Pianoteq, Laurel and Yanny - what do you hear and like part 2

MacMacMac delvento This claim is totally antiscientific and does not follow from the rest of your message.

It follows precisely. Please re-read it.

Fair enough, sorry for being dismissive without argumenting. I re-read it more carefully and let me deconstruct it now. It looks to me that you make two implicit assumptions which in my opinion (and with the things we all know about PTQ) are both false:

1. PTQ (or any virtual instrument, FWIW) could objectively (or even subjectively, but in a "constant-per-person" way) "sound like" (quoting your words) the corresponding acoustic piano it's based on.
2. Ignoring the "elephant in the room", i.e. that some people notice a difference among the various PTQ sounds, so much that they purchase them individually while for others those instruments sound all pretty much the same.

The Yanny/Laurel tests demonstrate that a recording of something can "sound like" (my words, stressing that are the same as yours) in two different ways to different people and even to the same person by pitch shifting (or even without pitch shifting with the "profanity" test). As such, 1 is false.

Before comparing PTQ instrument A to corresponding acoustic instrument A, IMHO one has to understand why the point 2 happens, otherwise it's a moot point! Like showing a mix of people (including color blind persons) images like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ishihara_test#/media/File:Ishihara_9.svg and try to conclude whether or not it shows the number 21. Knowing what color-blindness is and who is affected by it, we can conclude that yes, the image shows 21 but not everybody sees it for chemistry reasons of the eye. Likewise, my test tries to understand if some characteristics of one's hearing influence how one likes PTQ. Of course I am shooting in the dark with a guess, because it might be a gazillion of reasons why that's the case, and low probability that I find the right answer, especially at first attempt. Nevertheless the question has merit and it is not moot, whether or not I find such a correlation in the results, as @QuasiUnaFantasia has argued.

MacMacMac That "paper chaser" example is astounding.

Probably because I'm not a native speaker, I hear only uttered non-sense, which I can try to force myself to interpret as word, but that feels like the witnesses of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Murders_in_the_Rue_Morgue

In any case, this example justifies my the test even more, doesn't it?

vagfilm That's named "sensorial priming".

Interesting! Let me make an even longer shot than the Yanny hypothesis. Can it be that we "primed" ourselves to like, or dislike PTQ and so most of us are strongly stuck in one camp, whereas a few poor souls (like myself) who are listening to it with an open mind explicitly looking for both the good and the bad (paper and profanity) could constantly switching camp?

RIP Can it be that we "primed" ourselves to like, or dislike PTQ and so most of us are strongly stuck in one camp, whereas a few poor souls (like myself) who are listening to it with an open mind explicitly looking for both the good and the bad (paper and profanity) could constantly switching camp?

This!

RIP Can it be that we "primed" ourselves to like, or dislike PTQ

I believe this could explain it partly. But I do not believe it explains it fully. I started out using Pianoteq before having listened to modern samples, and I really liked the Pianoteq sound. Later I discovered sampling, and since that time I find fault with Pianoteq's sound.

RIP Can it be that we "primed" ourselves to like, or dislike PTQ and so most of us are strongly stuck in one camp

I don't think that is the case for many. I am always EAGERLY wanting to enjoy pianoteq, and I cannot ever (let me rephrase it: If I had to live with the Pianoteq, I think I would be very happy with their Steinway B and Petrof Mistral; but then I compare it to Garritan or VSLs, and think "why settle for this?").
Maybe the priming lies not on our bias, but on our piano-listening/playing experience. I have ZERO experience of anything other than perfectly tuned and regulated pianos because I have never played for more than 5 minutes in real-life domestic pianos. So, ALL my piano listening experience comes from live or recorded concerts (thus, perfect pianos). Some people like the imperfection of some VSTs because it reminds them of their imperfect pianos. I cannot do that, because I don't have that experience. So, whenever I hear a demo of pianoteq or a sampled piano, my thought is "can this fool me for being an actual recording?". Many sampled examples can, while pianoteq never does throughout a piece. It is always "wow, it is very good. Sounds really authentic... Maybe they nailed it. Jeez, this section here is really off. Now, it is good again... Nahh, it is weird sounding again. Forget it...". And I must say that some of the worst examples are the demos in the official Pianoteq page.

vagfilm Good point!

And I agree completely about the official Pianoteq demos being bad. I think some of them are so bad, it completely baffles me why they would allow their own product to be terribly misrepresented like that (I believe they use very inapropriate presets; in fact I think Modartt are near clueless when it comes to creating presets).

By the way, on the point of importance of experience: I have life-long experience with acoustics, and one of the consequences of that is that I dislike recordings of pianos - and I mean the official prime-label, prime-artist recordings you buy on CD. They sound NOTHING like the real thing (some exaggeration intended here for emphasis). This may be due to recording technology, but I suspect it is primarily due to sound reproduction technology.

