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Post by jsdyson on Jan 5, 2018 14:45:57 GMT
Since you seemed to be entertained by SuperTrouper and MamaMia -- I just added I am the city (216.mp3) and Under Attack (218.mp3). I am working on Take a chance on me or maybe another one -- not sure which one sounds best... I think Take a chance sounds pretty good -- so I should be uploading it (103.mp3) in about an hour. I am actually working on a super restored version of SuperTrouper -- cleaning up the choruses better -- but it is VERY tricky. They really hyper compressed some of that, and did some spatial matrix things that make things challenging. Everything that I am doing is meant to be minimally changed -- just enough to modernize the sound a little. So -- probably expect 'take a chance' about 1Hr from now.
One caveat -- the resulting sound is very RAW. I didn't 'finalize' the sound at all -- so there is no treble enhancement, bass boosting or even normal compression after the restoration/recovery processing. Normally, one might add some strategic compression/limiting and some EQ here or there. I have done NONE of that. I do have some last ditch limting enabled so that if the signal gets too loud that it will keep it from clipping. The limiters (there are several passes of limiters in the processor that I wrote) haven't been triggered, however. I carefully made sure that the output doesn't go into limiting.
Frankly, the music might have sounded a LITTLE better with some dynamic range control -- but it takes a lot more time to tune the right amount (the processor has several kinds of compressors and limiters -- each one does something special.) I haven't been focusing on that stuff right now, and working solely on signal clean-up/restoration/noise reduction/peak restoration/etc.
John Dyson
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Post by jsdyson on Jan 5, 2018 20:25:57 GMT
I have added some more examples to the repository. Firstly, I have a very-difficult-to-process copy of 'dreamworld.' I only have a very heavily compressed copy of dreamworld, so I gave it a try and uploaded it to the repo site. It sounds pretty good, but is still pretty damaged. Also -- I have uploaded some 'finalized' copies of the previously processed songs. These 'finalized' copies come from the processed versions that I had previously uploaded -- from EXACTLY the same files (except that I locally work in 96k/24bit flac, and not mp3.)
One note -- the quality isn't really high enough to hear much of a difference between 200+k mp3s and flac, but I started with the original flac copies of the processed versions simply because those are the versions that I traditionally use.
So, I have 'finalized' versions of 'under attack', 'take a chance' and some others... These have been compressed and sweetened a bit... I didn't spend a lot of time doing careful finalization, but you can probably hear that ABBA is really meant to be listened to in compressed form.
I REALLY hope that you enjoy. I am still working on the restoration processor and psuedo-DolbyA decoders. On most ancient music ('60s through '80s), the software does really help. ABBA is definitely a worst case, and very difficult to process my probably one of my very favorite bands!!!
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Post by jsdyson on Jan 6, 2018 1:12:45 GMT
UPDATE -- I have fixed the harshness/transient balance problem (to a large extent). I am getting good transient behavior and a lot less harsh sound. I made several mistakes -- actually forgot to enable the full transient recovery mechanism -- so all I could do is to make it nastier sounding instead of more clean/intense. Also, I had an incorrect sync between the audio signal and the audio level signal -- they were more out of sync than desirable (everytime I change a certain set of parameters, I have to change some corresponding delay parameters -- but forgot to do that.) One more thing -- I wanted my version to sound more like Polar's version but without so darned much compression. Well -- I figured out that the distribution that I have has a matrix difference between typical ABBA releases and what my version has. SO, I have tried to rebalance the matrix (hard to explain, but has to do with the spatial presentation of the singers/instruments/etc -- and can actually be tuned.) After these changes, the results are better than anything that I have demoed here before.
It takes approximately 20minutes per song for the audio processor to do the cleanup -- the hard part is the transient recovery (reshaping the audio signal so that sharp/intense sounds appear more clear.) When all of them are complete (probably tomorrow morning), I'll post the updates. After this, I intend to leave this specific matter alone for a while to complete some other things. However, I'll happily take specific processing requests (favorite songs or whatever), and make them available fairly quickly.
This is very tricky to try to complete a phase of a project -- there are always BUGS -- and all of the bugs have been my own screwups.
FIgure on something on the repository and an announcement here in approx 12Hrs or less.
