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control theroomTECHNOLOGY FOCUSLoudness Monitoring TipIt’s a good idea to use an SPL meter to check your monitoring levels. Most of us listen tooloud, both for accuracy reasons and for health reasons. Spend $30 on a Radio Shack SPLmeter (the analogue one, not the digital one) and set it for 80/C weighted/Slow (you’llunderstand when you get it). Place the device near you pointing at the speakers, maybeon the other side of your keyboard opposite your mouse (you are using a computer right?).Then play some music at the level you usually play it at. The needle should be dancingbetween 0 and +6. If you peg the needle you’re killing yourself and probably are deliveringbass light mixes. If the needle is not moving you’re either using a dead batteryor you are one exceptional human being with phenomenal self control on listening levels(and you are probably delivering bass heavy mixes too).A good way to normalise monitoring levels and to deliver consistent mixing results is touse a reliable volume control like the Dangerous Music Monitor ST. First you set a levelfor a mastered CD in the style you like to work in to hit the magic + 0 to +6 spot onthe SPL meter. Memorise that volume knob position. Then play one of your unmasteredmixes and set a position for that. It should be quite a bit higher because your mix isnot (yet) limited to within an inch of its life like the mastered CD is. Now you haveto reproducible mixing positions: one for mixing and one for listening to masteredCDs with the benefit that both will now play at the same SPL level. Only then can youreally start comparing your work with the work of others without fooling yourself.Isn’t that wonderful?FAB (puremix.net), c/o PDB MusicSonnox’s recently released Fraunhofer Pro-Codec plug-in enables mix and masteringengineers to audition up to five codecs inreal time within a DAW environment. It alsoeliminates the time-consuming cycle of encodinga mix to mp3/AAC, previewing, tweaking andre-rendering, letting the engineer concentrateon producing an optimised mix during thepreview process. It enables the production ofoptimized mixes, and provides the option tosimultaneously batch encode to multiple formats.mp3, mp3 Surround, AAC-LC and HE-AAC aresupported, as are such lossless codecs as mp3HD and HD-AAC. The Fraunhofer Pro-Codecis compatible with Pro Tools, Logic, Cubase,Nuendo, Sequoia and Wavelab. Both Mac andWindows are supported.www.sonnox.co.ukBase SpeakerThere’s an awful lot of rubbish talked about highend, really expensive, rubbed-against-the-thighs-ofvirginsmagnesium-alloy... What you want is a soddinggreat heavy thing to stand your speakers on – andit’s no good putting it on a wonderful speaker stand,wonderfully linked up to a diaphragmatic wooden floor,because that’s just the same. Although if your speakerstand is full of lead, it’s then going to be quite heavy,so the resonant frequency of the floor membrane it’sstanding on is going to be much lower.David Bell, Whitemark Acoustics, Monitors 2010Aww, SoffitIn bigger rooms, you start by designing the room to try and increase the effectiveness of theroom-speaker combination. One of the things you can do is to minimise the effect of bass reflectionin a room by soffit mounting the speakers – build them into the wall. This is done not justby sticking a piece of wall fabric under the speakers but by building them into a substantialwall in a big, heavy box. We then pack the front wall – we use mineral wool, though other peopledo other things.The bass end becomes more efficient because it’s all going forwards. If you correctlysoffit mount a speaker, you’ve got the early bass reflections under control. And then if youcarefully design the distance between you and the walls, you can further improve those earlybass reflections.David Bell, Whitemark Acoustics, Monitors 2010What Directors WantWe always want people we like being around, whose input is going to be apart of it. You want what you want from everyone on a movie: to be makingprogress. You want people who aren’t going to look for problems justbecause they need attention; you want people who are going to contribute.I feel that the people that we’ve worked with can deliver whatever it is thatwe want to do. It’s just a question of, ‘what do we want to do?’ For me,that’s what we’re always struggling to do: it’s not trying to find the peopleto deliver, it’s finding the idea.David Fincher, Director, The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button, Audio Media, December 2008AUDIO MEDIA AUGUST 2011 31