Is movie dialogue getting harder to hear for you?

I have Paradigm Studio 40s from L-R and a CC470 as the center, I'd say they are GREAT speakers. Running a Pioneer Elite VSX-94TXH. It's not that.

And I had my hearing checked , so it's not my ears.

The solution may be to mix turn my center UP from what the sound engineers think is the correct volume. But then my SACDs will sound weird unless I adjust the center.

John Adams had a lot of weird accents and mumbling in a lot of places, no?

 

Sorry to join the thread so late! A few random comments/observations:

The hearing loss that we experience as we age is termed presbycusis. It is completely normal and occurs gradually, usually effecting higher frequencies first.

I have major problems with dialogue on DVD, and this involves playing DVDs on a 32" Sony TV w/ the standard stereo speakers built in sides. I thought a home entertainment system, w/ a dedicated center channel would help this, but from reading other posters, it would seem not always.

The problem isn't presbycusis; it's not movie related (I have no problem in the theater); it's not an equipment problem; it's not even that actors are mumbling; it's simple: they mix the background sound (usually music, sometimes explosions) TOO LOUD in the mix! Period.

So I use subtitles not only for foreign language films (I don't get much opportunity to speak Japanese in Texas!), and not only for strong accents of the English language (Irish, some British), but for some English language films as well.

Perhaps the underlying reason is that dialogue isn't as important as it used to be? Why write dialogue (a truly skilled art) when you can have a car chase or blow something up?

 

I wouldn't rule that reason out. But my opinion is mostly that things get stupider and stupider.

 

It's not quite as hard today for a a few reasons:

1) pre-dubs. A lot of the layers have already been premixed by the effects, dialog, and music supervisors. They still have to deal with balancing a lot of tracks in the final mix (as many as 96 tracks or more), but it would easily be 300+ tracks if they had to go all the way back to the original material.

2) automation. Every fader move is captured and stored on the fly continuously. If they make a mistake, they backup ten seconds and punch back in. It still requires lots of skill and infinite patience, but at least they don't have to go all the way back to the beginning of the reel, as they did pre-automation.

2) a three-mixer crew. Having one re-recording mixer each for dialogue, music, and effects allows each of them to concentrate solely on their own responsibility, optimizing each step. The dialogue mixer is still the lead, and he calls the shots for the final, but at least this lessons the pressure of having to move, say, 20 knobs vs. only 8 or 9.

4) tight schedules. With a lot of current blockbuster films, they schedule the mix about 2 weeks before the prints have to ship. That gives them maybe 10 days to do the final mix, and two days for fixes. When you only have a day and a half per reel, the director has to make the decision right then and there, and move on. No futzing around.

Unfortunately, the latter makes the pressures and long shifts worse than ever. There are compensations (like big paychecks and lots of overtime), but the hours are brutal.

I have mixed home video versions before, but only unsupervised, in cases where the studios only heard the final mix after it was all completed. It took a lot of time, but when you don't have a high-pressure delivery date, it's not nearly as intimidating as it might seem. In fact, I discovered all kinds of mistakes on a few titles (pieces of missing words, dropouts, background sound effects missing, etc.) that I was able to fix, most of which I suspect were due to time and budget problems from the original films.

 

It's a dynamic range problem. Soft sounds (especially dialogue) are too soft; loud sounds are too loud.

The C.A.S. guys constantly carp on this in their monthly newsletter. If you're hearing it this way on home video, all you can do is voice your complaints to the studios, and hope they'll pay more attention. In the theater, it may well be a problem with how the speakers are set up. It may not be the mix per se; it may be due more to how it's being presented in a specific venue.

 

Exactly. I think you are right on target.

 

Cinema is still mixed in big rooms

Doesn't always translate to home cinema

My local 6 screen has excellent acoustics

When I go in the afternoons I'm often alone

Sounds great.

 

Perhaps they feel that "over the top" sound effects will "involve" people more with the film. Maybe they do add a certain amount of excitement, but I don't understand why flashbulbs need to sound like the cannon shots in Telarc's 1812 Overture... or a door closing needs to sound like a tank running into the side of my house!

 

I generally have a very low opinion of modern film-making, in comparison to what I see as the hey-day of 1935-59 (ish). In defence, however, many films have made excellent use of the surround tracks but it does have to be subtle - a concept usually lost on Hollywood for whom over-the-top seems to be the norm.

