SPECWEB (Now 2.2)

[MC Maniac]

I followed him to all his forums, tried every method I could find, not only those made by EoH and Kempfand. I was also on the "secret forum" ! And yes I remember SMACS ..... it was very similar in it's results to QSXTPRO IRRC.
It was a real disaster what happened on that secret forum and I asked EoH by email if I am allowed to tell here what was really wrong. He has no objections if I inform you.

I am most happy to hear EOH is doing well - I too was on that secret forum and was one of the members that left to start SBU..

We all were well aware that he had serious health issues and that it was the cause of the outbursts. Believe me we tolerated it for quite some time - but ultimately this is a hobby for us and as he was the train's conductor, he had every right to derail his train if he wanted to - so we had no option but to part company.

He also told me he didn't want to publish that on SBU because it would look like a
cheap excuse, which IMO it isn't, but I can understand his decision. So now I told what was themain reason why everything went wrong at a certain moment with him. He still has a lot of diseases but is the old EoH again !!

We do know what happened and I dont see it as him making excuses - it was what it was and and glad he's back to a normal life..

Based on peaklevel is giving those triangle like sounds. A peak level can be ONE sample in a whole song with 44.1 samples a second, right ? It's better to use the RMS values as base...... and that's what WAMINU does with it's mastering process. And on 75 % the separation is almost equal to that of SPEC !
The numbers are the same here : 1/3 A+ 1/3 B 1/3 a C or lower ;-)

Am I correct to assume that WAMINU requires using Plogue Bidule?

Nice challenge : Gentle Giants Octopus : song 1,2 and 5 are upmixes in DTS with the Penteo method. Rip the stereo 24/96 and try that one. LOL ! WAMINU and SPEC gave a better result than Penteo !!!!! But........ nagging mode....... SPECWEB with the artefacts, WAMINU without ! Incredible Steve Wilson uses That Penteo stuff ;-)

I highly doubt Steve has any knowledge of SPEC - Penteo was likely chosen because it's a commercial upmixer..

Well, I hope I made things a bit more clear with this and previous reply and I hope I gave yo'll enough information to reconsider your views about EoH. I think he will really appreciate that !!

Yes thanks for sharing..

 

[SurroundMaker]

You may be interested to know that ZAG is an implementation of the original "spreadsheet method", used by EOH and others but not developed by him, but by the author of AudioMuxer.

With the latest versions of Spec/SpecWeb, there is also a "normonly gains" setting, in which the original mix controls the channel to channel levels, and only "normalization" is done, applying the same gain to all channels so the loudest peak is 0dB (or whatever your output settings is).

Re 1 sample out of the whole song, Spec has optional limiters and compressors, etc., to deal with that. I've been working on building those into SpecWeb, but have not been happy with the results yet.

Yeah, who didn't use the spreadsheet ? ;-) But I remember different things and asked EoH to clarify for me yesterday.
The idea to make it came from EoH, he placed a request on the forum if someone could make it and IIRC it was a guy from Belgium (Stefan ?) who made it. But.... during the development all try-outs were first sent to EoH , as he told me yesterday. He tried them and responded with ideas and removal of bugs to improve it. He also said he still has all the originals that didn't make it on his HD as proof and even but in a large archive all the mails that were exchanged between the maker and EoH.........So he didn't make it, but it was made according to his ideas by someone else !

In WAMINU we don't need the spreadsheet anymore......

If the same guy also made Audiomuxer, then I take my hat off !! I use that program almost daily and EoH have put online a lot of instructions in Dutch for newbies. I also understood EoH also is responsible for the removal of at least 5 bugs since it was made !
Just like you all, he uses a different nickname on the SBU public forum ! (example : one of the most important things he pointed the maker to : the headers of Retail DTS CD's gave problems. The maker made a fix for that....)

I'm glad to hear you're working on building the compressors and limiters into Specweb and I hope you do get good results. It would be great !!!
Keep on the good work !

