Klas:
I too would like to hear answers to your question about defining "shrill".
According to my dictionary, "shrill" means "high-pitched and piercing". In
other words, shrill sounds can be a little hard on the ears.
An example is the call of the Spring Peeper. Though not extremely
high-pitched at 3-3.5 kHz, it is extremely piercing. One only has to walk
into a chorus and find out. The sound is so piercing that it causes
distortion in one's ears, probably due to simple overload.
Relative to our discussion of parabolas and the quality of recordings
obtained from them, I think "shrill" means that the parabola is boosting the
highs (relative to the midrange) and making high pitched songs or the
high-pitched portions of songs more obvious.
One notices this when recording the song of the Wood Thrush, where the
frequency ranges from around 2.5 kHz upwards to 7-8 kHz. Even when recorded
with a microphone having reasonably flat frequency response (such as my SASS
unit), it becomes clear that certain parts of certain Wood Thrush songs have
shrill components that are a very hard on the ears. When one uses a parabola
and records a Wood Thrush in dead-on focus, it is likely that the shrill
components of the song will be emphasized even further, which can really
cause a listener to cringe if the resulting recording is played at high
level.
This argues for using a parabola setup that has a fairly flat response, at
least from around 3 kHz upwards to 10 kHz.
Unfortunately, most parabolas don't behave this way. Usually, there is an
increase in gain (for on-axis sounds) as the frequency increases. At least
up to a certain point. Thus, if we had a hypothetical bird singing a song
that ranged from 2 kHz all the way to 10 kHz, a focused parabola will
probably emphasize the higher components of the song, sometimes with a great
difference in gain involved. The result is a "distorted" or "skewed"
recording, where there is a distortion of the loudness spectrum (= loudness
versus frequency).
Try getting a parabolic recording of a honking Canada Goose. You will be
amazed at how it will overemphasize the highs in comparison to the lows,
which can be below 1 kHz for this bird. The resultant recording sounds tinny
and unnatural. That's why one should use a shotgun mike to record geese.
Shotgun mikes are superior when recording broad band sounds because the
frequency response is quite flat for on-axis sounds.
So back to "shrill". I think in this discussion it simply refers to an
overemphasis of the high end, relative to what one would hear without using
a parabola or relative to a recording made with a naked omnidirectional
mike.
Lang
> Can sombody, again, define what "shrill" means.
>
> Klas.
>
> At 22:39 2004-02-25 -0500, you wrote:
>> From: "Rich Peet" <>
>>>
>>> I use a 32" Greg Clark Parabolic. Not in commercial production.
>>> http://home.comcast.net/~richpeet/rich.jpg
>>
>> Could you give us it's other critical dimensions?
>>
>>> I am starting to think that not all people do hear the same way.
>>
>> I've made that point numerous times, enough so I'm beginning to wonder
>> if anyone is listening. Not only do we differ in our physical ears, but
>> the sound we "hear" is what our brain produces based on the signals from
>> our ears. This is highly influenced by our experience, our moods, our
>> attitudes, all previous things we have heard. I simply find it amazing
>> that we hear even close to the same thing.
>>
>> It
>>> is true that I was blessed with good very high hearing. As a kid I
>>> played games with other kids at night where I would tell them where a
>>> bat was going to be comming from because I could hear their echo
>>> location calls at a distance. Where most people do feel that the
>>> Telinga makes a complex sound, sound closer, to me it does not, and
>>> simply makes the sound shrill.
>>
>> I, too could hear bats fairly easily when I was young. Not any more. I
>> do miss hearing things like the sound of bats.
>>
>> Sometimes the Telinga produces the nearer effect to me, most often it
>> does that. And sometimes it is shrill, at least as I understand that
>> term, like the peepers at the Gopher Frog pond which took considerable
>> management to record. I'm sure I don't record exactly the same way you
>> do, and also sure I don't hear sounds the same way you do. I don't like
>> shrill sounds much, and have learned ways to manage the times I have
>> that problem with the Telinga.
>>
>> Walt
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> "Microphones are not ears,
>> Loudspeakers are not birds,
>> A listening room is not nature."
>> Klas Strandberg
>> Yahoo! Groups Links
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
> Telinga Microphones, Botarbo,
> S-748 96 Tobo, Sweden.
> Phone & fax int + 295 310 01
> email:
>
>
>
>
> "Microphones are not ears,
> Loudspeakers are not birds,
> A listening room is not nature."
> Klas Strandberg
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
>
>
>
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