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  #31  
Old Jul 23, 2012, 08:00 AM
GoldfishX GoldfishX is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Datschge View Post
It's gotten so bad that even for popular music the "unmastered" lossy audio data used in games is of far better quality dynamic range wise than what's officially put on CD.
I actually wondered if this was the case for music other than the Death Magnetic tracks, but that is the only thing I usually see ripped. Both GH and RB cover a lot of good music that doesn't exist in non-hyper compression. I believe it is the way that the layers are split up for the individual instruments, plus that they come from the original masters in most cases.

I can vouch for the GH3 Death Magnetic tracks though. They sound amazing. A fine example of songs that are regularly 7-8 minutes long and keep my attention the whole time (even though much of the music is repeating the same riffs).
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  #32  
Old Jul 23, 2012, 09:27 AM
Xenofan 29A Xenofan 29A is offline
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Originally Posted by GoldfishX View Post
Also, Mitsuda's stuff is generally well-produced, one of the reasons I think his music ends up on the upper end of the popularity scale (someone above posted about the Tsugunai soundtrack, I felt that one sounded fine).
It's very well-mixed, well-arranged, and well-composed music, so it may not be particularly noticeable, but it is squashed to HELL in terms of dynamic range. It was Mitsuda's first attempt at mixing/mastering himself, though, so I understand that he was new and probably took the advice someone gave him to make it "hot" to get attention. Since then he's mastered any number of releases to a very reasonable level.
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  #33  
Old Jul 23, 2012, 10:24 AM
GoldfishX GoldfishX is offline
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Heh, I thought this was interesting. You had mentioned Advent Children...it actually has an entry in the unofficial DR database. It's not pretty:

http://www.dr.loudness-war.info/details.php?id=6131

Not too many other VGM albums, but here's a few:

FFVII: http://www.dr.loudness-war.info/details.php?id=19325

Chrono Cross: http://www.dr.loudness-war.info/details.php?id=10686 (surprisingly bad!)

Wild Arms Code F: http://www.dr.loudness-war.info/details.php?id=20463

King of Fighters 95: http://www.dr.loudness-war.info/details.php?id=6734 (lol, audiophile grade!)
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  #34  
Old Jul 23, 2012, 10:46 AM
Xenofan 29A Xenofan 29A is offline
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Originally Posted by GoldfishX View Post
Heh, I thought this was interesting. You had mentioned Advent Children...it actually has an entry in the unofficial DR database. It's not pretty:

http://www.dr.loudness-war.info/details.php?id=6131

Not too many other VGM albums, but here's a few:

FFVII: http://www.dr.loudness-war.info/details.php?id=19325

Chrono Cross: http://www.dr.loudness-war.info/details.php?id=10686 (surprisingly bad!)

Wild Arms Code F: http://www.dr.loudness-war.info/details.php?id=20463

King of Fighters 95: http://www.dr.loudness-war.info/details.php?id=6734 (lol, audiophile grade!)
I go to that site as well, but be careful about judging based solely on a number. As I said on the previous page, you can have two tracks that rate a 6, but one of them sounds far better owing to other factors. Also, those ratings can be deceptive:

Kirite would be (I scanned this myself):
DR10 -0.20 dB -12.76 dB 01 Is Kirite Burning Up_.wav
DR11 -1.51 dB -15.37 dB 02 The Market in Volfinor.wav
DR10 -0.20 dB -12.43 dB 03 Promise With Winds - Petals' Wher.wav
DR9 -1.49 dB -13.19 dB 04 The Forest of Lapis Lazuli.wav
DR9 -0.20 dB -11.51 dB 05 The Azure.wav
DR10 -1.50 dB -16.01 dB 06 Scorning Blade.wav
DR7 -3.57 dB -14.09 dB 07 Upon the Melodies of the Moon.wav
DR9 -0.46 dB -13.02 dB 08 Fated Encounter - The Fall of Dar.wav
DR11 -1.33 dB -17.46 dB 09 Nocturne.wav
DR10 -1.01 dB -13.20 dB 10 As Autumn Passes Away.wav
DR11 -0.75 dB -15.16 dB 11 The Snow Howling.wav
DR9 -1.37 dB -13.15 dB 12 Prayer Tree.wav
DR9 -0.20 dB -11.60 dB 13 The Name of Our Hope.wav
DR11 -3.86 dB -18.66 dB 14 Circle of Eternity.wav

