Now That Atmos Is Everywhere… Real vs. Phantom Center in a 5.1 Music-Focused Setup

[krabapple]

Not Atmos. I would like to see how "indistinguishable" 768kb/s is in 7.1.4 setup, and not for a helicopter flying over, but music.
But thank you for the reference.

If anything, lossy encoding artifacts would be less indistinguishable, with all those channels playing.

As Atmos is an object-based sound format, which is supposed to be able to fold down all the way down to even a pair of headphones or a simple sound bar, I would expect the format to be able to fold down to my 5.1 system with a preserved balance between what goes to the front three channels compared to what goes to the two surround channels.

I think we all understand that more speakers than 5.1 are needed to be considered a full Atmos system, and that the name of the format suggests that overhead speakers are needed for a full Atmos system. But as mentioned, it should be able to fold down with a preserved balance all the way down to an Atmos-compatible system of only 2 channels, like a pair of headphones.

I think I have managed a good balance between all channels in my 5.1 system. But still, some Atmos mixes sound balanced in the way that I expect them. For example, the main instruments have a "weight" towards the front of the sound stage. But with some other Atmos mixes, it's like some of the main instruments have way too much weight towards the surround speakers, making the mix balance somewhat distracting in a way I have a hard time believing the mixing engineer intended it to be.

I suppose you could try, ripping or otherwise obtaining the 7.1 file of an Atmos release (it will have 3 fronts, 2 sides, 2 backs, LFE channels when loaded into e.g. Audacity) and then compare per-channel content of that, to what you are hearing in each of your 5.1 channels.

(The 8 channels should have all of the audio content, even the 'audio objects' intended for 3D positioning, though it won't show/tell you what those objects are.)

So the question is (granted that the mismatched balance is not caused by me setting up my 5.1 system wrong), would the balance problem be solved by going up to a 7.1 system, adding side surround channels? If not, it's either a problem with how Atmos folds down the side information, or it may be that some mixing engineers have their speaker levels set up wrong, leading to a skewed balance in the programme material.
I would expect the latter, the lack of a correct balance between the channels in some studios.

IME adding sides notably improved how the 7.1 version of an Atmos track sounds to me, compared to when I used a 5 speaker bed configuration. Haven't done any objective analyses (like I propose above), though. And of course, it's hardly a blind preference test!! NB you *will* occasionally hear instruments or parts placed quite plainly 'to the side of you', in pop/rock music mixes. If you hate that, it may be a trial.

Unfortunately, I don't have room for side surround channels in my setup, as I have a doorway to the left and a window to the right, so I can't investigate this on my own. I don't think the lack of overhead channels is the main cause of the problem I experience, as those speakers should most likely act as supporting channels in most Atmos mixes.

To allow you to add sides, maybe rotate your entire configuration 90 degrees?

 

[krabapple]

The last time I checked, Dr. Toole was using a version of Logic7 remixer (i.e., the original Dave Griesinger product that made Lexicon what it became) on a JBL Synthesis AVP--which I asked him about. Most people who run multichannel setups I find are not using $20K-40K+ AVPs from Trinnov (or JBL Synthesis stenciled on them), and Logic7 isn't really offered in any recent AVP/AVR that I'm aware of.

Chris

He also *recommends* upmixing and I'm sure he knows most of us don't have his gear. He is a big fan of 'envelopment'.

 

[BJL]

I find Rock and Pop to have little center. And when it does, I can barely tell the difference between the phantom and the center. The phantom is a bit deeper.

I tried a couple of discs randomly.

The Who "Who's Next" (Steve Wilson). He only uses the center on two or three tracks, but it is effective where used. The vocals are mostly in the front wides throughout.

Then I went for something a more modern, Yello Touch 15th Anniversary Atmos blu ray (Boris Blank, Leo Gerteis), they make extensive use of the center, not only (or even predominantly) for vocals.

I don't think that it is possible to generalize to all recordings, but one thing is for sure, if you can implement a center channel speaker, you should.

 

[Mort]

I tried a couple of discs randomly.

The Who "Who's Next" (Steve Wilson). He only uses the center on two or three tracks, but it is effective where used. The vocals are mostly in the front wides throughout.

Then I went for something a more modern, Yello Touch 15th Anniversary Atmos blu ray (Boris Blank, Leo Gerteis), they make extensive use of the center, not only (or even predominantly) for vocals.

I don't think that it is possible to generalize to all recordings, but one thing is for sure, if you can implement a center channel speaker, you should.

Yeah I'm listening to contemporary stuff that's all released on Atmos. Very little center.

