[MLA] AES71 comments

Wed Jun 6 01:39:20 CEST 2018

I think headroom and environmental issues are just as bad or worse for
non-music program.

AES71 introduces a "DRC Profile" concept which I would hope could be used
to implement your limiter suggestion. DRC Profile is not fleshed out so
there would be work to do.

Kevin

On Tue, Jun 5, 2018, 3:02 PM Bob Katz <bobkatz at digido.com> wrote:

> Yes, it's a mess. And designing a fall back to -23 in this day and age is
> a real problem. And you are correct about the notification sound issue!
> Even on IOS I had to struggle to keep the bluetooth "ding" from being too
> loud compared to the navigation speech. And so music is even worse. Apple
> tries to make things "easy" but the customization choices get buried.
>
> Here's an idea:
>
> Maybe the solution for fallback in the absence of metadata on portable
> devices we recommend a gain boost of 7 dB with a protection limiter. Since
> it's music it's likely to have a PLR of less than 16 dB so if it was
> normalized to -23 it would hardly trigger the limiter. But without metadata
> how do you know it's music? And if they normalize regular program to -23 it
> will be too low for many portable devices, also.
>
>
> Shit (excuse my French),
>
>
>
> Bob
>
>
>
> On 6/5/18 5:18 PM, Kevin Gross wrote:
>
> We're not there with metadata. Maybe this is something this group could
> focus on.
>
> AES71 should do the right thing if there is metadata. I believe it wants
> to but is lacking specific recommendations for how players use metadata.
>
> AES71 should do something reasonable in the absence of metadata. What it
> recommends in this case is delivery of -23/-24 LUFS material to portables.
> As per the tests that AGOTTVS did (we've done some of this too), listeners
> are going to want to turn their device's volume all the way up. They're not
> going to be able to make out dialog in loud listening environments. When
> they receive a text message they will get blasted by the notification sound.
>
> My concern with this is that platform providers are going to implement it,
> listen to it and reject it. They will then each implement a higher target
> level of their own choosing and the loudness war will continue.
>
> Kevin
>
> On Jun 5, 2018 10:33 AM, "Bob Katz" <bobkatz at digido.com> wrote:
>
> Well, without metadata I don't see a good solution :-(  I only see
> conflicts.
>
> Bob
>
>
>
> On 6/4/18 5:36 PM, Kevin Gross wrote:
>
> I would estimate that about a quarter of this standard is explicitly about
> portable devices and applications. We should also expect the trend of
> stationary application becoming portable to continue. Your cell phone or
> tablet is your OTT box in increasing cases. My daughters' generation
> watches most of their TV and listens to most of their music on portable
> devices. I don't know where the cart is but the horse is out of the barn.
>
> Kevin Gross - AVA Networks
>
> On Mon, Jun 4, 2018 at 9:45 AM, Bob Katz <bobkatz at digido.com> wrote:
>
>> Dear Kevin: We are all aware of the conflicts involved. I occasionally
>> read the AGOTTV5 reports but got lazy about it, my bad.
>>
>> Since this is primarily intended for OTT boxes and portable has not been
>> mentioned, I hope there is not a big conflict. Music will be turned down to
>> -23 in the OTT boxes. Sooner or later we will have to address this, but
>> until metadata is standardized it's putting the cart before the horse. I'm
>> concentrating on helping us get music streaming services in line, and then
>> eventually we'll have to reconcile things, but until metadata is
>> standardized I doubt we can solve the conflict with a document other than
>> recognizing that a conflict exists.
>>
>>
>> Bob
>>
>>
>>
>> On 6/3/18 5:17 PM, Kevin Gross wrote:
>>
>> I don't know if any of you have been following or working in the AES's
>> AGOTTVS initiative. This group is working on loudness for over the top
>> (OTT) and online video distribution (OVD). They have produced a standards
>> document that will come out for public comment soon as AES71. The
>> recommendations are reasonable - produce, transmit and use metadata where
>> possible, use BS.1770 with -23 or -24 LUFS target.
>>
>> There is, however, a large portable aspect to these topics and the line
>> between OVD and music loudness is not very crisp (YouTube is everyone's
>> favorite music streaming service). In these cases the -23 LUFS is at odds
>> with the -16 LUFS recommendation in the AES TD1004 recommendation. -16 LUFS
>> does appear in the AES71 draft in what appears to be a "not to exceed under
>> any circumstances" specification.
>>
>> Aside from the potential problems connecting these recommendations, I see
>> problems with a -23 LUFS target for portable applications. We've discussed
>> limitations of portable devices and environments here and I know we don't
>> all agree but we have seen evidence that this is not loud enough for
>> certain hardware and situations and regulations.
>>
>> AGOTTVS did do some experiments on this and the findings were that were
>> that -23 didn't work for everyone in all scenarios and that more testing
>> was needed. I don't know how they got from this to a -23 recommendation,
>> but they did.
>>
>> As an officer in AES standards, I have reviewed the draft and submitted
>> some comments to clean up some definitions and other inconsistencies and
>> underspecification. I'm not sure how to broach the subject of an
>> unrealistic target level recommendation. I was hoping someone here could
>> talk me through or talk me down from this.
>>
>> Kevin Gross - AVA Networks
>>
>>
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>>
>>
>> --
>>
>>
>> If you want good sound on your album, come to
>> Bob Katz 407-831-0233 DIGITAL DOMAIN MASTERING STUDIO
>> Author: *Mastering Audio              *Digital Domain Website <http://www.digido.com/>
>>
>> No trees were killed in the sending of this message. However a large number
>> of electrons were terribly inconvenienced.
>>
>>
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>>
>>
>
> --
>
>
> If you want good sound on your album, come to
> Bob Katz 407-831-0233 DIGITAL DOMAIN MASTERING STUDIO
> Author: *Mastering Audio              *Digital Domain Website <http://www.digido.com/>
>
> No trees were killed in the sending of this message. However a large number
> of electrons were terribly inconvenienced.
>
> _______________________________________________
> MLA mailing list
> MLA at grimmaudio.nl
> http://grimmaudio.nl/mailman/listinfo/mla_grimmaudio.nl
>
>
>
> --
>
>
> If you want good sound on your album, come to
> Bob Katz 407-831-0233 DIGITAL DOMAIN MASTERING STUDIO
> Author: *Mastering Audio              *Digital Domain Website <http://www.digido.com/>
>
> No trees were killed in the sending of this message. However a large number
> of electrons were terribly inconvenienced.
>
>
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