Measuring to get your monitors at the right angle?

[Bass Music]

How would a studio measure to get their monitors pointing perfectly at a 30 degree angle?

I've been setting up my studio and just got some A7x's so need everything to be perfect. Cheers

[B-Frank]

I really do think people take it a little too seriously if they do that. I mean, unless you want to stick your head in some fixed supports to make sure it doesnt move the angle will change as your body does. Get it close enough and you will be fine.

[Sharmaji]

after the space is built out, the mic's and gear are purchased and installed, the cables wired up, the electrical and a/c working, the finishes built, the acoustics measured and controlled, the desk (if it has one) commissioned, and the aero chairs rolled in...

folks might get down to measuring nearfield monitors. more often though, they got either on stands or on top of the desk, and if they look like they're looking at you at an equal angle and equidistant, that's enough.

we're making music here, not landing the space shuttle.

besides, sound changes as you move around a room. it SHOULD sound differently from 10' back as opposed to right up by your nearfields.

a mastering room is a different story, of course, as you're looking to create as big, and as sweet, a sweet spot as possible. but most production rooms do not go apeshit over the location of their relatively-cheap nearfield monitors.

[atticuh]

a mastering room is a different story, of course, as you're looking to create as big, and as sweet, a sweet spot as possible. but most production rooms do not go apeshit over the location of their relatively-cheap nearfield monitors.

It may be a matter of preference for most, but after I measured out my setup so that my speakers were equidistant from each other as well as from me, it was much easier to mixdown as the stereo image seemed much wider.

How would a studio measure to get their monitors pointing perfectly at a 30 degree angle?

I've been setting up my studio and just got some A7x's so need everything to be perfect. Cheers

I've set up my speakers so that the distance from the sweetspot to both speakers is the same distance as the distance between the left and right speakers. The positioning would look like an isosceles triangle with the sweet spot and 2 speakers each being points on the triangle, angled inward at 45 degrees. IMO if you must have a 30 degree angle, get out the measuring tape and brush up on your geometry/trigonometry.

[flex vector]

This is a pretty good watch if you're interested in monitor placement and room treatment.

[Kaslo]

we're making music here, not landing the space shuttle.

You get more tunes done when you're not worrying about acoustic anomalies anyway. That kind of fuss is just a form of procrastination I figure - like obsessively cleaning your room and making sure you're "in the vibe" before writing a term paper.

[VirtualMark]

[quote="Sharmaji"]we're making music here, not landing the space shuttle. [/quote

this. just get them an equal distance from your head and each other. more importantly, make sure to treat the room as reflections and standing waves will be the biggest problem in most rooms. also cross check your mix on headphones and other peoples systems. its pretty much impossible to get a perfect monitoring setup, especially at home.

[Suangi]

if you must have a 30 degree angle, get out the measuring tape and brush up on your geometry/trigonometry.

yeah, and buy a protractor. they're like 10 cents, or pence or whatever.

[Kilo beats]

I am in the process of building a studio and treating my room.. I watched that episode of Pensado's Place: #21 - The secrets behind tuning your room and I made notes for my refrence while doing the build..

Im putting the notes on here so if you dont want to watch the hour long vid you can read my condenced version.. sorry about spelling, it was very late when i took notes


Pensado's Place: #21 - The secrets behind tuning your room!
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AUTe7F0Q ... r_embedded#!

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70% of what you can do for yourself is finding that one magic place in the room where the speakers and the listner want to be, there will be ONE PLACE in the room that will sound best

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get the room sounding as good as possible without and use EQ as a last resort.

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70% listner & speaker placment
-minimise speaker/boundary interaction (200hz and below)

25% accoustical treatment
-solve first order reflections (absorption)
-adjust room size perception (diffusion)
-solve bass issues (traps)

5% EQ
-icing on the cake/ fine tuning
-apply standards (dolby X-curve)

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EQ's in room treatment

in certian cases EQs can address low frequency problems that otherwise would be too costly to do or if you dont have enough space to address low frequency problems, EQs can then take more of that percentage and can sometimes even save your butt!

Bob Hodas generally does "cut only" EQ on the room - this is normally the first point of call. boosting is dangerous for a few reasons

1) every time you boost you take headroom out of your system, so by adding 6db of boost you are basiclly taking half the headroom of the frequency out, so you can drive your system into overload more easily.

