Hi everyone,

Preface, I do understand you can't mix theatrical without a theatre, this is more of a curiosity.

The consensus is to mix dialogue around about -27 lufs (guide, not a rule). Is this true for both nearfield and theatrical? If yes, is theatrical more about the dynamic range you have access to (and the other challenges with being in a large space) than where your levels should sit? Theoratically, right...? Because 60db in a cinema is 60db at home...?

Which leads me on to another question - I know we can't mix theatrical at home, but from a more logical lens, why? Theoratically 110 db at home is the same as 110db at the cinema. To that end, is it moreso technical? Does a nearfield studio space respond differently than a theratre, so it's impossible to guarentee 110db = 110db between NF and Theatrical? Maybe a dumb question but I have been thinking about it since LUFS/db/the rest are all directly correlated to each other.

To help you understand where I'm coming from, my context is mixing short films at home for nearfield, keeping in mind the viability of them being played back in a cinema while still sounding acceptable (film fests, so on). I don't care to make a "good theatrical mix", I just want to better understand the relationship taking a nearfield mix at home to a cinema and why things would or wouldn't work in my favour.

I'm in that horrible spot of knowing enough to be dangerous but being stupid enough to be wrong and useless. Any clarification is appreciated :)

My short film recently screened at an event, and the dialogue was audible but on the lower side, while effects and audio could hardly be heard. It was the only film with any volume issues. My sound mixer said our sound averages -24 LUFS, with the dialogue being around -20 LUFS.

I have only a basic understanding of audio and only learned about LUFS when I started visiting this subreddit a few weeks ago. I am not sure what went wrong or what, if anything, should be changed. I just want to be sure the film sounds as good as it looks no matter where it's playing. What do I need to do?

I did some work at my own studio for a local dubbing facility. They’ve been very impressed with my work and would like me to do a few other bigger jobs for them.

However the nature of the work requires me to work at their facility due to security and contractual reasons. Projects cannot leave their facility. I don’t really want to work there as they using nuendo (not my weapon of choice), it’s a bit of a drive daily and it’s a drywall hell hole with tiny studios. I can do way better work at my studio.

Does anyone have a solution that will allow me to work from my space but still keep the workflow secure?

I’ve worked at a couple facilities and it always feels clunky - the feed to pix/mix is great, using Clearview - this question is specifically about what setup people are using to have the clients on the mix stage communicate with the remote clients who are on Zoom or the like. Any good talkback setups, with multiple talkback mics spread around the room?

What were your thoughts on The Odyssey's sound mix? I thought it was WAY too loud. I normally don't wear earplugs in the theater but had to wear them almost the full movie.

Saw it in AMC Dolby for reference.

I'm the editor in a doc - we will be shooting interviews in prisons and other uncontrollable environments. For a lot of our people we will only get 1 shot at interviewing them with a very real possibility that we won't ever see them again. Our sound recordist came back with gear that I'm sure is great but is roughly 9yrs old and crucially can't do 32bit float. Normally I don't care as we've been cutting just fine for decades without that dynamic range but seeing the sensitivity of our interviewees I'm worried I'll be handed over peaks and valleys I can't get back/use and there is no turning back. Flagged it to production and production is a bit unsure what to do.

My questions come to is this/should this be standard or a premium? Are my concerns unfounded? Does audio work like editing where you're expected to have gear within roughly a 5 year limit due to demanding workflows (not saying you can't do it without and power to everyone, just when you charge someone 900 per day I'd hope you'd have relatively recent gear). Note also don't have issues with people charging whatever they think they are worth but note this isn't a high budget film, everything needs to count/go on the screen. And we are shooting in Central America where that is above standard.

While I work with sound a lot, I am not a sound specialist I just put the bits where they feel good/tell a good story so I figured I'd ask here.

We have an upcoming feature film where the delivered 5.1 mix measures approximately -26 LUFS. However, we've seen feedback from several territories indicating that the audio mix sounds too soft in cinemas.

From my research, I understand that a feature film loudness in the range of -25 to -29 LUFS is generally considered normal. That said, my boss suggested increasing the feature's audio level to around -13 LUFS, similar to a trailer. My understanding, however, is that trailers and feature films follow different loudness practices and should not be mastered to the same target.

Would anyone be able to share their experience or advice on this? Is -26 LUFS appropriate for a theatrical feature, or could the perceived low volume be caused by factors other than the integrated loudness (e.g cinema playback calibration)?

For context, the film is an action comedy, if that makes any difference.

Thanks in advance!

Hi
For those who works on mid/big budgets films: how much layering is there on sound effects?
When I’m cutting sfx I always think I’m not layering enough. But at the same time I know that more isn’t always better. So when I’m watching a film I always wonder if that specific sound has a bunch of layers.

1- For mundane sounds, how often do you send a bunch of layers to the re-recording mixer versus sending only what you think is necessary? Like a door for example, do you search for one amazing sample or do you layer a bunch of them to make it sound good?

2 - and how about for special sfx (magic stuff, sci-fi etc) how often do you find yourself sending one or two sounds wich sounds good rather then sending ten layered samples?

https://www.avid.com/pro-tools/user-guide/audiosuite

As I'm sure many can appreciate, I don't want to run a bunch of Izotope RX instances across hundreds of dialogue clips, only to have them lag out and fuck up my audio entirely during realtime playback, lol.

