Why are movie previews so loud?

Discussion in 'Visual Arts' started by Johnny Action, Oct 16, 2019.

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  1. Michael

    Michael I LOVE WIDE S-T-E-R-E-O!

    it is such a PITA! but, yes...
     
  2. Ignatius

    Ignatius Forum Resident

    Trailers are all metallic WHOOSH CLANGS and constant booming percussion,
     
  3. SandAndGlass

    SandAndGlass Twilight Forum Resident

    From a general technical standpoint, they are correct. But that is concerning those individuals who have normal hearing that has not been previously subjected to loud music or other noise. Normal sound levels, loud and annoying as they are apparently are not damaging to healthy ears.

    Don't concern yourself what others may do or not do. There is nothing wrong with wearing hearing protection any time you feel subjected to sounds that you interrupt as being overly loud. I am over twice your age so since you have already incurred some damage already, it certainly would be prudent to wear some kind of hearing protection when you are around loud noises.

    I have some mild tinnitus in my left ear from having my stereo up too loud and falling asleep with it on. This was with some La Scala's, which have some nasty high frequency horns. I had incurred a significant knee injury back at the end of 2013. I don't take pain pills, so I would drink mass quantities of beer to deaden the pain and then fall asleep.

    I used to attend loud concerts in my younger days, but was well aware of the speakers and did not sit in front of them, but between them in the middle of the stage. But back then, most Rock concerts were in outdoor venues, indoor venues with loud music are much worse.

    I have always owned large theater type speakers since I was sixteen and powerful amplifiers. But, while I like to listen at loud SPL's, I also don't leave the volume turned up all the time. I have always kept the volume controls by where I sit and continuously vary the volume.

    Unfortunately, with hearing damage, you can not undo it, but you can take measures to prevent making it worse.

    Since you have a lot of years in front of you, hearing protection seems like a good thing.
     
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  4. lightbulb

    lightbulb Not the Brightest of the Bunch

    Location:
    Smogville CA USA
    All of this Concern, Consternation, and Complaining is lost...

    Upon deaf ears.
     
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  5. arley

    arley Forum Resident

    Bear in mind that loud noise--regardless of source--can cause deafness, and it's permanent. I've always used hearing protection when using power tools, etc. If you're at a concert and you come out with ringing in the ears, you've probably sustained some damage and over the years it's cumulative.

    I used to work in a riverfront store that provided supplies for tugboats, ships, etc. You could always tell the deck crews from the engineers and others who worked in the engine room--most of the engine room crew were all partly deaf. (This was in the pre-OSHA days, and I hope that the conditions are better now.)

    How Does Loud Noise Cause Hearing Loss? | NCEH | CDC
     
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  6. lightbulb

    lightbulb Not the Brightest of the Bunch

    Location:
    Smogville CA USA
    THE
    LOUD
    SOUND
    IS
    TO
    GET
    YOUR
    ATTENTION!
    ;)
     
  7. bamaaudio

    bamaaudio Forum Resident

    Location:
    US
    Kind of a timely thread. Not a movie, but earlier this morning I was waiting outside with a bunch of other people for a local store to open and out of nowhere a really loud siren was blaring. It was loud enough to where at least a few plugged their ears and others were kind of facing the other direction. It caught me off guard and so I just stood there without plugging my ears. My phone spl meter tops out at like 100dB and so it was even louder than that for about three minutes. Not sure if it was a test or weather siren or what, but it sounded pretty close by. Hopefully no damage from it, but it was definitely annoying and it 'seems' like I have some ringing from it.
     
    Last edited: Nov 6, 2019
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  8. MRamble

    MRamble Forum Resident

    They're loud so they can do that hacky trick of when all the noise is building and building----and then BAM the sound cuts out for a beat or two of silence before the volume slams back on for the final part of the trailer. They all do this. Every. Single. One. Of. Them.
     
  9. SandAndGlass

    SandAndGlass Twilight Forum Resident

    Volume and time are the two most significant factors.

    934 dB. = 1-hr.

    97 dB. = 1/2 hr.

    100 dB.= 15 min.

    103 = 7 min. + 30 sec.

    106 = 3 min. + 45 sec.

    109 dB. = 1 min. + 53 sec.

    112 dB. = less than 1-minute.

    When things get loud, safe listening time comes down fast.

