LM6

Every day, millions of people adjust their level controls over and over. Why? Because of the most fundamental audio issue of all – the control of loudness. Rather than just measuring peak levels, LM6 combine frequency weighting with an energy-integrated measure of sound, or equivalent continuous sound level, abbreviated Leq. Broadcast has standardized on Leq(K) for measuring loudness, and for the balancing of programs.

Previous level control methods are responsible for unacceptable level jumps in television, for music CDs getting increasingly distorted, and for different audio formats and program genres becoming incompatible: Pristine music tracks from the past don't co-exist with new recordings, TV commercials don't fit drama, classical music or film and broadcast doesn't match. The most fundamental audio issue of all - control of loudness - every day makes millions of people adjust the volume control over and over again.

Compliant with e.g. ITU-R BS.1770-2, EBU R128 and ATSC A/85, LM6 offers you a standardized and intuitively correct step forward. You can use these loudness radar meters for precise balancing and tight specification of any type of audio signal, and they cover both mono, stereo and 5.1 surround.

SETUP
Detailed parameters, including logging setup, are
located on the Setup Page.
In a multi-platform world, it is also important that delivery criteria can be easily specified and met even by people not primarily concerned with audio. LM6 empowers the production engineer/musician/journalist to visualize the loudness tolerance of the consumer under different listening conditions. With standardized loudness control in place in the studio, less level correction is needed downstream, with better audio quality the result. For platforms where range restriction is needed, audio results are also improved because foreground and background elements of a mix automatically retains their relative position. LM6 consequently enables easy level management across distribution and broadcast platforms without the need for extensive metadata maintenance.

LM6 displays real-time Loudness (LU or LUFS) and True-peak level along with Loudness History (1 minute to 24 hours) in the Radar View. The angular, color-coded display makes it easy for you to balance audio visually, and to see when level falls below or exceeds the end-listener's Loudness Range Tolerance. The True-peak level display warns you when excessive level is at the risk of creating distortion in downstream equipment such as data reduction codecs or converters.

STATISTICS
LM6 keeps track of detailed statistics that can be saved
to a standard formatted text file.
Further, LM6 adds two Universal Descriptors, by which the entire loudness 'landscape' of a program, film or music track can be precisely characterized. LM6 improves the quality of your audio and reduces level jumps on all distribution platforms from Mobile TV and iPod to HDTV using AAC or Dolby AC3, and work coherently together with TC equipment - as well as equipment of other brands adhering to the BS.1770-2 standard.