes my entire house.
Yeah! It would sure be nice if we took accessibility issues seriously.
Like one lesson we learned as a society in the aftermath of implementing strong ADA laws (in the US) is that what’s needed for the bare minimum for some of us is often really nice for the rest of us.
For example: if you’re delivering a dolly of boxes to a building, the wheelchair ramp really beats working the dolly up the stairs.
It would be amazing if dialog were a separate channel, if only so that it can be boosted for the hard of hearing. If that meant more options for remixing for you and me - oh no?
It would be amazing if the subtitles were available and accurate. Great if you can’t hear the audio. It’s useful for scrubbing if you want to remember and find a obscure movie quote.
and accurate
My pet peeve. I also watch shows in the original (foreign to me) language to train my listening comprehension and often the subtitles are not word for word accurate especially in the hard to understand parts.
No, the directors intent is more important, and obviously you need a full Dolby speaker system to properly enjoy. /s
I’m not sure but Dolby Atmos might be responsible for some of it. Dolby Atmos lets the engineers assign coordinate values to each sound “object” in the scene, then your receiver takes that information, along with the room calibration mic info and your speaker layout, and actually generates the channels itself based on the listeners “position” within the scene. Maybe engineers just not putting as much work into making discrete channel audio mixes anymore when the “gold standard” no longer uses discrete channels.
For people with Atmos-supporting audio equipment, this is actually an improvement. My rear surrounds aren’t in the same place as yours, and my system knows that, so I can hear the positioning the audio engineer intended.
Turning up the center channel gives you more dialog. But that assumes you’ve got surround sound set up… Producers don’t give as much love to stereo setups these days.
It also assumes all dialog is centered. That usually works for the main characters of a scene, but not all dialog.
Maybe if Gen X had ever learned to level audio correctly with limited spectrum and inverse dynamics we could understand what people were saying between explosions.
You mean anything by Christopher Nolan? Actually infinite it really does depend on the film, some of them do have pretty good audio mixing but Tenant was terrible
This kinda makes sense to me.
Movie theater audio systems continued to go big blue baby boinking bonkers. Remember when the THX logo wasn’t survivable by children under 7?
There was a similar scene, I think in Rocko’s Modern Life, where they went to the theater, and the THX logo blasted and then said THE AUDIENCE IS NOW DEAF.
Back in the 90’s “Man that THX logo is uncomfortably loud, huh?” was comedy gold.
I'm hard of hearing and Hollywood insists on making dialogue bearly audible, so I need to use subtitles to understand wtf the character just mumbled.
Audio levels are mixed horribly and go crazy loud with music but i cant fucking hear anyone talking. It feels like around 2010 or something tv shows and movies were like “lets just forget about voices and let everyone hear explosions and shitty driving music”.
Its not my ears because YouTube folks who can mix their audio properly are easy to hear. Anime is mixed well usually with voices.
Its the studios doing this for whatever reason unknown to us.
I use subtitles 100% of the time now.
For anything cinematic, the intent is usually to get more dynamic range. If you turn it up enough that the dialogue is audible, then the explosions will be as loud as an actual explosion. Fine in a movie theater, not so much in an apartment complex.
They should release dual audio, high dynamic range for ppl with good systems and low dynamics for ppl listening on computer speakers, but if that’s not the case I can always put a compressor on an HDR master, but can’t recover lost information on stuff like anime where a phone vibrates as loud as an explosion.
Mostly is because it’s mixed for 5.1
The center channel takes care of most of the dialog and the rest is distributed to 4 satellite (and usually smaller) speakers but when it’s down sampled to stereo everything has the same level
But even with a 5.1 setup, it is seldom audible.
Anime is very poorly mixed, a phone vibrates as loud as an explosion, there’s no dynamics. That’s not how real sound is supposed do work.
I agree that some shows like modern Star Trek exaggerate and while I can’t hear Michael murmuring the Spore Drive almost blows my woofers away every time Discovery jumps.
