Audio Monitors
 

I am in the process of getting some studio monitors and haven't found the answer via search.

1. Would it be recommended to plug the ole computer into the home 5.1 surround system, or go for independent studio monitors? I don't think (at this point) I will be doing 5.1 mixing for my projects, so will the home system (yamaha and sony) in stereo mode be sufficient for sound playback and true enough?

2. Or, would it be better to get the studio monitors? If you say studio monitors, could you please list specific models and brands...I have checked out AKG, Tannoy, Mackie, Genelec, and KRK's...just would like to know what specifically is being used.

3. Also, many have said headphones, but "headphones don't produce 'real' enough sound" (true to acoustics of some "specific" environment) is what I have heard and understand...so should I get both?

4. I most likely will not be egg crating my house or editing room, so will the monitors be good in a non-dry enviornment? And, how much will this affect their reproduction?

I think my head is going to explode now and I am sure the answers to these questions will take care of the rest of my body. Thanks in advance...
Clay

As far as I know it is better to check the audio on studio monitors
instead of headphones. I can imagine that a homecinema setup
might change the sound that it is putting out (it is distributing
it over the speakers and doing calculations for this etc.).

I my feeling says it would just be better to have a couple of
stereo monitors if your not gonna do surround anyway. But
then again, I ain't exactly an audio buff...

Any "pro's" on this?

Im definitely no pro, but from asking that very question and doing some searching, I could possibly shed some light, albeit dim, on the subject.

Audio guru extraordinaire Jay Rose over at dv.com wrote a great article "Somebody isn't listening" in the "Audio Solutions" archive. Great info!

(FYI - You need a free membership to dv.com to access this article)

I have also found Genelec products to be the most recommended, and most expensive. For most of us budget conscious buyers who want the most bang for their buck, the Yamaha MSP3 two way compact woofer comes highly recommended as an inexpensive monitoring solution. About $150 each.

Hope this helps.

Tim,

Would you just use one of these MSP3 monitors? Also, is this a woofer, or what is the two-way compact woofer? Thanks in advance...

Clay

Hi, I´ve struggled with the same audio monitor for a few months now..
I can quickly answer question 1 through 3, as I´ve been told on many forums... not just DV stuff but in sound forums.. and by pro audio guys I know...

"If you want good sound get some decent Near Field Monitors. No headphones, no 5.1 home theatrhe stuff.... just plain flat pro Near Field monitors."

The brand? Well that´s a pretty long kind of thread in the audio forums.. go check yourself.. but the bottom line.. is get a good pair.. and learn how they sound... and repond... then start mixing.

QUestion number 4? I can´t answer that since I´m not practicing what I´ve learned.. And I´m still mixing with my headphones... But you´ll get a variety of answers from the purist saying "good architecture is a must" to the more relaxed type.. giving just a few hints on how to place the gear.

One last thing... if your going to some audio forum (and have not been there yet)... be ready for some thread warfare... there´s nothing like peacefull DVinfo...

About egg-crating your room, yes that would be ideal. But as long
as you don't use a concrete empy room you should be fine mostly.
You can also hang the more heavy tape drapes along the walls
to dampen the sound.

Positioning is very important as well. From what I've seen they
tend to place the speakers at head level (or a bit higher looking
down a bit) and have them turned a bit towards the chair you
sit in at the optimal position.

Monitors like Genelec are overkill for most of us. We don't have the enviroment to make the most use of them and few of us have the budget.

KRK, Mackie, Tanoy and others in the same range make good basic units that will really make the sound editing a lot easier.

I feed a set of KRK ROK-R nearfields from a 60 watt Rotel with great results. My edit suite is so crowded that I don't have to worry about reverb and the other issues. Well, I tell myself that anyway.

But to get better, I'd have to create a very nice sound-isolated studio and that isn't going to happen very soon.

I use yorkville ysmp1 and they are great for the money. I think the optimal positioning is an equilateral triangle between the two speakers and the listening position. I think most people point them in a tad. Try to get the tweeters about ear level, doesn't have to be exact but you don't want the speakers way up high or way up low. Depending on where they are positioned in the room you might need to do some sound dampening etc. Don't worry about that until after you get them and experiment. Every speaker is different really and there is no blanket solution. Try to keep them away from the walls as much as you can to keep from attenuating lower frequencies. Corner placement also tends to attenuate lower frequencies. But you just have to be realistic and work with whatever you can manage.

