Editroom in a small space

[RCA]

hi all,
I had to move all my equipment because we had to move to a new smaller house 3 rooms

This means I have not much more than a small room for my editroom.

Our house has a flat roof.
All the rooms got angled walls on the side where the windows are.
So last night I tried to build a 3D graphic of my new room.

This is how I thing it is should be, but I got still some questions.

Fist of all, the angled wall with the window.
I made new walls for the main monitoring system.
I know it is not good to have that angled space their.

Question :

Is it a good idea to put a second window in front of the window, so the their is a new glass wall that is standing up straid?
See second image

I build the sublow speakers in a small box below the window.
Is this a good place or should I place them under the main monitoring system in the same angled wall ?

Because I can not build a lot of new walls i tryed to make a reflection free zone by adding frames with insulation on the walls in line with the mixing colsole.

Is this correct or did I do it completly wrong

Behind the mixing console I add a wall with insulation and cloth to absorb reflections from behind.
But I'm affraid that it will be to much so that their is no longer much life in the room .

Chould this happen ?
And how will I know if this is going to happen ?

The rest of the room is wood ( yellows and reds )

Is their somebody who has more tips or ideas to make changes to this design ?

Many thanks

original idea:


With extra window :


Sub speaker at their new place :

[knightfly]

If there really will be that small a space next to your soffited mains, then I doubt you'll see much gain from soffiting at all; you need a much wider flat surface baffle extension to see the 2 pi space happening.

In that configuration, leaving the window slanted downward should actually improve imaging at the mix position; it will direct any difraction from speakers downward to the floor, and from there to the wall behind the mix position... Steve

[RCA]

Dear steve,

Thank you for your quick reply.
Let me see if I understand this correctly.

In this case is soffiting only show and doesn't give it that extras what it normally would do.
Please notice that this drawing is not exactly , the extra wall are going to be 1.5 meters and the speakers which are build in approx. 40 cm (width )
the space for the window is 2.0 meters. ( this for extra information )

Now I understand from your message that in my case the angled window is nothing else but positive.
If I put glass in front of it, it will be a negative choice.

So what whould you advice me in my case
Leave the space for what is is, and put the main monitor system
just behind the mixing console and get rid of the soffited speakers ?
Then the angled wall will be much larger.

extra information which I didn't mention :

Depth : 4.5 meters without the angled part
height : 3.1 meters
Width : approx. 4.5 meters / 5 meters ( ...my mind left my for a moment , sorry )

Like I said, it isn't all that big but I have to work with it
That is why I bring all the 19"gear on line with the console

Computer systems will be put away in the box that I had in mind for the sub low system.

hope that this bit of extra information can help you and the other any further.

Chris

[knightfly]

Your nearly identical length and width will make the room harder to treat, so maybe the soffits should stay - do you have either pix or sketch of the REAL space you can post? Might show something you've not yet considered... Steve

[RCA]

I know that this isn't what we like to call, the right room for it.
But I think that is the challenge, so I do not give up that easily.

I really like to understand the way studio design works so I will keep trying.

I put up some extra walls for the main monitoring system, knowing the fact that it isn’t an ideal room.
I thought that by reducing / cancel the extra waveforms which normally come from behind the speakers, this should mean less problems and thus less room optimization and they work like basstraps.

I write this down, so you can read how I was thinking while making this design.
Maybe I think wrong and like to know that.

You ask for an image or a drawing of the room, so here it is.
Notice the strange shape.



====== Edit post ======

I attached an image of the house.
Only we got one big window instead of two small ones.
As you can see, their is no extra space above the room which we can rebuild and we got no permission to build a space on top of the roof.



Chris

[knightfly]

That window makes things tough to figure; it reduces the baffle width if soffits are built, which will narrow the sweet spot by causing horn loading. Also, side wall absorbers would need to be 100mm thick spaced off the walls by 100mm - this whether or not you soffit the speakers.

IF you soffit, and make the mix position an equilateral triangle, it will put your head only about 2 M from the rear wall and make the mix triangle about 3 M per side.

For that reason, I think I'd try NOT soffiting first; instead, placing speakers on stands closer to the window, and placing thick rockwool absorbers behind the speakers to reduce SBIR effects. Subs will need careful placement to avoid modal peaks/nulls, check out the papers on this here

http://www.harman.com/wp/index.jsp?articleId=default

HTH... Steve

[RCA]

Thanks for your remarks steve.
I made a new drawing and used your advice.
Something like this should be the only correct thing to do.




I will leave the soffit for what they are and will place the speakers closer to the window on stands.
some how the room gives a nice quiet look without the buildin speakers.

I made a small test setup, and I think there is no need for the subsystem, however it can work with one subwoofer.

When there is time I will make a table for speaker placement and will post the results here.

Thanks again

Chris

[RCA]

Last night I had some time left so I made a start with the frequency layout
(see below.)
I also calculated the first 10 frequencies for the height / length and height.

These calculations shows me that there are 4 problem zones.
the calculations are listed below.