 

[BJL]

Yeah I'm listening to contemporary stuff that's all released on Atmos. Very little center.

I think that you missed my second paragraph. The remix of the 1970s album (Who's Next) did not make much use of the center channel. The more contemporary recording (Touch Yello) made extensive use of the center channel, and now that I think about it, I recall the the Brian Ferry Retrospective also made good use of the center, at least my memory.

 

[Mort]

I think that you missed my second paragraph. The remix of the 1970s album (Who's Next) did not make much use of the center channel. The more contemporary recording (Touch Yello) made extensive use of the center channel, and now that I think about it, I recall the the Brian Ferry Retrospective also made good use of the center, at least my memory.

Lol, man. Yello and Brian Ferry are not contemporary. Where are you going with this line of argument?

 

[goat76]

I find Rock and Pop to have little center. And when it does, I can barely tell the difference between the phantom and the center. The phantom is a bit deeper.

I don't know how many Atmos tracks I have listened to now, just to figure out what goes into the center channel, and for most of them, there is very little use of that channel in the randomly chosen rock and pop tracks available on Tidal.

And yes, it can be hard to tell if something is actually coming from the center channel, since my main front speakers already produce a very solid phantom center on their own. That said, I think Atmos mixing engineers should make more use of the center speaker, but I do understand the concern some of them have, as the center speaker is likely the weakest in many people's setups, especially when crucial things like the vocal track are usually panned to the center front space of the sound field.

 

[goat76]

The majority of the music Atmos recordings (and all of the cinema/tv Atmos recordings) that I own make good use of the center channel. The guy talking in the video attached who was promoting the use of a phantom center instead of a real one, in my opinion, is living in the past and should take some lessons in 21st mixing techniques.​

I don't doubt that all movies and TV shows in Atmos utilise the center speaker, but I'm surprised that the majority of the Atmos music in your collection makes use of it when even a guy like Bob Clearmountain says that there is generally very little of the center channel in Atmos music.
If you ever decide to use a streaming service that provides music in Atmos, I suggest you go through some of their playlist collections with random artists and see for yourself.

P.S. All the guys in the video are pretty seasoned mixing engineers who obviously love mixing in Atmos. I'm sure they have enough knowledge in the field, and I doubt they need many lessons in mixing music. You could always check them if you feel the need to. The names are Greg Penny, Steve Genewick, Dave Way, Fab Dupont, and Andrew Scheps.

 

[JRowland]

I find Rock and Pop to have little center. And when it does, I can barely tell the difference between the phantom and the center. The phantom is a bit deeper.

I got sick of getting up to check, I can’t tell the difference at all between phantom and real. No complaints.

 

[Sal1950]

I don't know how many Atmos tracks I have listened to now, just to figure out what goes into the center channel, and for most of them, there is very little use of that channel in the randomly chosen rock and pop tracks available on Tidal.

Can't much speak for the streamer files though I do have Apple Music available. I currently have approx 203 Atmos TrueHD lossless BD and download sourced music files in Rock, Country, Blues, some Big Band, not to include the movies and Auro3D music.
Your trying to twist the words of the engineers. Hard panning to center channel is more a movie dialog thing, with Atmos music vocals & more looking to use an "object" positioned somewhere upfront. I don't know why your making center channel use as much of a deal, it's simply one of a minimum of 9 speaker positions used the create a sounds position in an immersive sound field, something in which they should all be "phantom".

 

[Sal1950]

Lol, man. Yello and Brian Ferry are not contemporary. Where are you going with this line of argument?

? Yello Touch was a 2009 release with the Atmos mix being done 2025, and Point BD being a 2020 release. Is that not contemporary enough for you? LOL

 

[Newman]

[to goat76] I don't know why your making center channel use as much of a deal, it's simply one of a minimum of 9 speaker positions used the create a sounds position in an immersive sound field, something in which they should all be "phantom".

Well... it is the title and topic of this thread.

The non-use of the centre channel for Atmos music is also something Dr Sean Olive has expressed displeasure about....discussed in another thread.

Interestingly, Dr Olive has information that the labels are rejecting Atmos music mixes that DO use the centre channel....and he is NOT happy about it, because the audio science is clear that (well done) centre channel use is clearly preferred perceptually to a (well done) phantom centre, not just from off-centre seats, but also from the main listening seat.

If the labels are enforcing phantom centre on the engineers, then the engineers won't waste time making (superior) centre front mixes.

cheers

 

[Sal1950]

Well... it is the title and topic of this thread.