 

[SurroundMaker]

Hi, Surroundmaker and welcome to QQ :banana:, I'll leave the official welcome to our well respected member Mr. Snood .

Thanks for clarifying some stuff around EoH (sorry to hear about his illnesses!), who's upmixes I know (and like) for a long time as well as his masterclass followers Mysyki70 and several others. I'm one of those guys that isn't as critical as he is, I like separation and never listen to the rears or center only so doing upmixing myself with QQSpecWebhelper (well SpecWeb basically) brings me a lot of joy especially because I can do this myself! Don't know if you know it but I followed Eoh's masterclasses myself but got stuck when I couldn't install certain programms needed, even after a complete Windows reinstall :yikes. Give us feedback if you can (and want to ) all help is welcome for noobs like me. :51banana:

Hi JanBakker,

If you're the same as on SN, then I know you ;-) You were a member of the TSSG group that did 4000 songs that were all once in the Dutch Top 2000. Am I right ? That was a very nice and marvellous job.... more than 23 Dvd's I believe and 95% good 5.1 !
Nice to meet you here too !!!!!

 

[JanBakker]

Hi JanBakker,

If you're the same as on SN, then I know you ;-) You were a member of the TSSG group that did 4000 songs that were all once in the Dutch Top 2000. Am I right ? That was a very nice and marvellous job.... more than 23 Dvd's I believe and 95% good 5.1 !
Nice to meet you here too !!!!!

That's me .

 

[SurroundMaker]

I am most happy to hear EOH is doing well - I too was on that secret forum and was one of the members that left to start SBU..

We all were well aware that he had serious health issues and that it was the cause of the outbursts. Believe me we tolerated it for quite some time - but ultimately this is a hobby for us and as he was the train's conductor, he had every right to derail his train if he wanted to - so we had no option but to part company.



We do know what happened and I dont see it as him making excuses - it was what it was and and glad he's back to a normal life..

EoH thinks the same now about the whole situation back then and said he would have done the same. He is absolutely not vindictive but he doesn't come back to any forum because he's afraid not all people will accept him because of the past.
He is now on Dutch Spotnet only....

Am I correct to assume that WAMINU requires using Plogue Bidule?

Yes, and it uses internally some commercial software.

I highly doubt Steve has any knowledge of SPEC - Penteo was likely chosen because it's a commercial upmixer..

LOL ! I wondered because he does have his own chapter on QQ...... perhaps someone should point him to this thread !!!

Anyway, I came here to ask for improvements on the artefacts and triangle sound and it seems you guys are working on it.
So the next version of Specweb can only be better...... and my worries for a flood here in the Netherlands will be minimized ;-)

Thanks for your responses.

 

[zcftr29]

Hi all,

I'm still working my way through the Queen albums - Just listening to Jazz which has some great moments on it. The first track (Mustapha) is particularly interesting as the verses are mixed in mono and then switch to stereo for the chorus - this gives a really cool explosion of surround when it kicks in. Dreamers ball separates very discretely - there is a different guitar playing in each of the four main speakers during the solo near the end.

I did News Of The World yesterday and had another 'reversed stereo' track similar to Misfire on SHA. 'Who Needs You' came out with the vocals all in the rears as before - so I did the same trick with a 0 for the centre width and then swapped front for rear and it came out a treat. Only 7 more studio albums to go to complete the set (I can skip ANATO and The Game) and I'll have a go at the live albums too to see what comes out. What fun!!

 

[DKA]

Does this mean that if I use SpecWeb on the same recording that DKA upmixed that I would get a similar result? As far as making adjustments using this program, it looks pretty daunting to a non-technical guy like me (if I can't point and click, then it ain't gonna happen!) I guess it would help if I read the directions...@:

If you used the guide AS WELL as the same settings I did on something..........sure.

 

[DKA]

Very glad to read JanBakker's post on EoH. I am happy as well to see that he is in good health. None of those upmixes you all like from me would be possible if it wasn't for him. He was the one who decided some random dude on a newsgroup was worth the time of day back in the day.

