What if they did HDR for audio? So an audio file can tell your speakers to output at 300% of the normal max volume, even more than what compression can do.
Isn't that just by having generally low volume levels? I'm being pedantic, but audio already supports a kind of HDR like that. That said, I wonder if the "volume normalisation" tech that definitely Spotify, presumably other media apps / players / etc have, can be abused to think a song is really quiet.
You would think, but not in a way that matters. Everyone still compresses their mixes. People try to get around normalization algorithms by clever hacks. The dynamics still suffer, and bad mixes still clip. So no, I don’t think streaming services fixed the loudness wars.
What's the history on the end to the loudness war? Do streaming services renormalize super compressed music to be quieter than the peaks of higher dynamic range music?
Yes. Basically the streaming services started using a decent model of perceived loudness, and normalise tracks to roughly the same perceived level. I seem to remember that Apple (the computer company, not the music company) was involved as well, but I need to re-read the history here. Their music service and mp3 players were popular back in the day.
So all music producers got out of compressing their music was clipping, and not extra loudness when played back.
I hope they end up removing HDR from videos with HDR text.
Recording video in sunlight etc is OK, it can be sort of "normalized brightness" or something. But HDR text on top is terrible always.
What if they did HDR for audio? So an audio file can tell your speakers to output at 300% of the normal max volume, even more than what compression can do.
Isn't that just by having generally low volume levels? I'm being pedantic, but audio already supports a kind of HDR like that. That said, I wonder if the "volume normalisation" tech that definitely Spotify, presumably other media apps / players / etc have, can be abused to think a song is really quiet.
Interestingly, the loudness war was essentially fixed by the streaming services. They were in a similar situation as Tik Tok is now.
You would think, but not in a way that matters. Everyone still compresses their mixes. People try to get around normalization algorithms by clever hacks. The dynamics still suffer, and bad mixes still clip. So no, I don’t think streaming services fixed the loudness wars.
What's the history on the end to the loudness war? Do streaming services renormalize super compressed music to be quieter than the peaks of higher dynamic range music?
Yes. Basically the streaming services started using a decent model of perceived loudness, and normalise tracks to roughly the same perceived level. I seem to remember that Apple (the computer company, not the music company) was involved as well, but I need to re-read the history here. Their music service and mp3 players were popular back in the day.
So all music producers got out of compressing their music was clipping, and not extra loudness when played back.
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I hope they end up removing HDR from videos with HDR text. Recording video in sunlight etc is OK, it can be sort of "normalized brightness" or something. But HDR text on top is terrible always.