That 7 sticks out like a sore thumb, doesn't it? You might assume that it's because of some massive dynamic range compression or something, but it's actually just because the normal compression applied to the vocals leaves it in that range. There is no brickwalling or hard limiting anywhere on the album, including and especially on that track.

The lesson is, you should judge based on what you hear, not some graphic or number. Those things do not compensate for other factors that your ear understands immediately.

And for everyone's reference, here is Death Magnetic.

Link

Last edited by Xenofan 29A; Jul 23, 2012 at 10:59 AM.
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  #35  
Old Jul 23, 2012, 09:43 PM
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TerraEpon TerraEpon is offline
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Of course Advent Children isn't actually VGM, but who's counting?
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  #36  
Old Jul 24, 2012, 06:05 AM
GoldfishX GoldfishX is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Xenofan 29A View Post
The lesson is, you should judge based on what you hear, not some graphic or number. Those things do not compensate for other factors that your ear understands immediately.
Yeah, I played around with the meter and it can give strange results (although most of the time, it was in line with my expectations). Korean Guilty Gear XX only registered an average of 8 and I KNOW that album sounds amazing (Ishiwatari's XX was a 7, which is pretty generous! And Black Mages 1 and 2 were around 5-6). And that Chrono Cross rating is goofy, way too low for that album I think. I did see the Tsugunai ratings though.

On the other hand, it gave Mighty Obstacle (my prime example of a poorly produced track) a 3 and Mighty Switch Force an album average of 4, so it does seem to be pretty spot on at times. Most early 90's VGM albums, it's giving a healthy 11-14 reading. And it loved those Grandia I tracks. I think that and Falcom Special Box 89 were the ones I got it to register the highest.
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  #37  
Old Jul 24, 2012, 07:03 AM
LiquidAcid LiquidAcid is offline
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Can someone give me a link to the explanation on how exactly the site computes the dynamic range?

I'm only reading this on the main page:
Quote:
Dynamic Range Meter is a foobar2000 component designed to give the same information as the Dynamic Range Offline Meter from the Pleasurize Music Foundation.
And the descriptions on PMF are not exactly helping either.
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  #38  
Old Jul 24, 2012, 07:11 AM
Xenofan 29A Xenofan 29A is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by TerraEpon
Of course Advent Children isn't actually VGM, but who's counting?
And of course I'm aware of that, but it's related.

Quote:
Originally Posted by LiquidAcid View Post
Can someone give me a link to the explanation on how exactly the site computes the dynamic range?

I'm only reading this on the main page:

And the descriptions on PMF are not exactly helping either.
Not a link, but I can try to explain.

It does not measure dynamics over time, or the difference in volume level between sections. It's primarily a reading of the average difference between the highest and lowest levels at a given point. Any natural sound has several "layers" to it that are at different volumes, so a collection of natural sounds will have a wide range in dB in any given instant. Pretty much any recording has some compression applied, though, to make more of these sounds audible. If too much compression is applied, the sensation of all of the sound being present all at once is unnatural, but it can seem to pop out of the speaker, especially on cheap equipment. A collection of the highest points of a track is collated and the average is taken, giving a general idea of how much "breathing room" the track has in general.
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  #39  
Old Jul 24, 2012, 09:59 AM
LiquidAcid LiquidAcid is offline
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Originally Posted by Xenofan 29A View Post
It does not measure dynamics over time, or the difference in volume level between sections. It's primarily a reading of the average difference between the highest and lowest levels at a given point. Any natural sound has several "layers" to it that are at different volumes, so a collection of natural sounds will have a wide range in dB in any given instant. Pretty much any recording has some compression applied, though, to make more of these sounds audible. If too much compression is applied, the sensation of all of the sound being present all at once is unnatural, but it can seem to pop out of the speaker, especially on cheap equipment. A collection of the highest points of a track is collated and the average is taken, giving a general idea of how much "breathing room" the track has in general.
Sorry, this is not what I'm looking for. I know what the dB value is supposed to represent. I want to know how this is computed, because that actually makes a difference.

