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[Trumpetguy]

Ye who search shall not find...

I have got the point that movies are mastered such that the LFE needs to be increased 10dB on playback. I take care of that in my Audiolense filter.

I have a (small) number of multichannel recordings from Lindberg audio (www.2L.no) - these are really reference recordings, masterings, and a joy to listen to. What bugs me is that I do not know whether the .1 channel shoud be boosted 10dB or not. Should it?

And in general (if there is such thing in multichannel music) - is multichannel music mastered according to the same reference standards as movies?

[Trumpetguy]

Ok, so after googling once more i found this excellent document from Dolby Labs: http://www.beussery.com/pdf/beussery.dolby5.1.pdf

According to the author, it is recommended that the .1 channel in 5.1 music should be mastered as for movies, and 10dB should be added during playback. It remains some investigation to find out whether this is the practice or not.

I have sent an email to 2L. Hope they will answer.

[Trumpetguy]

I know http://www.2l.no/ is doing business in a niche market, but they still have world class productions so their opinion matters.

I got an email from them yesterday stating that there are well established standards both in music and movie production. For music, they calibrate all channels at same level, dissimmilar to a movie audio track where the LFE is lowered by 10dB and is to be increased 10dB in the playback end. Furthermore, they state, when you want to publish music on a movie format (such as blu-ray disc), the two standards colide. What they informed me about was that for (multichannel) SACDs and FLAC downloads, their channel calibration is flat, i.e. you should not boost the .1 channel. If you buy the same recording published by the same company on Blu-Ray disc, however, it is calibrated in "movie fashion" and you will need to raise the .1 channel by 10dB.

So now I know how 2L do this.

Question is - is this general for, let's say, all concert blu-rays and dvds?

Sorry if I am stating the obvious here, but these things have been unclear to me. And still are.

[Matt]

I got an email from them yesterday stating that there are well established standards both in music and movie production. For music, they calibrate all channels at same level, dissimmilar to a movie audio track where the LFE is lowered by 10dB and is to be increased 10dB in the playback end. Furthermore, they state, when you want to publish music on a movie format (such as blu-ray disc), the two standards colide. What they informed me about was that for (multichannel) SACDs and FLAC downloads, their channel calibration is flat, i.e. you should not boost the .1 channel. If you buy the same recording published by the same company on Blu-Ray disc, however, it is calibrated in "movie fashion" and you will need to raise the .1 channel by 10dB.

I think they're swimming against the stream on this.  It would be better to master to the standard calibration of +10dB for the LFE.

To handle non-standard files like this in Media Center, you could add a -10dB volume adjustment to the LFE channel in DSP Studio > Parametric Equalizer.

[Trumpetguy]

I think they're swimming against the stream on this.  It would be better to master to the standard calibration of +10dB for the LFE.

To handle non-standard files like this in Media Center, you could add a -10dB volume adjustment to the LFE channel in DSP Studio > Parametric Equalizer.

Fortunately, handling the LFE level is not my problem. I use Audiolense filters that have either a flat calibration or add 10dB on the LFE channel. Combined with the excellent ZoneSwitch and proper rules it works really well. Using DSP studio and parametric equalizer should work as well, but I already have my filters going.

The main problem is to know what has been done in the mastering process for each individual title. Matt- your statement suggest the same as Dolby labs recommendation. And it is maybe fair to assume that all titles published on bluray disk is mastered according to "movie rules", and add 10dB LFE during playback. 2L is not that far off main stream, they are also doing that for bluray versions of the works.

[mojave]

I inquired with AIX Records about the same thing in 2010. Mark Waldrep replied said the LFE in their releases is -10 dB.

[Trumpetguy]

Thanks for the tip about AIX records, the label was new to me!