"Here's Why Movie Dialogue Has Gotten More Difficult To Understand (And Three Ways To Fix It)"

[Mr._Clark]

This article states that movie dialog has gotten more difficult to understand, and it discusses various contributing factors. I've experienced difficulty understanding dialog in various movies. For the most part I attributed it to tinnitus, aging, etc. (I'm sure that my hearing is far from perfect), but it appears to me there's more to it.

According to this article Netflix has excellent specs, but I watched Extraction the other day and the dialog was so muffled and low in some scenes that I gave up trying to understand what was being said. This was only true of a few scenes, however, most of the dialog was quite understandable.

I'm curious what others thoughts are on this topic?

Here's Why Movie Dialogue Has Gotten More Difficult To Understand (And Three Ways To Fix It) - SlashFilm

/Film spoke with several Oscar-winning sound designers, editors, and mixers to learn why it has become tougher to understand what characters are saying.

www.slashfilm.com

 

[Kingnoob]

This article states that movie dialog has gotten more difficult to understand, and it discusses various contributing factors. I've experienced difficulty understanding dialog in various movies. For the most part I attributed it to tinnitus, aging, etc. (I'm sure that my hearing is far from perfect), but it appears to me there's more to it.

According to this article Netflix has excellent specs, but I watched Extraction the other day and the dialog was so muffled and low in some scenes that I gave up trying to understand what was being said. This was only true of a few scenes, however, most of the dialog was quite understandable.

I'm curious what others thoughts are on this topic?

Here's Why Movie Dialogue Has Gotten More Difficult To Understand (And Three Ways To Fix It) - SlashFilm

/Film spoke with several Oscar-winning sound designers, editors, and mixers to learn why it has become tougher to understand what characters are saying.

www.slashfilm.com

London has fallen had the same exact issues, I had to turn closed captions on to understand it. Many other films to the extent I cannot list ..have the same problem. And that’s with everything perfectly tuned with xt32 after asking for help in a thread on calibration .

On a tv with quality built in speakers like my dads top tier 2009 Samsung 3dtv not the trash speakers my Sony tv has. These movies dialogue sound far better . Seems their tuning sound to cater to those with tv sound quality audio. Not surround speakers.

 

[Verdinut]

This article states that movie dialog has gotten more difficult to understand, and it discusses various contributing factors. I've experienced difficulty understanding dialog in various movies. For the most part I attributed it to tinnitus, aging, etc. (I'm sure that my hearing is far from perfect), but it appears to me there's more to it.

According to this article Netflix has excellent specs, but I watched Extraction the other day and the dialog was so muffled and low in some scenes that I gave up trying to understand what was being said. This was only true of a few scenes, however, most of the dialog was quite understandable.

I'm curious what others thoughts are on this topic?

Here's Why Movie Dialogue Has Gotten More Difficult To Understand (And Three Ways To Fix It) - SlashFilm

/Film spoke with several Oscar-winning sound designers, editors, and mixers to learn why it has become tougher to understand what characters are saying.

www.slashfilm.com

Have you tried using a good set of headphones with which you can adjust the volume to your liking. I have frequent tinnitus and I also often use closed captioning when available.
How is your tinnitus? Is it high pitched or just clicks? Apparently, clicks can be treated and I would suggest verifying with an ORL then.

 

[lovinthehd]

I blame Christopher Nolan.

 

[Trell]

Some movies I’ve watched at home do have a dialogue that is hard to understand, but not sure how wide spread that problem actually is.

One thing that helped for me was to replace my 2.5 way horizontal center speaker with a bookshelf, and that helped mostly when not sitting in MLP.

 

[Mr._Clark]

Have you tried using a good set of headphones with which you can adjust the volume to your liking. I have frequent tinnitus and I also often use closed captioning when available.
How is your tinnitus? Is it high pitched or just clicks? Apparently, clicks can be treated and I would suggest verifying with an ORL then.

My tinnitus is a constant "ringing" (for lack of a better word). I don't have problems understanding people in daily life, so I don't think my hearing is too terrible.

My wife and I were both watching Extraction, and she also couldn't understand the dialog in certain scenes. She doesn't have any hearing issues, at least not that I'm aware of. We could both understand the dialog without problem during most of the movie.

In my experience the problem seems to be most pronounced in movies that have a lot of scenes with loud explosions, etc. but also have quiet scenes (typically indoors) in which only two characters are talking. In these quiet scenes the sound volume is often very low and muffled.

