Headphones?

[warpig1]

Why are headphones marked left and right? Do we have different hearing in each ear, or is it something to do with different sides of the brain? Just wondered.

[Loosehead]

They are stereo, different bits of the sound come out of each side. As opposed to mono when the full sound comes out of each side. The whole sound is designed to come to your ears as if the player was just above and in from of your head. So for best sound put them on correctly. It's not a disaster to put them on the wong way round though. Try just listening to one side you'll find half the sound gone.

[chazza]

Some are also slightly differently shaped (mirror images of each other) to fit the shapes of your ears better

[ll_billym]

For instance if you are watching a film in stereo where a car moves from left to right on the screen, the sound will go from left to right also. This also applies to the position of people on screen, and off screen noises. You would almost certainly notice this after a few minutes of watching, I know I do!!

[john91]

also for orchestras, where the various groups of instruments are in set positions, you would want a recording to sound the same as a live performance.

[warpig1]

Thank you all, maybe I am just a bit thick today, d'oh.