The 'C' Note

[Direkt]

Righto...

Surely most peeps have experienced dramas with the perceived volume of the 'c' note.

Soooo much louder than other notes, particularly on certain synths and settings.

I've heard it's something to do with the how the frequency resonates within the human body, or something...

Anyway - how do most people deal with this?

Do you just automate the volume of the track, and dip the volume on the note?

Or is there some magical trick out there?

[Spherix]

are you only talking about middle c, or every c?

[Direkt]

Middle C

[a1studmuffin]

It may have something to do with the perceived equal loudness curve of the human ear. Our ears "hear" certain frequencies louder than others, thanks to years of evolution:



But you'd expect other notes around middle C to sound pretty much as loud - middle C is 261.626Hz so it's not exactly at the peak of that graph.

To be honest I haven't noticed middle C to sound any louder than other nearby notes - you may want to look at your room acoustics.

[Direkt]

To be honest I haven't noticed middle C to sound any louder than other nearby notes - you may want to look at your room acoustics.

Really?

It's massively louder, really noticeable on sine waves on my timewARP 2600...

Must be my room then?

[razyier]

yeah imo it would probably be your room

http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/dec07/a ... saudio.htm - download that and give it a go, and yeah as it says on the page they should all sound pretty even, if not then it's your room and you might want to fix the acoustics. just getting around to doing mine finally, hoping for big improvements once i get it done!

[unsoundbwoy]

yeah i never had that problem, for me middle g is noticeably louder, which is a combination of the loudness curve and the first harmonic of a standing wave.
but the less lower mids the better for my mixes anyway so the more i taper there the better

[Direkt]

Cool, thanks guys.

[tactik]

Could be speakers or room... or your ears.

Resonant cavities FTW.

[spiral]

on hearing and perception
http://www.soundpunk.com/index.php?topic=977

[a1studmuffin]

Yeah sounds very much like your room to me.

If you've got Ableton Live, you can go into the settings and turn on a test tone, then sweep the frequency to whatever you want. In most rooms, you'll hear *massive* dips and peaks (particularly from 0-400Hz), sometimes to the extent that you can barely hear the sound at all or that it sounds twice as loud. It's quite eye opening actually, I recommend doing it. That's pretty typical for an untreated room, especially one that's squarish in shape. How to fix it? Buy some acoustic treatment + bass traps, or move to a different room. To be honest there's no easy solution (apart from designing a room shape from scratch), and every solution isn't a total one, just a better one than having nothing at all.

[Lauer]

I got dips at around 80 and 115 being the most signifacant...

Gearslutz.com have an area in their forum solely for acoustics...got some really good info on there.

[Direkt]

Could be speakers or room... or your ears.

Resonant cavities FTW.

Yeah, doubt it's the monitors or my ears.

Sounds like the room, so - looks like I'll have to check out the recommendations regarding testing and treatment.

Thanks guys.

[FoundationStepper]

walk around a bit first to get the vibe for the room problems. especially if it could be related to a standing wave, the peak might be (given short wavelengths) pretty localised