How do you master a DSD recording?

[IanB52]

Your posts speak for themselves.

And how would random dude on HeadFi with zero experience in professional audio know that?

 

[chef8489]

And how would random dude on HeadFi with zero experience in professional audio know that?

Except you have not been dealing with some random dudes with no experience in pro audio. You have been dealing with recording engineers, audio engineers, and other sound engineers with degrees and decades of experience.

 

[IanB52]

Except you have not been dealing with some random dudes with no experience in pro audio. You have been dealing with recording engineers, audio engineers, and other sound engineers with degrees and decades of experience.

I am a recording engineer with a degree and decades of experience...

 

[chef8489]

I am a recording engineer with a degree and decades of experience...

Then how can you not understand the basics of digital audio recording much less how it truly compares to analog audio recording? How the industry switched to digital much less why they switched. You can't seem to grasp how transparent and perfect digital audio is and how analog audio is not. Analog degrades and distortion and noise is introduced.

 

[IanB52]

Then how can you not understand the basics of digital audio recording much less how it truly compares to analog audio recording? How the industry switched to digital much less why they switched. You can't seem to grasp how transparent and perfect digital audio is and how analog audio is not. Analog degrades and distortion and noise is introduced.

Well, there is theory, and then there is practice. And not all things are weighed equally in a listening experience, such that basic specs are only relevant to a point, and they don't tell you everything. Not everything is quantified or measured, and different people weigh various metrics differently.

You will find that while I am a bit of outlier, most of the recording industry moves from converter to converter, and plugin to plugin, over the years as the technology improves. And the technology does improve, because they are not perfect or transparent. Very, very few deny that.

 

[bigshot]

Are you saying that 16/44.1 isn't sufficient for mixing and mastering? I agree with that. 16/44.1 is for home playback of commercial CDs. Considering the response and dynamics contained in commercially mixed and mastered music, CD quality is more than capable of completely reproducing it. I've compared the redbook and DSD layers of a natively recorded and mastered DSD recording and there is absolutely no audible difference. None. Zip. Nada. Most hybrid SACDs don't contain the same mastering on both layers. That is probably what is confusing you.

If that isn't what you're saying and you can prove that you can discern the difference between a sample DSD recording bounced down to 16/44.1 and back up to DSD and the original DSD recording itself, you shouldn't be arguing with us here. You should be submitting your unique ability for verification by the AES. I think you need more stringent controls on your ABX.

Every engineer I’ve ever worked with says that CD sound is audibly transparent. Plug ins are not transparent by definition. They’re filters to be used creatively in the mix.

 

[71 dB]

Except you have not been dealing with some random dudes with no experience in pro audio. You have been dealing with recording engineers, audio engineers, and other sound engineers with degrees and decades of experience.

Looks like I am the only random dude over here who has no experience in pro audio. All I have is my Master's Degree in electric engineering which contained (optional) studies of acoustics and signal processing. That's why I claim to have a good understanding of digital audio (for example, I wrote a seminar paper on dither in late 90's), but I don't claim to know much about sound engineering. At least I have not done it for living. Reading this forum gives me an insight of the world of sound engineers and I am learning...

My own experiences in mixing music is my own hobby of music making, but it is very different from pro audio. Mixing is just a small part of that hobby as I create the music all by myself from start to finish and of course I don't have a million dollar studio to work in. Just my crappy computer and free software. I don't know where I belong in this World. I have been unemployed for 6 years now and getting any kind of job seems hopeless. I am not good enough for anything, or at least that's what I feel when reading the responses to my job applications. That's why I have massive self-esteem issues and I tend to take it hard when my ideas get rejected online. I am tired, frustrated and bitter, but I try my best to avoid depression. Posting on this board is one way to feel some connection to the World.

How do you working sound engineers have time to write here? Aren't you too busy delivering mixes for your countless clients?

 

[bigshot]

You really shouldn’t expect sympathy from anonymous forums. The internet doesn’t really care about anyone. That’s what real people in your life are for.

 

[gregorio]

You have a polyannish view of everything PCM and make inappropriate equivalencies between analog and digital artifacts …

Digital artefacts are distortion and noise, analogue artefacts are distortion and noise, is that why they’re different?

(it should be extremely apparent that these are different when 12 bit does not transparently capture a tape source, least 16 or 24 bit).

Actually, 12bit is close to transparency but then we don’t use 12bit, we use at least 16bit which is audibly transparent.

I can put any waves or UAD plug and immediately there is grain and flatness that only gets worse the more I stack on, which does not happen with analog.

Sure, analogue audio/processing doesn’t have noise/distortion and magically defies the laws of physics. While digital audio has all these huge problems even though it is not constrained by the laws of physics. Sure, one can screw things up with plugins, just as one can screw things up with analogue processing.

And it's not hard to hear albums that were mixed ITB, they sound grainy and bleh.

Depends how it was mixed ITB and how analogue mixes were made. But a well mixed album absolutely should not sound grainy or bleh in the box! How can you possibly not know this?

Because the filter process involves extremely drastic processing using low DSP resources

That’s just more ridiculous audiophile nonsense. It may appear to be “drastic processing” but computationally, it’s ridiculously trivial. Baring in mind a modern iPhone has more processing power than the most powerful super computer in the late 1990’s, the DSP resources required is ridiculously tiny compared to what could easily be available for peanuts. Just more audiophile marketing nonsense!

