On Thursday, 12 December 2013 at 18:31:58 UTC, Joseph Rushton
Wakeling wrote:
On 12/12/13 19:15, Iain Buclaw wrote:
You know, I've never had that... but then again I haven't had
the
fortune of being in a band where distance between the first
and back
musicians is > 200 metres. (Because sound doesn't travel
*that* slow
;)
Well, it's not _just_ about the speed of sound, there are also
things like the speed of attack of different instruments and so
on.
Then again, ever been to a performance of one of those pieces
that ask for some musicians to be placed in different locations
round the back of the concert hall for spatial effects? Things
can get fun with that ... :-)
Only in the recording studio - if the time it takes for sound
to leave
your instrument, into the microphone, through the walls into
the
studio booth, into the mixer (and assuming digital) from the
mixer to
the sound card, to the DAW software mixer which is taking the
recording and mixing it in with the playing tracks (optional
live
effects processing being done) back to the sound card, to the
mixer,
through the walls into the studio room, into the headphones of
the
receiver playing the instrument... is greater than 22ms, then
the
person playing experiences a delay in the time he plays to the
time he
hears himself in the song. If that happens, you are not in a
good
situation. =)
So, if your latency is 22ms, think of how that corresponds to
sound travelling in space: you only need to be separated by
about 7.5m for that kind of delay to kick in.
Delay between people isn't really the problem, it's delay in
hearing yourself that's the killer. Although 22ms is the normally
quoted limit for noticing the latency, it actually depends on
frequency. Even regardless of frequency, i typically find that
anything less than 64ms is ok, less than 128ms is just about
bearable and anything more is a serious problem for recording a
tight-sounding performance.