Take a look at both the ReplayGain specs and the newly proposed EBU R 128 one. Both techniques compute gain correction, but the results are different.

I don't trust any black box where you put a track in and it magically computes an integer value. If you don't know what is happening inside the output is meaningless. If the site doesn't give any information about the algorithm behind (and I'm talking about formulas / math) then it doesn't provide _any_ credibility.

That's like the guy coming up with the PSNR formula implementing it in a black box and then saying: "Hey, here I have something where you put two images in and the machine tells you how much the images deviate from each other. Big number means large deviation, small number little deviation. But I'm not telling you what my box does *nah nah nah*."


EDIT: Funny thing Xenofan, because you almost express this yourself here:
Quote:
The lesson is, you should judge based on what you hear, not some graphic or number. Those things do not compensate for other factors that your ear understands immediately.
The main problem is that you've got to know how these graphics and number were created in the first place. Only then can you interpret them correctly. If you don't know anything about the computation of these, then this won't work and you're just guessing stuff out of thin air.

Last edited by LiquidAcid; Jul 24, 2012 at 10:03 AM.
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  #40  
Old Jul 24, 2012, 10:47 AM
GoldfishX GoldfishX is offline
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Well, if you've established expectations for the program and it runs as expected for 90-95% of examples, I would say it's doing SOMETHING right.

Every heavy metal album I've analyzed from the past decade performs miserably and the database confirms that. Same for pop albums. Same for crappy remasters of various classic albums. I can't get anything from the past decade to register above an 8 (if a couple of tracks are lucky, that is). Just about every CD I put in from the late 80's/early 90's, on the other hand, registers juicy double digits. My own hearing lead to that conclusion a long time ago, the program isn't telling me anything new. Based on it meeting my expectations in that manner, the program works as expected.

I think with VGM (and probably soundtracks in general), there is such a wide variety of production practices, that it is impossible to say it is the perfect way to read everything. We all know Chrono Cross sounds good and I'm not going to back off my praise for the Guilty Gear album based on the rating alone. Anyone who listens to Mighty Obstacle can tell there is something wrong with the music coming through the speakers, slapping a DR Value of 3 on the poor track makes a lot of sense. The exceptions are far fewer than the rules here.
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  #41  
Old Jul 24, 2012, 10:49 AM
Xenofan 29A Xenofan 29A is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by LiquidAcid View Post
The main problem is that you've got to know how these graphics and number were created in the first place. Only then can you interpret them correctly. If you don't know anything about the computation of these, then this won't work and you're just guessing stuff out of thin air.
Do I know the formula? No. The algorithm has not been released. If you want, you can try to judge the results against those of other similar measuring tools, and you'll get a pretty accurate picture of how it is calculated.

On the other hand, it's not just some magic black box that I think pops out an answer at a whim. I know the general method by which it works, and I explained this above. Honestly, I don't need any more than that personally because I don't use it to make decisions for me. My ears are fine for that. Nor should it be used to pass any sort of definitive judgement on a given recording. It is, on the other hand, useful for comparisons. Unless you believe that its computations are random, then they are valid within their own sphere, and provide a useful point of reference.

Certainly a far cry from "guessing stuff out of thin air".

Quote:
Originally Posted by GoldfishX
I think with VGM (and probably soundtracks in general), there is such a wide variety of production practices, that it is impossible to say it is the perfect way to read everything.
There is no perfect way to read anything in any kind of music, especially as the aesthetic needs of different tracks differ significantly.