Although I havn't tried them, there are the Studiophile (MAudio) BX5 and BX8 nearfields that seem to have a pretty flat response. Unfortunately what I can tell is that it's only flat down to about 200hz and then falls off quite fast, so if you're mixing bassy music you might need a subwoofer.

Cheers
Aaron

that would probably true for most bookshelf sized monitors as its hard to get deep bass out of those 6.5 in woofers and smallish enclosures. If you go with the yamaha msp3 there is a deal for a matching sub.

Yeah, but I have seen that the Alesis (sp?) 1 MK 2's have a reasonably flat response down to about 50 which seems a lot better. But they are more expensive I think.

Cheers
Aaron

Actually, the KRK's go quite low. They are fairly phenominal at how clean they are.

Subwoofers are not recommended for mixing (usually). Certainly not for 2-channel stereo.

Buy Jay Rose's books and read his articles on dv.com.
I chose Tannoy Reveals. They are cheap, uncoloured and do a good job on speech. P.C. speakers are only good for picking editing points not mixing.

I definitely agree with going the two-speaker near-field route for monitoring.

At the office I am using a pair of KEF 8-inch 2-ways at ear level and even with an ancient amp they crank out enough to mix with hard rock or hip-hop soundtracks. The company has some Mackies buried somewhere in a warehouse which were used in a discontinued karaoke promotion (don't ask) and I am trying to get my hands on them for a second edit desk...I'll find them someday.

At home, where I have much more room I am using a very old pair of ADS speakers through a Crown D150A. My wife gets pi$$ed off when I drown out her TV shows while editing. Ironically, my veteran JBL 4311B's (which are actually designed for and meant to be used as monitors) are doing yeoman service as front speakers in my living room home theater...of course it's good to try out your finished video on a system like this.

Behringer's "truth 2031" monitors are very affordable, and get great reviews. I've never listened to them. A buddy of mine has a pair of the Mackie 824s and they're fantastic, but they're expensive.

Look into treating your room a bit. You would be suprised at how much more you hear in a room with some decent treatment. Dense, rigid fiberglass like corning 703 is cheap and covered in cloth, hung a couple inches from the wall does a great job of absorbing sound.

I got a pile of acoustic foam for free and I'm adding some lower frequency absorption from a company I found on ebay(foambymail). Just what I have up now makes all the difference in the world.

Keep in mind that as sounds bounce back and forth between parrallel walls, not only are some sounds increased, but some are cancelled out.

Those reflections are causing what's known as standing waves, which is why a non-rectangular room shape is favored by many audio engineers and architects. It's good to break these up any which way you can, which can also include regular soft surfaces normally found in a room: carpeting, drapery, upholstered furniture, etc. and even angling the speakers can have an amazing effect.

It hasn't been much of a problem in my home studio, which has cathedral (slanted) ceilings with dormers (it's built over the garage) which really break up the rectangle, and a lot of rugs.

At the company HQ (my real job), the speakers are so close to me and angled inward, so it hasn't been noticable.

BTW, it is actually possible to "over-deaden" a room so that it doesn't sound natural. So now instead of building an anechoic chamber, many engineers are opting for a "live-end/dead-end" layout and trapping just one end of the room.

I think I have pretty much decided to go with headphones. Does anyone have some good recommendations? Or, can anyone recommend a audio forum to check out for this? Thanks in advance...

The industry standard for audio guys would be the Sony 7506.

About a $100.

Can't go wrong with the MDR-7506. Having said that, I still see a strong reason to use speakers. While I will slip on a pair of cans to detect infinitesimal nuances, tight edit points or complex mixes or to find out if the background is really really quiet, I want to have the same psychoacoustics going on as most of my viewers.

Which means the sound field of a pair of speakers.

No need to get crazy with speaker modeling and that kind of thing to exactly replicate specific playback conditions or equipment.

Just the fact of having a pair of speakers flanking the screen gives me the approximate feel that the typical audience will have during actual real-life conditions.