Because you can see the pulse height and width change as well as latency, and the introduction of pre and post ringing on the waveform.

And you typically master recordings containing nothing but Dirac pulses do you? Where in the audio spectrum is the energy of that pre/post ringing and how often and of what magnitude is that ringing with music/sound audio signals compared to Dirac pulses? Again, as an actual engineer you should know the answers to these questions!

I’m not going to go through every point in that post because it would take too long but it’s a litany of false audiophile marketing that any real engineer should know!

Ok, so nothing to say about the paper itself, its methodology or results?

Yes; the meta analysis cherry picked the papers it included and even then, it could only come up with a discrimination accuracy of about 52%, arguably within the margin of error for pure chance. Baring in mind the bias/purpose of its commissioning, if the cherry-picked paper inclusion and marginal results are the best the audiophile world can come up with, that’s VERY convincing evidence of NO audible difference!!

Absolutely analog tape has higher fidelity than 16/44.1. It also has a higher noise floor, more harmonic distortion, and an uneven frequency response …

How is it possible that you cannot recognise such an obvious self-contradiction? If it has more noise and distortion then by definition it is lower fidelity!

Is it really possible you don’t know what “fidelity” actually means? Not if you really are an engineer it isn’t!!

Analog transfers keep getting better and represent some of the best audio that exists, and best recordings ever made, but all those albums mixed to DAT in the 80s and 90s are basically knee-capped and stuck aging poorly in comparison.

Analogue transfers have got only very marginally better but cannot break the laws of physics, there must always be significant generational loss, which does not occur with digital audio. Again, this is some of the most basic, beginner knowledge for engineers and it’s inconceivable a formally trained and experienced professional engineer would not know this!!

But PCM conversion, esp at 16 bit, is doing something else which is currently not well quantified (although there are various theories).

By definition 16bit is not “doing something else” and is well quantified! This assertion is typical, unadulterated audiophile marketing nonsense which again, any real engineer should know!

I am a recording engineer with a degree and decades of experience...

Unless they award degrees for quoting audiophile marketing BS instead of the actual facts, then I’m calling you out on that claim!!!

[1] You will find that while I am a bit of outlier, [2] most of the recording industry moves from converter to converter, and plugin to plugin, over the years as the technology improves. And the technology does improve, because they are not perfect or transparent. Very, very few deny that.

1. So now you’re contradicting yourself. Previously you supposedly represented every engineer, then you admitted there were some outliers who didn’t agree with you and now you’re saying you are the outlier. At least get your story straight!

2. When the recording industry moves from converter to converter or plug-in to plug-in it’s because the technology improves in terms of functionality NOT because of transparency. There are some specific exceptions but still it’s not really about transparency. Again, as a professional engineer you should know what the imperfections are and how it relates to transparency, instead of just spouting this incessant audiophile marketing BS!

Not everything is quantified or measured, and different people weigh various metrics differently.

Firstly, of course everything is quantified/measured, because that’s the definition of digital audio! And, how can “people weigh various metrics differently” when the metrics are below the threshold of audibility to humans? There’s only two answers to that question and obviously neither of them have anything to do with audible differences.

Again, it’s just wall to wall audiophile marketing BS with no indication of any professional engineering experience or formal education in the subject. You wouldn’t even have passed a short course or diploma with your assertions, let alone a degree!

G

 

[71 dB]

You really shouldn’t expect sympathy from anonymous forums. The internet doesn’t really care about anyone. That’s what real people in your life are for.

I don't expect sympathy from anyone. I am just providing an alternative voice. Reading about your or many others post here gives an impression that everyone are very successful audio engineers and have respectable 30 year long careers behind them, but not all people are like that! There are also people like me for whom working life has always been a struggle.

Real people don't help much, because I am very introverted and weird. My MBTI personality type is INTJ which means I appear very cold and robotic to other people while my social skills are very poor. That's why "real people" don't want to interact with me. They want to interact with other people with good social skills. Now I at least know this, but just a couple of years ago I didn't know about personality types and I was VERY confused about what is wrong with me. Now I at least know I am a human robot! INTJ's are typically geniuses (Albert Einstein was an INTJ), but my IQ is too low to be a genius. My strength is to see logical connections where most people don't see, but it seems employers are not interested of such an abstract skill. They want something much more tangible such as coding skills.

My INTJ mind recently generated an idea of what is the mathematical difference of future and past, but my understanding of quantum physics is too weak (I took only one course in quantum physics in the university which I barely passed) for me to develop the idea further and of course the idea is probably completely wrong!

 

[bigshot]

TMI

 

[71 dB]

TMI

Filter out excessive information. I try to give enough information for people to understand what kind of person I am and why my posts are what they are.

 

[bigshot]

If you define yourself by your limitations, you limit yourself.

 

[71 dB]

If you define yourself by your limitations, you limit yourself.

Well, how should I define myself? Recognising my limitations is about being realistic and knowing myself better.

 

[bigshot]

Define yourself by your achievements and what you can do. Don’t require validation from others about who you are, and focus on your strengths to overcome your weaknesses. Don’t surrender to them.