[Deolum]

I'm really sorry for this stupid questions but geometry and arts were always my weakest subjects so i need some help with this.

If i turn the headphone wrong on the head so that the frontside is on the back and the backside is one the front but change the cables to right side so that on my right ear is the right channel but the left earpiece and on the left ear is the left channel but the right earpice. What happens now with music where music comes from the front and from behind? Is this made by the cable so even of the headphone is turned wrong on the head the things that are in front and behind of me are still presented right or is it so that the front and the backside of the headphone determine it and the presentation is now inverted? It should be the first one right?

 

[castleofargh]

If at any point you invert something, then you send the left channel to the right, and vice versa. If you do it twice, you're back to normal with a left channel signal coming out of the driver on your left.
So plugging the left output of the cable into the right side of the headphone, and then turning the headphone around, will give you left channel on your left as intended.

About front and back impressions, for the most part we have a hard time telling what's what on typical stereo albums and headphone playback. Most of the time if you invert left and right(only once, so it's really inverted at the end), you will only notice how sounds you expected on the left have moved to the right. It's mostly about panning and only rarely about front and back switching place in how you perceive some sounds. If it's a music you know very well, you might notice the left/right switch. And if you're watching a movie it can be more disturbing. Imagine watching a helicopter take off toward your left and hearing the sound of it leaving toward the right at the same time. but that's usually the end of it. and that's when things are clearly wrong and inverted.

There can be exceptions with the proper left channel reaching your left ear when the headphone is turned around(so with the double permutation like you described), but I'd expect it to be fairly rare. Maybe with some angled drivers, the way the sound would bounce on your ears would be enough to tell your brain that the source of the sound is slightly in front or slighter behind the axis between your ears(or at least if the front back impression isn't there, you could expect a small change in signature). But if the headphone is mostly symmetric in term of front/back design, then there is no reason to worry about audible impact from doing what you propose.

 

[Redcarmoose]

I'm really sorry for this stupid questions but geometry and arts were always my weakest subjects so i need some help with this.

If i turn the headphone wrong on the head so that the frontside is on the back and the backside is one the front but change the cables to right side so that on my right ear is the right channel but the left earpiece and on the left ear is the left channel but the right earpice. What happens now with music where music comes from the front and from behind? Is this made by the cable so even of the headphone is turned wrong on the head the things that are in front and behind of me are still presented right or is it so that the front and the backside of the headphone determine it and the presentation is now inverted? It should be the first one right?

Not a stupid question at all. Also many people will do this mod. As you say you flip the headphone positioning on the head R to L and end up with L to R, then switch the cables to again return the audio sides to the original side.

With the above there will be drastic frequency changes when you have headphones with angled drivers. Many manufacturers have positioned the drivers to not be at the side of the ears but way out front. This is not so much for image positioning but relates to how the ear receives sound waves. Our ears, just like our eyes are directional to the front. The outer ear gathers sound waves more proportional from the front. The outer ear is an amplifier directing the sound waves coming from the front and increasing the sound volume level. Headphone manufacturers know this and some are facing the drivers backwards at a tilt to take advantage of our physiological hearing make-up.

Once you reverse the driver side it’s then placing the sound waves forward which will in turn defuse the waves, making them not as direct. Such qualities can be wanted by some as it has the ability to change the intensity of choice frequencies and change soundstage.

With some styles, if the cups are totally round, effectively there would be no difference, obviously the pads need to be the same round way like Grado pads.

The other concern has to do with the process done to headphones which have flat positioning of drivers yet the cups and pads are not circular. Such a interior of cup will also affect the tone and make a change.

 

[Deolum]

But is the placement of the sounds in front and behind now inverterted or not?

 

[Redcarmoose]

But is the placement of the sounds in front and behind now inverterted or not?

Let someone else answer this question. But as I listed how the cup shape in relation to the ear changes the frequencies. Thus backwards with normally back facing drivers, the drivers are now projecting the sound forwards. The frequency response has an effect on positioning.

Best if we were to use the flat Grado example. So if everything was the same the driver flat and the cups round and parallel to the ear the sound would be the same. Because you have headphones with no difference if the are right or left switched.

The part of my understanding (which is just personal beliefs) is that image positioning is due to frequency response. Obviously it’s panned across from ear to ear with the amount in each channel. Meaning the louder side has the position. But besides that my understanding is top to bottom is controlled by frequency level. The bright frequency goes up top and the lower bass frequencies drop lower in position to your ears. That’s why the midrange seem to stick out to the sides the farthest. At least that’s how I rudimentary understand positioning. Though remember with a combination of the balance and frequency you can make the illusion of sounds traveling slightly forward and back. I’m pretty sure though that there may be some positioning from real-life recording, but nothing like what you could create in the studio. If you listen to the very beginning of TDSotM you will hear a synth that sounds like a heart beat. Due to the frequency it’s in front of you and to the right. That’s supposedly the arraignment if you could actually hear someone’s heart yet they were facing you, their heart is slightly to the left in the chest cavity. The heart beat, I don’t think could be made to dramatically travel behind?

