Is it possible to have Good Imaging close to wall


I keep looking for the best speakers to stand flush against the front wall and end up looking at the usual suspects: North Creek Kitty Kat Revelators, Allisons (now old), Von Schweikert VR-35, NHT Classic 4s, Audio Note AN/K, and other sealed or front ported speakers. But I have never understood how, even though the bass is controlled, they can defy the law of physics and image as well as, say, my great actually owned other speakers, Joseph Audio Pulsars, far out in the room? Is it physically possible for these flush mounted speakers to image as well?
springbok10
Onh,

I suppose it depends on ones goals and corrsponding perspective.

If you just want to hear the recording, headphones are probably the best way to do that.

Any stereo speakers take it to different level by nature of the resulting sound heard being totally dependent on room acoustics in all cases, with the exception perhaps of an ideal nearfield setup.

If you consider the recording to be more than just a recording being played back in stereo on two speakers though, in other words a technical abstraction of live music, the sound of that too is always affected by room acoustics and those spatial cues from direct and reflected recorded sound is in the recording to various degrees. For teh best recordings, they tend to be there A LOT!!!

So the reflected sound of teh room during playback is needed in order to attempt to best reproduce what might have been heard live rather than just what is in a 2 channel stereo recording.

Of course playback room acoustics will be different than what existed during recording, so the two may never be exactly the same, but can come pretty close when both are similar.

You might get a pretty good idea what the jazz quartet sounded like when recorded live in a small jazz club in a decent sized room at home, but that symphonic recording is less likely to have the room to breathe that the original players did.
Agree that Duke is the man on this site when it comes to principles of soundstage and imaging in speker design.
A good analogy for listening to a good stereo recording without proper soundstage and imaging enabled is to watching a 3-D movie without the glasses. The 3-D visual information is in the film. WIth the glasses, it is processed by our eyes properly to deliver the best resulting image possible. Without the glasses, not only is there no 3-D but the 2-D image seen is not quite right for viewing and certainly not as clear as the alternate 2-D version of the film.

I can't think of any recording I have ever heard on a system with good imaging and soundstage ability that sounded totally 1 dimensional. WIth my pseudo-omni OHMS, set up well, even monophonic recordings have some natural ambiance that makes it sound live, as if the performers were all clearly front and center on stage in some live venue.
Yes, get a speaker with a dome tweeter and midrange driver. I have a pr of ADS 910 and they go against the wall and they produce a wall of sound.

They were designed to go against the wall.
I am surprised that the Larsen speakers have not been mentioned. I just heard these at the Newport Audio show and was simply amazed at the sound. They are designed to be placed right up against the wall and are full range, the lower limit to 24 Hz. I believe that there are three models, although they only had two of them at the show. I saw a sign indicating that there is a recent Positive Feedback review, although I have not yet read it.