First I will start by writting down the calculation results :
I calculated this values with the following formula : (c/2)x(mode/wall in meters)
where c = 340 m/s

Code: Select all

Height : 3.10 meter               Width: 5.0 meter                Length: 4.60 meter
54,84                                   34                                   36,96
109,68                                  68                                   73,91
164,52                                  102                                  110,87
219,35                                  136                                  147,83
274,19                                  170                                  148,78
329,03                                  204                                  221,74
383,87                                  238                                  258,70
438,71                                  272                                  295,65
493,55                                  306                                  332,61
548,39                                  340                                  369,57

As you can see their are 4 (??) bad combinations :

Height combined with Length : 109,68 with 110,87
Height combined with Length : 219,35 with 221,74
Width combined with Length : 306 with 332,61
Width combined with Height : 272 with 274,19


frequency layout




But I doubt this is correct .

notice that I have at the bottom (drawing) / left side when I sit at mixposition less good places to place my main montors.
I guess that when a room is symethric the places to put my main monitors
should be the same at the left and right side.

Is their someone how can explain this or tell me what I did wrong ?

Chris.

[knightfly]

You're right, symmetry is same both sides of center; I'm not sure I understand your question, I don't see any un-balanced situation there. Also, I ran your dimensions (using average room length because of the sloped wall) and came up with only one shortcoming; a slight "hole" in response around 35-40 hZ. I use a spreadsheet developed by Jeff Szymanski of Auralex, and it does all three types of modes (tangential and oblique as well as axial) - this will, a lot of the time, smooth out what might look like a bad room.

For a starting point, I would use the room length measured at woofer height for placement starting points; keep in mind though, that these are JUST starting points; it's not uncommon for tangential and oblique modes to get in the way of using this method. Listening and testing will always be necessary to be sure... Steve

[RCA]

Steve,

With the last remark about the room I mean the following
My console will be faced to the window.
If so than I will look at the window and will have 4 layers of green spots on the rightside and only 3 layers of green spot on the left.



I just donwloaded the room calculator you wrote down earlier.
But some how I can't put my finger on the fact you just get one little dip in the 30-40 hz region.

I think I'm gona sell cars instead
It is damm hard to handle acoustics and understand it.

Anyway I will keep trying.


Thanks for your help so far.

Chris[/img]

[knightfly]

Chris, have patience; I've been studying this stuff since 1982, and STILL don't know squat

If your room is symmetrical, and your desk is centered and your speakers are set up symmetrical, then you're using the method wrong; it MUST be balanced.

The calculator I use is called modesv2.xls, available at Studiotips.com in the tools section. If you convert your dim's to feet/inches and use the AVERAGE of your front-to-back dimensions (I used 5.1M, or 16.7 feet) - enter in all your dimensions, then do [ctrl][shift]s, [ctrl][shift]c, it will calculate; then click on the Bonello tab, and look at the bar graph; you'll see that only the 1/3 octave around 40 hZ has less than ideal amount of modes, which could cause a slight "hole" in the sound at that frequency. If your speakers start to fall off at that range, you may not even notice the difference. If you're mixing R&B or Rap, etc, you'd probably have a sub anyway... Steve

[RCA]

Steve,

I had downloaded that file that you used but the answers didn't match.
You pointed me on a fatal human error.
It looks like I forgot to press ctrl+shift+c, which made the update for the graphics to fail.

And I see now what you ment by a hole in the 30-40Hz range.
Well you told me that it was no problem if the speakers don't reach that far and they do not.
From now on I'm goning to work with the old version of KRK/ KROK
If I'm correct the are going up to 60 Hz so I realy need a nice sub for the lower freqecies.
There are times I work on projects. Mostly Jazz / Blues and Irishmusic so I need that sub I guess.

Ok so now we know I miss a part of the spectrum, but how to go on from here?

I can't see extreem peaks or holes in the "modes" graphic.
Does this mean the room isn't all that bad as I thought before?

All the blue bars from the Bonello graphic are higher than the red ons except for the one at 30-40Hz.
If I understood the "help" text on the left side, this is a good thing (?)

I have still much to learn but I don't mind.
I like music and acoustics very much and I still got plenty of time to study.


Well back to the drawingboard.......


Chris

[knightfly]

Yup, we're on the same wavelength now; also, with a sub it'd be possible to use SBIR to your advantage by placing the sub so it's cone is the right distance from a wall to emphasize 40 hZ range - I don't have time to calculate that right now and may be "talking out my butt", since that's a low frequency/long wavelength, but maybe worth looking at... Steve

[RCA]

Steve, Thank you again for all your advice.
I still haven't worked things out with the sub.
But maybe you can explain to me what SBIR means ?
Maybe I know it in other words, the dutch words I mean, but I can't place them

I found out that I didn't had enough space for my equipment so I added 2 extra racks.
I hope you and John like the image I made so far with all the the information you gave me and the things I found at the discussionboard.



Explaining the image :

The red panels are absorbers to prevent reflection of the front walls
For the same reason there is hanging a red panel on the ceiling to prevent reflections from above.

The wooden panels on the left and right side are Panel absorbers
so there is some insulation to the house next door and to keep some life in the room.

The back wall is not far away and should be reflect the sound because it will damage the stereo image but the problem will then that their is to much "dead" material in the room which kills life of the room.

The wooden box on the right next to the console will be a computer case.
Their will be 3 or more havy computers in that case ( lots of noise ) so that case will be filled with insulation to prevent that noise will be escaping from the case.

The yellow bar right on the floor will be a duct for all the cables.
Maybe it is going to sit behind the wall.

So Steve / John What do you think of this design ???

Chris.