SurroundByUs.com

Thank you for your comments Fantasia.

I listened to a sample track made by River161. It is a really odd source and it would "naturally" be a good fit for a 4.1 mix. SPEC 4.0 does not have an option to specifically address these odd channel situations when a channel is very weak or much too strong. But SPEC 4.1 will address this issue. We started working on it several weeks ago but were slowed down by all the work associated with the new site launch.

There will always be odd sources that will be a challenge for any method. SPEC 4.0 is very powerful and flexible but we have not stopped developing it. SPEC 4.1 will be another step forward.

Personally, I have not used any pre/post-processing VST's other than a free compressor/limiter for many months. I like it that way. The compressor/limiter gives more energy to the mix. There are a wide range of opinions about the use of pre/post-processing VST's, just as for the channel balance in the soundfield (louder rears, anyone?), the degree of separation, the tolerance for artifacts, and many other variables. You give SPEC and the same source to five "expert" converters and you're going to get five different conversions, because that's the way they like it. This is not an exact science. The beauty of the whole exercise is that everyone can do their own conversion if they don't like someone else's.

hello Fantasia
can you send 30 seconds of any stereo music for me to extract center for you?

pm me with the url to download if you wish.
cheers!

I was set to write a completely different response here until I decided to play with "Electric Shiva" some more. Thanks to Fan51, who gave me this suggestion, but I decided to go in a completely different route, utilizing already-published tools, and ended up thinking that the best tool we've got here to get better information into that center channel would be ZPan. Running a test on tracks #3 and 6 off that album, utilizing SPEC-SLICE with .7/.85/1 as the respective humidities, as well as narrowing the front spread with ZPan to even about 40/-40, as well as the rears to about 105/-105, a much more prominent center channel emerged. While I do stand by my earlier assessment, and feel that ArcTan did a very good job at representing the stereo source, this is something Fantasia could attempt right now with his source. The great thing about ZPan, in this case, is that it could even be combined with a non-SPEC method.

A lot of this is taste, though, and there's nothing we're going to be able to do about differing tastes. I actually don't think going 4.1 is a bad idea here either. Your friend needs to listen to this source on some headphones before wanting to convert it. There's even guitar that goes from the SR to C back to SR on the same song in a matter of a few seconds.

As for "out of the box" versus "non-out of the box," and other subjects in your (Fantasia) reply, we're working with different ideas as to what "out of the box" means. Anything I used, to me, is fair game. A pre-release version simply means it's something in which we're working the kinks out of and you will be able to utilize very soon.

The mastering conversation is an interesting one, and one that I hope gets its own thread. This thread is getting way too convoluted at this point. I agree with Fan51's line of thinking, though, although I am a proponent of highly tweakable VSTs, such as Ozone, which are as strong or gentle as you configure them. It's like salt.....some people add too much or too little. Sometimes, I tend to add too much salt, rather than too little, and that applies to both food and, er, music.

As for QSL, I am a 100% supporter of you believing your methods do the best job. If you didn't feel so, I'd question why you had a website at all! Your methods certainly did not go "out of style" because there's a new site, and I agree that a 4.1 QSL version of this album would do a good job, regardless of what your friend thinks. The same goes for us, though, and "pride" versus "bragging" does walk a thin line. I'd like to think we don't brag too much, but we are certainly very proud. Nothing wrong with that either.

i like of yours comments Fantasia....lol, you 'talk too much' but is cool!

criticism, salt, sugar, pepper with acid, discussions, are parts of the development as don't exist perfect method and one method isn't better than another.
the quality of the audio is source dependent and the method chosed determine the seperation.

as you have your method, i'm interested to know(not to have, only to understand what you do)
please pm me if you can share.

cheers!

Briefly, I would simply add that I have heard several great mixes produced with this methodology and have a huge backlog of surround upmixes to review.

It's true that a number of upmixes using previous techniques are clearly lacking but that is what makes the good ones so exciting. It's worth the time to check it out.