 

[Yardstick]

I've been going down the rabbit hole trying to figure out how to make movies and certain TV shows more intelligible lately. I think I started the journey just before seeing that article for the first time. The other factor that throws me off sometimes is the mixing of accents in a show/movie. The most recent was watching Amazon's, 'The Peripheral'. Another one with a similar issue was, 'The Expanse'. Not only do they have the loud/muffled combo but they have a wide mix of accents and even some of their own language sprinkled in. I like those types of shows, but the dialogue can be hard to follow sometimes.

 

[BoredSysAdmin]

This Article isn't entirely wrong, but lacking actual solutions for Home Theater, where AH we already discussed this to near death, and the issue is ALWAYS with center channel speakers!

Vertical vs Horizontal Center Speaker Designs

This article discusses performance tradeoffs of vertically vs horizontally mounted drivers in center channel speakers. We show how off-axis lobing can negatively affect performance of horizontal MTMs.

www.audioholics.com

Vertical vs Horizontal Center Channel Speaker Designs – An Alternate Perspective

This article contains an in depth discussion of the trade-offs of different center channel designs (MTM vs WTMW, etc) and their real world applications and limitations.

www.audioholics.com

Center Channel Speaker Design Additional Considerations

This article explores the various center channel designs while also referencing past works on the topic. Horizontally mounting drivers can compromise off-axis performance but there are alternatives.

www.audioholics.com

How to Properly Set Up your Center Channel Speaker to Maximize Performance

This article gives tips on proper positioning and setup up of your center channel speaker for achieving maximum performance. Center channel placement is critical to ensure a direct path of sound.

www.audioholics.com

Pros & Cons of Various Center Channel Designs

This article and YouTube Video takes you on a tour of the most common center channel driver arrangements and discusses their strengths and weaknesses to help make the best selection for your needs.

www.audioholics.com

 

[Trell]

This Article isn't entirely wrong, but lacking actual solutions for Home Theater, where AH we already discussed this to near death, and the issue is ALWAYS with center channel speakers!

Vertical vs Horizontal Center Speaker Designs

This article discusses performance tradeoffs of vertically vs horizontally mounted drivers in center channel speakers. We show how off-axis lobing can negatively affect performance of horizontal MTMs.

www.audioholics.com

Vertical vs Horizontal Center Channel Speaker Designs – An Alternate Perspective

This article contains an in depth discussion of the trade-offs of different center channel designs (MTM vs WTMW, etc) and their real world applications and limitations.

www.audioholics.com

Center Channel Speaker Design Additional Considerations

This article explores the various center channel designs while also referencing past works on the topic. Horizontally mounting drivers can compromise off-axis performance but there are alternatives.

www.audioholics.com

How to Properly Set Up your Center Channel Speaker to Maximize Performance

This article gives tips on proper positioning and setup up of your center channel speaker for achieving maximum performance. Center channel placement is critical to ensure a direct path of sound.

www.audioholics.com

Pros & Cons of Various Center Channel Designs

This article and YouTube Video takes you on a tour of the most common center channel driver arrangements and discusses their strengths and weaknesses to help make the best selection for your needs.

www.audioholics.com

The center channel speaker is not always the issue, though very often it is. Bad dialogue intelligibility from the source can be partly overcome, if it's in a language/dialect one is very familiar with, otherwise it can be real hard.

For me this thread is about the mixers (or whoever) f*cked up the dialogue intelligibility in a fit of incompetence that that they attribute to artistic brilliance.

 

[Kingnoob]

This Article isn't entirely wrong, but lacking actual solutions for Home Theater, where AH we already discussed this to near death, and the issue is ALWAYS with center channel speakers!

Vertical vs Horizontal Center Speaker Designs

This article discusses performance tradeoffs of vertically vs horizontally mounted drivers in center channel speakers. We show how off-axis lobing can negatively affect performance of horizontal MTMs.

www.audioholics.com

Vertical vs Horizontal Center Channel Speaker Designs – An Alternate Perspective

This article contains an in depth discussion of the trade-offs of different center channel designs (MTM vs WTMW, etc) and their real world applications and limitations.

www.audioholics.com

Center Channel Speaker Design Additional Considerations

This article explores the various center channel designs while also referencing past works on the topic. Horizontally mounting drivers can compromise off-axis performance but there are alternatives.

www.audioholics.com

How to Properly Set Up your Center Channel Speaker to Maximize Performance

This article gives tips on proper positioning and setup up of your center channel speaker for achieving maximum performance. Center channel placement is critical to ensure a direct path of sound.

www.audioholics.com

Pros & Cons of Various Center Channel Designs

This article and YouTube Video takes you on a tour of the most common center channel driver arrangements and discusses their strengths and weaknesses to help make the best selection for your needs.

www.audioholics.com

I’m using an mtm 2 way center the one often considered the worst in audio . Sitting too close to it ruined sound quality but moving it downstairs sitting 9-10 feet away it’s much clearer now. So room acoustic have a big part of it, but the movie dialogue itself is hard to understand.

