Just wondering why my speakers are loud sometimes and sometimes softer sound but, its on the same volume!, does it matter on the moisture in the air like at night the speakers are louder! i think!!

Any hints would help on how to fix it or just wat it is.

Its a Alpine headunit running 4 fusion speakers!!

recording volume of different music

I second that, sometimes your mood will also affect the way music sounded. It does to me.

You may have heard of cd "mastering". this is where a album is designed so each song has pretty much the same "maximum" volume across all the tracks, among other things.

Problem is, different studios have different ideas as to what the ideal level is. So each cd will have a different volume. So, if you play two tracks from two different albums, they PROBABLY wont be the same volume.

So, this is why your speakers sometimes sound louder/softer while they are at the same volume level.

Of course, if your volume is fluctuating massively WHILE A SONG IS PLAYING, and its not supposed to part of the song, you have more serious issues

Thanks very much for that information guys.

i did actually think that cause i do notice that my burnt cds r alot softer in volume and also my sound system seems to be louder at night but thats proberly because my ears rnt used to the noise u know!!

i also find that after listening for a while, the music seems to get quieter as your ears get used to it

- Stooge007 out

hey that comment about the music getting softer from getting usded to it is very true! thats proberly why it is soft for me cause i have the one cd in for about a week....lol

You will also notice that your ears tend to reduce all noise to a certain level, much like your pupils dilate to let in the same amount of light at all times.

An example is if your volume goes up to 50, you set it on 40, it sounds very loud, then you get used to it.

Turn it down to 30, it sounds so soft! Leave it for 10 minutes and you can hear it all clearly again

Turn it down to 20, it sounds really soft! Leave it for 10 minutes and it sounds the same volume as at 30....

Then crank it up to 40 and blast your ears off again

Hahahahahahah says Buzz Lightyear .

Mastering dependant on the type of studio is done to referance - what that reference is depends on the type of studio - not the individual studio (although that does afftect it but only margonally).

IMHO yes temperature and humidity has a HUGE HUGE MASSIVE amount of affect on volume and characteristics of music being reproduced by speakers. I know when I mixed a gig at Rod Laver once we did setup during the day before when it was about 30 degrees (and a crap load hotter on the floor let me tell you. then during the day we did sound checks etc and let every one practice for the nights show - then about 2:30 a cool change came through and the humidity when sky high and the temerature dropped. Let me assure you that the poor old yamaha desk was run thought its paces as myself (i was instrument FOH engineer) and the FOH vocal engineer went sick re-eq'ing every thing. we had to bump mid high eq, change x-over settings for the highs. re then regraphed the feed back distroyer for the MC it was hectic as. I remember just before the show we did a VU check (SPL check if you like) and we were about 6dB higher than we had been during the day in the sub bass region and nothing on the sub bass had changed all we could put it down to was humidity and a slight tweek of the sub track (I cant remember why but we had the Sub line running as a group feed coming off the PFL returns - maybe we had an FX rack that dint have sub pass through?)

So yes IMHO temerature and humidity do affect sound.

As for you getting used to volume levels - its actually the bodys natural defence agains loud noise. theres a bone you your ear that moves up to restrict the amount of air passing into the ear drum, from what i understand it also stops water going to far into you ear. Also you find when listening at high levels you produce alot of ear wax, and when the high volume dissipates the ear wax can quiet litterally fall out of your ears in big chunks.

No too many of us FOH engineers use plugs (I think the foldback guys are smarter than us - dont let them know LOL) but im looking at investing in some volume limiting plugs to protect my hearing.

OH and BTW one of my favorite things to do is on a cool quiet wet night I love to set up my speakers out side and just sit there and listen - man its awesome.

Other favorite thing is to on a similar type night sit in my car in a quiet spot with my rear (of not all) my windows down and just blast my brains out with some awesome music. (then i start my car and go for a blast through the dandenongs with my front windows down still listening to awesome music - thats why i love car audio)

I actually find that when listening during the day in my car the volume is normal, but if I play the same stuff at the same volume during the night its a lot louder. I start the night on a set volume and by the time I finish my drive, the knobs gone down a few notches.

Maybe my ears are more sensitive at night. Maybe i'm a werewolf

Remember it from physics, sound waves travel much better in cool dense air then it does in warm air, and by Komodo's discription it sounds like certain frquency's are effected more then others.

Luke

Also all your hardware plays differently in different temps.

Thermal noise is always there too. If only we could run everything at zero degrees.

I find the emotions play a big part in it. If you're stressed vs relaxed...

I reacon about 100degrees k would be better but i'll settle for 0 degrees C.

Yeah definately psychoacoustics play a big part in it.

I dont belive that the ambient temerature around hardware plays that great of a part in the final sound output (as opposed to the wave form output) of your speakers as much as the ambient temerature and conditions around the speakers. Im not saying it doesnt affect it - i just dont belive tis as noticable.
I am willing to be proven wrong though.

And another thing - not all albums are mastered - its an expensive process that alot of small time bands dont have money or time for.

No not that great a part in the musical sound, but thermal noise like other induced interference raises ur noise floor.

Other things I find that throw my sound out. Changes to my seat position, sunvisors up/down. Windows open is a shocker for me. Can't drive with them there as there's too much rattle.
Boot open/closed. Stuff in the boot/car.
Passengers. Big passengers.

Alcohol consumption. (not whilst driving )

I always thought there was a set of protocols in place for CD mastering and setting the right volumes etc. And everyone had to follow this??

Anyone know?

I know it is very important with music that is very dynamic in nature. Symphonies for instance. Where the difference between low level sections of scores and high level booming drums is great. Without attenuating these signals there would be no dynamic range. Our amps would be clipping on the loud sections and barely audible during quiet sections.

I have an exam covering some of these aspects on Tuesday.

Theres mastering and then theres mastering.

Every CD will be mastered, but whether its done in a dedicated stereo mastering studio is another thing.

As komodo says, alot of CD's aren't "mastered" as it's simply too expensive to get it done in a dedicated mastering studio, so the recording engineer will typically do it as part of the mixing procedure.

As far as i'm aware there are no specific protocols in place for the mastering of CD's, but generally music would be compressed before it is put onto a CD.

Yeah Foxey is onto it.

Basically when you lay up a set of tracks.... ...actually where is tuneman he knows abotu recording I dont really know much about it so see if we can get him in here to tell us about it.

But yeah you can do a "mastering" in the final mixdown making sure everything is EQ'd the way you want and all levels are good and nothing clips nothing with greater than 90 odd dB of dynamics- no not dynamics whats that other word crap i forget. But a good Mastering studio from my under standing you give them a pretty raw setup on tape (or these days disc) and an outline to what you want you might have 4 tracks that you need mixed down into a final stereo mix - i belive thats where they do things like instrument placement etc.

I remember someone I know who is a pretty good jazz guitarist telling me he played for a singer a while back and the recording was like 60k and the mastering was like 40k of that

Would anyone like to comment as to why my system is louder with both windows down? If i close a window or both then there seems to be no bass, just the mechanical noises of the sub.

I found that this isn't noticed much with a car that has a boot (sedan) but with my van, the metal lining on the inside seems to boost the mechanical noises of the sub or something?

Because you get cancellation.

The bass wave hits the windows, reflects, and cancels out the sub-bass.

Wind the windows down and you don't get the reflection, so it seems louder.


Similarly, some people with poorly placed subwoofers experience a massive increase in bass when the boot is open, because the reflection from the back of the car that was cancelling out sound is now escaping, so perceived bass is greater