John Dyson
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Post by jsdyson on Jan 6, 2018 9:17:19 GMT
Finally -- the repository now has REALLY REALLY better versions of the reprocessed ABBA songs. The names of the songs on the site are based upon their track number of ABBA GOLD & ABBA GOLD II. The sound is more present and generally less distorted than the originals (and better than my previous tries earlier today.) Also, they are less compressed. For those who really like the 'compressed sound', I have produced a few songs as 'finalized', where I have enabled my finalizing processor. I didn't spend a lot of time tuning the finalizer, so the compression might be a little odd. MUCH MUCH BETTER. AGAIN -- this has LOTS of bugfixes when compared with the original copies that I produced earlier today. The attack times are better synchronized, and shaped more like DolbyA attack times. Also, the attack times are better synchronized with the music. The total effect is that the garbling effect should be totally gone. Also, I am going to distribute the latest version of my psuedo-DolbyA decoder later on today/tomorrow. It has some attack time bugfixes, and the DolbyA decoder is doing about 1/2 of the processing chores of the 'restoration' processor suite. I hope to distribute the rest of the restoration suite within a few weeks. That thing is COMPLICATED, and might still have some lurking audio processing bugs. ABBA songs on my repo site: 103.mp3 (Take a chance on me), 104.mp3 (Mama Mia), 106.mp3 (SuperTrouper), 110.mp3 (SOS), 117.mp3 (Name of the Game), 216.mp3 (You are the City), 218.mp3(Under attack.) A few of the songs have 'finalized' versions, where they have more of the traditional ABBA sound, but are not nearly as severely compressed (103-finalized.mp3, 110-finalized.mp3, 216-finalized.mp3 and 218-finalized.mp3.) I am probably going to add Dreamworld soon also -- but the copy that I have is pretty rough, so my processor has troubles finding the hints in the structure to reconstruct the sound. I am adding Dreamworld because it is so uncommon. If you have any favorites, I might be able to clean one of those up a bit (bring the sound forward a bit), but I only have ABBA GOLD, ABBA GOLD II and a few others. The purpose of this exercise is primarily as fodder for my audio processing software, but I enjoy ABBA and I hope that you'll enough the music before I have to delete it (I don't want to keep it all on the site for very long.) PLEASE ENJOY IT. Here is the respository again: spaces.hightail.com/space/pG4t4ZFnyBJohn Dyson
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Post by lamagiadeabba on Jan 6, 2018 12:46:16 GMT
Okay. I will heard them with so much excitement. And it's not tedious at all. I'm very excited and happy to be lucky enough to hear this amazing project. There's any chance to get "the visitors" remastered? OMG that song it have that amazing haunting atmosphere. I love it. Thank you very much for your stunning work. - i will comment you about that under attack mirror in a while when i get to listen to it -
- Salvador
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Post by jsdyson on Jan 6, 2018 13:01:11 GMT
I do have a 100% clean copy of the Visitors, plus a Polar & Polydor copy. The Polar & Polydor appear to sound very pretty -- I'll see if I can produce an essentially unprocessed version that sounds good. Sometimes, they (ABBA) did a really good job of processing, then sometimes they seemed to have jammed too much into the music. I understand their market -- but I do wish that they let the 'girls' voices be more prominent. I'll work on the Visitors right away and see what I can do.
John Dyson
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Post by jsdyson on Jan 6, 2018 17:41:11 GMT
Demo music is definitely ready now. I was WOWED with these results. VERY CLEAR -- and no garbling or time delay distortions between the gain and the signal. Bottom line -- unless you heard a studio copy, I doubt that you have heard these releases so well. In fact, I am going to promote some of my ABBA results into my set of demos for my audio processor -- before I only had some Carpenters, Brasil'66, Anne Murray, Simon & Garfunkel -- but now these ABBA results sound great and SOUND LIKE ABBA!!! MOST ARE READY AND AVAILABLE NOW...Let me know what you think. The music names are based upon the track numbers for abba gold and abba goldII (simpler names than the long english ones.) All are high quality MP3 encodings -- everything was originally processed as 24bit flac at 96k and converted to normal very high quality mp3. Gonna keep on adding songs until later tonight. I have three or four more definite selections, but there are several good ones on there right now. The repository location: spaces.hightail.com/space/pG4t4ZFnyB |
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Post by charly on Feb 3, 2024 2:46:26 GMT
Hi John jsdyson, I’m new here and I would like to hear some samples of your work improving Abba sound, please. |
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Post by jsdyson on Feb 3, 2024 3:32:28 GMT
charly, THANKS FOR YOUR POTENTIAL INTEREST!!! WOW, it has been a long time since I have been on this board!!! Your timing is perfect because the 'FA decoder' is starting to work like I promised 5yrs ago or more. Many many premature announcements have been made, and crediblity is lacking. It is likely that this release in the next few weeks will be functioning correctly. Demos coming in days, not 'weeks'. As of 2017, the software was a vain attempt at the desired function. The software has been more completely developed over the years, to the point where few settings (if any) are required. The software is still free in source and binary form. Plans are for source to be distributed along with binaries. Patents and proprietary knowledge has been totally avoided, and any offers would have been rejected. The program development has take so very long because I started with no knowledge about the precise techniques used for distributing commerical audio recordings... The final design might be one of the most complex audio processing programs that exists. IT IS A BEAST.... READ FURTHER FOR A PARTIALLY DEFECTIVE (but probably worthwile) demo... Less defective demos are coming in approx 4 days or less (late sunday 04Feb2024 or maybe a day later...) The project was many many times more complex than I had originally guessed. It uses both normal dynamics processing (e.g. attack/release type gain processors), but also a rather eccentric dispersive processor which provides infinitely fast attack/release (really -- sounds impossible, right?) After about 5 yrs since my last post here, there have been many, many, many embarassments with my mistaken proclamations about success. This version is working and initial reviews are showing positive results. I have learned to be more proactive about accepting CONSTRUCTIVE and respectful criticism. Nowadays, I use lots of sources for demos and testing, while ABBA albums are still very important. The sources for the testing are totally pristine, often using sources that are not normally available (e.g. the earliest Polar version, which sounds very little like the normal Polar stuff.) After many years of work, being 100% persistent, the first fully functioning version is being finalized.I have been finishing a new, finally fully functioning version. For input, it requires a pure CD or digital download .wav file only (44.1k, 48k, 88.2k, 96k along with multiples.) Mp3 (or opus or anything like that) encoded/decoded recordings produce suboptimal results. The decoder will sometimes work pretty well on that material.[/div]
IMPORTANT: when playing the snippet, PLEASE download first. The dropbox online player is much lower quality than the recording itself.
