Thank you, and I shall try to pay AES $33 for a reprint (abstract below) unless there were other means.
I can think of a number of "semi-strong" experiments using my Android Mi9 smartphone's built-in hearing test, which played a randomized series of frequencies to one channel or the other near the limit of audibility, then produced L/R parametric EQ curves to be named/saved/used through the earphones output. (I have used this tool to directly confirm the "heard" FR of my most accurate diy micor55 LX, which reproduced harpist's two arms crossing over life-sized Irish harp.)
(abstract)
Is Linear Phase Worthwhile?
This paper investigates the improved performance of
linear phase loudspeakers. It was found that phase distortions several times greater than that introduced by conventional speakers are inaudible on speech and music signals. However, making speakers minimum phase also improves other performance aspects which lead to their enhanced stereo and depth presentation. Arising from these findings are guidelines to designing loudspeakers with these characteristics.Author (s): Lee, Richard
Affiliation: Rank HiFi, Bradford, England (See document for exact affiliation information.)
AES Convention: 68 Paper Number:1732
Publication Date: 1981-03-06 Import into BibTeX
Permalink: https://aes2.org/publications/elibrary-page/?id=10251
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Hello, Okay so it seems that the stereo "Phantom Image" is a large part of the experience and that is as far as some need to go.
Is that about it, or is there more to soundstage / imaging?
Recall, that all or most of the location information is due to microphone placement in the original recording and or mix technology in the control room.
Thanks DT
Is that about it, or is there more to soundstage / imaging?
Recall, that all or most of the location information is due to microphone placement in the original recording and or mix technology in the control room.
Thanks DT
My apologies @CinnamonRolls : I missed to mention the Beyma 8M60N midrange, a 8" unit common to my two speakers 375L and 475L, helped in the later one by the SATORI 2.5" dome midrange.
T
Yes but as we've discussed, the role of the speaker doesn't change.. nor does the way we design it. Designing a speaker for imaging is about ensuring it doesn't distort the image, therefore if it isn't affecting the image it can't be asked to handle one case differently to another. If you want to control your image with the speakers you would then be talking about adding distortion of the image.
You have an entirely different view of what I am talking about. That is not a bad thing, I like it.
In an International Standard Listening room the better the speakers get the more they sound the same, at least to me.
It is not about the speakers.
As Linkwitz would say it is about having the imagination of being there. You the close your eyes and you are there kind of thing.
You could sit front row center with your head clamped in a stereotactic device and have the best of the phantom image.
I am thinking that you do not need to sit front row center, it could be 3rd row 4th seat and still imagination being there.
I get the impression that some here stop at the "Phantom Center Image". I think that it is more than that.
Thanks DT
DT have you read David Griesinger papers on auditory Proximity and Limit of localization distance? "Imagination of being there" is depending on this stuff so you might find it interesting regarding imagining about sound and what the perception is, and how to align those two if you wish.
Non surprisingly the goal for a playback system (or good concert hall) is to align auditory system to provide good perception for the listener. I found Griesinger papers and lectures absolute mind blowing from my own perspective for this, they were the key to me to learn how to understand my own perception of sound and how to connect logic to it, which is great way to make sense on all this stereo sound stuff and enables me to actively gravitate to a listening position that has the sound I want to perceive.
For example phantom center image can be utilized to learn how to listen our own auditory system, the brain, to detect whether it provides sound I want to perceive. Basically auditory system provides different sound for us to perceive depending on whether it pays attention to the sound or not, a binary on/off effect according to Griesinger, which enables using logic. I could reason with the Griesinger papers about what I'm perceiving. Phantom center is sharp and clear when brain is paying attention, akin to what you have at great seat on a concert hall.
Since it's coffee time some more text to accompany, for anyone interested on this stuff 😀
This involuntary attention from brain is something we cannot directly control by thought, but can force it indirectly by changing listening position to simply let it happen! When the brain is in state of paying involuntary attention, it makes "the imagination being there" perception possible according to Griesinger. Conversely, when brain isn't paying attention it's not possible, and this is easy to detect actually.
I wrote that state of auditory system makes the "being there" sound possible because perceived sound is not excellent automatically even if brain is paying attention. In a domestic room it's very likely that envelopment isn't great by accident and people mistake the sound bad because it's not as spacious as when brain doesn't pay attention, the low hanging fruit of early reflection dominated hazy frontal sound that expands the whole front wall, "they being here". Important thing here is that when your brain pays attention you can be sure envelopment should be there, but if it isn't you can do something about it, and you know how to listen for it!
I argue that learning to listen our own auditory system, to be able to detect when it is paying attention or not, is single most important thing every hifi person should do. When you learn to listen your own auditory system (state) you can utilize it to conduct AB listening tests on various aspects of the stereo playback like, imaging and envelopment. For example, positioning yourself, the listener, to position where auditory system is about to change state you can move just a little forward to effectively toggle early reflections off from your perception and listen for envelopment. Or move back a bit to engage the early reflection frontal sound back on. Now you learned about what is envelopment and what the early reflections sound like. It's really powerful and allows you to improve on positioning and the system in general, including any acoustic treatment, just by listening.