Now That Atmos Is Everywhere… Real vs. Phantom Center in a 5.1 Music-Focused Setup

Yes but still the topic itself and it's question sort of doesn't take into account that music and movie BluRays most always include separate 2, 5 - 7. and Atmos mixes. Backwards compatibility with new formats most always includes things that don't work out perfect.. Does your TV with 2 little speakers in the rear provide even a proper stereo image, let along a Dolby surround one. LOL Or Mono Forever?
With Atmos or even Dolby 5/7.1 surround, in the end it's going to up to the production time to decide how they want to use the available technology to present the product in the manner they choose.

If the labels are enforcing phantom centre on the engineers, then the engineers won't waste time making (superior) centre front mixes.

??? The whole Atmos object approach predisposes "phantom positioned" everything.

 

[Newman]

Sure, but a laissez-faire, "everything's up to the production team" attitude equates to not having quality standards. Is it "up to them" to use crappy speakers throughout and make the circle of confusion bigger than ever? I thought we had moved on from that attitude: yes we can't stop them, but not caring about it is a different matter.

I think there are two things here: production creativity, and production quality. An example of production creativity might be to transfer the masters to cassette tape before redigitising for distribution, because they want that sound. Okay, fine. An example of production quality might be where they only distribute on 128 kbps mp3. Hmm, not so fine. Not for us audiophiles.

The decision to avoid the front centre speaker is a production quality decision. We could have had better sound quality, and they are withholding it from us. And not for creativity reasons.

I assume that we are discussing audio here in the context of high production quality enabling high quality sound reproduction. We care.

cheers

 

[goat76]

Can't much speak for the streamer files though I do have Apple Music available. I currently have approx 203 Atmos TrueHD lossless BD and download sourced music files in Rock, Country, Blues, some Big Band, not to include the movies and Auro3D music.

It's very easy for you to "speak for", as all you have to do is listen to a few random Atmos playlists on Apple Music, and go up and listen closely to the center channel for what is actually panned to that speaker.

Your trying to twist the words of the engineers. Hard panning to center channel is more a movie dialog thing, with Atmos music vocals & more looking to use an "object" positioned somewhere upfront. I don't know why your making center channel use as much of a deal, it's simply one of a minimum of 9 speaker positions used the create a sounds position in an immersive sound field, something in which they should all be "phantom".

In Atmos mixing, the mixing engineer has the opportunity to use "bed channels". These are fixed channel-based audio within the Atmos mixing suite, just like traditional multi-channel audio formats. For Atmos, the most common is a 7.1.2 channel configuration, where the mixing engineer can specifically pan things in the mix. They can also use stereo tracks within the bed channels, as is the case for the discussion we have now, with many mixing engineers choosing to pan things to the front center stage of the mix using a phantom center, instead of either using the bed center channel for a fixed position or an object-based channel positioning the sound object in that position within the mix.

You are saying I'm trying to "twist the words of the engineers", but I think I may just have a deeper knowledge of what they are actually talking about, as I mix music myself in my spare time. I have played around mixing 5.1 multi-channel, where I can easily choose to pan a sound object to the center channel, or I can specify it to use the left and right front speakers and pan the sound object as a phantom centered sound.

 

[Sal1950]

Sure, but a laissez-faire, "everything's up to the production team" attitude equates to not having quality standards. Is it "up to them" to use crappy speakers throughout and make the circle of confusion bigger than ever? I thought we had moved on from that attitude: yes we can't stop them, but not caring about it is a different matter.

Your driving off the deep end with that one buddy.

I assume that we are discussing audio here in the context of high production quality enabling high quality sound reproduction. We care.

That's why we're all here I assume ?

It's very easy for you to "speak for", as all you have to do is listen to a few random Atmos playlists on Apple Music, and go up and listen closely to the center channel for what is actually panned to that speaker.

I don't need or nor care to go up to my speakers and listen for which ones are most active?
I sit back and enjoy the mix as it was presented to me by the production team. The Atmos works I listen to from the likes of Wilson, Clearmountain, Parsons, Blank, Soord etc; all sound fabulous. Vocals and other objects determined to be positioned in a front & center are solidly there. I'll leave it up to them to choose how they decide to mix.
I will simply question that as a professional I wonder why your using lossy streaming as the basis for all your judgements?

The reason for this can be many things. The mixing engineers may be used to how the key elements sound when panned as phantom objects, or they don't think that many users (or themselves) have a good enough center speaker, or that the center speaker often has a somewhat compromised position in most audio systems. I don't know, but in most Atmos tracks I’ve heard and analyzed, the center speaker is only sporadically used, or just acts as a supporting channel for the two main front speakers, or it is not used at all.

