5 Reasons Dolby Atmos May Be DOA

[Auditor55]

HDR can be quite impressive when done properly. Unfortunately, most displays cannot display the full range and have applied tone-mapping that reduces mid-tone brightness which makes HDR look darker than its SDR counterparts. That appears to be improving. I disabled all tone-mapping on my C9.

Most HDR displays have wider color gamut and essentially cove the P3 gamut used in cinema's. This is often overlooked but even with added brightness color volume is is eye-opening and IMO the most important advancement.

4K is also beneficial because all resolutions are compressed so the effect resolution is less. When properly encoded, a 4K encoded BD easily bests the 2K counterpart. Streaming is more compressed of course but has provided some excellent results which can exceed a 2K BD.

My system if 5.1 but Atmos mixes tend to be better surround mixed and I have found improvements.

4K, HDR, 2020 colorspace, and Atmos are all improvements that are not going away.
Atmos is backward compatible so comparisons to 3D are not applicable.

- Rich

That's interesting that you have disengaged tone mapping on your OLED considering the fact of OLED's limited capability to display high nit content, or mastered as such without tone mapping it.

 

[RichB]

That's interesting that you have disengaged tone mapping on your OLED considering the fact of OLED's limited capability to display high nit content, or mastered as such without tone mapping it.

I'd rather clip highlights that are very limited the reduce the average picture level.
For example, with tone-mapping engaeged Batman V Superman can be seen to show more detail in bright scenes but the image dims.
When disabled on the 9 series OLEDs (using custom tone-mapping) the overall picture is brighter and the lightning and explosions have better impact.

Reviews occasionally miss the obvious pursuing detail in still frames.

- Rich

 

[VonMagnum]

Of course 4K has higher resolution, but that doesn't mean you can see it with a 55" display at 15 feet, compression or no compression.

Atmos has nothing to do with 4K beyond studio convenience to push more expensive discs and streaming plans by tying them together.

HDR is a mess of non-standards, compatibility issues and as you say brightness issues.

 

[VonMagnum]

Laserdisc didn't "fail" to endanger DTS and DD. It got replaced by DVD, which was smaller and cheaper to manufacture and supported progressive displays.

Japan actually had analog HD long before the US digital HD and they had HD laserdiscs several years before Blu-ray came out, but then laserdiscs were quite popular there compared to the US.

 

[Auditor55]

Laserdisc didn't "fail" to endanger DTS and DD. It got replaced by DVD, which was smaller and cheaper to manufacture and supported progressive displays.

Japan actually had analog HD long before the US digital HD and they had HD laserdiscs several years before Blu-ray came out, but then laserdiscs were quite popular there compared to the US.

Laserdisc did get replaced by DVD. DVD simply was superior to and more convenience to consumers than laserdisc. Yes, I actually saw one of those analog HD laserdisc. I had laserdisc player and I loved it, spent over a grand for it. I used to watch the laserdisc Jurassic Park with DTS and man that was awesome.

 

[VonMagnum]

I've still got Jurassic Park DTS on laserdisc and it's connected to the system. I just watched it the other day to compare it to the UHD DTS:X version and at least the levels were similar (within 2dB on average) unlike the neutered DVD versions. I don't know about subsonic (<20Hz) bass on the DTS:X one, though, but it was close for overall levels here at 20Hz and up. There's very little in the way of overhead sounds in the DTS:X mix, though, but it does move things around a bit more at the bed level, I think, taking advantage of being able to image behind you mid-way through the room, not just in the side surround speakers.

 

[ParisB]

This thread did not age well

 

[BMXTRIX]

I think some people forget that Atmos is a mixing technique. I'm sure it's been the case for years that mixing 'placed' objects within the surround mix. But, when mixed, it was around an 'ideal' setup. A plane flying from front to back, and that sound tracking through a predefined space using a set number of speakers. When you play it back, it is VERY analog. So much noise to the front speakers, now a bit more to the back, now less in the front and even more in the back, and SWOOSH! the plane flies overhead.

But, it needs people to play back with speakers in the exact location that the people mixing the audio required to get that proper sound.

Atmos just makes it all easier, for everyone, to get the best sound. For those of us who care about setting our audio up correctly from day one, this may offer very little real world improvement. Maybe none at all. But, for those who buy cheaper setups, it really can maximize their experience. The idea of adding metadata to describe where in space a sound should come from and having every single speaker setup interact with that metadata to enforce proper sound with the specific speaker setup which exists in that room is a huge leap forward from the analog mix. You can now get much more accurate placement of sounds in any room and any speaker configuration. Even stereo can be more accurate in Atmos setups.

 

[shadyJ]

I think some people forget that Atmos is a mixing technique. I'm sure it's been the case for years that mixing 'placed' objects within the surround mix. But, when mixed, it was around an 'ideal' setup. A plane flying from front to back, and that sound tracking through a predefined space using a set number of speakers. When you play it back, it is VERY analog. So much noise to the front speakers, now a bit more to the back, now less in the front and even more in the back, and SWOOSH! the plane flies overhead.

But, it needs people to play back with speakers in the exact location that the people mixing the audio required to get that proper sound.

Atmos just makes it all easier, for everyone, to get the best sound. For those of us who care about setting our audio up correctly from day one, this may offer very little real world improvement. Maybe none at all. But, for those who buy cheaper setups, it really can maximize their experience. The idea of adding metadata to describe where in space a sound should come from and having every single speaker setup interact with that metadata to enforce proper sound with the specific speaker setup which exists in that room is a huge leap forward from the analog mix. You can now get much more accurate placement of sounds in any room and any speaker configuration. Even stereo can be more accurate in Atmos setups.