Last edited by Xenofan 29A; Jul 24, 2012 at 10:51 AM.
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  #42  
Old Jul 24, 2012, 12:01 PM
LiquidAcid LiquidAcid is offline
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Originally Posted by Xenofan 29A View Post
Do I know the formula? No. The algorithm has not been released. If you want, you can try to judge the results against those of other similar measuring tools, and you'll get a pretty accurate picture of how it is calculated.
I doubt that anyone is going to suceed with this kind of reverse engineering. It's a lot more complicated than you might think (see below).

Quote:
Originally Posted by Xenofan 29A View Post
I know the general method by which it works, and I explained this above.
With all due respect, I don't think you have any clue about how it's computed. If you indeed do, then at least me give some pseudo-code here. This so called "explanation" is worth nothing.

Remember the thing about why a plane is flying in physics lesson? The stuff about the air traveling with different speeds above and below the airplane wing? Anyone tried to build a real plane just based on this information? Hopefully not, because you will probably kill its passengers instantly. The "explanation" is overly simplified and furthermore incomplete. It might give someone a very coarse idea about how things work, but it's worthless if you actually want to fly / build a plane / evaluate it's flying capabilities.
So if this is the kids explanation to airplanes, then your explanation Xenofan is the kids explanation for dynamic range computation.


Need to make it more clear?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Xenofan 29A
It's primarily a reading of the average difference between the highest and lowest levels at a given point.
1) Level is not defined. What should that be? Sample value?
2) What kind of average? Linear? Weighted?

There are infinitely many ways to compute momentary volume/loudness levels. You just need to take a look at the RG specs about this part:
RG1 specs - loudness measurement

It's sophisticated, it's complicated and it matters how you do it. You seem to believe that the loudness level is some natural property that just comes along with the audio data. This is simply _not_ the case.
And therefore it's of utter importance to know how a tool, which you ultimately want to use to compare different data, computes it.

Swap out this part of the scanner and a track with previous result of 12 might now produce 10, while another track changes from 10 to 12. What is "better" now?

--------------------


Quote:
Originally Posted by Xenofan 29A
Any natural sound has several "layers" to it that are at different volumes, so a collection of natural sounds
will have a wide range in dB in any given instant.
It's not clear if the algorithm knows of these so-called "layers". I highly doubt that, since this would involve some way to automatically "extract" single instruments from the data. And there's a limit what you can do with a FFT / DCT.


Quote:
Originally Posted by Xenofan 29A View Post
It is, on the other hand, useful for comparisons.
And that's what I doubt the most. How do you define a proper metric for comparison if you don't know what these values are anyway.

This really reminds me of all this bullshit about radiation in the media when hell was breaking loose in Fukushima. Bombardement with information about radiation in Sievert, Becquerel, Gray and what not. And everybody had their opinion on that matter, even though these units didn't tell them shit (sry for cursing). 10mSv here, 20mSv there -- people just knew "more = bad". It was just numbers for them. But everybody suddenly felt like an expert...


Quote:
Originally Posted by Xenofan 29A View Post
Certainly a far cry from "guessing stuff out of thin air".
It's unscientific in every conceivable way. I'm honestly amazed how you guys can trust something so undocumented (if it really this, maybe I just haven't found the right FAQ yet) like this.


And to prevent any misunderstandings: I'm only talking about the technical aspects of the scanner here. The interpretation itself is a totally different matter and as you pointed out numerous times Xenofan, it's best to let the ear decide in the end. And I've got no doubt that you can do this perfectly, probably better than most of the people here. I just doubt you understanding the technical subtleties that come with such a scanner.

To quote from the EBU site:
Quote:
Originally Posted by EBU
EBU R128 is the result of two years of intense work by the audio experts in the EBU PLOUD Group , led by Florian Camerer (ORF).
This _is_ rocket science and not something you think up in your 5 minute coffee break. People are vastly underestimating this subject.



