It's so LOUD!!

[rootLucus 2]

10 minutes ago, Mathijs Kok said:

 

At the same distance from the engines? Keep in mind that you are damned close to the props in the cockpit and almost in line with the propblades and with a door made of 2mm aluminum, single pane glass. The noisiest place you can be. 

 

If you have serious experience from the flight deck we like to talk to you however.

 

Hi Mathijs thanks for your reply. Yes from the same distance in the outside view (using drone camera to ensure proper distance). Do I have flight deck experience in these myself, no I do not. 

 

The issue I see is that in the outside view, most of the sound I hear is solely from the turbines. The sound of the actual prop chopping through air (that famous twotter sound) does not seem to come through in the outside view. Inside the cockpit it's replicated perfectly. 

 

If you reference this takeoff https://youtu.be/sk7D2Hvqt8I?t=100 (1:40 timestamp), you can hear the turbine sound which quickly gets overwhelmed by the prop sound as it starts to spool up). I hope this makes sense, I just tried a short takeoff like in the video and all I hear is turbine. 

[zaki87 30]

Thanks you for the Twotter! 

I really like the plane and looks nice and flies nice, but that sound issues are absolutly not what I expected.  When can we expect that sound patch? A bit disappointed  at this stage, plane stays grounded till fixed.

Could be a 5/5, soon.

 

[abennett 41]

Great to hear that you are aware of the sounds issues and have things set for an update?

 

Is it advisable to run this aircraft with default sound or headphone simulation in the settings? The CRJ is the only aircraft I have that I need to use headphone simulation otherwise I hear the outside wind in the cockpit and so wondered if you developed all aircraft with the headphone simulation setting in use?

 

Andrew

[Payt Laros 28]

Just for illustration of what it SHOULD sound like, listen to this:

 

 

Another thing missing is WIND sound. In most planes that fly at some speed, you'll start hearing the airplane cutting through the air. You can hear it really well here:

 

 

It really helps with the immersion. And the wind sound is pretty simple: it's basically filtered white noise that increases in volume and gains more high frequencies (like a cutoff filter opening up) as you fly faster.

 

Comeon peeps! Sound is half the experience of flying a plane. I'll admit I'm a bit of a sound nut, but as you can see in just this thread and the one on the MSFS forum, it's really important to LOTS of virtual pilots. And now we have the means to make it such a convincing experience. Having really good sound actually SELLS planes. Just have a look at the Just Flight Hawk or the Kodiak. I'm sure the fact that those planes had incredible sound helped make them the successes they are!

[paulwareiNG 23]

Add me to the list.  Way too loud (compared to all my other aircraft), and all transitions are way too harsh.

 

[Aerosoft Team [Inactive Account] 51558]

Again, can I ask people to read what was said? Just repeating things does not really anybody.

Also we learned the hard way NEVER to use YouTube videos as a reference. Unless you are using professional sound equipment a small microphone simply picks up very different frequencies than  human ear. 

 

If there are any real pilots we would gladly use there comments, but saying it is way too loud without any real world reference while the pilots who assist us simply say it is not too loud and that you sit 2 meters from a prop with just 2 mm aluminium between you and that prop. How many other sim aircraft do you have like that?  Of course we can make things less loud, but as far as we can see it at this moment it simply would be less realistic. So again, if you have experience in a Twin Otter cockpit, do let us know.

 

[ReproCase 17]

1 minute ago, Mathijs Kok said:

Again, can I ask people to read what was said? Just repeating things does not really anybody.

Also we learned the hard way NEVER to use YouTube videos as a reference. Unless you are using professional sound equipment a small microphone simply picks up very different frequencies than  human ear. 

 

Having read all that has been said, let me add this:

The plane is wonderful and a pleasure to fly. The sounds really are a challenge to enjoy at the moment.

At the moment, with all sound sliders at 100%, spatial sound on, I measure a sound output during the takeoff roll which is only 1dB louder than at ground idle. This is surely not correct. The audio also appears to be clipping. A cockpit video of a twin otter during runup and takeoff posted to youtube has a difference of +5.5dB for the runup and takeoff as compared to ground idle, and the audio on this video is surely compressed, both by the iPhone / Go Pro, and by the subsequent post-processing. No cheap recording devices add dynamic range, they lose it. I use this as a reference not to say that it should sound as it does on YouTube, but as a point of critique that somehow this aircraft in the sim has less dynamic range than a youtube video.

