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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.
If you have a proper surround system than usually soft dialogue isn’t as big of a problem since the voices are on the center channel and don’t share the same speaker as the music and sound effects which are on the other speakers. The problem arises when you listen to a surround mix on a stereo system or a cheap soundbar. The center and surround channels then gets down mixed into the stereo channels. Which can drown out the voices by the loud sounds since now they share the same speaker.
The real solution is adding a proper stereo mix as an option. Which used to be normal in the DVD era.
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.
Well that might be the problem, you are listening to a surround mix on a stereo system. The center and surround channels gets downmixed to the L-R channels which could drown out the voices since all the voices in the center channel are now on the same channel as the surround sound effects and music. Maybe add a mixer in between to boost the center channel before the down mix.
Well shit. I hate surround sound haha
But subtitles work 🤷
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.
Even when it’s English subs with English audio, so much is done with “AI” now but clearly they’re never checked by a human!
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. As an example, if an object is moving from front to rear then the engineers no longer have to pan it between channels, just tell the coordinate system that the sound is moving “that way” and let the receiver take care of it. Maybe engineers just aren’t putting as much work into making discrete channel audio mixes anymore when the “gold standard” no longer uses discrete channels/tracks.
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.
Yeah, full disclosure I have a full atmos system and it’s a noticeable improvement in positional accuracy over even DTS-HD Master. I wish there were less expensive solutions though so that it could go mainstream.
My front speakers have Atmos but my rears don’t.
But Atmos is a receiver level technology?
How does a speaker “have Atmos”?
It has to have upward drives to really have Atmos. It needs the ability to bounce it off other surfaces for it to really be Atmos.
Wouldn’t that mean you have a 5.1.2 setup, a valid Atmos configuration?
The rear ones don’t have to have any upfiring capabilities.
That’s the same configuration I have, with a Denon amp doing the atmos processing. I had some rear upfiring speakers also but I ditched them because my ceiling is too high for the heights to work anyway D=. Even without the heights though you get SIGNIFICANTLY improved positional audio. Things like panning from front to rear are seamless, especially with timbre matched speakers.
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, e.g. a character off-screen trying to get the attention of the other.
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.
Aren’t Franklings what we call people from France?
/s
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
- There was this complete and utter hack with a couple fluke hits under his belt named George Lucas. He noticed that some theaters might not even have functioning audio sometimes, so he hired some engineers to create THX.
- Movie theater audio systems continued to go big blue baby boinking bonkers. Remember when the THX logo wasn’t survivable by children under 7?
- Directors, especially the self-important “my vision must be realized” scrotes, the ones who objected to a playback speed setting on Netflix, start designing their soundtracks to take full advantage of 90.1 channel 1.21 jiggawatt sound systems as found at the local umptyplex. They can make the sound of a dental drill sound like it’s in your mouth.
- While all of that was going on, TV technology changed significantly. We went from big boxes with CRTs and thus plenty of room for speaker cones inside, to a 2 inch thick LCD panel with down/back firing laptop speakers. Or people consume video content on laptops, tablets or phones instead of a “television.”
- Even with the increased popularity/necessity of external soundbars and surround sound systems, a home 5.1 system still can’t keep up with Dolby THX Atmos Skibidi Brushless Guarana Turbo Surround.
- Movie theaters have been closing down in droves.
- Television" the art form has converged a lot with movies. Since the 90’s there’s been a trend of making television shows more “cinematic,” wider aspect ratios, more dramatic lighting, more dynamic camera angles, longer episodes, overall plots that you need to watch in order. So television shows fall into the same engineering traps that movies do. Mix it for the theater, even though half of your audience is going to watch this on an iPhone 12.
- “movies” and “tv” are now mostly consumed on devices with poor quality stereo speakers, and yet the audio was designed for million dollar cinema systems, so the dialog is completely unintelligible.
- “Survey reveals most people under 40 use subtitles.”
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.
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.
No, not dual audio. I want more Control. On my Peloton bike I can adjust the volume of the host and the music independently. I want that for TV and movies. Two volume rockers on my remote. One for voice and one for “everything else”. I know the technology exists, and it would not be crazy complicated to implement. Well maybe for broadcast TV… But for anything streaming, this should benrelativwly easy to do. I know that the voice and music and FX tracks already exist separately digitally. Let me mix it myself.
