In Broadcast - November 2012 - 61

ISSUE 14 - NOV/DEC 2012 | WWW.INBROADCAST.COM

I N T E R N A T I O N A L

N E W S

InSOUND

The ‘Audiomation’ Of Loudness
By Oliver Masciarotte, Director, CX, Minnetonka Audio Software, Inc.
So, you need to repurpose a programme for iPod. How to accomplish that, without blowing your budget or your mind? These days, we are all well aware of the basic mechanics of loudness control and file-based workﬂows. Contemporary assets are usually mixed to target, but archival content must also be broadcast-ready and, increasingly, content must also be scaled for particular targets, like mobile and various IP platforms. The EBU has established a solid foundation for addressing inconsistent loudness, but speciﬁcations and recommended practices alone are not enough. The reason that many loudness processing workﬂows do not preserve the artistic intent of the original track is that simplistic implementations of the spec yield compliant results, but produce ﬁles with ﬁdelity not much better than what was acceptable in the analogue age. Back to those pesky platforms… The emergence of numerous examples of real world material that requires heroic and objectionably audible efforts at control have surfaced since loudness control guidelines have come into effect. Long form content, typically motion picture soundtracks, exhibit very wide variations in loudness range, noise ﬂoor, maximum short-term and maximum momentary loudness. When recently produced material is intercut with locally produced interstitials and shows created decades ago, the deviations in loudness and dynamic range between these sources become even more apparent, especially when listening with ear buds or headphones. Repurposing requires automation, but that doesn’t mean that quality has to be tossed out the window. Handling myriad file types and content with a wide range of quality causes many types of automation to fail or worse, fall back on severe

Oliver Masciarotte

and audible control measures. A simple example is that, if Loudness Range Adjustment is applied to a ﬁle with dramatic changes in dynamics, audible pumping will occur after loud transients. Audio specialisation is the key and, for real world problem solving, full interoperability and ease of integration into any infrastructure is a must. Many facilities have invested heavily in automation and management systems that cannot intelligently handle loudness control or reasonably be replaced by a similar system that does. Speciﬁcations and recommended practices are only the beginning. Specs alone can’t address the problems of differences in noise ﬂoor, dynamic range and power spectrum between archival material and recent releases, or contrasting maximum momentary and maximum short-term loudness for modern short and long form content. Workﬂows themselves need to hit targets, but with the audio insight that produces a compliant, quality result. Intelligent loudness control is possible with products like AudioTools Server, a ﬂexible, modular system that easily slots into existing infrastructure, and can be conﬁgured for individual business practices and workﬂow requirements. For broadcasters, OTT and MVPD post, AudioTools Server’s sophisticated multi-pronged approach delivers unobtrusive compliance while retaining all the excitement viewers expect. ■

Loudness in Radio
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In Broadcast - November 2012

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