Weiss Enginering Ltd.
DAC501-4ch/DAC502-4ch
Figure 29: Comparing different settings of the Dynamic Level, (Pink Floyd, Wish You Were Here, live)
As last part of this section we want to show you a nice picture to support the understanding of the function-
ality of the Dynamics Adaption.
In the figure above you can see three different loudness measurements, displaying the piece of music ”Wish
You Were Here” by Pink Floyd live. The blue curve shows the loudness of the original audio signal. The
curves in yellow and red are normalized ones. The yellow one still contains a lot of the dynamic content
of the original. In contrast the dynamic content of the red curve is very limited and the loudness is nearly
constant.
The maximum loudness level for both normalized curves is the same. In this figure you can see especially at
the beginning and at the end the difference of the dynamic content of the two normalized signals. Besides
you can see that the dynamic content of the output of the Dynamics Adaption is level depending. When
adjusting the Dynamic Level you should keep this level dependencies concerning your play list in mind.
So for example if you want to avoid annoying loudness peaks in your playback but still desire to keep most
of the dynamics choose a Dynamic Level in the range between 0dB and higher. If you have a lot of different
recordings with a wide range of loudness levels choose a lower and if needed negative Dynamic Level. The
lower this level is the more the dynamic content is limited. The value 0dB is our default setting and should
be like the golden middle between the different sound capability of the plugin. We recommend you to start
with this default setting. Be careful with very low Dynamic Level settings for some recordings the adaption
can sound unnatural.
4.7
The Weiss De-Esser
The sound of sharpness is a natural part of singing vocals - especially when singing S or T consonants. In
fact it is a necessary characteristic of such consonants and helps the human ear to identify them. Beyond
vocals a lot musical instruments contain sharpness within their characteristic sound. For example the Hi-
Hats of a drum set would be hard to recognize without any sound of sharpness.
The science of psychoacoustics describes sharpness as a special timbre. Sounds with sharpness can be
distinguished by taking a look at their frequency characteristics. The main part of the signal energy is in the
high frequency range. Nevertheless it can happen, that certain high frequencies are too dominant and the
sharpness of the sound becomes very displeasing or even harmful for human ears.
This can occur under diverse circumstances. For example inapt conditions of a playback room can em-
phasize sounds with high sharpness. But also during recording or mastering a boost of sharpness can be
added to the music.
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