KC-25 Center Speaker | Klipsch

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And everything sounds very clear except the movies that are mastered to be hard to understand, ex London has fallen.

 

[BoredSysAdmin]

The center channel speaker is not always the issue, though very often it is. Bad dialogue intelligibility from the source can be partly overcome, if it's in a language/dialect one is very familiar with, otherwise it can be real hard.

For me this thread is about the mixers (or whoever) f*cked up the dialogue intelligibility in a fit of incompetence that that they attribute to artistic brilliance.

I should've mentioned my crappy HT is full of voice comprehension issues, but none then I use headphones.

 

[Trell]

I should've mentioned my crappy HT is full of voice comprehension issues, but none then I use headphones.

But with headphones you’re listening to a stereo mix and in a different environment than your HT setup.

 

[Teetertotter?]

My current speakers have made an improvement in dialog understandability. I also turned off a setting in the audio portion of the AVR. My front tweeters are right at ear level and the center is at ear level. My seating is 7 feet from screen along with the mains. My subwoofer gain is turned down, as I do not like a whole lot of base, but just enough. Yes, depending on the movie source, I might have to turn the audio up a bit. I'm 79. Overall, my speaker set-up and AVR audio settings, are working pretty good to my ears. Yes, I have a pair of one year old fancy Phonek hearing aids, which I use, if in a room of people, church, Kiwanis meeting, and doctors' office.

 

[lovinthehd]

This popped in my feed today

 

[Golfx]

My son visited with us for awhile. He often works on his laptop watching tv. He asked if he could turn on closed captions to not have to listen with sound. My wife and I got used to it and now just leave them on especially as we watch a lot of BritBox and Acorn. They just disappear from our annoyance factor and after awhile serve as help for any missing dialogue.

 

[Hobbit]

Like yourself, I find I'm using subtitles more than I beleive should. I chalked some of that up to my reduced hearing and some tinnitus. In my case I would think turning up the volume would help. Even though I'm in my late 50s, my hearing is unusual in that it's just shifted down. I really don't have the age related rolloff. But turning up the volume up doesn't help.

Another thing I've learned, and I hate doing but in some cases it's almost a must, is changing the decoding to plain ole dolby surround. I'm not sure why this works? It was briefly touched upon, coloring the sound yadi yada, in the article, but not really explained why this would make dialog easier to understand. But it works! Too bad there are other downsides to doing this sound wise.

 

[lovinthehd]

Like yourself, I find I'm using subtitles more than I beleive should. I chalked some of that up to my reduced hearing and some tinnitus. In my case I would think turning up the volume would help. Even though I'm in my late 50s, my hearing is unusual in that it's just shifted down. I really don't have the age related rolloff. But turning up the volume up doesn't help.

Another thing I've learned, and I hate doing but in some cases it's almost a must, is changing the decoding to plain ole dolby surround. I'm not sure why this works? It was briefly touched upon, coloring the sound yadi yada, in the article, but not really explained why this would make dialog easier to understand. But it works! Too bad there are other downsides to doing this sound wise.

What's the original codec when you upmix with Dolby Surround?

 

[mtrycrafts]

Some movies I’ve watched at home do have a dialogue that is hard to understand, but not sure how wide spread that problem actually is.

One thing that helped for me was to replace my 2.5 way horizontal center speaker with a bookshelf, and that helped mostly when not sitting in MLP.

I would think background music on soft dialogue also creates issues.

 

[mtrycrafts]

My tinnitus is a constant "ringing" (for lack of a better word). I don't have problems understanding people in daily life, so I don't think my hearing is too terrible.

My wife and I were both watching Extraction, and she also couldn't understand the dialog in certain scenes. She doesn't have any hearing issues, at least not that I'm aware of. We could both understand the dialog without problem during most of the movie.

In my experience the problem seems to be most pronounced in movies that have a lot of scenes with loud explosions, etc. but also have quiet scenes (typically indoors) in which only two characters are talking. In these quiet scenes the sound volume is often very low and muffled.

Do you see the issue when background music is a bit too loud? I do and so does wife

 

[mtrycrafts]

This popped in my feed today

I have no problem understanding her.