EDIT: I already spotted some comments on HydrogenAudio that somewhat mirror my whole critique here (Link).
Quoting from the thread:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Northpack
I don't see anything professional about all of this. They don't update their website, forgetting their own announcements as you've said. They don't properly document the algorithm used by the Dynamic Range Meter - but if you actually figure it out, you'll notice that it's pretty coarse and far less apt to match subjective perception than those developed by the EBU or by David Robinson. Than there is the strange case that the foobar plugin still gives DR values hughely different from those reported by the offline DR meter (and that noone seems to care about this fundamental flaw, even 3 months after it has been reported).

OK, they gave that tool a neat design and made up a coherent CI. Maybe that's the real defition of beeing professional: to enshrine technically deficient products within a big marketing bubble, made out of fancy terms and labels. Some people would certainly agree.
Aha...


Another funny thing is that I found a claim about the scanner being open-source, which would pretty much destroy my critique here. But the source itself is nowhere to be found, so I don't really believe that.
More funny stuff: The author even mentions EBU R 128 in his ChangeLog, so probably he's aware of the issues with the scanner.

Last edited by LiquidAcid; Jul 24, 2012 at 12:32 PM.
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  #43  
Old Jul 24, 2012, 01:11 PM
Xenofan 29A Xenofan 29A is offline
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A few comments:

I do not consider myself an expert here, as I have said. I am not a programmer, and there is no way I could begin to code a program, beyond the most insultingly simple.

I am not an audio engineer, and although I understand the basic terminology used in the field, I think of music in terms of notes (think sheet music) rather than digital samples.

I do not consider this program any sort of be all and end all solution or explanation. I am entirely aware that it does not show THE ONE AND ONLY TRUTH of the matter. I am also aware that different programs will get different results.

Even a crude slapdash calculation can be useful, like using 3.14 to approximate Pi, which is extremely inaccurate at a scientific level.

The only reason I brought it in was to illustrate a point that it was NOT a measurement of how good or bad something is.

I don't even think we're really disagreeing here.
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  #44  
Old Jul 24, 2012, 01:46 PM
LiquidAcid LiquidAcid is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Xenofan 29A View Post
I do not consider this program any sort of be all and end all solution or explanation. I am entirely aware that it does not show THE ONE AND ONLY TRUTH of the matter. I am also aware that different programs will get different results.
In fact I'm getting the impression that it doesn't exactly model (humanly) perceived DR (see below).

Quote:
Originally Posted by Xenofan 29A View Post
The only reason I brought it in was to illustrate a point that it was NOT a measurement of how good or bad something is.
Agreed. Especially how it seems to be computed as of today.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Xenofan 29A View Post
I don't even think we're really disagreeing here.
Haha


-----------------

Anyway, I did a bit more digging and stumbled upon these:

Pleasurize Music Foundation @ HA
This at least partially reveals how the computation works. The bulk of information (sparse!) comes from the (german) manual:
Quote:
Zur Ermittlung des offiziellen DR‐Wertes wird der Titel bzw.
das Image des Tonträgers (Wave, 16bit, 44,1 kHz) gescannt
und im Hintergrund ein Histogramm (Lautheitsverteilungs‐
Diagramm) mit einer Auflösung in 0,01 dB‐Schritten erzeugt.
Die nach etablierten Standards für die RMS‐Berechnung in
einem Zeitfenster von 3 Sekunden ermittelten
Lautheitswerte (dB/RMS) werden quasi in 10.000
unterschiedliche Schubladen aufgeteilt (der 0,01dB‐
Auflösung entsprechend). Von dem Ergebnis werden nun die
lautesten 20% als Berechnungsgrundlage für die
durchschnittliche Lautheit der lauten Passagen errechnet.
Gleichzeitig wird der höchste Peakwert ermittelt.
Der DR‐Wert ist die Differenz zwischen Peak und Top‐20 des
durchschnittlichen RMS.
My problem with this: It doesn't take human loudness perception into account at any point. ReplayGain e.g. does this (see the aforementioned paragraph on HA about loudness computation), and also R 128 -- it should be mandatory by now. If you want a good metric for DR you have to consider the "consumer" of the audio, and this is (with high probability) going to be a human being.