Bottom line to me is thankfully all these engineers are still living in a free world where they can choose how best to create their product. No one can or should decide to be a dictator over their creative processes, the free market will decide if one or the other is better or best.

I got sick of getting up to check, I can’t tell the difference at all between phantom and real. No complaints.

LOL Amen.

 

[goat76]

I don't need or nor care to go up to my speakers and listen for which ones are most active?
I sit back and enjoy the mix as it was presented to me by the production team. The Atmos works I listen to from the likes of Wilson, Clearmountain, Parsons, Blank, Soord etc; all sound fabulous. Vocals and other objects determined to be positioned in a front & center are solidly there. I'll leave it up to them to choose how they decide to mix.
I will simply question that as a professional I wonder why your using lossy streaming as the basis for all your judgements?

Well, just like @Newman pointed out to you, the main topic of this thread is "Real vs. Phantom Center in a 5.1 Music-Focused Setup". So the main discussion is whether a real center speaker is necessary or not, which obviously isn't the case as long as people (like you) don't even hear if there is any sound or not coming from that speaker, and as long as most mixing engineers don't use the center speaker for much or anything in their mixes.

Who's the professional?
I don't know what lossy or not has to do with how the mixes are done, but for the question of why I only use Tidal streaming as the source for Atmos playback, the short answer is that the main genre of music I usually listen to is unfortunately not available in Atmos. I would love it if noise rock, post rock, punk, and more alternative bands would start releasing their music in Atmos. But I don't see that happening, so I will probably never invest in any physical format for Atmos. The surround speakers I have are mostly for watching movies, and Atmos music playback is more of a bonus at this point.

 

[Mort]

In some contrived circumstances with good down mixing of music content that depends lightly on the center channel, single MLP small setup etc ..- it may not be needed.

Unless you have good down mixing it's just easier to have a center channel.

 

[Sal1950]

Well, just like @Newman pointed out to you, the main topic of this thread is "Real vs. Phantom Center in a 5.1 Music-Focused Setup". So the main discussion is whether a real center speaker is necessary or not, which obviously isn't the case as long as people (like you) don't even hear if there is any sound or not coming from that speaker, and as long as most mixing engineers don't use the center speaker for much or anything in their mixes.

But you generalized way too much there.
We've argued over this since the 1930s and how beneficial a dedicated center speaker/channel is or not.
In the end I think the market and it's unwillingness to spend the money won out. But the 5.1 HT market brought it all back to life again and in the movie genre I believe they're are heavily used so a good choice for a number of reasons with dialog intelligibility being at the top.

I don't know what lossy or not has to do with how the mixes are done

Me either but I only bring it up because in the discussions of lossy vs lossless Atmos comparisons, I most often hear it stated that changes in image positions are one of the most obvious. Maybe it's all BS, maybe worth deeper investigation on your part??? I make no claims either way and personally only use lossy sources (no matter how many channels) when a lossless one isn't available.

but for the question of why I only use Tidal streaming as the source for Atmos playback, the short answer is that the main genre of music I usually listen to is unfortunately not available in Atmos. I would love it if noise rock, post rock, punk, and more alternative bands would start releasing their music in Atmos. But I don't see that happening, so I will probably never invest in any physical format for Atmos. The surround speakers I have are mostly for watching movies, and Atmos music playback is more of a bonus at this point.

Since you state watching movies, I take it you have a BluRay player at hand? A few music BD's can be obtained second hand for peanuts and lossless alternative music downloads are available inexpensively from sites such as Immersive Audio Albums and Surround Music One. The surround music market is much larger than most people imagine. It might be worth you time to do a wider investigation for things your like.

 

[goat76]

Me either but I only bring it up because in the discussions of lossy vs lossless Atmos comparisons, I most often hear it stated that changes in image positions are one of the most obvious. Maybe it's all BS, maybe worth deeper investigation on your part??? I make no claims either way and personally only use lossy sources (no matter how many channels) when a lossless one isn't available.

I don't need to investigate that, as I already know it's BS. If there are changes in the image positions, it's not the same mixes to begin with.

Since you state watching movies, I take it you have a BluRay player at hand? A few music BD's can be obtained second hand for peanuts and lossless alternative music downloads are available inexpensively from sites such as Immersive Audio Albums and Surround Music One. The surround music market is much larger than most people imagine. It might be worth you time to do a wider investigation for things your like.

I do have a Marantz Blu-ray player somewhere in my home, but it has been a long time since I stopped using it in favor of downloads and streaming services. I have looked around for downloads before, but have never found anything in my preferred genres. Thank you for the links. I have visited the site Immersive Audio Albums a few times and subscribed to their newsletters for a while.