ALSO -- VERY IMPORTANT, the demo IS defective. Since I am not totally happy with it (it was intended to be a quick example of functioning on defective material), I'll produce a more complete example in the next day. Sometimes, I get excited and prematurely demo something that might be misunderstood. The new release should be final enough to produce a casual more complete demo tomorrow....
On my home forum, I have promised a series of approx 5-10 demos for late this weekend, then the entire demo sequence later on in the week. I'll inform this forum when it is ready, but the demo above is a first offering.
I'll add several ABBA tracks to the short list for this weekend, The 'normal' set of demos is between 95 and a few 100 tracks, depending on how much time I decide to spend in making the test demos.
A true release should be available in a month or so. I lost the machine where I do Windows builds, so I still have to rebuild the build environment for the decoder. The 'Windows port' has already been done, just that I cannot build it anymore. (Machine failed.) It will take up to 1wk to re-create the build environment (more likely a better part of a day, but gotta leave slop in the schedule.)
The decoder is now trivial to use, most of the time requires only the input/output file name along with decoding quality settings, often use a fixed set of command options. Previously, many years ago (e.g. 2017), even when the decoder was working, it required a complex set of settings. I have learned A LOT about the ubuitious final processing used on consumer commercial recordings.
Will return with more examples in approx 4days!!!
(This message might be a bit scrambled because I have been working hard while finishing up the decoder.)
THANKS SO MUCH!!! I'll be back in a few days with more info...
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Post by jsdyson on Feb 5, 2024 20:46:40 GMT
Here are some 'decoded' examples with the last phase of mastering at least partially undone. These examples include some ABBA, Linda Ronstadt, Steely Dan, Carpenters, Herb Alpert (AFAIR). I forget all. ABBA probably has the biggest representation. The decoder will be available FOR FREE in source and binary form, about 2wks. For practical use, at least 4 core CPU needed, but much easier at 8-10 recent CPU cores. (I use an i10900X.) A more complete set of demos will be available in approx 1 wk once the nits from the current version are resolved. Sorry for the delay beyond my original estimate, but I have been having problems with my hearing, so the final A/B tests have been tricky at best. There were finally two candidate versions, and one problem that I have been worried about is an excessive dynamics stretch. The design of the system offers 'steps' instead of 'tweaks', but there are still combinations of 'steps' (original encoding probably designed by R Dolby). Over 6yrs ago, I had underestimated what it really takes to decode this last step, but finally the current structure WILL accurately decode recordings. As mentioned above, there is still a final set of choices, but except for the sound of slightly excessive 'stretching', I doubt that you'll hear any distortion 'tells' from the processing itself. IF YOU DO HEAR A PROBLEM, PLEASE BE KIND AND TRY TO DESCRIBE IT TO ME. This thing CAN and WILL be nearly perfect. The decoder is mind numbingly complex and uses over 2000 equalizers, 24 Hilbert transformers, a myriad of FIR filters, and a dispersive audio 'compressor/expander' (along with 6 DolbyA emulations.) Here are some early demos (sorry, again must be snippets!!!) PLEASE DOWNLOAD THE EXAMPLES FIRST -- the Dropbox player will not produce the best quality.
www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/zw5omel88g5x1ywh2ks8n/h?rlkey=egakjobeiyucr6xhvqf1cfj5b&dl=0John |
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Post by Liebezeit on Mar 4, 2024 0:32:03 GMT
jsdysonGreat to hear that there is progress that's gotten this far. The ABBA samples reveal many buried instruments, especially in Take a Chance on Me, where the electric piano playing the bass part is not even muddy anymore. I can't identify what seems to be the problem with it. As for the other artists' samples, in your sample of Carpenters' Superstar (apparently the 1991 remix), the oboe has no distortion but happens to be ringing in higher frequencies than the original file. It sits between the centre and right channel, and might possibly be a side effect. It doesn't sound as if it belongs to an instrument. The audio otherwise seems to indicate success in decoding. The strings, keyboards, and brass are certainly well represented in the samples and are the subject of successful decoding: I hope the woodwinds are accounted for.
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