However needs needs to have dynamics so the viewer can have an emercive experience.
Yeh you can watch at lower volume with subtitles because even if you don’t conciously look at them it still helps your brain interpret the sounds and make up for anything you miss due to the reduced volume.
I for one love having to turn it right up to hear the actors mumble important plot points at eachother right before gunshots or jarring violin stingers damage my speakers/ear drums/wake my kids up.
Dunno why you’re pussying around with subtitles lol.
Exactly! If I’m not clutching the mute button for dear life, an I really having a relaxing movie night?
Ants can’t read dumbass. Subtitles don’t cause ants, trans people do.
And sometimes trans people become aunts. They then dote on the larva like a good ant aunt does.
No, no, no I think you’re confusing something. Subtitling trans people is actually turning the ants gay.
Also a lot of people forget that English is the international language, and most of the non-native speaker can’t really hear the pronunciation correctly. Well i don’t at least.
most of the non-native speaker can’t really hear the pronunciation correctly.
Either that, or the audio quality is just bad.
(I’m looking at you, Christopher Nolan)
I turn on subtitles cue we can’t hear shit when they talk
It’s hard to understand poor pronunciation mixed with fast dialogue. I’m a native English speaker and I often struggle with high paced scenes. I basically always use subtitles for that reason.
I grew up in the US so my fluency is on par with those born here, I still have to use subtitles.
I turn on subtitles to subtley force my kid to read. He’s got ADHD like me, but mine made me read at a super early age, while he struggles with it. To me, it’s a way to expose him to words and the spelling as they come. My dad struggled with reading as well and basically just memorized most words and their pronunciation instead of actually learning to read. If that helps the kiddo, then I don’t mind it, but I secretly turn it off by myself, and turn it back on when I’m done.
basically just memorized most words and their pronunciation instead of actually learning to read
That’s pretty much the only option you’re Anglo anyway, there are basically no letter-> sound rules that apply a non trivial vocabulary.
It’s perfectly consistent if you follow the 400 normal rules and 1300 exceptions.
How bizarre. I detest subtitles for myself as I end up reading rather than watching the content - compulsively.
I've never had an issue hearing dialogue so I'm perplexed as to what audio setups are being used to make things so lousy for so many people.
The only time I prefer to read subtitles is if the film or TV show is in a language I don’t understand. I prefer to hear the natural language for more authenticity.
I tried watching The Dark on Netflix with the English dub (only because it’s the default), and it was so bad. I had to switch to German and uae subs.
The problem with my audio setup is in my temporal lobe. I have autism.
The modern TV has awful audio since the speakers are pointed either down or behind the TV. It makes everything sound muffled, just so the screen looks like it has a little black frame around it. I didn’t need the subtitles when using a CRT TV because the audio was considered part of the watching experience and they pointed the speakers at the viewer.
Even with a good sound bar and surround sound it’s hard to hear sometimes because audio mixing is made for theaters and some directors just suck.
Less audio setups, more what they’re watching. Worst one for me lately was netflix’s Castlevania. I love the voice acting, but some characters are borderline whispering at all times
I have hearing loss, and from this thread I gather most of you have it too lol. Yeah, probably sound mixing is bad, but do yourself a favor and get checked. Your life quality can really improve if you treat this condition.
I’ve used descriptive audio to re-“watch” my favorite movies while driving for work. It’s fascinating how the descriptions work with the time constraints to get the story across.
Here’s a great podcast episode about how they are made: 20,000 Hertz - Audio Descriptions
As a millennial that had Gen X and boomer relatives… So do they, especially as they got older.
Well, at least they are reading something…
I mean, she does suck but isn’t that the norm?
I can’t eat popcorn anywhere without needing to hoover up around me afterwards, and I ain’t untidy by any means!
It helps with the dialogue, but I also like it because I feel like it keeps my mind more active and involved in the story. It’s more like reading a book and watching a movie.
that is also the dryest popcorn I have ever seen, where is the butter?
