5.1? yes or no?

hall_e_woode wrote on 7/28/2004, 3:28 PM
Hey, I just finished enocding a 5.1 project in Vegas and exported the ac-3 audio into Architect. But when the wave-forms show up, I only see two channels. Also, I don't have a 5.1 setup connected to my computer, right now, but I could definitely tell that the audio sounded a clearer and more distinct (like 5.1 would) in Vegas. Once it's in Architect, it's just regular stereo, even though the file properties menu says it's 5.1. Am I missing something? BTW - I made sure that the project settings were set to 5.1 surround sound.

Comments

bStro wrote on 7/28/2004, 3:56 PM
You're not missing anything. DVDA's preview doesn't do 5.1. As for the waveforms, I'm not really sure why DVDA bothers showing them at all -- it's not like you can edit the audio within DVDA. At any rate, your audio is still 5.1.

Rest assured, as long as your project settings are proper, the audio should sound the same on the final DVD as it does in Vegas -- since DVDA doesn't do anything with other than mux it with the video.

Rob
richard-courtney wrote on 7/28/2004, 7:00 PM
Can't edit audio? I assume you meant can't edit AC3.

I have placed the sound in different "spots" in the room but wish I
had more knowledge of the accoustic models such as used in Dolby Headphones.
bStro wrote on 7/28/2004, 7:42 PM
Um, no, I mean can't edit audio. We're talking about DVDA, not Vegas.

How do you edit audio in DVDA?

Rob
JaysonHolovacs wrote on 7/29/2004, 11:51 AM
Ummm... I think DVD-A2 preview CAN do 5.1... I seem to remember hearing my panning in DVD-A2. Regardless of whether you can hear it, yes, DVD-A produces fine 5.1 DVDs. Look at the audio track in the preview timeline in DVD-A2. The icon there will look like a speaker if the track is stereo and 4 speakers pointing inward if the track is surround. But the actual waveform will not indicate 5.1.

This may be stupid, but I have even encoded stereo tracks in 5.1(just using front two speakers). Why? Because if I do 2.0 ac-3, my reciever interprets the stereo as Dolby Pro-logic, and if there is little separation I end up with everything just on the center channel. So I tried encoding 5.1 with only 2 speakers and this works. But this is probably a bit-hungry way to do things. Or will the empty channels compress out?

-Jayson
bStro wrote on 7/29/2004, 12:52 PM
Ummm... I think DVD-A2 preview CAN do 5.1... I seem to remember hearing my panning in DVD-A2.

Sony will be interested to hear the news, then. Their people here have said that DVDA's preview mode downmixes 5.1 to stereo. :) I have no way of testing since I don't have a 5.1 sound card.

Rob
JaysonHolovacs wrote on 7/29/2004, 1:50 PM
Well, then, they probably know better than I do. :)

I thought I had gotten 5.1 out of it, but perhaps I was misremembering. It's possible that I was actually playing back the produced DVD on my PC rather than previewing through DVD-A2. But I DO remember that 5.1 sounded different than the stereo track when I switched between the two audio tracks (I did a DVD with 5.1 and stereo tracks like some commercial DVDs. It's probably pointless to do this, but it can be done.).

But DVD-A2 definitely creates 5.1 disks.

-Jayson