When people feel like this it’s actually right to left panning and frequency changes which draw the imaging up and down. That’s at least how I believe it to work, but I don’t study this, only basically I’m always aware of positioning due to frequency.

I’m pretty sure a non-changing tone would only be able to be panned left to right and center, no forward and back in a normal playback set-up?

 

[sander99]

Let someone else answer this question.

I was thinking the same last night after thinking a while about this question. On the surface it may seem like a very stupid question but indeed it is not a stupid question at all. Complete books could be written about it.

Short answer for practical purposes:
Human sound perception and localisation are very complex and some aspects of it can differ hugely per individual.
That's why it is very well possible that there are individuals out there - maybe you @Deolum? - who may experience, with certain headphones, with certain recordings, some front localised sounds that invert to the back when switching the cups. Such an experience would however in many cases be mainly a somewhat coincidental effect of how various aspects combine with the individual, and rarely (or never) be related to any intension of the content creators. Also I don't think it could ever be a complete and precise front-behind inversion of all sounds, just some coincidental effect on some of the sounds.

Really convincing out-of-head sound localisation in all directions using headphones is possible with binaural audio matching your personal Head Related Transfer Function and preferably adaping to your head movements (using headtracking). For example with a binaural simulation of loudspeakers in a room. Like with a Smyth Realiser A16 or A8. Or with the help of Impulcifer (no headtracking, and you will need to buy or borrow in-ear-mics and access to a room with at least one speaker), free software by @jaakkopasanen. (https://www.head-fi.org/threads/rec...ses-for-speaker-virtualization.890719/page-34,
https://github.com/jaakkopasanen/Impulcifer)

 

[Redcarmoose]

I was thinking the same last night after thinking a while about this question. On the surface it may seem like a very stupid question but indeed it is not a stupid question at all. Complete books could be written about it.

Short answer for practical purposes:
Human sound perception and localisation are very complex and some aspects of it can differ hugely per individual.
That's why it is very well possible that there are individuals out there - maybe you @Deolum? - who may experience, with certain headphones, with certain recordings, some front localised sounds that invert to the back when switching the cups. Such an experience would however in many cases be mainly a somewhat coincidental effect of how various aspects combine with the individual, and rarely (or never) be related to any intension of the content creators. Also I don't think it could ever be a complete and precise front-behind inversion of all sounds, just some coincidental effect on some of the sounds.

Really convincing out-of-head sound localisation in all directions using headphones is possible with binaural audio matching your personal Head Related Transfer Function and preferably adaping to your head movements (using headtracking). For example with a binaural simulation of loudspeakers in a room. Like with a Smyth Realiser A16 or A8. Or with the help of Impulcifer (no headtracking, and you will need to buy or borrow in-ear-mics and access to a room with at least one speaker), free software by @jaakkopasanen. (https://www.head-fi.org/threads/rec...ses-for-speaker-virtualization.890719/page-34,
https://github.com/jaakkopasanen/Impulcifer)

But what we are guessing is that if you took a pair of Grado headphones which have perfect symmetry (round)....you switched cables and wore them backwards it would be identical to having them forward with the wires R and L correct. That’s really his question.

 

[Deolum]

But what we are guessing is that if you took a pair of Grado headphones which have perfect symmetry (round)....you switched cables and wore them backwards it would be identical to having them forward with the wires R and L correct. That’s really his question.

Thanks.

And i have another question about this: how is soundstage created in non binaural recordings? So just one microphone. Is it only created by volume difference or is is possible to locate things in the room?

 

[castleofargh]

Most stereo albums were created with and for speakers and don't even have to bother considering something like front or back. The speakers will be in front of you, and that for the most part will decide how far and where you'll perceive the instruments. The main work is about panning(louder on one channel to separate instruments from left to right). There are more advanced psychoacoustic tools and sound engineer know how humans work and how to make us believe. But again, if you have speakers 2 meter away from you, most sounds will feel like they come from them and between them.

With headphones we don't have that frontal sound source, so by default we either place things somewhat in front of us because that's where we're expecting them, or inside our head(maybe on a line on the axis between each drivers, but how we imagine things varies). If you perceive information about front and back in a stereo album, it probably isn't by design, and is more of a coincidence.
Which is why I said that it would be unlikely to experience sound coming from the back when turning the headphone around and inverting the cable, unless maybe the headphone itself was clearly asymmetric(angled or even off center drivers, relatively to the pads). then maybe you would detect the position of the driver from how the sound bounces on your ears, and have your spatial impressions affected by it?
I've had one very clear experience like this where turning the headphone around made me feel like some sounds were behind me(at the back of my skull). one time it was unmistakable, while I tried... many headphones over the years.