 

I think it was Jim Katz who did the remixing on the restoration of My Fair Lady. Fantastic, fantastic job, no other words for it. I'd love to work in film sound restoration, but what I know about film sound amounts to one drop in the ocean compared to guys like that!

 

It's fun, by the way, to be reading a thread suggesting a mainstream media sound production of having too much dynamic range and suggesting one use compression. Sometimes it seems everything's so backwards these days. Music on CD and downloads, where dynamics can matter in terms of expression, is often compressed to nearly a square wave, while movies on DVD, where dynamic range frankly has far less significance past a certain fairly mild point, go hog wild on dynamics. And which industry is doing better than ever in mass market sales?

 

I'm glad someone else noticed that little bit of irony.

 

I'm 35 and I find myself referring to the old days already.

In both cases: lack of dynamics in audio media, and too much in visual/cinematic some of it comes down to digital technology it seems. More dynamics for bigger bangs in cinema (120dB dynamic range IIRC? Isn't 120dBA around the threshold of pain?) and advance "intelligent" limiting/compression on audio...

 

Too much proregress methinks.

 

Steve, I think today's mixers do know how to do it. The problem is, they often run up against directors who think they know better, and demand that it be louder.

If you did this for a living, and an A-list director sitting right behind you yelled at you and said, "no! I want it louder!" What are you going to do? Walk out of the session? Lose your job, knowing the next guy is just going to give the director what he wants anyway?

I think the smart mixers try to get a compromise between what they know is best, and what an inexperienced (or deaf) director demands. That's the most we can hope for nowadays.

There are directors around who have good ears and know what good mixes sound like. I would put guys like Spielberg and Lucas in that category. I just listened to the mix of Bob Zmeckis' Contact this past weekend, and I think that's another extremely well-mixed film. So the good guys do exist out there.

 

+1

It's the theater that hurts my ears...at home I can at least turn it down.

No kiddin!

I'm 32

There are many reasons I don't like going to theaters, one of them is I'd much rather rent the DVD and stay home where I can turn the ear piercing sound down!

I'll let you in on one of the others...I can't get a Pepsi!!!!! (Can get one at home though)

 

i was watching Constantine on a cable channel and I had to turn up the volume big time to hear ANY dialog. then, whenever special effects kicked in... BLWAAAAHHH!!!

 

Now, substitute "mastering engineers" for "mixers", and "label heads" for "directors"...and re-post that in the Music forum!

 

Complain! They're supposed to set the Dolby/DTS tracks to an 85dB reference level. Chances are, some ***** bumped the knob, and it's a few dB too high. Or even worse, the channels are unbalanced. I used to go to theaters (even in Hollywood) in the 1980s where the surround channels would be dead, or one of the front speakers was dead. In one case, I complained, called back the next day, and they admitted that the tweeter had blown out. God knows how long it had been dead.

They've at least now got standards on how loud trailers can be played back. There was a "loud, louder, loudest" war going on for years with movie trailers, but the MPAA finally stepped in and put all trailers through an approval process. This at least put a limit on how loud trailers could be. I used to hear trailers that were about +5dB louder than the feature they preceded, and that drove me nuts.

 

There was a story told on my degree course (by an ex cinema guy come lecturer) about a cinema where the sub was stolen mid way through a film!

 

I often prefer the surround set up at home, but I often use an onboard compressor on the AV amp - that's for the neighbours though, thinking about it. When I auto callibrate I usually stick the callibration mic on my head. Also refreshment goodies don't cost and arm and a leg!

 

Watched a film today and the levels seems really good apart from one moment when a track came up comparitively loud (but no voice at the same time.) The film was Stranger Than Fiction.

 

Not at theaters around here you can't. The employees likely to be present are only doing time for part time minimum wage and may be able to start and stop it but probably not much else. That's assuming they're sympathetic and accept your complaint at all. If someone more senior is there, they're apt to claim it is professionally calibrated (notwithstanding the fact that I wouldn't take credit for that sound were I a professional responsible for it), disregarding any validity to your complaint. Still from what you say it's nice to know there are theaters that might listen.

 

I recently cranked up the center channel on my system.

My hearing is pretty bad too and I know it's those sounds in the talking range that leave me saying "huh-what"?