<<<-- Originally posted by Jacques Mersereau : The industry standard for audio guys would be the Sony 7506. -->>>

I read a lot of old posts on this topic here awhile ago. IIRC, some people were saying these are basically the pro version of the consumer MDR-V600. I'm not clear on what the differences are, if any, between these models. The 7506's are not as widely available through local retail outlets and I was in a hurry so I got the V600's at a local electronics superstore. I ain't no pro either, but these sound nice to me, are comfortable and fold up nicely to take on location. Price was also $100.

I believe www.fullcompass.com sells Sony 7506,
but you are correct Boyd that these phones are not
greatly advertised nor publicized.

I also agree with Mr. Butler that monitoring audio
via a pair of decent speakers is very important.

I guess if I *only had $100*, I would go with the Sonys
as speakers at this level won't give you any *real* idea of
what you're really mixing.

Boyd,

I believe the Sony MDR-V6 and the MDR-7506 are pretty much the exact same thing. From what I have read they are good. Everyday, I change my mind between speakers and headphones. I thought I decided on headphones and then started reading more and going back and looking at the yorkville's. The one thing I like about phones is that I can't hear any cars going by or people walking by my place, etc. Does anyone know of any headphones that even come close to using speakers? Has there been any research about this? Anyone, anyone, anyone, Buehler, buehler....

If you are on a tight budget, go with the 7506.
Even studios with thousands of dollars invested into
their monitors still use 7506 to check the mix.
If you are in an evironment filled with outside
noise, that increases the reasons for going with phones.

To get into "decent" near field monitors is going to
cost a lot more than $100.

Pony up to a friend who has a good stereo and
check you mix on speakers there.

The 7506 headphones are indeed the industry standard for production monitoring. Jay Rose's book discusses why a closed set of headphones are not the best for post production work though. Closed headphones like the 7506 are to detailed and if we mix based on that sound it will far too subtle. Speakers are recomended but I suppose a good set of open headphones would be better than closed for post

My office is cluttered as it is and I just have no room for a pair of monitors. I had planned on buying a decent set of open AKG's

What's the difference between open and closed headphones?

Very simple: closed headphones completely cover and enclose your ear, isolating you from ambient sounds. Open ones do not...they usually have just an airy foam pad between the driver and your ear and usually an open back. The outside world can leak in, and of course the sound generated by these also leaks out. They have some advantages for personal entertainment music listening: less claustrophobic feeling, lighter and more comfortable, closer to a speaker-like experience...the latter is exactly why they don't help me much when I need a pair of cans for editing--if I want a speakeresque experience I'll use my speakers.

And if you do have a lot of outside noise, you definitely need closed phones. Like the MDR7506 recommended in this thread.

You can get them at:
fullcompass.com
zzounds.com
bhphoto.com (a sponsor of this forum)
samedaymusic.com
samash.com
markertek.com
and many more, and they’ll all get them to your front door quickly.

I don’t even waste my time with the consumer retailer “superstores”…they just don’t sell what we buy. Can you imagine walking into a Circuit City or Best Buy and asking to see a Mackie 1402VLZPRO? Or a Sennheiser Evolution 100ENG? Or a Laird distribution amp? LOL!!!!

Duh. I hate it when things are so freaking obvious and I can't figure it out. Thanks Mike! Still thinking about the 7506's...the closed ones!

Editing should be done with speakers and in a quiet environment. Sound mixed for closed headphones will not sound the same on speakers. For the record I use 7506's for recording only.

Very well said, Bryan.

The spatial characteristics of 'phones, along with the way they reproduce detail, give no representaion of what the viewer of your video will hear under normal conditions (unless you know that all your viewers are going to be using headphones, ha ha).

Especially dialogue, which may be perfectly intelligible through the cans but sound like total mud in the real world (speakers) until you do something to pull it out (equalize it, attenuate the music or SFX, re-record the voice with better miking, etc.)

What about mixing music? I guess it would be the same reason.

I am still sturggling to understand the difference (in layman's terms) other than you get a more true sound out of the speakers??? True to what? The performance, the sound of one's voice?