And i have another question about this: how is soundstage created in non binaural recordings? So just one microphone. Is it only created by volume difference or is is possible to locate things in the room?

For the most part music isn't recorded with the intent to capture the accurate spatial location of the instruments/singers. They record to get the best sound(objectively or subjectively, usually a mix of both), and they later "place" each instrument however they want so we don't get a mess of stuff packed at the center in mono.
Few sound engineers are concerned with accurate spatial positioning.Those who do care, probably don't waste their time with basic stereo albums for typical stereo playback.

I think I'm not saying anything outrageously false, but I'm just your average consumer so maybe I am. @gregorio we need you.

 

[bigshot]

Headphones only have left and right, not up and down nor front and back. Commercially recorded music isn't recorded using binaural techniques. If you invert the channels, it likely won't do anything to the soundstage, other than putting the cellos on the left and the violins on the right.

 

[Redcarmoose]

Headphones only have left and right, not up and down nor front and back. Commercially recorded music isn't recorded using binaural techniques. If you invert the channels, it likely won't do anything to the soundstage, other than putting the cellos on the left and the violins on the right.

That’s interesting as IEMs absolutely have an up and down related to frequency. It’s not an illusion in any way. I’ll have to go back and study full-size headphones to see if there is any placement due to frequency characteristics, like IEMs?

The placement of IEM music is both inside and outside the listers head, though full-size just has the music outside the cups.

 

[bigshot]

Your ears/brain may interpret up/down based on frequency, but that isn't a function of the transducer.

If you want to test for spacial effects that might be caused by the headphones or IEMs, listen to a dry mono recording with them. If the sound is planted right in the center of your head, the transducers have no part in your perception of space. It's all in the recording itself.

 

[Redcarmoose]

Headphones only have left and right, not up and down nor front and back. Commercially recorded music isn't recorded using binaural techniques. If you invert the channels, it likely won't do anything to the soundstage, other than putting the cellos on the left and the violins on the right.

Well I’ve got my reference system up. Really the system a completion of a life dream, though I use IEMs more now.

To tell you the truth I’m not sure what to say. I mean this could all be just like when they put the upside down mirror glasses on the test subject and his brain reverses everything right side up in a day.

They take his mirror glass off and his vision is upside down for a day........then eventually returns to normal. As far as headphones. I’m not so sure imaging of high frequency is up higher? Wild. It could all be suggestive effects, just like it’s suggested that Starbucks is good coffee?

The treble seems higher as normal? The bass is lower in the soundstage?

But at the moment the violins was are way outside with drums more center with bass.

So it could even be the minds response to hearing stereo mixes that it fills in it’s own suggested reality? I’ll believe anything at this point.

Reverbs are panned way out right and left which again create a parallel to reverbs in life. Obviously the mixers are using these skills to replicate a synthetic outside hearing experience for relevant effect?

Wild as it makes you wonder if these reverbs were centered?

 

[bigshot]

A really good response can make your brain interpret sound as more "real". It doesn't mean that it is any more dimensional , even if it might be perceived as improvements that don't seem to have anything to do with response. But those are just interpretations that your brain makes. They aren't physical. The way to test it is to remove variables to focus the test on what you are questioning. That's why I suggested to test the "soundstage" of IEMs by listening to dry mono. That removes all the baked in secondary depth cues in the mix.

 

[Redcarmoose]

A really good response can make your brain interpret sound as more "real". It doesn't mean that it is any more dimensional , even if it might be perceived as improvements that don't seem to have anything to do with response. But those are just interpretations that your brain makes. They aren't physical. The way to test it is to remove variables to focus the test on what you are questioning. That's why I suggested to test the "soundstage" of IEMs by listening to dry mono. That removes all the baked in secondary depth cues in the mix.

I will definitely admit I know nothing in this realm of thought. Though just like corporations who use group studies to try taste tests, it would be fascinating to have people draw on paper where they think the test tones are. Meaning take the general public and actually tell them the headphone may broadcast the sounds up and down and see what place each test tone was placed at on a paper graph of positioning.

I do totally agree that we fill in stuff. Much of this is common with optical illusion where the two poles are placed on a drawing of a convergence of stick rail road tracks. The closer pole is accepted as smaller as it’s closer, when in reality the poles are the same.

We can regulate where we place perception both by illusion and control of want.

The Ponzo Illusion

Thus with positioning clues the mind fills in the rest out of thought economy. We truly only take in 1/2 of our perception, with the other half simply mentally filled in.