Pin point imaging isn't for everyone


A subject my posts touch on often is whether pin point imaging is desirable, or natural. While thinking about wide-baffle speakers in another thread I came across this quote, courtesy of Troels Graveson’s DIY speaker site. He quotes famous speaker designer Roy Allison:

I had emphasized dispersion in order to re-create as best as I could the performance-hall ambiance. I don’t want to put up with a sweet spot, and I’d rather have a less dramatically precise imaging with a close simulation of what you hear in a concert hall in terms of envelopment. For that, you need reverberant energy broadcast at very wide angles from the loudspeaker, so the bulk of energy has to do multiple reflections before reaching your ear. I think pin-point imaging has to do with synthetically generated music, not acoustic music - except perhaps for a solo instrument or a solo voice, where you might want fairly sharp localization. For envelopment, you need widespread energy generation.


You can read Troel’s entire post here:

http://www.troelsgravesen.dk/Acapella_WB.htm

This goes, kind of, with my points before, that you can tweak the frequency response of a speaker, and sometimes cables, to get better imaging, but you are going significantly far from neutral to do so. Older Wilson’s were famous, and had a convenient dip around 2.4 kHz.
erik_squires

I hear quite precise imaging in live unamplified sounds.

I was recently in a city park in which a large group of people were playing a variety of percussion instruments, large and small.  Eyes closed, the direction of the instruments were quite well defined.  I could point with good precision to any instrument I chose.

As to "point point imaging" that actually remains a bit too vague.  Just "how pinpoint" would be be talking about?  In one sense it can mean images squeezed to tight they have become miniaturized spots of sound in the soundfield.  "pinpoint sized."  On the other hand it can mean simply "the sound coming from a precisely localized space."  Which to me certainly doesn't sound bad and is actually how I experience most sounds.   So not sure which we are talking about, or if it's somewhere in between.

In any case,  I have come to value precise imaging.  It's not simply due to the visualization effect, but live sound sources to me have the characteristic of density and palpability, not a sense of being diffuse.When a speaker "lines up" the sound sources well, the sonic impression to me is that the instruments take on that added solidity of the real thing.

Ill go along with "precise" imaging.  Just not "pinpoint".    But if people use the term I know what they mean so not a problem practically, just not an appropriately  descriptive term. 

When I’m in a small club, with no mics on the drumset or guitar/bass amps---just the vocal mics, yes, the location of each instrument is very concrete. But what does that have to do with reproducing the imaging contained in any given recording? Nothing!

Expecting a loudspeaker to recreate the ambience and instrumental/vocal imaging heard in any given space---whether a concert hall or Jazz/Blues/Folk/whatever club---is folly. That’s one reason the Bose 901 sucks!

Recording engineers choose their mics, the locations of those mics in relation to the performers, how the numerous mic signals are mixed, in order to create a "sound field"---a sonic picture. It is the loudspeaker’s job to reproduce that recording, not to create the sound of a concert hall, small club, etc. If the recording contains pinpoint images, the loudspeaker should recreate them. If the recording contains diffused image locations, that's what it should sound like when played on your loudspeakers. Duh.

Well in some acoustic environments you can certainly hear precisely where each instrument and voice is located .I agree that is not what you hear in large concert halls but in smaller performance spaces playing smaller scale music you certainly can.And for many of us creating that sort of sound in our system is what we aspire towards.And perhaps we can even get it better than the real thing.Just like a well filmed,lit and edited film might be better than a live play because it uses techniques to intensify ,focus and enhance the subject.


@Eric>

A subject my posts touch on often is whether pin point imaging is desirable, or natural. 



blindjim>

desirable?

 of course!


natural?

  many factors affect  that out come.


imaging intimates a couple things, first off is harmonic integrity and thereafter geographical identification  of the musicians within the sound field/venue, and for some, the atmosphere or physical attributes  of the venue itself.  


Which version of imaging is being taken to task here? geographic localization, or harmonic  integrity?


I’ll presume the former.


precise = marked by exactness and accuracy of expression and detail.


pin point adj.  to fix, determine or identify with precision


although these definitions are  not  the whole shooting match when the job of speakers is concerned, it does  define   their basic criterion during their performance. 


recreating localized imaging as has been said already is the predominate result of how the venue was miked and or how the studio demo was thereafter processed or mixed down.


speakers is ignert, but they ain’t stupid! you can’t fix stupid but you can fix ignert, .


the electrical signal educates the speakers to what ever level the speaker’s aptitude will allow.


many though not all  speakers can demonstrate very good imaging IF the upstream components and room are well accomplished.


this is why I profess spending more on the electronics than on the speakers usually. especially when the ‘ducket’ bucket only has so many frog skins  in it.


sit in the front few rows of any acoustic show/concert, and if you can not distinguish who and where singers or musicians are on the stage, then save your concert going money  and stay home.


alternatively if you are at the rear of the venue/hall, it becomes a tuffer task, unless of course you can actually see the performers. together, the visual and audible information locates ‘precisely’ the artists.


at school or church you can pick out your kids voice, or some other’s in the choir or on the stage, can’t you?


even with orchestras one can readily fix where the strings, brass, reeds, etc., are set.


I suppose at WoodStock 50 years ago this week, if you were standing or stumbling way on back from the stage, it was all a mono affair.


 so why can’t we expect speakers to do the same provided we’ve done our jobs and thoughtfully considered for our speakers, their room, positioning, their electronics, and of course, the media itself?


the design philosophy of any loudspeaker build should be to create a system which emmulates as closely as possible harmonic integrity, instrument localization, as given by the source, and the chosen media and dependant on the mixing process when it was mastered in as listenable a fashion as possible.


that said, I’ve yet to hear or own a system which I can undeniably state that from listening to a recording, I can ‘precisely’ locate everything within the concert including what material is making up the venue’s walls, curtains, width and or depth of the stage, etc., as some reviewers seem to enjoy accounting from time to time.  


perhaps the only way to actually gain such insight is to be there during that recording, and hopefully have a perfect auditory and otherwise, memory along with an outstanding uber performing audio rig. 


imaging, both localized and harmonic,  is the thread which connects the demonstration together propelling it to greater heights of enjoyment for many in this hobby.  when a recording combines positioning information, and tonal accuracy the depiction is considered excellent, but it all lives or dies with the recording itself and how much attention and effort went into its production.


how the recorded media content  is going to be conveyed is another crucial responsibility for the speaker system designer to develop.   


RE Mr. Allison

sounds to me like Mr. Allison is making an argument  for how he has chosen to build speakers or for his own philosophy for listening to them. His  position is a more relaxed perspective on designing speakers as it seems to lower the bar for the build.


physically locating the components of any musical production is part and parcel a result. how well it was rendered depends on numerous concerns, yet the source media is the primary  ‘person of interest’ in unraveling the   soundstage’  conundrum. 


if a system does not image well,  on both sides of that coin, I lose interest quickly