Just binged Ju-On Origins, been a long time since I binged something. Holy shit it's good.

I finally gave in and watched Shang Chi. Surprisingly a decent film, well choreographed fight scenes and not a stupid plot like with most MCU movies. Image quality is also fairly good, Dolby Vision is well done and I like the fact that they used real IMAX cameras (not IMAX digital) for the entire movie.

But good news end there. I would have actually graded the entire movie as good if it wasn't for the terrible audio track. An absolute lack of bass (and yes I have a graph to back it up) and compressed dynamic range in the mids and high end, making the movie sound and feel lifeless. BEQ (bass EQ) saves the low end, but it can't save the compressed dynamic range the movie inconsistently has.

BEQ graph for Dolby Atmos track (from the UHD disc, NOT the lossy DD+ from web stream):


Dotted green and red line is the original movie's track output, the darker line is after BEQ'ing them. I have 4 subs (well 6 subs if counting the crowson actuators) and without BEQ, the audio track doesn't even tickle my balls.

This post has been edited by SSJBen: Nov 25 2021, 06:56 PM

Venom's bass is fucking insane though. Which is ironic because it's a Marvel movie but it's also not a Marvel movie.


Look at the graph, numbers don't lie. There is no output below 30hz, doesn't matter what system you use to play the movie.

From 40 to 70hz, the output is flat and anemic. That's why the movie feels so lifeless.

This post has been edited by SSJBen: Nov 26 2021, 02:58 PM

Interesting. I really thought they were IMAX 70mm.

Holiday yesterday, finally get to watch a movie.

Put on Doctor Stress in the Multiverse of Stupidity and was.... disappointed. Not sure why I expected Disney to finally stop sunat on the bass, but here we are once again, another movie that's bogged down because of the weak AF LFE. I've already mux the Atmos track from the UHD disc to the Disney+ IMAX stream version. The UHD Atmos track is on average ~6db louder than the lossy DD+ Atmos track on the stream, yet it's still so lifeless.

Audio quality aside, the IMAX version is quite a treat otherwise. Dolby Vision from Disney+ is better than the HDR10 on the UHD disc. Entire movie is so clean, no grain, very little banding, but unfortunately a little bit of macro blocking in heavy CGI scenes (in the beginning 5 minutes this is very apparent).

Nothing to say about the plot because there's really no plot. A woman who's going through menopause wants children, goes on a rampage to achieve that. Ok lul.

This post has been edited by SSJBen: Jul 12 2022, 05:00 PM

Just watched a small part of it, audio sucks.

I have not watched Thor Love and Thunder. I don't believe it can be so bad that it's worse than that toxic junk known as captshit marvel.

Top Gun Maverick is one of those rare home release Atmos tracks that makes decent use of the height speakers. Not amazing, certainly could be better but compared to about 90+% of the Atmos movies out there, it's one of the better ones.

Overall sounds good, but could be better.

Thank goodness Auro-3D exists.

I think 95% of the movies out there sounds significantly better in Auro 3D than their native Atmos/DTSX tracks. I didn't realize how much I was missing out with the standard Atmos tracks until I installed my a new receiver that has Auro 3D recently.

About every movie is like a new movie again. Mind blowing.

Auro3D been around for more than a decade already. Never gained enough traction, then went bankrupt. But its technology is still top of the class, especially its upmixing algorithm.

I've already had a full 7.1.4 setup for several years now but never had Auro3D Auromatic upmixing up until recently. Went back and rewatch several Atmos movies over the long weekend (13 Hours Soldiers of Benghazi, John Wick, Wonder Woman) and my jaw dropped to the floor just how much better those movies sounded. Even went and watch some old shitty horror flick like Silent Hill which was poorly mixed from day 1 and never got a remaster, Auromatic made it quite an enjoyable experience.

Auromatic has made my entire setup feel new again, can't wait to go revisit some movies that advertised to have Atmos but has only like 2 minutes worth of height and 3-dimentional sound effects (hint; MCU movies).

Yes it's a tough pill to swallow. I already swallowed it couple of years ago, especially during the PKP time. Forced to stay at home and watch countless movies everyday, I realized how much of a waste the height speakers were.

Spent a small fortune on buying the speakers, spent so much time calculating the exact angles to install them just for some "wooosh, sweee, tik tik tok toks" up in the ceiling. Lmao.

Wish I jumped on Auro3D sooner because now no more PKP cannot stay at home everyday.

Trinnov is my next target. That's the next level.


No, 2 was never enough. Minimum 4, optimum 6 - which is the max allowed by the mainstream pre-pros (Denon A1H, Anthem AVM90).

You want more than that, gotta go StormAudio or Trinnov.

You guys can watch this video here, he does some comparisons between Auro-matic upmixer vs Dolby Surround Upmixer vs DTS Neural X vs native Dolby Atmos:





Use headphones btw, because the clips are recorded in binaural.

This post has been edited by SSJBen: Oct 26 2022, 10:02 AM

Good documentary yes.

But they fuck'd up the UHD release (just like Green Planet, Planet Earth II, 7 Worlds 1 Planet). Reason is because they converted the film from 25fps to 23.976. Results in stutter and audio sync issues.

Re-watching the entirety of Game of Thrones, UHD in DV and Atmos after getting the itch from watching the shitshow that is House of Dragons.

Season 1 GoT is still legendary. Holy shit the details in season 1 is still unmatched by any TV show today - the story structure, characters and performance of the actors, the visual and aural details... WOW I didn't remember them to be this good, shows how far down the shit hole TV shows has gone now a days.

This post has been edited by SSJBen: Nov 21 2022, 03:00 PM

To be specific, I'm talking about the UHD Blu-Ray version. NOT the HBO Max version, which has very low bitrate even at 4k stream.


Watched already.... it's pretty but, there's no saving the cringe AF acting and woke snorefest plot.

Prey for the Devil (2022)



Watched this piece of shit yesterday, boring AF, cringe fest. Was hoping for a female take on The Exorcist, turns out to be a "woke" take of it instead.

The movie has several scenes with good on screen suspense, but it isn't translated well into the audio part of it. It coulda been interesting if Atmos was utilized better - barely any usage of the heights and barely any surround objects in the 3D plane being thrown around in the bed surround channels. There's a couple chest-slamming jump scares, but that's simply not enough. Audio is such an important part of a horror movie, this one is mediocre at best.

At least the Dolby Vision mastering is fairly decent though. But the eye-roll inducing, cringe fest'd CG makes everything look cheap.

GoT UHD in DV streaming is only on HBO Max. So unfortunately, you need a VPN.

Otherwise, do what I do - buy the entire UHD boxset and remux them yourself. Been rewatching the entire series the last couple of months in UHD + DV. Will never watch on HBO max because the audio quality on the streaming version sucks donkey ass.

Watched both Avatar UHD releases to test out my new 77" G3.

Holy shit the first movie looks fucking amazing.

The UHD remaster for the first movie is so damn good that the quality difference is next to indistinguishable from the sequel.

It's almost like they made the movie back-to-back. It's arguably the most impressive remaster I've ever seen from a movie.