2) if you have a cancelation creating a hole the more energy you boost into it the increase in the "out of phaze" ness caused by the canceling if a hole is more than 6db in a room you generally want t address it accousticly rather than by EQ

low frequencys are the main problem as they are the hardest to control, high frequencys are really easy to control.

speakers are omni directional below 200hz

the best way to even out the frequency responce is to MOVE THE SPEAKERS & THE LISTNING POSITION AROUND until the reflections coming off the walls & ceiling "comb" themselves into a "fairly" flat responce ( also can use room EQ wizard?)

moving the speakers 4-6 inches can show you a significant diffrence

try to find the best placment for your speakers that give you the smoothest bass responce, then it becomes easier to find the first order reflections.

when moving speakers around focus & listen mainly on the low frequencys, as high frequencys are prettys easy to controll

common accoustic foam has little mass and is only good for first reflections/ high frequency absorption, not good for absorbing low frequencys because low frequency wavelengths are bigger. A 100hz wavelength is 11ft wide (132 inch), so in order to absorb 100hz you wan about 2.5ft (30 inch) of trapping. accoustic foam is only good for about 3000-4000hz and up.

a good way to get better results from 4" bass traps/ foam is to leave a gap behind it by giving it an airspace and move it out a couple of feet (2-4"), all of a sudden the wave has to go through the foam/ panel, hit the wall, come back through the air, hit the foam again, and come back out.. doing this will help controll the low frequencys better than just having them flat against the wall

note that you can find a spot in the room where the bass sounds great but the stereo imaging is poor, this is due to not being in an "equilateral relationship" with the speaker.

The equilateral Triangle.

The diffrence between the left & right speakers should be fairly close to the distance from one of the speakers to the listner. if you imagine a equilateral trianle of 3x 60 degree angles you should be positioned "inside" the triangle just a little bit, because if you are seated directly at the apex then you will fade in and out of the center image every time you move your head slightly. Speakers should be "focsed" or "meeting" just behind your head. generally if a room is particularly small or has very bd accoustics, the "sweet spot" could be no bigger than the size of a watermellon even after treatment

symmetry is the most important thing ever in setting up a room becuase symmetry (e.g speakers the same distance from the front & side wall, not stacking all gear up in one side of the room, etc) will greatly effect how the bass behaves in the room. If you want good stereo imaging you need the speakers to peform the same with the same frequency response..

symmetry is the main starting point

Advantages of symmetry.

-applies to walls, equipment & speakers
-accoustical treatment works for both speakers
-beter side to side imaging
-better center image

if your 2 speakers have a diffrent frequency responce you will have phase cancelations in the center (due to sound bouncing off walls)

the problem trying to controll low frequencys is the addition and cancelation of certian low frequencys based on first reflections from the walls - 200hz and below is "omni-directional" by having speakers built into the wall you eliminate one boundary = less reflections

it can sometimes be worth putting speakers near a wall/ in corners in order to use the build up of bass there to get a better responce. although this should be approached with caution as it may lead to a 3db to 6db increase in low frequencys that may give a false picture! experment with placment to find the best place.

whatever works, works.. no rules of thumb, if it sounds good, it is good.

measure with things like room wizard to test the room.

even something like having your desk against a window can be good, the sound going straight out the window may reduce interfearance, it may not. ultimatly - where does the bass give you the best responce? listen, and test by taking mesurements!

rule of thumb - you want your speakers 2ft (24") away from any boundary (front & side walls), but again, this does not work for every room

bass traps in corners are a good starting point, but beware because you may be sucking out frequencys that you DONT want to suck out, everything is interactive.

if you dont have room wizard or a similar tool, get a freind to move round the room with a panel/trap while you sit in your listening postion until you find the best spot.. when treating a room you cant just put panels anywhere and expect them to work.

for bobs home made bass traps he uses 2 to 4 inch 703 (or rockwool equivalnt) glued to a sandwich of sound board (crumbly brown stuff, used to be used in construction - johns manville sound board?? kind of like the stuff in drop ceilings, but not as dence.

the way these traps work is they turn sound enegry into heat by movment, this how they absorb the fequency, they move a little bit and it transfers the energy. the waves pass through soundboard and makes it move.

Bass Traps.
-more universal fix throughout room

-larger sweet spot

-trap styles
tuned membranes/ broadband & low frequency
large broadband
electronic tunable trap

-always measure
not all corners are bad
placement critical


newby room treatment - speaker placment

use RPG room optimiser to get a good idea of speaker placement & first order reflection points - £100(80% success rate) http://www.rpginc.com - saves you a LOT of time

51:09 - the "mirror" trick - how to find first high frequency reflections

[AxeD]

You could always produce the music and when you're satisfied with it, take it to a studio.