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One of my biggest criticisms of most media sites is the lack of audio normalization. It's a bad user experience to be listening to a playlist and then suddenly
by kyledrake 9y ago
One of my biggest criticisms of most media sites is the lack of audio normalization. It's a bad user experience to be listening to a playlist and then suddenly get blasted with audio at a much higher volume.
I used to just run one on my computer, but it usually involves installing a pretty hacky/custom audio takeover program and isn't really accessible for most people.
Purists will probably complain about the audio being modified. I suppose you could either (optionally) enable it dynamically, or you could store separate tracks for the unchanged and changed audio. But I suspect that most people would prefer their audio to be normalized. I like to throw in a good multiband compressor when I have one too, but that may be a little too opinionated for the general use case.
- badlucklottery 9y ago>I used to just run one on my computer, but it usually involves installing a pretty hacky/custom audio takeover program and isn't really accessible for most people. If you're on a windows box, most audio drivers (at least in the last few years) have some form of system-wide volume normalization. Of courses it's hidden in some oddly named tab under the audio device properties.
- ben174 9y agoNormalization alone wouldn't always work. Highly compressed songs sound louder than a very dynamic sound. Even with both are normalized.
- alsetmusic 9y ago> Purists will probably complain about the audio being modified. As a SoundCloud user, I would argue that a great number of the target audience (musicians) would be turned off by having a carefully crafted mix altered. Anyone who has spent large amounts of money on the tools of their trade has an investment in achieving a particular result from their hard work. The listener is (IMO) secondary to the artist in this case.
- disantlor 9y agothats fair but I always found soundcloud's stream compression to be pretty bad. I think maybe it got better recently but there was a long time where it sounded like ~128kbps or less, particularly on stuff with cymbals, etc
- _wmd 9y agoThe problem is simple enough that it could be solved client side, with some precomputed metadata from the server (an 8-bit integer for e.g. ReplayGain). That could be implemented as a little checkbox that twiddles the volume control from JS
- jacalata 9y agoThen give the artist tools to fit a normalized audio experience, or build a business that doesn't need listeners.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- interfixus 9y ago"The customer is secondary to the manufacturer". Good luck with that.
- alsetmusic 9y agoI have always viewed musicians as SoundCloud's primary customers. That's who brings listeners. The site is built first for hosting, second for streaming. The streaming audience is a consequence of artist utilizing the platform. I would revert to hosting my music only on my own sites if I learned that SC was altering my audio. Edit: imagine if github altered code when hosting public repositories.
- em3rgent0rdr 9y agoYouTube and Spotify target volume at -14 LUFS and Apple -16 LUFS. They punish audio louder than this by turning it down automatically. This has effectively put an end to loudness wars. https://www.masteringthemix.com/blogs/learn/76296773-mastering-audio-for-soundcloud-itunes-spotify-and-youtube https://www.masteringthemix.com/blogs/learn/76296773-masteri... This would be very simple for soundcloud to do. Also, I don't bother listening to tracks with soundcloud because its autoplay feature isn't able to understand that if I'm listening to instrumental piano versions of video game music, then please don't blast me with some super loud chiptune music next.
- hashmal 9y agospotify compresses all songs, it's my biggest pain with it.
- xorcist 9y agoYou can turn off volume normalization. It's under "advanced settings", "playback".