So if anything this DR value is going to give you a _very_ crude idea. In fact the effects that you mentioned Xenofan ("bad" DR values but still nicely sounding) might be largely because of this issue (not taking into account the human aural system).


Another thread, this time on "JusticeForAudio.org":
Link

This brought me to this github repo by adiblol, who implemented the algorithm described in the manual:
dr_meter@github

He claims that the results from this tool are "compatible" with the TT DR Offline Meter (which is also the basis for the DR values in the database). No way I can confirm this though, but at least there is some "reference" code for what this tool is supposedly doing.


So what does all this tell us? At least for me it tells me that this DR values should be regarded with great skepticism. Like always, take them with a grain of salt -- preferrably a _big_ grain in this case.
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  #45  
Old Aug 13, 2012, 06:07 AM
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Need to throw the recent Sunsoft remix album on here as well. Sad, since that is the only thing wrong with it, but it's tiring to listen to. Probably would have been a classic if it were released in the early or mid 90's.

Also need to retract Xenoblade...Disc 3 of the soundtrack registered fine and was actually pretty enjoyable to listen to. I think a couple of the tracks on disc 1 were registering high volumes and that threw me off, disc 3 was mostly normal when I went through it (was interested in disc 3, since it seemed to have a majority of the common in-game music and seems to be regarded as the strongest disc by most of the community).
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  #46  
Old Aug 13, 2012, 06:41 AM
LiquidAcid LiquidAcid is offline
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I recently moved to r128gain for gain scanning. Even more recently I noticed that it does not only compute gain correction, but also the loudness range of each track. Everything in one pass.

Example: Hanashirube
Code:
01 The Door for the beginning of my journey (Ballad Ver.).flac = 7.19 LU
02 Mirai wo Shinjite (Jazz Waltz Ver.).flac = 7.11 LU
03 Time and a Word (Soft Fusion Ver.).flac = 4.96 LU
04 Tiny Tail (Bossa Nova Ver.).flac = 3.10 LU
05 Taisetsu na Kotoba (Latin Fusion Ver.).flac = 6.62 LU
06 Armeria (Jazz Waltz Ver.).flac = 7.71 LU
07 Sirius (Soft Ballad Ver.).flac = 6.50 LU
08 Kunpuu no Shoujo (Spanish Latin Fusion Ver.).flac = 10.17 LU
09 celestial ark ('90s Soft Club Music Ver.).flac = 7.11 LU
10 Cloudy ('80s Pop Soul Ver.).flac = 3.99 LU
11 silent rhyme (Rap Ver.).flac = 2.34 LU
12 Ayumu Michi (Ballad Ver.).flac = 9.76 LU
13 Altair ('70s R&B Ver.).flac = 4.44 LU
14 Hanashirube (Salsa Ver.).flac = 3.28 LU

album_range = 6.57 LU
LU are Loudness Units. Here's it's simply dB.
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  #47  
Old Aug 13, 2012, 07:04 AM
GoldfishX GoldfishX is offline
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Are LU the amount of decibels over 89 (or in rare cases, below 89 db)? That is how Wavegain calculates it. I wonder how the two compare.

Usually, I put my files through either Wavegain or mp3gain first, while keeping an eye on the values, then I use the foobar DR scanner separately. If I am getting constant values that are over 95-96 db, usually there is no need to go further with the DR scan. Unless I have a particular interest in the music (the Sunsoft album had Blaster Master and Journey to Silius arranges), experience has told me it's not worth keeping at that point.
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  #48  
Old Aug 13, 2012, 02:43 PM
LiquidAcid LiquidAcid is offline
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To clarify things. The list above was generated from the track range metadata. It is _not_ displaying the gain correction. And no, the range is not identical with the correction.

