Normal equal-loudness-level contours

joenoone

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Oct 18, 2018
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Hi,
I was wanting to test how close to "flat" earphones are using your software, to see how true some IEMs are. I see ISO 226:2003 is the current standard for "normal equal-loudness-level contours" and I was wondering if there's a way to adjust the output graphs using this to show how close/far from "flat" the earphones are.

Thanks!
 
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John Mulcahy

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Apr 3, 2017
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Equal loudness contours aren't what you need for that, they show how the ear's sensitivity varies rather than whether the source has uniform reproduction. Headphone and IEM measurement is complicated by the need to account for the ear and ear canal's effect on the measurement. It is, unfortunately, a complex topic with no clear right way to go about deciding what the 'correct' target curve for any given measurement rig should be. Things are them further complicated by layering on top a subjective preference curve. This video discusses some of the issues with reference to headphones, many of the same difficulties apply to IEMs. This article covers much the same ground, it is in two parts.
 

joenoone

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I'm talking about earphones not headphones. I'm aware of the varied resonance of the inner-ear canal affecting earphones, but what you site is more the external variety of resonances. The equal-loudness contour is the [current] accepted "level" sound, and therefore what a "flat" (or true) sounding earphones should be.

Theory aside though my question was about how to apply a contour graph in REW. Whether it's the measured contour graph of my inner ear or the ISO 226:2003 or whatever.
 
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