Other loud piston and turboprop aircraft in MSFS have an idle vs takeoff SPL contrast of +12dB (a famous four engine piston airliner) and +4dB (a particularly loud little push-pull aircraft). I have made these measurements using Audacity's Contrast Analysis tool and by recording the sound outputs from the simulator directly thus eliminating any environmental effects of my space.

Quite simply: there is absolutely no contrast. It is as loud as possible, all the time. I see the audio output clipping in every phase of flight. This is measurably incorrect.

As for the user experience: I think we all understand that the plane is very loud, but are indeed struggling with how much louder it is than everything else; it is so loud that one must turn down the engine and environment volumes for it to co-exist with anything else on the computer. It could sound exactly as it does, at a lower decibel level. If one wants it to be loud, they can simply turn it up for the same experience. As it is, we are all turning these volumes down for the aircraft to co-exist with anything else (voice chat, youtube, people streaming, all are doing the same thing to balance this). In comparing the DHC-6 to other add-on aircraft which are similarly famously loud the Twotter is 10+dB louder; over twice as loud. The only aircraft I could find to match the SPL of the DHC-6 was an F-14, in the external view, at full afterburner, to match the twotter's interior on the takeoff roll.

While it is certainly most important to accurately re-create the sound of the interior of the aircraft, I believe it is also important to acknowledge and respect that an end user's volume control is an expectation, and that if one thing is twice as loud as everything else at the same volume settings we are not respecting that element of the user experience.

I would humbly suggest that the best experience would be one where all other sound settings being equal the twotter is loud, but not "far too loud" and that throughout the phases of flight the *relative* volume levels are correct. This latter part is critically absent at the moment.

[Aerosoft Team [Inactive Account] 51558]

8 minutes ago, paulwareiNG said:

Add me to the list.  Way too loud (compared to all my other aircraft), and all transitions are way too harsh.

 

 

And in what of your other aircraft are you sitting 2 meters from the props in a cockpit that has zero sound dampening? 

[Payt Laros 28]

Hi Again Matthijs,

 

I think you may be right about the volume. In the twotter it's probably incredibly noisy when those 2 props are are spining at full power. The volume is probably accurately represented in the current mix.

 

It would be much more acceptable if the pitch/crossfading issue was addressed. I'm sorry if I and other keep repeating that, but that's probably because the feedback we're getting doesn't really acknowledge that you understand what we're saying. If that's the case, please let me know, and I'll try to find another way of explaining it.

[Aerosoft Team [Inactive Account] 51558]

4 minutes ago, ReproCase said:

In comparing the DHC-6 to other add-on aircraft which are similarly famously loud the Twotter is 10+dB louder; over twice as loud

 

You compare it to other aircraft, exactly to what aircraft?  Any 1970 aircraft, two very very loud props (the design was not aimed at a sound reduction, the prop bladed 2 meters from your seat, prop blade pointed at you (where the sound is the loudest), zero sound dampening, non-pressurized cabin (so totally open to the outside), single 3 mm plexiglass window. 

 

Again, we do listen to the people who spend a lifetime on the flight deck and to our customers. But if the real pilots tell us thing are correct and customers expect something else, without being able to compare to the real world, we have to make a choice. If people want it softer, we sure can. Does that make the current sound set incorrect in volume, certainly not.

[Aerosoft Team [Inactive Account] 51558]

Just now, Payt Laros said:

Hi Again Matthijs,

 

I think you may be right about the volume. In the twotter it's probably incredibly noisy when those 2 props are are spining at full power. The volume is probably accurately represented in the current mix.

 

It would be much more acceptable if the pitch/crossfading issue was addressed. I'm sorry if I and other keep repeating that, but that's probably because the feedback we're getting doesn't really acknowledge that you understand what we're saying. If that's the case, please let me know, and I'll try to find another way of explaining it.

 

And we said that will be looked at. I gladly repeat that.

[BenKorek2021 23]

1 hour ago, Mathijs Kok said:

 

The comments are being looked at very seriously, to some degree they are caused by users using the aircraft different to what our advisory pilots do. If you check the sounds video Jeroen did, you notice that, while not perfect, the issue is far less obvious.

 

That's encouraging. Thank you, as always.

 

With regard to @Moach's original comment about the layering of the sound transitions: I recognize Moach's user name from the Kerbal Space Program forums from several years ago. If he's the same person I knew there, then he's got credentials in the computer gaming industry and I would hope his comments are given due consideration.

[Aerosoft Team [Inactive Account] 51558]

2 minutes ago, Joe Markowski said:

And the point is well taken about the proximity to the props and the thin skin of the aircraft, but are the sounds presented representative of the aircraft with or without hearing protection?