This can not be emphasized enough. Atmos is just mixing in metadata at XYZ coordinates. If you want to hear Atmos as it was intended, you need proper speaker placement and proper speakers. And, contrary to many people's over-hyped impressions, the advantage of height channels over a standard 7.1 mix is not substantial. Vertical sound localization is already dependent on visual cues. Human ability to localize sound on a vertical axis is not nearly as good as the lateral axis. And many surround systems already incorporated a level of elevation in the placement of surround speakers anyway. Not that it made a big difference since so many home theater seating has high-backed seats which blocked surround channel sound from reaching the listener properly anyway. The idea of object-oriented sound mixes is really cool, but the implementation by Dolby has been a fiasco. The continued weighting of sound away from the front stage is a mistake. It's very possible that Atmos has broadly done more to hurt home audio than help it, both in a business sense and also from a sound quality sense.

 

[snakeeyes]

So as the side and surrounds drop to ear level, different seats do make sense.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

That's just how many I personally have purchased in the last year and a half, dude. That's not the total number available and it's only been out a few years.

He thought that you must own EVERY SINGLE Atmos/DTSX/Auro3D titles available.

 

[VonMagnum]

If overhead speakers make very little difference, there's something wrong with your setup. We don't image well behind us high or low, but anywhere from straight above to in front of us above image quite well, IMO.

Atmos' object based system IS a bit of a joke. A true object system should take into account your speaker locations as well and do its best with what you can fit in your room at home. But it doesn't work that way. It has to be set up just a precise as a channel based system.

DTS doing their Pro X with Neural X filling on the speakers between the most distant parts of the 7.1.4 basic framework should work just as well and gets around locked setups like Disney.

Objects are more useful on the encoding side as it basically automates panning between a lot of potential channels. The end result can be encoded in a number of different ways with proper software, whether channel or reduced objects like home Atmos, etc.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

The Lord of Rings Trilogy is far superior to the Star Wars prequels and the new Star Wars crap, but yet they will keep remastering them for purchase. I need to have Lord of the Rings on UHD to take this stuff seriously.

All 3 Lord of the Rings movies were filmed in 35mm films and Mastered on 2K (1080p) Digital.

They were not mastered in 4K.

So if they are going to Remaster them, they will have to take those 35mm negatives and Scan them to 4K Digital Masters. That will take some time since each movie is only about 4 hours long.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

Remember, until Lord of the Rings is released with Atmos... Atmos is a failure.

There is no other way to measure Atmos as being successful. It doesn't matter how many places stream it. It doesn't matter how many devices play it back. It doesn't matter how many products exist with Atmos capabilities.

Lord of the Rings or bust.

Darn, that's a lot of pressure on that Peter Jackson guy.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

Laserdisc did get replaced by DVD. DVD simply was superior to and more convenience to consumers than laserdisc. Yes, I actually saw one of those analog HD laserdisc. I had laserdisc player and I loved it, spent over a grand for it. I used to watch the laserdisc Jurassic Park with DTS and man that was awesome.

C'mon, man. Jurassic Park in 480p LaserDisc and DTS was "awesome", but the new 4K/Atmos movies aren't "awesome"?

 

[VonMagnum]

C'mon, man. Jurassic Park in 480p LaserDisc and DTS was "awesome", but the new 4K/Atmos movies aren't "awesome"?

That depends on whether they screwed the sound up or not since we're talking about DTS (audio). The levels seemed OK when I compared, but I'm not sure about bandwidth (subsonic bass for the shaking effect).

 

[Auditor55]

C'mon, man. Jurassic Park in 480p LaserDisc and DTS was "awesome", but the new 4K/Atmos movies aren't "awesome"?

Yes, for that time period, it was absolutely awesome.

All 3 Lord of the Rings movies were filmed in 35mm films and Mastered on 2K (1080p) Digital.

They were not mastered in 4K.

So if they are going to Remaster them, they will have to take those 35mm negatives and Scan them to 4K Digital Masters. That will take some time since each movie is only about 4 hours long.

Well that means no Atmos on one of the all time trilogies.

 

[Auditor55]

He thought that you must own EVERY SINGLE Atmos/DTSX/Auro3D titles available.

This is basic math. DVD, by a long shot, outsells Blu Ray, Blu Ray outsells UHD Blu Ray, additionally, streaming is killing off optical disc, so where does that leave Atmos and DTS-X? I'm not optimistic? I just don't see volumes of UHD titles out there. There are lots of movies that are not making it to UHD. I believe vast amounts of movies will never be on UHD because the disc format is dying.

 

[Auditor55]

"If you want to hear Atmos as it was intended, you need proper speaker placement and proper speakers."


That is why your local AMC Dolby Cinema is where people can experience Atmos properly. Too many variables in the home. They told us that these home formats will be able to adjust to whatever speaker placement a consumer might have, we now know that's not the case.

 

[VonMagnum]

Well that means no Atmos on one of the all time trilogies.

Why would it mean that? Half the UHD Blu-rays out there are just upconvert garbage and people eat them up anyway. They can't see any improvement in resolution, but believe only losers still watch 2K sets. The emperor has no clothes and never did. But hey it says HDR on the discs so it MUST be better despite no consistency to nit levels used, no flags to tell the set which HDR setting to use and so people just select whatever suits their fancy or more likely leave everything on whatever settings the TV came with forever. The people who couldn't figure out how to set their VCR clocks and let them blink away still exist and put 5.1 speakers all in front or backwards or whatever fits in the book case.

George Carlin once said, "Think about how dumb the average person is and then realize 50% of all people are even dumber than that."

We're screwed as a species.