I didn't know where else to put this in here...
So I recently moved to another city for my studies. Found this nice three-room apartment for rent. The only problem is, that when mixing/listening to music all seems fine...except when there's a low B in the music, that particular note jumps out of the mix quite clearly. Since I know very little (practically nil) about acoustic treatment, I decided to post here, hoping that someone more qualified tells me what to do...
Some info:
The room is approx. 4x4x4 meters
The walls are concrete (yikes!)
The back is entirely made of closets built in the wall
Cheap acoustic treatment for my room?
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- KVRist
- Topic Starter
- 45 posts since 12 Apr, 2016 from Finland
Makes music that sounds like it came out of a game or film.
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- KVRer
- 12 posts since 24 Aug, 2016
I highly recommend anything said by the user "Yep" in this thread. He considers this the most important purchase you could make in the world of audio quality (this and monitors). Not sure if he says it in this thread, but elsewhere he has said that he would rather mix with one speaker in a properly treated room than on an SSL with every pre-amp and mic you can think of, in your average living room with even a home speaker system (since those are not for accurate listening).
http://forum.cockos.com/showthread.php?t=11882
To sum it up, concrete isn't great, and the smaller your room is, the less time there is for a single "wave" to be dispersed. And sound is omnidirectional. You will have infinite sounds bouncing around, and they will actually cancel each other out. You may know about phase cancellation. These sounds, without dispersing, are knocking into each other and creating positive and negative points throughout your room. The lower a frequency is, the longer it takes to disperse, so these are often the problem frequencies. You may hear a really big boom on the low B, but you could also hear absolutely nothing with the G above it. All sorts of problems can come up.
The big misconception about treatment is that it's essentially a "low shelf" for your room. People think this because low frequencies are usually the problem ones (your low B, for instance, takes nearly 6 meters to disperse), but the effects of low frequency standing waves actually are heard THROUGHOUT the entire spectrum. Although 1000hz takes only 0.3 meters to disperse, it could bump into a bunch of Low B's.
So lack of treatment could actually make your room sound brighter or darker than it is. It could make it sound honky. Acoustic treatment, essentially, tries to do some of the legwork for smaller rooms. Your Low B takes nearly 6m to disperse. That's around 19 feet, and it needs to happen before it reflects off of surfaces. Acoustic treatment absorbs some of it so it can disperse quicker, and the absorbed sound is turned into heat. All surfaces absorb some sound, it just so happens that concrete doesn't do it as much as a lot of surfaces.
The thread can explain it a lot better than I can. But DIY treatment, imo, is way more effective than bought treatment. I had a bad experience with Ethan Weiner's traps, though it was my fault. They are very expensive, and I figured that their regular traps would work. Turns out, they weren't big enough to absorb my lower problems, no matter where I put them. So now I just have them. Fiberglass wrapped in burlap has been crazy effective.
If you do end up treating your room, I highly recommend, before making changes, putting a microphone in front of your speakers and recording some of your favorite music. Note the volume and settings of everything. After you're done treating, use the same settings to record the same songs. Compare the before and after.
My slight treatment made the first recording of Bitch Don't Kill My Vibe sound like it was being played in a church.
http://forum.cockos.com/showthread.php?t=11882
To sum it up, concrete isn't great, and the smaller your room is, the less time there is for a single "wave" to be dispersed. And sound is omnidirectional. You will have infinite sounds bouncing around, and they will actually cancel each other out. You may know about phase cancellation. These sounds, without dispersing, are knocking into each other and creating positive and negative points throughout your room. The lower a frequency is, the longer it takes to disperse, so these are often the problem frequencies. You may hear a really big boom on the low B, but you could also hear absolutely nothing with the G above it. All sorts of problems can come up.
The big misconception about treatment is that it's essentially a "low shelf" for your room. People think this because low frequencies are usually the problem ones (your low B, for instance, takes nearly 6 meters to disperse), but the effects of low frequency standing waves actually are heard THROUGHOUT the entire spectrum. Although 1000hz takes only 0.3 meters to disperse, it could bump into a bunch of Low B's.
So lack of treatment could actually make your room sound brighter or darker than it is. It could make it sound honky. Acoustic treatment, essentially, tries to do some of the legwork for smaller rooms. Your Low B takes nearly 6m to disperse. That's around 19 feet, and it needs to happen before it reflects off of surfaces. Acoustic treatment absorbs some of it so it can disperse quicker, and the absorbed sound is turned into heat. All surfaces absorb some sound, it just so happens that concrete doesn't do it as much as a lot of surfaces.
The thread can explain it a lot better than I can. But DIY treatment, imo, is way more effective than bought treatment. I had a bad experience with Ethan Weiner's traps, though it was my fault. They are very expensive, and I figured that their regular traps would work. Turns out, they weren't big enough to absorb my lower problems, no matter where I put them. So now I just have them. Fiberglass wrapped in burlap has been crazy effective.
If you do end up treating your room, I highly recommend, before making changes, putting a microphone in front of your speakers and recording some of your favorite music. Note the volume and settings of everything. After you're done treating, use the same settings to record the same songs. Compare the before and after.
My slight treatment made the first recording of Bitch Don't Kill My Vibe sound like it was being played in a church.
