Automatic volume control pre-amp
 

On 23 Jul, wrote:


I'm now trying to recall when we last watched ITV.

Just remembered that I recorded "The Untouchables" that was on ITV2 a while
ago. Still can't remember the last time we watched ITV1...

..of course, one of the nice things about having recorded the film was
that I could zip through the adverts. :-)

In fact the DVDR I have (I think) lets you mark sections to 'skip' when
replaying, so I could have set the recording to jump over the ad breaks
auotmatically. Wonder if that puts a chill down the spine of TV
advertisers... ;-

Slainte,

Jim

--
Electronics http://www.st-and.ac.uk/~www_pa/Scot...o/electron.htm
Audio Misc http://www.st-and.demon.co.uk/AudioMisc/index.html
Armstrong Audio http://www.st-and.demon.co.uk/Audio/armstrong.html
Barbirolli Soc. http://www.st-and.demon.co.uk/JBSoc/JBSoc.html

Automatic volume control pre-amp
 

On Fri, 23 Jul 2004 09:09:29 +0100, Glenn Booth
wrote:

Hi,

In message , Don Pearce
writes
On Thu, 22 Jul 2004 21:36:03 +0100, "Dave Plowman (News)"
wrote:

It wouldn't surprise me if some presenters actually got less than this for
the hours they are at work. And not all actors make telephone number money
either - it's not unknown for them to be poorer paid than some of the
technicians working on the same programme - and the days of them being
well paid are long since gone too...

OK, just ban any actor that has ever called another one "darling".

But... that's all of them, except maybe Arnie.

Hehe... you noticed!


3. Once a presenter has made three programmes, force them to retire
for at least a year.

Now that's a good idea.

Better yet, during their year off put them in the Big Brother house. But
don't televise it unless David Attenborough can do the commentary.

5. Ban award shows.

Yup

That might go a long way to cleaning most of the cocaine off the streets
at the same time...

Just add ground glass to the cocaine.


7. Teach "yoof" presenters how to speak. Particularly beat them with
whips until they no longer pronounce "this" as "dis".

Add compulsory public floggings for any that change 'ask' into 'axe'.

Now you're talking!...

d
Pearce Consulting
http://www.pearce.uk.com

Automatic volume control pre-amp
 

In article ,
Glenn Booth wrote:
7. Teach "yoof" presenters how to speak. Particularly beat them with
whips until they no longer pronounce "this" as "dis".

Add compulsory public floggings for any that change 'ask' into 'axe'.

They'd only make a programme about it. With a suitable warning at the top
of course. 'Don't try this at home.' Unless you really want to, of course.

--
*Work is for people who don't know how to fish.

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

Automatic volume control pre-amp
 

In article ,
Jim Lesurf wrote:
The advertisers who pay for the programmes you're watching want
their ads heard. If no one watched them, there'd be no ITV - it's as
simple as that.

I'd vote for that. :-)

So you'd be happy with more than doubling the licence fee to get rid of
advertising on ITV? I think you could hold your first supporters meeting
in a phone box...

You are saying that the BBC would cost more to run - for its *existing*
channels - if ITV wasn't around?

No - I'm only saying that if 'ITV' existed without adverts it would have
to be funded in some way - like by an extension to the licence.

It's aimed at those who complain about adverts. They don't *have* to watch
ITV, but if they do, they surely must realise that's what pays for it?

If so, can you explain why?

Also, are you taking into account how much ITV costs us all via the
mechanism of the part of the purchase price when we buy things? I have
no figures, but I recall comments in the past that the costs for ITV
average out, per TV station, much higher than for the BBC. The money for
this comes from the ads, paid for out of the money we pay for goods that
are advertised. Thus I pay more per year for ITV than BBC.

Could well be. However, without ITV, the advertisers would just spend
their budget elsewhere - perhaps in newspapers you never read or pop radio
stations you don't listen to.
Besides, if you feel that strongly, there are always alternate products
that aren't advertised - supermarket own brands for example.

I don't watch ITV much, but I've not yet found a shop which will sell me
good more cheaply because I don't watch the programmes funded by the
adverts towards which the makers advertising budget is contributing.

Why should they? No one is *obliged* to sell you anything. They offer
something for sale and you buy it or not - the choice is yours. It was
perhaps different when the old state monopolies advertised, but there's
not many of them left.

As regards them being too loud, it rather depends on the programme
material before them, and there isn't the effort put into balancing
programme etc junctions, and never has been.

FWIW, adverts actually peak rather less than programme material
already.

They may do. However as you imply below this brings us back to
metered peak power not really telling you how loud something sounds.
My impression is that adverts are often compressed and processed to
give more impact and 'loudness'.

They are indeed. And that is precisely the intention of the people
making them. Would you expect otherwise if you were commissioning an
ad?

Depends. I suppose that I'd want to get attention. But I also suppose I'd
want to avoid irritating people or simply provoking them to switching off
the sound, or changing channel.

Some people just don't like ads - full stop. I often get very bored seeing
the same one over and over again - and I don't watch much TV.

--
*One of us is thinking about sex... OK, it's me.

