Do loudspeakers need to image precisely?

[RayDunzl]

Do loudspeakers need to image precisely?

I might find them preferable to those that image imprecisely.

 

[tuga]

I don't experience great imaging when I listen to an electronically amplified blues band in a small crowded bar without any mixing board and each instrument having it's own amp.

I don't experience great imaging when I'm walking through a train station and hear a busker playing the saxophone down the corridor.

Last night, while eating dinner al fresco in Waikiki, there was a folk guitarist about 70 meters away, across a pond, with palm trees in between, using a cheap portable PA, the sound reverberating around a courtyard. There wasn't anything I would call imaging.

On Sunday there was a street parade, with a marching band, and the wall of sound coming from them had no resemblance to what I think of as imaging.

When I hear a live violin playing through an open window, it's not a sense of imaging that lets me know it's live.

For me, it's transients and dynamics.

I associate, perhaps erroneously, crisp imaging with good instrument separation and thus increased resolution, which translates to increased realism and is as important as transient and dynamics.
It's not so much the construction of a virtual soundstage that I treasure or associate with good imaging but a better recreation of the nuances of instruments and vocals, and a clearer more intelligible restitution of complex passages in large orchestral pieces.

 

[tuga]

FWIW, some of my mono recordings also have a great sense of depth, which leads me to believe imaging isn't just a stereo thing.

Stereo is about producing phantom images in the horizontal plane, between the speakers, either from distance (level and time/phase delay) to opposite mic/channel, or pan-potting in a stereo mix.
I would think that depth results from the relative level between instruments which results from distance to mic and also venue cues, or in case of a stereo mix, the gain, delay, reverb, decay, etc.
Depth is far more perceptible with stereo than mono.

I've attached a presentation on the subject by Le Cleac'h (in French malheureusement).

 

[RayDunzl]

What I had in mind is something from using panel speakers. The backwave is out of phase. With certain spacing from the rear wall, the reflected rear wave can bounce back and reinforce the front wave over a narrow frequency range rather than canceling it. It is a comb filter effect, and only works to help on the low end of such speakers just a little bit.

Would an omni (in-phase backwave) be any different, other than maybe combing a slightly different set of frequencies if located the same distance from the front wall?

 

[Sal1950]

"Do loudspeakers need to image precisely?"
Yes, they absolutely should.

When I go to a live, unamplified concert, I don't get precise audio imaging,

I'll have to take your word for that, I've never been to one.

I've been to more rock, blues, country, etc; concerts than I could ever begin to count but for the most part they don't relate to what we get on a recording. What we get on pop music recordings is a snapshot of someones imagination. Not having any recording experience I have no real idea how it's done, I know the L/R balance knob can position a mono track somewhere on the L/R stage but beyond that I'm lost. How is depth created, how do you get an performer to be positioned outside of the L or R speaker and all the rest of a engineers tricks, I don't know that either. What I do know is I very much enjoy a well focused image that makes the speakers disappear and allows the illusion of a number of performing musicians to be created in a darkened listening room!
And since it's all just a figment of someones imagination anyway, what I really enjoy even more is the multich work of engineers like Steven Wilson, Alan Parsons, James Guthrie, etc; that can create an imaginary space in which talented performers are playing in a soundfield all around you. You have to put aside the old ingrained experience of listening thru that imaginary window onto the performance and open yourself to becoming a part of the experience yourself, a whole new level of high fidelity reproduction.
But more to the point, whether 2ch or more, the better a speaker can focus the engineers minds-eye creation, the better the listening exprience will be. IMHO!

 

[dasdoing]

whenever I go to a classical concert I make sure to get a frontish seat (too close is not good, too), and as close to the middle as possible. whenever I couldn't get seats like this I was distracted by the imperfections. There is a reason they put the pope where they put him lol

So I expect my speakers to emulate the "pope-listening-position"

 

[tuga]

So I expect my speakers to emulate the "pope-listening-position"

It's not the speakers but where the mics are placed that defines the "listener" perspective (what I like to call soundscape).
With multi-track stereo mixes it never sounds wholly realistic (as if one were in the audience) but some labels get it mostly right tonal-wise.

 

[dasdoing]

It's not the speakers but where the mics are placed that defines the "listener" perspective (what I like to call soundscape)

but "the pope seat" is what a sound engenier will adujst his stereo micing teqnique to. a mid-side microphone configuration for example is one that gives the engenier the possibility to actualy adjust the stereo field in the studio

 

[FeddyLost]

I've always listened to "audio canned food" since I was a child, so I don't care for "reality" because all reality i've auditioned, was disappointing at least. I prefer "correct" pinpoint imaging, if that is possible without compromising other qualities of system. At least half of this job is done by room treatment and placement. My choise is still dryish room treatment.
But I've visited another enthusiast once, he went into 100% diffusion in listening room and was effectively recreating opera hall space. It sounded nice (deep, spatial and more or less correct) at laconic dual-mic records from Decca and Deutsche Grammophon, but most of modern synthetic, multitrack, "sewn-up" records sounded somewhere between "artificial" and "noisy flat fuzzed crap". So, it's obviously not for me.

 

[Sal1950]

whenever I go to a classical concert I make sure to get a frontish seat (too close is not good, too), and as close to the middle as possible. whenever I couldn't get seats like this I was distracted by the imperfections. There is a reason they put the pope where they put him lol

That's how it is for me when I go to the movies. only more middle of the room front to back also.
The Pope? why you draging him into this, you could get into deep, deep trouble like that.