But, Bryan said: "Closed headphones like the 7506 are to detailed and if we mix based on that sound it will far too subtle. Speakers are recomended but I suppose a good set of open headphones would be better than closed for post."

Don't have Rose's book, but will get it. In the mean time, I thought what we all are striving for is detailed sound.

Why do amps and speakers and such "muddy" the sound up? I understand amps process sound differently. But, if we take that into account we'll never get it right. The possibilities are unfathamable as to exactly what set-up our costumer/viewer will have. So, is everyone just making an educated guess?

Man, I have no idea where that came from? Too much coffee! Ok, thanks in advance for helping me understand...just trying to learn some new stuff and understand what's going on in this big bad world of editing!

Clay

Clay,
yep, same idea for music.


True to what?
Let me relate it to a joke I heard:

A blonde (OK, don't everybody go getting politically correct on me here...I'm blond too!) is watching a video, and reads the notice at the beginning: "This video has been reformatted to fit your screen." She says: "How did they know what size TV screen I have?"

Well, what they did know is that most people have the standard old NTSC 4:3 aspect ratio, and that the widescreen format of the original film will look cut off at the edges. So this reformattiing works well on most TVs.

And what we are trying to do here is create an audio track that will work best when played back on 99.9% of our customers' setups, which is speakers. Whether the crappy little 3 inch speakers on a cheap TV, or a bi-amped array of sound reinforcement speakers on stage, it's speakers.

The difference between all speakers and (almost) all headphones is this: With headphones, the drivers are about 1/2 inch from your ear, and each ear only hears what is fed to it from its respective driver and nothing from the other one. With speakers it is different. Without getting into a lengthy boring engineering treatise about time delay, phase shift, cancellation, room reverberation and all that, let's just say that the sound waves have to travel many feet before reaching your ears. Plus each ear hears a mix of both speakers, and the brain sorts it all out. Psychoacoustics of headphones will not match those of speakers. So we edit and mix true to the most likely soundfield environment our customers will have.

Why is this important? One reason: with the cups so close to your ears and no external acoustical factors to worry about, something may sound crystal clear on the phones but may seem buried in the mix when played back in the real world. And since Job 1 (usually) is to communicate, we want our program material to be intelligible.

<<<-- Originally posted by Mike Butler :
And what we are trying to do here is create an audio track that will work best when played back on 99.9% of our customers' setups, which is speakers. So we edit and mix true to the most likely soundfield environment our customers will have.

So Mike, would it be safe to say that editing in a normal living room with half decent speakers is what we should do and make that sound as best as possible. Or (here I go thinking out loud again) should we edit in a dead room with the most expensive speakers. I would assume that if you make it sound the best possible on the best speakers and amps, etc. it will sound the best possible on the crappiest systems?

"Without getting into a lengthy boring engineering treatise about time delay, phase shift, cancellation, room reverberation and all that, let's just say that the sound waves have to travel many feet before reaching your ears. Plus each ear hears a mix of both speakers, and the brain sorts it all out. Psychoacoustics of headphones will not match those of speakers."

Do you know of elementary reading that I could get into to learn about this statement?

Mike, thanks for indulging my "3 year-old" questioning rampage. I really appreciate the info!

Clay

I guess it's similar to production video monitors. It's about establishing a standard, and I guess with audio mixes big budget movies are mixed with good gear and played at theatres through good gear and that's what people expect. The DVD's are made well and more and more people generally listen to them through a stereo home theatre. If you want to make you're sounds "standard" you need to try and get that sort of thing too. Now we generally can't afford 5k on speakers so we have to do what's best. Get good ones we can afford, test the material on a range of devices once mixed and just live with it ;)

And also we want good reproduction so that we don't miss errors in the mixing. I've been mixing my LadyX episode and I just have Cambridge Soundworks speakers. Everything seemed find until I played them through my Sony 7506's... I then finally heard all the low rumblings, hisses etc that was making it sound shit. Now I'm having to foley a lot of stuff ;)

It also depends on what you're doing too. If you're internet based distribution then you can do with crappy speakers as people are used to it being crappy. If you're wanting to get into festivals, get some good speakers.