Some games do this - often called “night mode”. Seems like a lot of people would benefit from it in other mediums!
Yes. It’s been a few years since I countered a video game that didn’t have separate volume sliders for dialog, for music, and for all others sounds.
Yeah, running it through a compressor should work. Maybe I should set something like that up… I’ve had issues hearing certain people talk on YouTube when my air conditioner turns on. It’s infuriating if I’m watching an interview or something with multiple people speaking and their mics are at completely different levels so I can only hear one person or get blasted every time they speak.
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.
I recently moved my center channel speaker to above my TV and that has helped dramatically with audio clarity. No more coffee table blocking the voice channel.
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.
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?
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.
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 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 over a non trivial vocabulary.
It’s perfectly consistent if you follow the 400 normal rules and 1300 exceptions.
The rules make sense if ya break it up into Germanic and Romantic groupings, if it’s Germanic in origin the phonetic spelling probably is right (weird accent shit not withstanding, I swap O and A sometimes) while if it’s Romantic in nature it’s either easy to spell because it’s just straight Latin or it’s a pain in the ass because it’s one of the French words. Tertiary lone words from other languages groups tend to be with Germanic in that it has probably had its spelling rejigged to be phonetic in English, Welsh lone words not withstanding.
For anyone who was as curious as I was about Welsh loan words.
See! All these dummies not holding a strong historical understanding of germanic and romantic languages. Didn’t you all learn latin primary school? So silly!
Gloria Latina Aeterna
Hell yeah par’nr!
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 use 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.
That’s true. There should def be a TV and theater sound mix.
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 often need the subtitles also, but like you cannot stop reading them even if the dialog is clear and end up not seeing what is going on in the movie.
The worst is movies like Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon. It has beautiful visuals and action—and the versions on the streaming services lacked a dubbed version. Had to go blu-ray to getting dubs so I could watch instead of read.
How bizarre. I detest subtitles for myself as I end up reading rather than watching the content - compulsively.
You’re lucky you’re (presumably) a native English speaker then, lol
You say that, but I have no problem at all with subtitles if I need them for another language. I’ve been watching Das Boot with my newborn by my side and it’s a great experience.
I think the issue I’m trying to complain about is having two options (e.g. if I’m watching with someone that insists on subtitles) where I could have the better experience without them. My brain can’t opt out of reading them.
When I need subtitles due to language then there is no other option so the one way to watch is with them. Dubbed versions of some stuff exists, of course, but it’s extra effort to track them down.
My brain can’t opt out of reading them.
Neither can your kids. And that’s a good thing. Not much into reading, are you?
What a strangely presumptuous and negative response.
I built myself a home theatre setup with an HDR TV to enjoy the visual medium. If I then spend the duration reading rather than enjoying the cinematography and colours then I might as well just go read in the armchair I have for that, in a different room.
Almost as if I’m a compulsive reader!
Am I also listening to music incorrectly?
Almost as if I’m a compulsive reader!
I have never met a person who has said “I couldn’t see the movie/show from all that reading I had to do”. And in the movies there’s subtitles in two different languages, while a third one is being spoken. (Officially bilingual country and city so all shows at the theatre have both Finnish and Swedish subs.)
I’m not presuming anything. There’s nothing wrong with enjoying the “visual medium”. You’re just not used to reading, clearly, meaning you’re probably not a big reader.
I’m from a country which prefers subs over dubs, and my personal experience (and studies such as the one Stephen is talking about) has shown that keeping subtitles on will improve literacy.
You say you have a newborn. So I thought it would be a good time to suggest that maybe you should try getting used to subtitles, because if you do, then you can keep them on by default and increase your child’s (and anyone else watching) literacy, just by doing that.
No-one is saying you should do this thing or that thing. Studies are showing that literacy improves if you use subtitles. That’s it. End of story. Not even a suggestion as to what you should do or how you should value literacy as a skill.
You do you man.
The only subs that really bother me are hardcoded asian subs with a hard black background, taking like a third of the screen and I don’t even understand the text. But then I just delete that version of whatever it was and find a new one. So I do understand personal preference and wanting to not have needless things you aren’t used to.
You make you own choices, I can’t, or rather won’t make suggestions. Not my place. But I can say what I think is factual. Like “using subs improves literacy”.