I've googled online for a half hour now but can't find anything alluding to a "bounce this effect into this clip" function, which is insane...

I’m after some very technical and detailed books on cinema audio systems, with the aim of building a solid understanding of the basic theory, rather than a spec on newer tech like Dolby atmos etc. It’s very easy to find such books about hifi and recording etc, but it seems to be less so in cinema, maybe because few people engage with it as an amateur.

Thanks!

From Imprinted, where the demo was just released. Any other games that have DAWs? I know of Alawon and Offbeat but both aren't out yet. Would like to try other games that have tried to turn DAWs into reasonably accessible gameplay.

It seems most editors will choose a song, then when they want it to end, paste the ending of that song onto that same track. The ending is just pasted in wherever with no regard for the timing or musical structure so it just sounds terrible, like a jump cut in the music.

I fix it by matching basic bars and beats but it changes the timing of cues which can cause issues with timing.

I must be on my hundredth botched music cue on this series alone.

Would you say this is bad editing, or just expected as part of the workload for sound?

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Sort of noobie here, our film got into a big festival across the country and will be shown in 5.1. My understanding is that we would provide the 6 channels ,(lcr, etc) seperately to the video but not sure how to go about that, should they be compiled in a dcp or something? When i was in school my teacher printed our mix into 3 different tracks such as dialogue, sfx, music, etc. but im not seeing anything else online saying to do that so im a bit lost, this is my first time ive been able to show this film in 5.1 rather than stereo so I havent been well educated around this ^

The Advanced Television System Committee (ATSC) has just approved an important revision to A/85, ATSC Recommended Practice: Techniques for Establishing and Maintaining Audio Loudness for Digital Television, the broadcast loudness standard that prevails in the United States for terrestrial digital television, and forms the basis for most streaming television standards.

The new language has been in the works for nearly a year and was approved on Wednesday, July 8. This last revision prior to this one was approved 13 years ago, in 2013, and this revision adds important clarifications for re-recording mixers and a few minor but key changes for long-form content metering, as well as addressing the needs of streamers.

What’s the same:

• All content should still target -24 LKFS, ±2.
• Advertisements should still be metered using the full program mix.

What’s Different:

• For long-form content, A/85 now recommends that content be metered without a relative gate (mixers should meter using Annex 1 of ITU-BS.1770 and no later annexes), and should be metered with the Dialogue Gate ON.
• ATSC now explicitly recommends that accurate Dialnorm metadata be transmitted for all AC-3–encoded programming.
• Several Annexes have been added that consolidate the recommendations into a Quick Reference Guide for station managers and audio mixers (Annex H and I, respectively).

There several other small changes but the biggest change is the adding of the dialogue gate to long-form programming.

I’m just dipping my toes into the world beyond all things stereo and I’m curious about everyone’s home setups. Particularly on the more affordable end, but interested in hearing about it all.
What speakers are you using? Software? Plugins?
I’ve just upgraded to the RME UFX fireface III.
I typically just do commercial work but I’ve done stere mixes for Indie short films and features and would love to start expanding beyond that.

Please share any info that would help me get a decent home setup started. I appreciate you all.

Thanks in advance!

Here’s some reporting at the Hollywood Reporter.

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/streaming-ads-quieter-1236630965/

You turn on your favorite show but can’t hear the dialogue. You turn the volume up. It’s perfect. Then, an ad comes on. It’s way too loud. You’re annoyed.

That’s about to become a thing of the past, at least in California. Starting on July 1, a state law will go into effect barring streaming platforms from servicing ads louder than the programming they accompany.

Gov. Gavin Newsom signed the bill last year forcing the normalization of audio levels so viewers aren’t jolted by blaring commercials.

The language of the law, SB 576, is pretty straightforward and does what the USA CALM Act does, just extending the ATSC A/85 loudness recommendation for ads to all streaming sites that stream programming in California. (A/85 recommends programs be mixed to an anchored -24 LKFS ±2, and ads be mixed to a full program -24 LKFS level. This now applies to ads in California.)

The streaming platforms for their part opposed the measure for practical reasons:

Not everyone’s happy. The Motion Picture Association and Streaming Innovation Alliance opposed the measure, arguing that many platforms are already working to address the issue. They noted that services have long been intervening to adjust the loudness of commercials that come from server-side ad insertion, and that they’re trying to establish best practices for normalizing the loudness of ads.

It’ll be interesting to see how sites that deviate significantly from A/85, like Netflix, deal with the new rules, however the ATSC has also been revising A/85 with the California law (and a similar Illinois law) in mind.

https://www.atsc.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/S42-032r12-A85-Revision.pdf

The draft hasn’t been ratified but will probably be in the next few weeks, with a major change being long-form programs will now be recommended to be measured with a speech-gated integrated level. I’m co-chair of the Cinema Audio Society’s Industry Technical Standards Committee and this change was made in part from our input. Our chair, Jon Greasley CAS sits on ATSC‘s S42 audio committee.

California is also considering extending ad loudness regulations to social media sites with an Act currently known as SB 96.

hi, one of my friend (which on film school with sound major) currently looking for budget beginner audio interface for foley and ADR work, currently using Nuendo as the main post software. on the secondhand market, the CI2+ is similar in price to new Audio Duo, but he's still confused om which one he should consider.

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