Most power is in just knowing one can change perception at will by changing location, regardless of sound source and environment. This empowers you to actively find the best seat on concerts as well, or if you want to remember what your loved one has to say to you then better pay attention, move closer until your brain pays attention, and you hear it! Really really important stuff for life, and hifi 🙂
Small thought experiment: anyone who spends money and buys best seat on a concert go and sit there, and not some random seat somewhere else, right? But, with your own stereo system you can't buy ticket for it to figure out what the best seat is, but you have to discover it yourself, you are in full control and already paid for it! I mean, you should be able to arrange best possible seat with your playback system, because those people at the concert could. Can you (anyone)? Go and find the seat and arrange the stage to cater it!🙂
Non surprisingly the goal for a playback system (or good concert hall) is to align auditory system to provide good perception for the listener. I found Griesinger papers and lectures absolute mind blowing from my own perspective for this, they were the key to me to learn how to understand my own perception of sound and how to connect logic to it, which is great way to make sense on all this stereo sound stuff and enables me to actively gravitate to a listening position that has the sound I want to perceive.
For example phantom center image can be utilized to learn how to listen our own auditory system, the brain, to detect whether it provides sound I want to perceive. Basically auditory system provides different sound for us to perceive depending on whether it pays attention to the sound or not, a binary on/off effect according to Griesinger, which enables using logic. I could reason with the Griesinger papers about what I'm perceiving. Phantom center is sharp and clear when brain is paying attention, akin to what you have at great seat on a concert hall.
Since it's coffee time some more text to accompany, for anyone interested on this stuff 😀
This involuntary attention from brain is something we cannot directly control by thought, but can force it indirectly by changing listening position to simply let it happen! When the brain is in state of paying involuntary attention, it makes "the imagination being there" perception possible according to Griesinger. Conversely, when brain isn't paying attention it's not possible, and this is easy to detect actually.
I wrote that state of auditory system makes the "being there" sound possible because perceived sound is not excellent automatically even if brain is paying attention. In a domestic room it's very likely that envelopment isn't great by accident and people mistake the sound bad because it's not as spacious as when brain doesn't pay attention, the low hanging fruit of early reflection dominated hazy frontal sound that expands the whole front wall, "they being here". Important thing here is that when your brain pays attention you can be sure envelopment should be there, but if it isn't you can do something about it, and you know how to listen for it!
I argue that learning to listen our own auditory system, to be able to detect when it is paying attention or not, is single most important thing every hifi person should do. When you learn to listen your own auditory system (state) you can utilize it to conduct AB listening tests on various aspects of the stereo playback like, imaging and envelopment. For example, positioning yourself, the listener, to position where auditory system is about to change state you can move just a little forward to effectively toggle early reflections off from your perception and listen for envelopment. Or move back a bit to engage the early reflection frontal sound back on. Now you learned about what is envelopment and what the early reflections sound like. It's really powerful and allows you to improve on positioning and the system in general, including any acoustic treatment, just by listening.
Most power is in just knowing one can change perception at will by changing location, regardless of sound source and environment. This empowers you to actively find the best seat on concerts as well, or if you want to remember what your loved one has to say to you then better pay attention, move closer until your brain pays attention, and you hear it! Really really important stuff for life, and hifi 🙂
Small thought experiment: anyone who spends money and buys best seat on a concert go and sit there, and not some random seat somewhere else, right? But, with your own stereo system you can't buy ticket for it to figure out what the best seat is, but you have to discover it yourself, you are in full control and already paid for it! I mean, you should be able to arrange best possible seat with your playback system, because those people at the concert could. Can you (anyone)? Go and find the seat and arrange the stage to cater it!🙂
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So all the agreement on a 8" midrange goes to trash!
If SPL ( and it does) is inverse to the distance, and you're feeling comfortable sitting at 80cm from the 1m aligned speakers, listening to your new/old tube stereo amp with your neat two-ways, having a midbass with a diameter of 9 cm and a preamplifier with tone controls ( yes, Allen B strikes again!) and you find blissfulness, who am I to tell you you're wrong?!
If SPL ( and it does) is inverse to the distance, and you're feeling comfortable sitting at 80cm from the 1m aligned speakers, listening to your new/old tube stereo amp with your neat two-ways, having a midbass with a diameter of 9 cm and a preamplifier with tone controls ( yes, Allen B strikes again!) and you find blissfulness, who am I to tell you you're wrong?!