 

[DKA]

Holland123's upmixes sound a lot better than DKA's, but even in Hollands123' there are still artefacts. But they are not very hearable when you play the 5.1 . When playing the rears only (and sometimes also the center) you can still hear them.......

No offense taken. At the end of the day, this is about what sounds best on your system, for you, and what your ears prefer. You are absolutely entitled to your own happiness, in your own living room.

 

[SurroundMaker]

Although I already left the discussion : artefacts are artefacts on whatever system you listen to the song
Silencing out parts of the song to make separate channels appear more prominent, will also make the artefacts more prominent when the fronts are silenced out !
They were disturbing in your upmix of "One Night in Paris - 10CC".......... In other songs from other albums they were not spoiling the overall surround experience, but on the mentioned song it was really bad.
(compared to other upmixes from the same song ).

And... 2 replies in one : EoH said : "gives my regards to DKA if he is there too, because he is one of the most productive upmixers ever !".... well, done !!

grtz,

Hans

 

[SurroundMaker]

I don't understand why my post are Always double posted !!!!

 

[zcftr29]

Quad vs 5.1

I was wondering if any of you had an opinion one way or another with regards to the merit of extracting out the centre channel vs making a 4.0 upmix. As noted previously, where I have encountered tracks with the main vocals mixed to the extreme outside of the stereo field, I have found the best approach is to set the centre width to zero and then swap front and rear - effectively giving quad output.

My workflow so far has been as follows (track by track):

1) Set both centre and front widths to zero and mode to arctan

2) Isolate the rears and adjust the centre width until there is little/no main vocals audible

3) Isolate centre and make sure the main vocal is not distorted (this is usually 5-10 degrees more than step 2 above

4) Isolate rears again and adjust front width until there is 'interesting' stuff going on in the rears

5) set mode to slice with stage 2 humidity at 0.95, wrap off and stage 3 at 1 - then adjust stage 1 until vocals are barely audible

6) set mode to arctan+slice and adjust 'adjspkr', 'lsblend' and 'rsblend'

7) save ini and repeat for next track

On the tracks where I have opted for a Quad upmix as noted above, I find the results just as imersive as a full 5.1 upmix and it avoids the inevitable artefacts SurroundMaker has refered to in his posts in the centre channel. Many on this forum have expressed a preference for minimal use of the centre channel (such as the Division Bell BluRay) as this can make a mix too centre dominant - something I have noted in the 5.1 upmixes I have done this far.

I had a go at Tubular Bells II yesterday (although have yet to play it back on my main system yet) and I went for a quad mix as there did not seem to be any particular instrumentation in the centre channel when I listened in isolation. I will report back on the results, but it sounded good through headphones while preparing the ini files

 

[HomerJAU]

Thanks for your post. I prefer little to no centre channel so I'll try your suggestions when I get back from my holiday.

 

[HomerJAU]

Neil Palfreyman here emailed me with his SpecWeb workflow:

Oversample all the album tracks
Use SpecWeb Play on first track to get best results, save the ini (as track name)
Repeat 2nd step for nextalbum track, repeat for all tracks.
Then use Helper to batch convert all the oversampled tracks (which uses each track's ini settings)

I will post an updated Helper app later today that adds two new commands to Oversample and Resample in batch mode to better support that workflow. In addition, there are new Preferences to enable users to Oversample, Convert and Resample using parallel processing so you can easily Oversample upto 8 files simultaneously. Although a full SpecWeb conversion seems to max out (speed wise) at about 4 concurrent conversions. Results will vary depending on PC configurations.

My tests on a quad core i7 with SSD drives show that 4 concurrent conversions is twice as fast as Helper's original method of 4 sequential conversions, but upping to 6 concurrent only gives a small increase over running 6 sequential.