    Not only that, but these times are based on normal sounds.

    Our hearing is most acute between 1-kHz. and 5-kHz.

    High frequencies like those of a siren affect our hearing, more than sounds below 1-kHz.
     
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  10. bamaaudio

    bamaaudio Forum Resident

    Location:
    US
    That's interesting. Apparently the area I was in does a three minute tornado siren testing one day a month and I never knew since I'm generally not in that particular radius and outdoors at that exact time. Three minutes is a pretty long time for a siren blare and I guess it indeed could have caused damage.
     
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  11. SandAndGlass

    SandAndGlass Twilight Forum Resident

    Usually individuals are not close enough to the siren itself for it to cause damage.

    Emergency alert sirens, like your tornado alert one, warn of possible catastrophic damage. So it is a pretty good trade off.
     
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  12. Vidiot

    Vidiot Now in 4K HDR!

    Location:
    Hollywood, USA
    There is an industry organization, TASA, that is "supposed" to regulate the volume of movie trailers, but not all studios and distributors follow the rules:

    "The TASA Standard" is an audio standard for motion picture trailer volume. It was developed by the Trailer Audio Standards Association at the request of The National Association of Theatre Owners (NATO) to address audience complaints about excessively loud trailers. TASA employs a measuring technique called "Leqm" that quantifies sound with an emphasis on the sound frequencies that are the most annoying to audiences.

    Not all "loud" sounds irritate an audience to the same extent. The irritability of sounds to an audience is frequency and duration specific. For example, breaking glass at 85 decibels is far more irritating to an audience than a foghorn at 85 decibels. Rather than simply measuring "volume," the standard seeks to measure "annoying volume."

    At any given time, the TASA Standard identifies a specific Leqm number as a recommended upper volume limit for trailers in order to bring the audio level of trailers closer to the features they precede. The current upper volume limit is Leqm 85.

    The TASA Standard has been voluntarily adopted by all of the MPAA member studios.


    TASA Website
     
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  13. SandAndGlass

    SandAndGlass Twilight Forum Resident

    Unfortunately, they seem to always emphasize the annoying frequencies like glass breaking and make sure that their volume is always maxed out.
     
  14. bamaaudio

    bamaaudio Forum Resident

    Location:
    US
    Probably would've been a good idea to wear earplugs at a holiday parade. I went to one today and for the first half or so it was mostly just cars driving by and people waving. And then the school marching bands started walking through, which was considerably louder. But the real kicker was towards the end when a succession of probably about a half dozen fire trucks came through with the sirens on and horns blaring. Traffic was already pretty backed up by that point in the parade line and so they must've been going for at least 5-6 minutes straight and with it only being like 15-20 feet away is was painfully loud. There wasn't really any need to do all of that since there wasn't an 'emergency' and it was just for show.
     
  15. Eleanora's Alchemy

    Eleanora's Alchemy Forum Cryptid

    Location:
    Oceania
    Why are movie previews so loud?

    To create an artificial sense of excitement/anticipation for uninteresting/boring films that you would most likely have no interest in ever seeing.
     
  16. polchik

    polchik Forum Resident


    regarding your 'one ear versus the other' ......

    have you ever had your ears flushed at a clinic or hospital ? i personally have only had it done ONCE .... about 8 years ago ...... you would not believe how much wax came out ...... i still have one ear that is very slightly less responsive to higher frequencies, but it is normally perceivable unless i do an isolated comparison ...... i was told to drop olive oil in that ear over night, and come back and get that ear better flushed ...... so perhaps that might be an option for you .... just puttin' that out there ....

    and btw i found THIS ...



    today and at the 6:00 min. mark, pete townshend describes what actually caused his tinnitus ......

    i was .... surprised, all things considered.......

    blasting phones along with any kind of depressant, such as alcohol or ....... as enjoyable as it is in the moment .... should be done w caution. i seriously wonder if that is how my tinnitus developed, as i USED to always blast my wireless phones (that i later found out had a compression algorithm built in, and it also had a bass boost), while ....indulging. also, when working at night (i've been a sound fx editor for over 2 decades) i'd use these headphones .... working on and listening to, over and over, exlosions, gun fights, car screeches etc etc ...... that is a lot of direct sound pressure ....

    anyway be careful out there!

    i love music ... i love sound ..... and i want to enjoy my hearing as loooong as possible! i'm definitely one of those, i'd rather go blind than deaf kinda people lol
     
  17. The Wanderer

    The Wanderer Seeker of Truth

    Location:
    NYC
    LOUD = MUST BE GOOD
     
  18. evillouie

    evillouie Forum Resident

    Location:
    Toledo
    Not only are they loud, but they always seem to have a voiceover with a voice so deep that it makes Lt. Worf from Star Trek: The Next Generation sound like a soprano in comparison.
     
