ofajen
New Head-Fier
- Joined
- Jun 4, 2007
- Posts
- 19
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- 0
I posted my first message over in the amp forum, since that's what I'm working on.
In brief, I'm not a headphones first kind of guy. I mainly work on my own recordings of my own music and have a high resolution monitoring rig and monitoring space for that. Headphones are what keep me going late at night when I have to work quietly, and of course, when I'm overdubbing tracks in sync with previously recorded tracks.
My ancient HD540s have finally gotten to the end of the line. One capsule has a bad internal connection. While consistency is very important in monitoring for music production (I'm using the same full-range monitors and power amp I've used for 26 years), I decided not to try to keep the old HD 540s alive and bought rocktboy's modded HD580s, instead.
The question I thought I'd post here relates to headphone use in general. I'm struck by a quote in The New Stereo Soundbook on this issue. This text is written by Ron Streicher and F. Alton Everest and is one of the best sources of information on the stereophonic illusion and is intended primarily for recording engineers. Indeed, I wish more of them read it.
At one point, he talks about how binaural recording and playback avoids the crosstalk problem of loudspeakers and wonders why binaural listening isn't more popular. Beyond the comfort and movement issues, Streicher gives the following explanation: "Perhaps the most negative aspect of headphone listening, however, is that the perceived image is usually confined into the space between the two earphones, resulting in an image crowded inside the listener's head instead of a wide, spacious, and external sound stage. This effect is the result of standing waves and resonances set up between the eardrum and the membrane of the earphone and in the irregular cavities between the earphone and the pinna. Such standing waves and resonances alter the shape of the composite transfer function, destroying the open, free-field perception. The listener is unable to associate an external location to the sound, so that the only remaining location is inside the head - resulting inthe "musical hat" effect."
I think there is little doubt that this is probably the biggest problem with typical headphone use. I omitted Streicher's internal references to the graphs showing the typcial transfer functions for the auditory canal and outer ear. Directional information seems to be encoded in those directionallly unique frequency responses and clearly the enclosed space of the typical headphone will make utter hash of those complex functions.
Now, I don't have as broad a range of listening as many of you all. Are there headphones or "ear speakers" that really go a long way to eliminating those standing waves and resonances and allowing open, free-field perception? It looks like something like the AKG K1000 might be in that category.
Of course, the other big problem is that most 2-channel sound is mixed on loudspeakers for loudspeaker playback. Spatial distortion results when those recordings are heard through headphones.
Cheers,
Otto
In brief, I'm not a headphones first kind of guy. I mainly work on my own recordings of my own music and have a high resolution monitoring rig and monitoring space for that. Headphones are what keep me going late at night when I have to work quietly, and of course, when I'm overdubbing tracks in sync with previously recorded tracks.
My ancient HD540s have finally gotten to the end of the line. One capsule has a bad internal connection. While consistency is very important in monitoring for music production (I'm using the same full-range monitors and power amp I've used for 26 years), I decided not to try to keep the old HD 540s alive and bought rocktboy's modded HD580s, instead.
The question I thought I'd post here relates to headphone use in general. I'm struck by a quote in The New Stereo Soundbook on this issue. This text is written by Ron Streicher and F. Alton Everest and is one of the best sources of information on the stereophonic illusion and is intended primarily for recording engineers. Indeed, I wish more of them read it.
At one point, he talks about how binaural recording and playback avoids the crosstalk problem of loudspeakers and wonders why binaural listening isn't more popular. Beyond the comfort and movement issues, Streicher gives the following explanation: "Perhaps the most negative aspect of headphone listening, however, is that the perceived image is usually confined into the space between the two earphones, resulting in an image crowded inside the listener's head instead of a wide, spacious, and external sound stage. This effect is the result of standing waves and resonances set up between the eardrum and the membrane of the earphone and in the irregular cavities between the earphone and the pinna. Such standing waves and resonances alter the shape of the composite transfer function, destroying the open, free-field perception. The listener is unable to associate an external location to the sound, so that the only remaining location is inside the head - resulting inthe "musical hat" effect."
I think there is little doubt that this is probably the biggest problem with typical headphone use. I omitted Streicher's internal references to the graphs showing the typcial transfer functions for the auditory canal and outer ear. Directional information seems to be encoded in those directionallly unique frequency responses and clearly the enclosed space of the typical headphone will make utter hash of those complex functions.
Now, I don't have as broad a range of listening as many of you all. Are there headphones or "ear speakers" that really go a long way to eliminating those standing waves and resonances and allowing open, free-field perception? It looks like something like the AKG K1000 might be in that category.
Of course, the other big problem is that most 2-channel sound is mixed on loudspeakers for loudspeaker playback. Spatial distortion results when those recordings are heard through headphones.
Cheers,
Otto