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

Automatic volume control pre-amp
 

In article ,
Jim Lesurf wrote:
Once *again*, it depends on the programme it's following. If it were
some brassy LE with heavy closing music under riotous applause, the ad
ain't going to sound louder. After some poignant drama, yes. But the
advertisers don't know where their ad is going - most of the time.

That surprises me. I thought they booked specific slots, often on
specific info as to what programme they would be withing or
preceed/follow. I had thought that some programmes commanded a higher
price, and others were relatively cheap.

It depends on the deal. I'm on shaky ground here as it's a long time since
I worked for ITV, but at one time an advertiser would pay for an
'audience' This might mean one showing at peak time, or several off peak.
Etc. They might also pay for a target audience, so that would be more
programme dependant.

But do you really expect them to produce many different versions, sound
wise, just for this reason? After all, continuity announcements over the
end of programmes blast you out of the room too - and they're under the
control of the transmitting company...

--
*Nothing is foolproof to a sufficiently talented fool.

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

Automatic volume control pre-amp
 

In article ,
Jim Lesurf wrote:
In fact the DVDR I have (I think) lets you mark sections to 'skip' when
replaying, so I could have set the recording to jump over the ad breaks
auotmatically. Wonder if that puts a chill down the spine of TV
advertisers... ;-

I doubt it. While you're setting this up, you'll see at least some of the
ads.

--
*I'm not as think as you drunk I am.

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

Automatic volume control pre-amp
 

In article ,
Jim Lesurf wrote:
Personally, despite the occasional 'whoops' like the Mozart, I am quite
happy to pay for the BBC via a fee. I would also be personally quite
happy if ITV dissapeared and less were spent on advertising.

I'm also more than happy to pay for the BBC. As regards money spent on
advertising, I rather my percentage of that wasn't spent on much of the
gutter press that do much more harm to our society than ITV.

--
*The e-mail of the species is more deadly than the mail *

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

Automatic volume control pre-amp
 

In article ,
Paul Dormer wrote:
Apart from Family Affairs, obviously.

Wossat?

It's a rubbish show Dave works on :-)

Used to - when it had some semblance of normality. ;-)

Me and the GF used to watch it on Sundays afternoons for a chuckle,
the acting and storylines were that laughable.. but I never had any
complaints about the audio quality ;-)

It was quite a struggle to achieve half decent sound quality in the early
days - the gear provided was *very* lower end. Lots of table thumping to
get reasonable microphones, compressors etc, but the console remained
cheap and nasty. Dubbing was an early PC based system too - MIDI rather
than timecode locked. Fun and games.

These days it's made on the same site as The Bill, with top notch
technical facilities. Nothing much else has changed, though.;-)
Fun to work on, although a hectic pace. In terms of hours of output, it's
probably the most efficient studio(s) in the country.

--
*There are two kinds of pedestrians... the quick and the dead.

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

Automatic volume control pre-amp
 

Peter wrote:

Hope someone can help with this query. I want to fit an automatic
volume control to my TV/DVD system to even out the loud and soft peaks
and troughs (when children are in bed we have to continually fiddle
with the voulme control so we don't (a) wake them up or (b) have it so
quiet we can't hear the dialogue). There are stereo phono outputs
which I can use to play the sound through a freestanding amplifier, so
some sort of preamp with phono input/output would do the job.
However, despite extensive Web searches I haven't found anything other
than new TV sets or amplifiers with built-in AVC which would be too
big an expense. If there is something available in kit form I'm
willing to build it myself but I'd prefer an off the shelf solution.

Does anyone have any suggestions and just out of interest, is anyone
else annoyed by wildly fluctuating TV volume? I can't believe I'm the
only one.

You're not.

In the least few years I've noticed several annoying trends in audio
production for TV.

Modern TVs and their ancillaries like 5.1 can happily handle 'hi-fi'
dynamics. It seems that some producers have used this to 'enhance' their
audio. Sadly this results in a dynamic range that may not be entirely
suitable for the home.

As you say - you might wake the kids with the 'loud bits' ( in my case
annoy the neighbour - and me ). Frankly I don't *need* to have the full
dynamic range of my system inposed on my to 'impress'.

'Old' TV production seemed to take account of everyday living conditions
better but since you have a problem you could attach a 'compressor' or
limiter - actually a combination of both is lilely to work best between
the signal source and amplification.

It's not a simple 'automatic volume control' since it requires a setup -
but once set you'll likely find it doesn't need adjusting.

Suggest you look at Behringer ( semi pro-audio gear ) and select their
simplest limiter / compressor currently available. They're quite good.

Being 'pro' it doesn't use 'phono' / RCA inputs / outputs though - so
you'll have to make some leads to convert to jack or XLR plugs / sockets.


Graham

Automatic volume control pre-amp
 

"Dave Plowman (News)" wrote:

In article ,
Nick wrote:
Most DVD players I've seen (old and new) have a neighbour friendly mode
that does exactly what you want.

It's somewhat easier to compress the dynamic range on a feature film since
it will start out with a fairly wide one. TV, on the other hand, is
already compressed.

Typically - yes. Doesn't stop certain producers setting high levels for their
intro music or whatever.

Are you sure that Nicam audio is compressed like the standard signal ? I've
heard several inconsistencies recently between the mono and stereo sound.


Graham