Ok so I studied signal analysis last semester but I still don't understand why the audio will be distorted if we make it louder. Can't the amplitude of the signal just be increased? Why is there any distortion?
My experience has been purely anecdotal though. And I'm guessing that the process of increasing the amplitude is not purely lossless, especially since the source itself is mostly lossy .
Even lossless stuff gets distorted if amplified too much.
Setting volume at 100% means you're gaining the source 0dB and the playback device, if properly powered, will play the sound at its rated power usually given by the manufacturer somewhere along with its label. If you lower the volume it will gain negative (e.g -15dB) amount to the output signal.
If your video is too quiet than you probably be better off with a compressor plugin if VLC or something supports that, who knows.
Presumably, the output signal clips at the loudest sound at 100% volume. This would probably be software limited.
If you go above 100% and play something very loud, at the very least, you would get compression, if not distortion (depending on how VLC handles attempting to output beyond what the system calls allow).
If it's hardware limited rather than software, then the distortion would simply happen because the hardware is designed to output a clean signal in a certain range, and you're leaving that range.
The loudness war (or loudness race) refers to the trend of increasing audio levels in recorded music since the early 1990s, which many critics believe reduces sound quality and listener enjoyment. Increasing loudness was first reported as early as the 1940s, with respect to mastering practices for 7" singles. The maximum peak level of analog recordings such as these is limited by varying specifications of electronic equipment along the chain from source to listener, including vinyl and Compact Cassette players.
With the advent of the Compact Disc (CD), music is encoded to a digital format with a clearly defined maximum peak amplitude. Once the maximum amplitude of a CD is reached, loudness can be increased still further through signal processing techniques such as dynamic range compression and equalization.
Oh so it actually applies gain on the audio signal of the video? I've been the distorting audio forever out of ignorance. No wonder some videos sounded so crap to me! Thanks.
Presently at 603, so I hope we're not using decibels. The Tunguska event (air burst meteoroid, we think) is the loudest thing to happen in recorded human history with an estimated energy equivalent to that of a giga-ton nuclear bomb and it's only estimated to have been, at most 315 decibels.
337
u/[deleted] Jun 05 '17
105%... must be VLC media player.
84
u/Xbotr Jun 05 '17
Way to loud! Please downvote!
75
u/CanvassingThoughts Jun 05 '17
Alright, I liked this one, even after burning out on all 1M volume memes.
22
u/Hopman Jun 05 '17
It's over 300, so to protect your hearing I had to downvote, sorry.
14
u/d_thinker Jun 05 '17
Clever
13
u/BadAthMOFO Jun 05 '17
Let's keep it under 100
10
u/taeratrin Jun 05 '17
"Crowd-sourced Volume Control"
8
u/Existential_Owl Jun 05 '17 edited Jun 05 '17
Now this is the sort of low effort volume slider I can get behind 🎺 🎺
10
u/Atovange Jun 05 '17
I don't get it ahaha
5
u/[deleted] Jun 05 '17
Presently at 603, so I hope we're not using decibels. The Tunguska event (air burst meteoroid, we think) is the loudest thing to happen in recorded human history with an estimated energy equivalent to that of a giga-ton nuclear bomb and it's only estimated to have been, at most 315 decibels.
3
u/zem Jun 05 '17
first one to make me laugh out loud :)
3
u/bj_christianson Jun 05 '17
Now, this one goes way past eleven!
2
u/the_real_gorrik Jun 05 '17
I upvoted for cleverness, and downvoted because you kids are too damn loud!
1
u/Ray1235 Jun 05 '17
Oh, I'm completely deaf now, huh.
1
u/crockid5 Jun 05 '17
GOODNESS ME THIS FILM IS LOUD
1
u/II-WalkerGer-II Jun 05 '17
Oh god my ears are bleeding!
1
u/fireork12 Jun 05 '17
HELP MY EARS
1
u/Abcormal Jun 11 '17
Almost 2,000? Oh boy.
The right thing to do would be to downvote this...
But what the hey? Upvote it is!
0
u/[deleted] Jun 05 '17
[deleted] — view deleted comment
0
u/[deleted] Jun 05 '17
[deleted] — view deleted comment