RIP I re-read it more carefully and let me deconstruct it now. It looks to me that you make two implicit assumptions which in my opinion (and with the things we all know about PTQ) are both false:

I can't quibble with your points because I really don't understand them. I think you make a complex case out of a simple situation.

I know that many people like PT. I don't know whether PT like/dislike correlates with Yanny/Laurel ... though you may soon find out.

But I if there is indeed a correlation then I (we?) don't yet know whether that is (a) relevant or revealing nor (b) whether cause-and-effect can be demonstrated nor (c) whether such preferences are connected to Yanny/Laurel pitch shifting ... or instead: to freq. response, phase distortion, or any other number of sonic causes. I just don't know what it tells us.

So I thought pitch correcting every time you want to hear the sample might be a bit clunky, so I made an SFZ library centered on middle C, since most of us are set up for playing piano anyway.

I thought this would be just a convenience, but then I noticed that the place where Laurel shifted to Yanni changed depending on which note I triggered right before. Try it out. Much easier to trigger.

Dore the VST creator comes through again! Nice work.

Just tried paperchaser, was going to update the library, but the pitch doesn't matter much for that one.

Since you're a tech guru … perhaps you could be imposed upon to do something different with paper chaser ...

I think that loss of high-freq content can easily cause confusion among sounds like P, F, B, and S. That's how "Pa - Per" can sound a lot like "Big Fu***".

So perhaps you could enhance the high end freq response. That is: create a second copy of the song with boosted treble. Will the ear respond differently with such a sample?

Note also that the use of the Brit-style non-rhotic R in the singing causes confusion between -ER endings and -UH endings. That's why the "-er" in PAPER sounds like the "-u" in FU***. But freq. compensation can't fix that. 🙁

MacMacMac So perhaps you could enhance the high end freq response.

I forget if SFZ is ok for you - because I could either manipulate the samples and repost or use SFZ to EQ.

Using SFZ is much more snazzy but could also be more trouble to figure it out.

I just made a video where I moved the EQ around. hopefully that'll work for you. Controlling in SFZ or posting audio files didn't seem like a good way to communicate.

I don't notice much difference.

That was fast! Your motto must be "ask and you shall receive".

When I'm online and reading (I don't follow all of the threads), I can be pretty quick. My tools are set up to edit and play digital piano very quickly.

At first I was puzzled that PAPER CHASER could ever be confused with BIG FU*** SLUT.
So I gave some thought to it and came up with this ...

They both contain four syllables, like so:

#1                                #2                                      #3                       #4
P A                               P E R                                   C H A                    S E R
^                                 ^ ^                                     ^                        ^
v                                 v v                                     v                        v
B I G                             F U                                     K I N                    S L U T
The P/B plosives sound much       The non-rhotic R in "PER" sounds        CH in "CHASER" sounds    Both syllables start with S. And the
alike, esp. with backing music.   like the U in "FU***". And the P/F   like the K in "KIN".     non-rhotic ER in "SER" is sounded as "uh",
                                  sound similar under the backing music.                           similar to the UT "uh" sound ... with the
                                                                                                   terminal T sound lost in the backing music.

But PAPER CHASER has the stress on the first syllable of each word, which I might depict as "*- *-".

The other has its stresses as "* *- *". As such the rhythm is different between the two phrasings.

It's easy to see that the syllables can be "interchanged" ... but I find it puzzling that the ear/mind can be tricked around the rhythm.

dore_m I forget if SFZ is ok for you - because I could either manipulate the samples and repost or use SFZ to EQ.

I had to dig to find my Sforzando player. I generally don't use it ... but it was there and your "VST" worked.
That provides a very easy way to see the shift in perception from Laurel on the low end to Yanny on the high end.
Fun stuff.

Now that you have sforzando working you should try my fazioli!

Is that the piano you developed last year?
Bring it on.

https://pianoclack.com/forum/d/263-the-experience-fazioli-f308

The other ones are on Pianobook

https://www.pianobook.co.uk/profile/dore_m/

To get more pianos from Pianobook I had to create an account.
Ok, that's easy.
Then it sends me an email with a link. So I click it.
That was easy.
Then it asks me to login. So I enter user name and password.
That was easy.
Then I click OK ... and it takes me back to the login page. Huh???
It's broken ...

Also ... when I was saving this new password information in my password book I noticed that I already had a Pianobook account under a different name. So I tried to login using that name. Same result. It just takes me back to the login page.

So then I clicked the Forgot Password link, and I changed my password. The change was accepted. But once again I could not login.

Whuzzup with Pianobook? I sent a message with this information. Still waiting for a reply.