  19. BeatleJWOL

    BeatleJWOL Senior Member

    I can't think of the last movie trailer I saw that had a voiceover. Usually it's dialogue from the film these days.
     
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  20. SandAndGlass

    SandAndGlass Twilight Forum Resident

    Me neither. But they do have loud theater announcements.
     
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  21. bamaaudio

    bamaaudio Forum Resident

    Location:
    US
    I've always wondered about that, but when I've gone for check-ups and ask the doctor to look into my ear he'll say there's no wax build up or at least seems to suggest nothing really notable. This is an internist and not an ENT speciaist and just a basic, quick look with a handheld otoscope that's in every doctor's office, but I'd imagine they can still tell.

    One of the dumbest things I did with the ears was see a 2-day indoor heavy metal festival in small rooms with concrete floors and walls. Of course I didn't wear earplugs through any of it and each day was over 12 hours of standing each day, many of which I foolishly stood right in front of the speakers because no one was standing there and I thought it was a good view of the stage. I was too naive as a teenager to figure out it's not a smart place to stand around, especially for several hours per day. I remember after a while of standing next to the speakers it didn't sound loud enough and so I'd get even closer to them. And that's not all - I went back again and did it again the next year but with foam earplugs. However, earplugs may not even be great protection for 12 hours or more a day of 115-130dB or so metal and I still can't believe I both went to them and standed so close to speakers both trips. There were a bunch of other concerts that I attended where I got so caught up in the hype of going that I forgot earplugs. And then there's the debate if wearing foam earplugs incorrectly really provides any protection at all and it's one that still kind of makes me nervous to this day since I've never been able to 'roll' them and really just kind of stick them in the ear and they don't perceptually seem to block much compared to say earmuffs.
     
    Last edited: Dec 3, 2019
  22. SandAndGlass

    SandAndGlass Twilight Forum Resident

    Foam earplugs do offer surprisingly effective hearing protection and do attenuate the SPL.

    But, in order for them to have any sort of effectiveness, you do need to "roll" them and have them properly inserted into the ear canal.

    Otherwise, they don't serve much of a purpose for anything.
     
  23. bamaaudio

    bamaaudio Forum Resident

    Location:
    US
    That's what kind of depresses me. I'd imagine like 90%+ of people wear them 'incorrectly' like I always have and it makes me wonder why they wouldn't just modify the NRR rating to adjust for 'improper' use. When I've watched people put earplugs in at concerts or while sport shooting, almost everyone has just put them in their ear with most of the earplug sticking out the ear. None of the rolling into a cylinder or raising the ear to get a good fit, etc. Each time I've tried that as well they seem to just fluff back up or even nearly fall out. I hate to think that for years I've been having a false sense of protection after numerous concerts, fireworks shows, etc. I've been around some really loud sounds of 115-130dB pretty much every year since I was a teen. I also have some flanged earplugs like the Etymotic ER-20s which 'only' have a NRR of around 12 and so I'd normally just put in the foams because I assumed they would offer more protection. But I guess not. It's probably why I'm in my 30s and often asking people to speak up or repeat what they just said.
     
    Last edited: Dec 3, 2019
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  24. The Pinhead

    The Pinhead KING OF BOOM AND SIZZLE IN HELL

    Volvéte a Argentina y listo, boludo ! Acá ya no pasan las películas con el sonido fuerte; tengo que levantarme a putear para que la suban, y no me dan bola:p
     
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  25. The Pinhead

    The Pinhead KING OF BOOM AND SIZZLE IN HELL

    The first and only movie I watched in the States was¨Starship Troopers¨in '97 . It was in a Key West movie theater; the speakers had ¨KLIPSCH¨ plastered all over them, and the sound was insanely loud, but so clean and exciting I loved every second of it. Man I felt I'd attended a metal concert ! The woman who went with me plugged her ears and suffered during the whole movie.
     
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