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[Ambler1980]

I listen to my sound through my Sennheiser HD558 headphones driven by an Audioengine D1 headphone DAC/amp, from my windows 7 laptop.  Output is ASIO.

I can play music at a comfortable and/or louder volume without coming close to turning the amp all the way up (50% or so).  But for movies I have to turn the volume up to 90% just to get enough volume to enjoy the movie's soundtrack.

I'm not sure if this is normal.  Or what the reason is. 

[mwillems]

I'm not sure if this is normal.  Or what the reason is.  

It's normal and it's a necessary consequence of downmixing.  Most video is in 5.1 or 7.1 and when downmixing all those channels to stereo the software needs to reduce the volume somewhat to avoid clipping and preserve the 10dB difference between Subwoofer/LFE content and the rest of the content.

By contrast, most music starts out in stereo so no downmixing or reduction in volume is needed.

[blgentry]

I listen to movies with headphones a lot.  I do several things that help me with my particular setup:

1.  I use Volume Leveling to try to bring up low level movie content and overall make movies have similar volumes to each other.  Note that you need to Analyze Audio on the movie files for this to work correctly.  I think #2 below also requires audio analysis.
2.  Because movies tend to have very dynamic sound content, dialog followed by explosions, I use Adaptive Volume > Night Mode, to bring the low level content UP in volume, closer to the explosions.  Note that this works best with Internal Volume set close to 100%.  I usually use between 85 and 100% volume to get the best Night Mode experience.
3.  I find the high frequency (treble) content of movies to be a little too strong on most material, so it's kind of biting or overly bright.  Again, this is mostly in the sound effects, particularly loud sound effects.  So I use Parametric EQ to bring the highs down a bit.  With my current headphones, amp, and DAC, I've settled on a High Shelf with -5 dB at 3000 Hz.

This combination makes movie watching more pleasant for me.  Maybe some of it can help you out too.

Brian.

[Ambler1980]

Unfortunately, volume leveling doesn't make it loud enough.

I should've prefaced this with the fact that I am using a sonarworks headphone reference level plugin with JRiver.  It modifies the sound signature of my Sennheiser headphones for studio reference levels, which makes the output quieter, so I have to raise the volume.  For music this isn't a problem since I had plenty of room on the amp knob.  But for movies, which were already kind of quiet, it makes it a problem.

I went ahead and raised the "preamp" knob in the equalizer, which helps ALOT.  But my question is, does that add distortion or any unwanted artifacts?  The level is much better, I just want to be sure I'm not altering the sound.  By the way, I do have clip protection enabled.

[Arindelle]

I went ahead and raised the "preamp" knob in the equalizer, which helps ALOT.  But my question is, does that add distortion or any unwanted artifacts?  The level is much better, I just want to be sure I'm not altering the sound.  By the way, I do have clip protection enabled.

I do this, to compensate for a similar issue. So in answer to your question, if you boost the preamp EQ too much it will clip. If you have clip protection enabled (which I personally think you should), then it is going to effect the clipped part of the signal.

So, what you want to avoid is pushing it into clipping, which will indeed cause distortion. As movies often have very large dynamics, I also do what Brian recommends. Here however you are messing with what I guess you are referring to as "artifacts" as the audio signal is being manipulated -- dynamics are sort of squashed together. As for movies, I don't care, my choice. BUT for concert films and music videos I do care.

So I create 2 Video playback zones. One where I boost just the preamp EQ. The other I mess with other parameters like Brian suggested. (I also have 2 zones of WDM streaming playback, btw).  You can set up zone switch rules based on sub-type to flip from zone to zone.

One thing to bear in mind, you have to be pretty careful with boosting preamp EQ, 5 to 10db should be more than enough (10 might be way too much even) ... but as you are adding an external pluggin to the mix, I'm not sure you know how much is being "reduced" as MWillem describes.

The Analyser  function can show clipping when put in flat line mode (turn your volume down), but I doubt it would include the external VST you are applying (?). So setting it for dialogue it won't clip but might indeed during an explosion. I'd set it to a minimum. Also the dsp engine is in 64bit, so you have a lot of headroom, before the signal gets mucked up ... a 16bit audio file is -48db, I am not sure how this applies to video though (or if it has anything to do with applying an EQ boost, compared to internal volume reduction).

I suppose I would try to set up the eq boost without your pluggin first, then add it on and make "ear-ball" adjustments. (maybe Mwillems has better advice though, I'm not a real "DSP" expert?)

[Trumpetguy]

I found that Volume Leveling (using R128 from audio analysis) when playing video unnecessarily consumed a lot of headroom*. I have seen volume lowered by some -7 to -10dB, in order to align the perceived audio volume to the R128 standard. This is not necessary because I rarely play several consecutive movies. Even if I had that habit, manual volume adjustment pr movie would be just as good.



*When playing music, volume leveling is vital though, in particular when playing a compilation from different albums.

[Arindelle]

I found that Volume Leveling (using R128 from audio analysis) when playing video unnecessarily consumed a lot of headroom*. I have seen volume lowered by some -7 to -10dB, in order to align the perceived audio volume to the R128 standard. This is not necessary because I rarely play several consecutive movies. Even if I had that habit, manual volume adjustment pr movie would be just as good.



*When playing music, volume leveling is vital though, in particular when playing a compilation from different albums.

its not so much the levelling that I use it for (I don't chain multiple movies), its the Night Mode which compresses the dynamics so I can hear the dialogue better without being blown away by "explosions". Fo 16 bit audio you have -48db in headroom approximately -40db for 24bit using the 64bit processing engine .. not sure how videos work, but -30db is a lot .. be practically silent as it is not linear. -10db adjustment+another -10db in internal volume correction falls well within the headroom provided I think.  I don't use headphones, but I am downsampling to 2 channel stereo, so its similar I guess. 

[Trumpetguy]

its not so much the levelling that I use it for (I don't chain multiple movies), its the Night Mode which compresses the dynamics so I can hear the dialogue better without being blown away by "explosions". Fo 16 bit audio you have -48db in headroom approximately -40db for 24bit using the 64bit processing engine .. not sure how videos work, but -30db is a lot .. be practically silent as it is not linear. -10db adjustment+another -10db in internal volume correction falls well within the headroom provided I think.  I don't use headphones, but I am downsampling to 2 channel stereo, so its similar I guess. 

I was surely describing a different scenario, where loud is good, and louder is even better  I thought it just worth mentioning, even being stating the obvious, that using Volume Leveling uncritically with movies can reduce your headroom more than necessary.