I enjoy reading. I also prefer text to phone call. I enjoy subtitles.
Elder millennial here, my T.V. often has subtitles on, but that’s because I only speak English but frequently watch content in other languages, namely Hindi, Spanish, Tamil & Telegu, and it’s still on when I do watch something in English.
That being said I turn the English off as soon as I find the remote, and one of the things I least like about visiting my brother is his wife insists on having English subtitles in large font all the time. Particularly annoying when watching something live like hockey.
*Laughs in Dolby 5.1 with high quality Remuxes that have a center channel.
Seriously though, you can’t blame them. Audio production these days is engineered for theaters and surround sound. Most of Gen z is watching this content in stereo - either through phone speakers or shitty TV speakers.
Pretty sure genx does this too
Hope all of you enjoy feeding the karma whore
could it be that sucking at eating popcorn is correlated with having subtitles enabled? 🤔
Hey, you’re talking about it?!
ExcessShiv@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 days ago
Because they insist on mixing the audio in a shitty way so unless you want to fiddle with the audio-level every 5 seconds or have your eardrums shattered by action/suspense-scenes, you can’t hear dialogue and need subs to understand what the fuck is going on…
halcyoncmdr@lemmy.world 2 days ago
It’s not that it’s mixed shitty, it’s that they never remixed it for new releases. So it still uses the theater audio mix and range where there’s 12,000+ watts of audio power available and like 12 audio channels.
When they actually remix it to a home release format the issues almost always go away. Even remixing for 5.1 most TVs can downmix to stereo just fine.
ViatorOmnium@piefed.social 2 days ago
Hyperrealistic acting also doesn't help. Lots of actors insist of mumbling in a way that makes it hard to understand even if in a cinema.
SapphironZA@sh.itjust.works 2 days ago
What about direct to streaming shows. They still have the same problem. Not saying it does not happen, but its mostly shitty mixing. Especially in American shows.
Scubus@sh.itjust.works 2 days ago
That and that they intentionally make the commercials about 30% louder than the show
BorgDrone@feddit.nl 2 days ago
The ‘problem’ is dynamic range. They mix movies with a large dynamic range because explosions and shit are a lot louder than spoken words. You are supposed to have your eardrums shattered during action scenes. That’s hot it’s intended to be listened to.
Could they mix it differently? Sure, but that would mean that the people who want to watch it as intended can’t. There is also no reason to because you can simply adjust this during playback. Any half-decent A/V receiver will have an option for dynamic range compression. Just because you didn’t set up your surround sound system properly doesn’t mean the movie is badly mixed.
ExcessShiv@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 days ago
I don’t have a surround system…I have 2.1 stereo, and even with dynamic range compression this is an issue.
I don’t want eardrums shattered when watching a movie, nobody wants that, it’s unpleasant and 100% unnecessary for watching at home.
N0x0n@lemmy.ml 2 days ago
Another solution would be to add a second audio stream (2.1) and let the viewer choose how to watch their movie.
hunnybubny@discuss.tchncs.de 2 days ago
I got a soundbar. Some look at this like a luxury. You are expecting a receiver?
Bronzebeard@lemmy.zip 17 hours ago
Nah, most of it is mixed like shit
grue@lemmy.world 2 days ago
If you’re playing the sound back through your TV speakers, it should compress the dynamic range by default.
jumping_redditor@sh.itjust.works 2 days ago
having surround sound helps, but not enough
Someonelol@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 days ago
This seems like a good use case for AI so that volume automatically fluctuates when switching between dialogue and action scenes.
osaerisxero@kbin.melroy.org 2 days ago
There's no need for AI, standard look-ahead normalization would be more than enough for this if it was allowed to work properly. I've not met the content that VLC's audio normalization can't fix, for example.
k0e3@lemmy.ca 1 day ago
Also, not many of us live in single homes with basements that we can turn into a home theater like our parents did.
Joeffect@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Here’s a good video about it… youtu.be/VYJtb2YXae8