Why in movies do the voice to sound effects levels always suck so bad?

Almost every single movie I watch no matter which television or sound system always has a completely crap sound edit.

I can hear the sound effects just fine, they shake the house, but the voices are so quiet even if I stick my ear to the speaker I can't make out the words, even at important times where what they are saying matters to the plot itself.

The new avengers movie is just another in a long line of this same problem. I have tried watching it on others dvd players and televisions, I have used 3 different computers with and without earbuds, I have used both my dvd players and televisions, and even used 3 different disks. It is not the equipment, it is not just my ears.

Why does hollywood continue to make crap voice tracks and overly powerful effects that completely drown out the voices?

I am just tired of having to blow out my ear drums when the music kicks in so I can hear the voices talking. It is one of the most enfuriating things about modern movies. Everyone whispers at 7decibles and the music and effects are around 60 decibles it seems.

Is there some kind of equipment that I can use to even this out so it isn't impossible to hear the words in most movies? As my current mthod is to turn on the subtitles so I can tell what they are saying, and it is quite annoying.

Please help me ATS, I just want to watch a movie with the sound at a reasonable volume and still be able to hear the actors commentary, without waking the neighbors with the special effects and music overly loud.

reply to post by inverslyproportional


you are most likely listening to a 5.1 audio output without the correct speaker configuration. had something similar happen to me. when i i had twin speaker so just 2.0 set up and was watching 5.1 output films.

You think we have it bad now? Damn, count your self lucky that you didn't have to settle with this kind of movie - Which we're rife back in the day, poor twats!



Although, this movie is genius. 0.22 is just amazing.

No I think the OP has a good point, I have noticed this too. My brother has a top notch tv and sound system all configured correctly and he used a proper sound level checker to get all the correct volumes for each speaker.

This p1sses me off as we cant watch stuff late at night as we keep having to adjust the volume every time some action kicks off, and then turn it back down when people are talking. I know you can get settings on amplifiers that will normalize the sound levels, but surly this should be addressed. You may also notice the same when the adverts come on, companies making the ads increase the volume to try and grab your attention.

reply to post by inverslyproportional


I have the same gripes as you do. I've tried adjusting all the different speaker settings and sound options and it is the same. Even just watching regular old television on about half of the channels it's the same situation- turn the volume most of the way up trying to hear what they're saying and then get your eardrums ruptured when music or an explosion pops up. I hate it!

reply to post by n00bUK


My god that's a real movie 1974 Turkish movis, Karate Girl...

lol it's KILL BILL gone wrong!

Storyline

Zeynep lives with his old father. She has lost her ability to speak because of an accident. She needs an operation in order to be able to talk again. One day, five prison fugitives come to their house and kill Zeynep's father. The fugitives take their money and attack Due to the shock, Zeynep regains her ability to speak. The fugitives are arrested but Zeynep wants to take revenge, therefore she says that the fugitives are not the ones who have attacked them. The police appoints Murat to make her give a statement. Murat teaches her how to use a gun and some karate, but she still doesn't know he is a cop. They fall in love and decide to get married. On their wedding, the prisoners kill Murat. Nothing can stop Zeynep now from taking revenge. She becomes a policewoman and traces the fugitives one by one.

LMAO

reply to post by Dodger13


Commercials are worse especially on Hulu. The show is like at 7db and the commercials at 107db. I have the late night problem as well- everytime a commercial kicks in everyone ends up waking up even though they are way down the hall.

I agree on the music though - I wish music was barely perceptible, gone completely, or NEVER overlaps voice. For the effects I agree as well - it needs to be dropped way way down.

reply to post by inverslyproportional


That stuff is dubbed in post production.

They NEVER use the sound from the actual scene in 99% of movies. Also they do that on purpose. It's a common practice to make the sound of scenes without action very low so you turn the volume up, to later be shocked and awed when some action scene comes.

They do same with commercials on TV.

~Tenth

Originally posted by ararisq
reply to post by Dodger13

 

Commercials are worse especially on Hulu. The show is like at 7db and the commercials at 107db. I have the late night problem as well- everytime a commercial kicks in everyone ends up waking up even though they are way down the hall.

I agree on the music though - I wish music was barely perceptible, gone completely, or NEVER overlaps voice. For the effects I agree as well - it needs to be dropped way way down.

I was just going to mention this! Beat me to it! I think there is a reason for it hehe...