The new Resample command will Resample both stereo and MCH files (without SpecWeb conversion)

 

[zcftr29]

Then use Helper to batch convert all the oversampled tracks (which uses each track's ini settings)

Sorry - I meant to include this in my workflow description. Once I have reviewed all tracks in SpecWeb Play and Saved ini files I run through the helper app with oversampling for the final conversion. I keep the ini files in an 'info' subdirectory so that I can go back and tweak if need be (or re-convert if/when improvments are made to SpecWeb in the future).

In the case of the quad conversions I also stip out the silent channels using the Sox remix command to give a 4 channel file (silent channels give incorrect DR Meter readings)

I have listened to a few tracks from the Tubular Bells II upmix on my surround system and they have come out very well - good discreet seperation, particularly on the opening track. Alan Rickman's introductions on 'The Bell' are clearly located in the centre channel position despite the 4.0 channel output.

As per my earlier post, it would be great if we could set up a sticky thread of stuff that has converted well - to include release information (catalogue numbers etc) and ini files so that others can listen and compare to their own upmixes.

 

[zeerround]

There are many features that can be added to SpecWeb, but I also want to keep it push button simple for the folks that are loving the results with default settings.

Rotate the surround field up to +/- 180 degrees
Expose the speaker positions (fixed in SpecWeb to ITU positions) to allow for custom positions and/or quad
Quad output or mixdown
etc.

What do people want/need?

PS, we are are probably only hours away from SpecWeb 1.2 release. Mostly bug fixes and minor ini and/or argument changes for QQ Helper and AudioMuxer integration.

 

[HomerJAU]

Sorry - I meant to include this in my workflow description. Once I have reviewed all tracks in SpecWeb Play and Saved ini files I run through the helper app with oversampling for the final conversion. I keep the ini files in an 'info' subdirectory so that I can go back and tweak if need be (or re-convert if/when improvments are made to SpecWeb in the future).

In the case of the quad conversions I also stip out the silent channels using the Sox remix command to give a 4 channel file (silent channels give incorrect DR Meter readings)

I have listened to a few tracks from the Tubular Bells II upmix on my surround system and they have come out very well - good discreet seperation, particularly on the opening track. Alan Rickman's introductions on 'The Bell' are clearly located in the centre channel position despite the 4.0 channel output.

As per my earlier post, it would be great if we could set up a sticky thread of stuff that has converted well - to include release information (catalogue numbers etc) and ini files so that others can listen and compare to their own upmixes.

Thanks! Good tip on removing the centre channel! The AF quad SACDs have a silent centre and that affects the DR readings, makes then artificially higher by quite some degree.

 

[JerseyEd]

There are many features that can be added to SpecWeb, but I also want to keep it push button simple for the folks that are loving the results with default settings.

I am one of those loving the results using the default settings. I don't feel secure enough to go changing ini information. True, some songs don't come out as well as others, but the majority are fine. One of my recent conversions was "Uncle Meat" by Zappa (just the original 28 song titles, not the first 3 additions to the second disc). This came out extremely well. I recommend that the Zappa fans (and non-fans) give it a try. :music

Also did "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida" (nice), Squeeze's "Singles 45's and Under" (subdued, but it has it's moments) and a few others I haven't had a chance to listen to, such as "Steppenwolf's Greatest Hits".

 

[zeerround]

SpecWeb 1.2 released. See post at top of thread or http://www.surroundbyus.com/sbu/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=913

Enjoy :music

 

[Snood]

You guys gonna make Snood make the jump :banana:

Welcome to the QQ forums Surround Maker, hope you will stick around for a bit or more and you should tell EOH to stop by and say Hi :banana:

It would be awesome koo to have the Main Guy hanging around QQ

Wanna thank all you guys like EOH, SurroundMaker, Holland123, Jan, Otto, McManiac, PoRFiN and GART for all the time and hard work you put into these koo awesome mixes for everyone to listen & enjoy. Very Koo Very Mega Koo

Thank you so much we all appreciate :banana: