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Technique: TV Monitoring

Posted: Wed Mar 08, 2017 1:31 am
by mojobone
If you wanna really hear what goes on under picture, get your eyes off the picture! It's good advice when you're mixing and it's great advice when listening to television cues and commercials. I'm typing this from a laptop on a coffee table in front of a large high-res screen, hooked up to a a stereo hi-fi system with 12" woofers and ample wattage.

I've been hooking my TVs up to full-range speakers ever since VHS went hi-fi; the stability required to reproduce the video signal produced way less wow and flutter than any other two channel recorder you could obtain, back then, so lots of us mastered our four-track Tascam mixes to Hi-Fi VHS. This was shortly before Alesis built a digital tape deck that did eight digital tracks on a VHS cassette, a format that survives today, even without the cassette.

Curently, my main screen is a Samsung Ultra HD, a 4k smart TV that's networked, so it can play Netflix, Roku, AppleTV and Youtube from any similarly networked device. A DVD drive feeds the same system, so I can audition files from other sources/systems over the same living room speakers. After the next upgrade, the living room speakers will be stands for the old studio speakers, with built-in passive radiators.

But the point of all this is to listen to TV without necessarily watching it, and I find that internetting with the TV on is kinda like driving while texting; you might think you can do two things at once, but you can't. A chef can, but it's more like spinning plates than real multitasking. Anywho, this is a case where dividing your attention can pay real dividends, and even more so, if you record the program and watch it with picture, later.

Re: Technique: TV Monitoring

Posted: Wed Mar 08, 2017 2:05 am
by Len911
When we first got this tv, the &%$#@ music was so loud you couldn't hear the dialog.

SOUND MODES:

Standard: Suitable for all types of programming.

Music/Cinema/Sport/Game: Customizes and optimizes the sound to match the specific genre selected.

Vivid: Delivers distinct voices with rich bass and clear, high-pitched sounds.

User Setting: Allows you to adjust the volume to a level of your choice using the User EQ.

In addition to these sound modes, your Laser TV also comes equipped with a Virtual Surround setting that mimics surround sound if you don't have it hooked up to a home theater system.
Too many options! Now there are "sound mode genres" :lol:

Re: Technique: TV Monitoring

Posted: Wed Jun 07, 2017 7:17 pm
by Merryband1
Great idea, Mojo. That's how I usually listen to commercials, anyway, not generally being interested in the products. Some of them have some great tunes! I always wonder, "Was that written by a TAXI member?" :) I haven't tried that with TV shows I like, but I'm always aware of the music, whether background or score. Must admit, I was watching a show earlier and looked away when the commercial came on, with a good, solid beat, feeling kind of hip-hop, but when it switched to solo classical piano, I had to look up to see what they were doing! It was a skateboarder suddenly jumping a car in slow motion. (Think it's a Mountain Dew commercial). Really interesting juxtaposition of musical elements. Then at the end, it switched back to the hip-hop (if that was the genre), and back to regular motion. Cool.

Merry

Re: Technique: TV Monitoring

Posted: Sat Jul 22, 2017 12:13 pm
by jonnybutter
Great idea, MJB! thanks for sharing!

Re: Technique: TV Monitoring

Posted: Sun Jul 23, 2017 3:41 pm
by cosmicdolphin
If you have teenagers they don't even look up at the screen from their phones half the time. Drives me crazy!!