Thank you for creating a thread for this. I have been incredibly frustrated with this same issue since I bought my surround sound a couple years ago. Every movie we watch has me continuously adjusting the volume: turn it way down during action/sound fx scenes and way up for conversations. When there's dialogue and action simultaneously we have to suffer the blaring volume just to make out what's being said.

It also seems that each movie has a unique sound level mix, causing even more frustration if I try to adjust the volume of the individual speakers. For the longest time I thought I had set up my surround sound incorrectly, so I tried multiple different settings for the system. Finally I just reset everything to its default and resigned myself to just dealing with adjusting the volume continuously...

So I'm in the same boat as the OP; if anyone has a solution it would be greatly appreciated.

-GreenGiant

P.S. I want to flag this thread but with my limited activity on ATS I have yet to figure out how it is done.

reply to post by inverslyproportional


Unfortunately I suffer from this as well.
Most movies have 5.1 surround sound.
In order to correctly hear the film you need to have a surround sound system with a center speaker.
The center speaker usually carries the voice.

This annoys me to no end and I'm also trying to convince my wife that we need a surround sound system on 2 tv's.
So far she's not convinced.

Because there is no "standard" level across the board for it. There are commercials, video, movies etc...all recorded on different equipment, by different companies and every single one is differetn. And add to that HD, Digtal, Analog, 5-Surround sound sound and all the rest? All different levels.

Best clue I can give you to understand all this is the settings at the beginning fo every dvd you watch where you select, Stereo, Digital, Surround Sound, Mono etc....

Put 100 examples all of these out...and no 2 are alike...because of all the ways, levels and types of equipment used to produce them.

PS And yes those sound level JUMP at you during commercials too....they make them that way! So you can hear them in the kitchen when you get up for a drink....

Thanks for bringing this up. I've talked to others about this same problem. I constantly have to change the volume when I'm watching a movie. It really irks me...

Again..."they" dont do it...its down to the zillions of different ways to record...and almost as many opposite recording techniques, recording equipment and sound levels.

reply to post by inverslyproportional


AMEN! I am sick of having to adjust the sound all the time. I try to be considerate of others as I work till midnight and am to wired to go to bed when I get home.

I don't like headphones, but am considering getting a pair of wireless ones. But I know that I will keep haveing to rewind just to find out what was being said.

It's quite annoying.

This is also the reason I don't go to movies anymore. Ya can't rewind that at the time and I always felt like I was being ripped off in the end.

The Batman flicks were the worst at this thing.

reply to post by mysterioustranger


Yeah they make the commercials louder on purpose. A law was passed in Minnesota that was supposed to restrict the level that the volume can increase by for commercials but nothing ever changed...they are as loud as ever.

Originally posted by mysterioustranger
Again..."they" dont do it...its down to the zillions of different ways to record...and almost as many opposite recording techniques, recording equipment and sound levels.

Yeah this is the reason, it's due to the advancement and broadness of the technologies involved. That being said, it still irks me when I have to have my remote in hand for an entire movie because I have to adjust the volume 100 times while watching it.

reply to post by inverslyproportional


It's funny you made a thread. Me and my girlfriend have been going absolutely crazy these past 2 weeks. We've been renting a lot of movies lately.

I thought I was just going deaf, so my voice recognition was off.

I wish the DVD would put options like
Volume: Voice, FX, Music...

It's like everyone is whispering. I remember as a kid thinking all the scenes where people were supposed to be whispering were dumb, because they were talking so loud, but now almost every movie I have to play captain volume nazi... Did something change?

I think it's the type of audio preference you choose for your TV and/or your receiver.

I used to have the same problem as you actually, but experimented with the audio preferences and all
is fine now in every TV show / movie and even commercial I watch.

But the bad audio you speak of is when they do a crappy job on the mixing audio levels for dialogue and effects together. There is a preference in many of the TVs today where it'll enhance dialogue and tone down the effects.

Commercials are horrible with this because their budget tends to be very low so the dropouts are huge.

reply to post by inverslyproportional


most good devices have an option, usually called something like "enhanced dialog" which raises the levels of the voices and kind of brings the other stuff down.

When talking media on your pc, if it's AC3 audio, you can go into your ac3 control panel and set the dialog to be louder.

but yeah, i agree, most shows and movies now are not apartment friendly as you have to crank the volume to hear the hushed whispering they call dialog, then quickly and preemptively turn it down just as the action starts.

I'm talking to you CSI, Fringe, and every other show out there