A lot of music has been recorded in a way that does not allow the "you being there" or does not allow a "natural" soundstage to be projected. And there is or has been a debate whether what is more correct or preferable: a "one being there" experience or "the music being here" experience. It probably depends on the type of music one listens to. Therefore I think that is also a preference one has and one can tune his system to this preference. In the end we do not know how the original performance sounded, anyway. For classical music it might be different, as one can go to a concert hall and buy a CD with the same music recorded in that concert hall. Still, the performance is recorded via microphones and mixing desks, so recreating that performance in your room is not without challenges.
Err.rrh! Soundstage / imaging is ALL about "Phantom Image(s)".
It's trivial to have something from L or R. MUCH harder to have something realistic coming from (phantom) Centre. Harder again to have something at half L or half R and even harder again to have something beyond the L & R speakers.
Hardest is to get seamless ambience filling the space between speakers and extending a bit beyond.
Then you have to allow head movement and the listener not in the 'sweet spot'. Surprisingly, no one likes to wear a Greene-Lee neckbrace. 😲
I'm not saying good "Phantom Centre Image" is the answer to Life, the Universe and Everything. But if you cannot even get that right, you can forget about everything else.
For 'everything else', wchang, I think your $33 is better spent on Gerzon's "General Metatheory ... ".
BTW, about 10% of the population can't hear stereo at all. They always hear 2 separate speakers. I was surprised when Michael Gerzon told me this. But I've tested and found it true for at least one section of the population; UK HiFi reviewers.
These people are not deaf. They are in fact more discriminating than most of us; not fooled by illusions and phantoms 😊 .. though HiFi reviewers, are as a group, generally less discriminating (do worse in DBLTs) than the 'Man in the Street'.
Well, harder for multi-ways but pretty easy for small fullranges properly toed-in, like MA Alpair 5, SB65, SS 10F, all of which very well known on diyaudio, typically as WAW. Coherent point source wins imaging contest almost without effort....
When music is "realistic" my head and body will naturally flow with the music, not be perfectly still. (Even at concerts sitting front-row center, however subdued.) I listened more or less head-in-vise when I had to, but in hindsight those systems weren't realistic enough. Only with my first diy (about four years ago, AMT/honeycomb/series-1st-order/tapered-TL) did I capture that magical immersiveness of live music, to respond to it body and mind. Fidelity -- not mystical psychoacoustics -- that placed the musicians where each ought to be (quartet in a half-circle), musical parts/lines physically un-entangled in/by space (unlike headphones' clustered in-head), engaged in conversation tossed back-and-forth, tunefully separate then coming together wow! Made me think all the years listening to "stereo" had been a waste of time. Thus began my crazy diy journey....
My first diy design HeilEve 7L 1m-line TLonken or is it just a TL? Cardboard version was easy, but the real thing had to be glued and clamped one-board-at-a-time inside the cab, then shifted into place and secured, due to the inner box-frame restricting ingress. The thin-walled $15/pr original cab sounded awful both sealed (no bass) and BR'ed (resonant), but the TL boards also served as very effective bracing.
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Let me speak to "classical music" by quoting myself to save typing.
One of the easiest imaging "special effects" is to up-fire coherent speakers: soundstage floats mid-air high above and well beyond the speakers. Not traditional "pin-point" imaging but palpably sized phantom soloists etc. to relax to.
A map of the locations of many of the instruments in Jennifer Warnes’s recording of “Bird on a Wire” (source: B&O designer blog).
This is a multi-tracked recording where each 'source' is pasted onto a 'stage' like a montage. Very different from real life.
When the visually challenged recording engineer, Angus McKenzie, first used a Calrec Soundfield, he said it was also the first time he heard in a recording, the distinct 'pools of sound' that is a string quartet playing in a good hall. Real instruments & singers have a size and this is captured by good recordings.
Don't get me wrong. I think Famous Blue Raincoat is a great recording and worthy of its exalted reputation. But it is also an example of what I referred to earlier; trying to get 'better imaging than real life'.
Anyway, it's a rare example of visualizing the position and size of instruments on stage. It's artificial, but it still allows to 'measure' the soundstage (or speakers imaging) in a way.
Off topic:
Hi Hydrogen Alex.
I don't know if blocking anyone is the answer.
I mean i think we are into the (global) situation we face because of too much 'polarization' of point of view.
I know it hurts ( it does to me) to read or hear really different/opposite views than mine but i decided to not lost communication with people, whatever they think.
I'm very probably naive but we are humans, nobody is more right than another and we need to share and practice empathy.
In the end we will be forced to do that anyway...
Hi Hydrogen Alex.
I don't know if blocking anyone is the answer.
I mean i think we are into the (global) situation we face because of too much 'polarization' of point of view.
I know it hurts ( it does to me) to read or hear really different/opposite views than mine but i decided to not lost communication with people, whatever they think.
I'm very probably naive but we are humans, nobody is more right than another and we need to share and practice empathy.
In the end we will be forced to do that anyway...