Ironically, I really don’t want to read that much text right now, but that’s mostly because it’s 0450 and said newborn has only just fallen back to sleep. I’m going to, but it amused me that the timing of me reading the comment is so poor.
Also before we go on:
I’m not presuming anything. There’s nothing wrong with enjoying the “visual medium”. You’re just not used to reading, clearly, meaning you’re probably not a big reader.
Your first sentence and last sentence are direct contradictions. I’m plenty used to reading and you’re presuming I’m not based on my dislike of subtitles (as what other data do you have to go on?).
Anyway, my annoyance at that aside, let’s have some context:
I read a LOT as a child, a tradition I intend to continue with my child. Ideally I don’t want her to spend much time watching stuff at all. I also grew up with a deaf sister and a father with one functional ear. We always had subtitles on.
I still turned out the way I did.
Also, I’m half Swedish, so any time spent in Sweden - guess what, subtitles!
I do not like that my brain works this way. It is extremely annoying. However, try as I might, it makes no difference.
So for preference I only use subtitles when I need to (elsewhere in the thread, for example, I talk about watching Das Boot). It’s a compromise for me and if I don’t need it I don’t want to have my eye constantly drawn to the bottom of the screen rather than wherever the filmmaker is trying to draw my eye (assuming the film maker knows how to do that - see Transformers vs. Fury Road!). In principle some subtitle formats support better placement but how often does that actually see use? It’s a total crapshoot.
Subtitles may well improve literacy, but I would expect that fostering the same love of reading that everyone else in my family has is probably better. She already has a library cued up and ready to go, both in English and Swedish, so we’re going to do our best.
Essentially I take the view that if I’m using a medium I want the best of it - within reason. So if it’s film, I want visuals (I collect UHDs), if it’s audio I want decent quality (but SACDs are still dumb 😆), and if it’s literature I want engaging narratives (I don’t care if it eventually gets good - lots of books are good to begin with and my reading time is limited!).
These days I don’t read much because I have so many other things to do, but when I do I kind of get a little… What’s the opposite of lagom? I power through books and then reappear looking like that bear that’s just emerged from hibernation 😂
One problem I do have with reading though is choice - my mother put amazing effort into picking books for me. However as a result my skill at choosing for myself isn’t great. Still, I have recommendations from friends and the internet and more of those than I have time to read. Hopefully my child won’t end up with that issue!
Subtitles may well improve literacy, but I would expect that fostering the same love of reading that everyone else in my family has is probably better.
“This scientific effect may well be true, but I’m ignoring it!”
You’re taking this extremely personally for some reason. You clearly said you “detest subtitles”. So you’re not gonna use them, even if there was science saying that they will help?
Why do you think using subtitles would subtract from “fostering the same love of books everyone in my family has”?
I’m not presuming anything. You literally said “I detest subtitles”.
You’re gonna not use them even if they helped your children to learn how to read and even after they know how to read, improved their literacy?
Are you gonna offer either subtitled TV or foster a love of reading in them without showing them any tv? Because if you’re gonna “foster some love of books” in them anyway, but that they are going to still use TV. Then why not add the benefit that using subs have scientifically been shown to have by putting them on? Because you “detest” reading while watching a movie more than a you do having your kids learn?
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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 got my hearing tested and it’s normal (for my age). I just have terrible auditory processing!
I have a slight hearing loss. If I play a movie with a sound designed for 5.1 on stereo, I will really have a hard time understanding the dialogue. If I switch to 2.0 (if available), I can hear almost everything perfectly.
What can they do to treat it? I thought once it’s gone it’s gone.
Hearing aides.
But what if I don’t want people following me around?
It’s true, but if you eyesight was shit you would use glasses. For some reason people don’t like to use hearing aids. Modern ones are really life changing devices.
I have minor hearing loss, I guess i’m just afraid it would sound more artificial. I’m an audiophile so the thought of music suddenly sounding bad scares me. Maybe I have it wrong though.
Newer aids are configured by frequency band, like an equalizer. Depending on the type of loss you experience, it would probably just improve things only where you need to, and leave the rest as is. You should try one
As a millennial that had Gen X and boomer relatives… So do they, especially as they got older.
Lies! Boomers can’t read! ;-)
Sadly they can, that’s why they stole Facebook from us
It’s the reading comprehension that gets them.
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