Concerning reference level. This is different from the RG 1.0 specs. Here find find either 83 dB SPL (=-20FS dB) or 89 dB SPL (=-14FS dB).
See again RG1.0 specs as reference.

EBU R128 proposes a ref level of -23FS LU, see this reference.
r128gain adds the reference level as metadata.

Wavegain implements scanning via RG1.0 specs.

Quote:
Originally Posted by GoldfishX View Post
Are LU the amount of decibels over 89 (or in rare cases, below 89 db)? That is how Wavegain calculates it. I wonder how the two compare.

Usually, I put my files through either Wavegain or mp3gain first, while keeping an eye on the values, then I use the foobar DR scanner separately. If I am getting constant values that are over 95-96 db, usually there is no need to go further with the DR scan. Unless I have a particular interest in the music (the Sunsoft album had Blaster Master and Journey to Silius arranges), experience has told me it's not worth keeping at that point.
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  #49  
Old Sep 6, 2012, 06:01 AM
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Perhaps nobody has noticed this, but I'd like to point out that while soundtrack CDs have indeed suffered, remixes are also being affected by this "war." If you compare the volume levels of songs posted to Overclocked ReMix in 2000 to songs like PhRey's "We are war" on Game Remixes, you'll notice that the loudness level in remixes is following the trend. Even 24-bit remixes are being compressed into small dynamic ranges, which sort of defeats the purpose of mixing them at 24-bit.

The question with remixes, though, is whether remixers are getting samples that were originally loud, so they can't do anything about the dynamic range. Or, they write out the notes to a song and listen to it in the program, and then find out that it doesn't sound like the original - so they tweak it until they realize that the volume was too low.

Since loud music "sounds better" at least at first, I'd wager that it's hard for a remixer to produce a quiet remix of a loud track, at least subconsciously.
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  #50  
Old Sep 6, 2012, 06:42 AM
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Originally Posted by quintin3265 View Post
Perhaps nobody has noticed this, but I'd like to point out that while soundtrack CDs have indeed suffered, remixes are also being affected by this "war." If you compare the volume levels of songs posted to Overclocked ReMix in 2000 to songs like PhRey's "We are war" on Game Remixes, you'll notice that the loudness level in remixes is following the trend. Even 24-bit remixes are being compressed into small dynamic ranges, which sort of defeats the purpose of mixing them at 24-bit.

The question with remixes, though, is whether remixers are getting samples that were originally loud, so they can't do anything about the dynamic range. Or, they write out the notes to a song and listen to it in the program, and then find out that it doesn't sound like the original - so they tweak it until they realize that the volume was too low.

Since loud music "sounds better" at least at first, I'd wager that it's hard for a remixer to produce a quiet remix of a loud track, at least subconsciously.
I've noticed this too, to a degree. Most rock doujins are blown up pretty bad and the combination of synth rock guitar and horrible compression is downright heinous. Metroid Metal comes to mind as something that lit up my wavegain values recently. Various fan arrange stuff I've looked at on Bandcamp is too darn loud to be taken seriously, so I usually just flip it off after a couple seconds.
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  #51  
Old Apr 20, 2020, 04:44 AM
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It took some time, but that abomination is reaching games now, with casualities.
https://twitter.com/thatACDCguy/stat...90243389927424

The composer didn't do the mix of the old music in the new game.
https://twitter.com/Mick_Gordon/stat...28567882600448

...and leaves the series (likely fake).
https://www.reddit.com/r/Doom/commen...rned_id_break/

Last edited by Datschge; Apr 21, 2020 at 12:58 AM.
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  #52  
Old Apr 20, 2020, 06:22 AM
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Actually that last one seems to be fake:
https://twitter.com/ThatSkullIsASpy/...95956557889536
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Old Apr 21, 2020, 12:57 AM
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Good call, going to edit that.
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