 

Without. if you make a sound set that plays things as they are heard with a well-fitting, modern noise-cancelling headphone (not a consumer-grade one), most customers would call us crazy as it sounds NOTHING like the sounds they know a Twin Otter makes. We might do one, but in MSFS soundsets are extremely expensive to make, and again as I said, most customers would never use it asd they would think it sounds nothing like a Twin Otter.

[Payt Laros 28]

3 minutes ago, Mathijs Kok said:

 

And we said that will be looked at. I gladly repeat that.

Thank you so much.. haha.. Sorry if my droning on is annoying

 

Anyway I'm of for another spin in the twotter!

[Aerosoft Team [Inactive Account] 51558]

Friends, as I believe everything possible that can be said, has been said, I suggest we let this one rest for now.

 

If you feel you should still need to explain you believe the sounds is way too loud, tell me if you have real-world experience or at least what aircraft that you compare it to (a 1970 aircraft, two very very loud props (the design was not aimed at a sound reduction), the prop bladed 2 meters from your seat, prop blade pointed at you (where the sound is the loudest), zero sound dampening, non-pressurized cabin (so totally open to the outside), single 3 mm plexiglass window.) feel free to do so.
 

[BenKorek2021 23]

2 minutes ago, Mathijs Kok said:

 

Without. if you make a sound set that plays things as they are heard with a well-fitting, modern noise-cancelling headphone (not a consumer-grade one), most customers would call us crazy as it sounds NOTHING like the sounds they know a Twin Otter makes. We might do one, but in MSFS soundsets are extremely expensive to make, and again as I said, most customers would never use it asd they would think it sounds nothing like a Twin Otter.

 

I'm fine with it, so long as I can still hear ATC. I've started dabbling in Vatsim and I expect to be using Vatsim even more when I start flying IFR in this aircraft. As it is, I find that it is already often hard to hear the Vatsim controllers in the other aircraft that I fly. If this one is too noisy to hear the controllers, that's going to be a problem.

[ReproCase 17]

17 minutes ago, Mathijs Kok said:

 

You compare it to other aircraft, exactly to what aircraft?  Any 1970 aircraft, two very very loud props (the design was not aimed at a sound reduction, the prop bladed 2 meters from your seat, prop blade pointed at you (where the sound is the loudest), zero sound dampening, non-pressurized cabin (so totally open to the outside), single 3 mm plexiglass window. 

 

Again, we do listen to the people who spend a lifetime on the flight deck and to our customers. But if the real pilots tell us thing are correct and customers expect something else, without being able to compare to the real world, we have to make a choice. If people want it softer, we sure can. Does that make the current sound set incorrect in volume, certainly not.

To a DC-6. From the outside, next to the props. And to an F-14, at full afterburner, from the outside, next to the nozzles.

But relative loudness compared to other "really loud" things in the sim, the most critical thing I am trying to say is this: the DHC-6 sounds in the sim have no dynamic range. Idle is loud. Takeoff is loud. Cruise is loud. The SPL output from the sim for all these scenarios is +/-1dB. Surely sometimes it is louder than others. It is as if we have recreated the perceptual experience of being an old deaf Twotter pilot with tinnitus, which is perhaps exactly what has happened.

An edit for clarity: it is about equal to these other two as viewed from the outside. It is +10dB louder than the DC-6 from the cockpit position, which is obviously different as it is far forward of the props. Again, the lack of dynamic range within the DHC-6 experience is certainly a challenge. 
 

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[Eirik Christoffersen 51]

I think you guys should talk to Asobo and get some tips on how to use Wwise sound editor. Those rpm crossfades in the twin otter is the weirdest thing i ever heard in a turboprop aircraft.

[Aerosoft Team [Inactive Account] 51558]

4 minutes ago, Eirik Christoffersen said:

I think you guys should talk to Asobo and get some tips on how to use Wwise sound editor. Those rpm crossfades in the twin otter is the weirdest thing i ever heard in a turboprop aircraft.

 

Okay, I'll say it one more time, we are going to look at that.

 

If people think the engines are too loud there is of course always the option lower them. The sim has that option:

 

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[Aerosoft Team [Inactive Account] 51558]

I am sorry, I am locking this for the evening, we fully understand what some people believe should be done and we will discuss it. Repeating things over and over simply makes no sense and just costs time for everybody.

 

If there are other comments on the sounds we would gladly hear about those of course.