From my research, at around the $400-$500 a speaker price range, I've found that the recommendations for *good* speakers came down to Genelec 1029s and JBL4410's. Genelec is powered but the JBL's require an amp. Thing is even those will not reproduce the bass notes amazingly accurately. Fine for dialog, but if you're mixing music it's been heavily suggested to me that you will probably need a sub too. Of course all this information, like I said before is relative to their standard of quality. Maybe you can get way with less.



Just my-not-even-just-a-beginner's 2c

Cheers
Aaron

Ah yes Aaron, not missing the errors, that's where a handy headset comes in. Just today I had to edit an audio clip of the Howard Stern show, where the Kuya girl said " fifteen dollars-fifteen thousand dollars." She obviously meant to say 15K, but I wanted it to come out without the blooper. So I razored it right down to the frame while listening on the cans, then verified it through the speakers. Came out fine.

I used to use Cambridges, they were OK for most "business news" stuff, but I have switched to KEFs. Much better for rock & hip-hop, even with the arthritic old amp they are paired with. Would like the Mackie 824s, would settle for Behringer Truths and toss the amp.

Hey, if you have the money for room deadening and expensive speakers, go for it. Or just do the best you can, upgrade as money allows, and meanwhile as they say in auto racing "run what you brung." I am not using the ideal setup (yet), but it is not stopping me from doing my job.

Fact is, if you mix on good speakers, you will be confident of it sounding as good as possible on most systems. There is a risk in trying to optimise for crappy playback speakers, you try compensating for their shortcomings and wind up with over-emphasized bass which strains amplifiers, shrill highs which hurts people's ears, etc. Although it's been said that in the early days of rock-n-roll, recording engineers would try their final mix on a cheap 6x9" car speaker to simulate how it would sound coming out of their target listeners' dashboards. I never did it though.

Clay, try Jay Rose's book, available on Amazon & half.com

BTW, there is no such thing as a stupid question, just stupid mistakes from failing to ask questions.

Which of his books would be best for beginning and learning?

Producing Great sound for DV
or
Audio Postproduction for DV

I read some (unhelpful) reviews and wanted a little bit more info. Thanks.

Clay

Producing Great sound for DV would be the first. Make sure you buy the second edition. Jay covers monitoring sound both on production and editing.

Clay, on www.dplay.com the author himself describes the two books. The one about postproduction is more likely to have answers for you about what's going on in this thread, but you may want them both. Speaking as a digital editor, I'd much rather work with clean audio to start with than to have to fix field production blunders (lord knows I have had to fix plenty of my own).

He also suggests that you click on amazon directly from his site so he can get a better commission.

I say why not let him get the xtra pay, cuz he has contributed significant knowledge to the digital video/audio community.

Clay
Go over to www.dv.com and sign up. Jay moderates the Audio forum. He's a very patient man and answers pretty well all of the posted questions. It's a very well behaved forum unlike the bunch of clowns next door on the DV.Com Camera Forum (I'm one of the clowns along with Frank from the Panny Forum here)

My whole point on the open cans was i don't have the space for monitors (although I have a very good preamp, amp and studio monitors) so I was going to compromise. I'm a slut for more toys anyway :)) It well could be a waste of money but we'll see.

Slut for more toys!!!! LOL!!

I think my wife would describe me as that! (never mind all the A/V stuff, at least I get paid to use them, how about the Harley and the backhoe!)

I totally relate to the space problem, I'd bring in my treasured JBL 4311B's from home but it's already crammed to the max here. :-) Barely room for the Mac keyboard and mouse, and when capturing DV I have to lay the cam on top of my flatbed scanner or on my analog edit controller. Got dubbing decks piled eight VTRs high and got more equipment under the desk.

I'm thinking about flying my speaks from the ceiling just to get'em off my desk, what the heck, I've done it with giant EAW's for corporate meetings (of course, with a sound contractor, using chain motors to hoist them up to the trusses).

I just signed up on dv.com the other day, maybe we'll meet up over there.

Well this thread has sort of drifted towards headphones. However... I'm also looking for some studio monitors. I've almost settled on a pair of Event Studio Precision 6 Active Monitors. I was really impressed by how large of a sweet spot these had and how incredible they sounded very close.

I've been able to find a place to get a pair for $899. What other active monitors in this price range (or lower) should I look at?