This was my favourite vide of yours to date. Great explanation of the thought process and methods that brought you to a great solution for that venue. Thank you for sharing.
Hey Micheal, thank you for showing the analytical process to improve that soundsystem. It really shows how important positioning of the speakers is in this case. When I was watching 2 questions came to mind: 1. Would'nt a C-weighted curve be a more accurate representation of the response at higher volumes? 2. Wouldn't the STI also be an important metric for this application? Introducing Relays definetly improves direct sound converage but seeing how much the STI changes (and if directional sources or acoustic solutions are advisable in the future), would be interesting.
Hey, Tim. Great questions and insights here. Although some perspectives do use C-weighting when working at higher volumes, I personally use A-weighting for point sources knowing that I have such little control over frequencies below 200Hz or so since frequencies below that point are basically omnidirectional. So I want to measure knowing what I can control. And yes, STI is helpful, but such few design softwares I use incorporate that metric and I also knew that the church would not be investing in additional sound damping for now, so my main guiding principle was HF coverage.
@@MichaelCurtisAudio Hey Micheal, since A-weighting already has a 20dB decrease from 1000 Hz down to 100 Hz, frequencies over 200 Hz are also effected in your measurements. Also I would argue, you do have some control over the low frequencies (EQ, Amplification). Also keep in mind we are measuring something (trying to represent reality). If you say you cant control frequencies below 200 Hz and therefore use A-Weighting, why not highpass the measurement over 200 Hz and get an even clearer representation of the frequencies you can control. Also I'm wondering: if you don't have a metric measuring "Crystal Clearness" (for example STI) how do you quantify that? I know Flat Response and Loudness in the 1k-6k Hz range contribute to Speech intelligibility but other factors are also important (background noise, Reverberation, psychoacoustic masking, Distortion etc.). So How can you be certain about your result, without that metric. Don't get me wrong, I don't want to be nitpicky. Just thinking loudly and trying to understand more through asking questions.
Thanks, Michael Curtis For your great Explanation on Handling the Sound by additional Delay speakers to achieve a clear sound in your Event in a big or large room.
Love your vids and love how i understand all of this even how you went about fixing the problems. I have a client that will need a system setup soon wish me luck the issue is their a start up with mixed speakers plus its in a awkward shaped room with a wikd echo so yeah either its gonna be a lot of pain or a lot of fun😅
In all seriousness, the difference between this project and a Looks About Right project is that your design prediction software gives legitimacy to intuition. The other cool aspect is once the work is completed and tuned, you can take real measurements to compare against the starting point and compare against the prediction. It is about objective data to prove what is subjectively evaluated by the client.
Great question! I still think the trim height of the speakers would have been above the projector image. But if they were blocking sight lines, I would have gone with a LR pair of narrower coverage speakers, then another LR pair for the relay.
Just curious about your thoughts on system design and accounting for room reflections when choosing speaker coverage. Like is it better to go narrow and avoid slap than go wide well beyond the physical limits of the walls?
Hi Michael. Great example as always. I am currently working with a local church and we have a QSC 212C in the air. I confirmed with QSC support we can do this. The solution is a suspended shelf. Sub placed on its side with Cardiod mode active. Basically 4 mount points from the ceiling down holding up a wooden platform. Tastefully done of course. So long as you are minimum 36" below the ceiling and the top of the sub you are within full manufacturers specs. Same as placing sub under a stage requirements. Of course be sure to include some safety cables in case the shelf should fail and of course have a competent qualified contractor do the shelf to withstand a 3X weight (minium) of the sub. So basically a suspended shelf that can hold ~ 300 lbs. You can run the sub in cardiod mode. Looking at the photo of the sanctuary you have I'm thinking the sub shel is just in front of the first (front most) A frame and above the sight line for the video screen. Should still give you the minimum 36" distance between the ceiling and the top plane of the sub. Will lessen the burden of front to back volume on the sub. Plus if they upgrade in the future can still use the suspended shelf for other subs. Would love to hear your thoughts on the Western Pennsylvania Red Neck engineering approach. LoL
Thank you so much for sharing this! That's a great idea and one I've actually implemented in a different setting. I should have been clearer in saying that the sub has no native rigging hardware, but yes of course you can get it in the air with the solution you prescribed.
Thank you so much! I would first level set each speaker at on-axis mid depth in their audience zone. Then I'd walk the "seams" of the zones and find where the speakers are meeting at equal level. That's where I'd place the measurement mic and find out the propogation time difference and insert the delay on the speaker that arrives first.
I was wondering Michael, as subs are omnidirectional, in this instance wouldn't placing the sub somewhere more central in the room (under a bench or at the side for example) have been a better way to create a more even dispersion of the subs? (Then just add the appropriate delay to the sub so it's inline with the mains). Was there a reason for not doing that in this instance? I noticed no one really does center placed subs so I wondered if there was a reason for this as in my mind it seems like this would solve some issues, i'm just trying to figure out why it wouldn't work (aside from perhaps space).
Hopefully, you see this; I'm designing (attempting to) an audio system for a mid-size church. Roughly 100 people. Our new sanctuary will be 65'W×60'L. We're using RCF ART 932 tops, which have 100° wide coverage. Will 2 of these be enough? I feel like the front center will not be covered well, I considered placing a 3rd 932 mounted horizontally to avoid comb filtering.
It depends on your trim height and how close your audience is to the stage, but shooting from the hip that should be enough, at least from a horizontal coverage perspective.
@MichaelCurtisAudio Thanks for the reply! So the centered horizontal 932 shouldn't be necessary? It as an option if we need it. Edit: These speakers will be flown about 20' in the air. Seating will be roughly 10-15' from the platform, but with it being in a church, the altar area being covered is vital, hence why I'm considering adding the center speaker.
Please Michael, how do we do a proper sound design for a concert by taking into consideration the noise of the crowd especially when the artist is singing? Most times I fall into the problem of calculating based on the coverage of the speakers, taking into consideration the size of the auditorium as well. But I found out, it still doesn't cover properly when the crowd is singing alongside, usually it feels like their voice is overpowering the speakers. I end up overdriving my equipment to make the speakers subdue the crowd What's the proper way to fix this issue?
Hi MIchael - Thanks for another excellent video. Just diving into EASE Focus 3 after having been mostly in MAPP 3D. Out of interest, how did you measure the distances in side view (to be able to incorporate the Z values) to enable you go calculate your range ratio? I can only seem to measure in Top View which is assumes the same Z co-ords from point to point. Thanks in advance.
Just been able to get it with your audio maths survival spreadsheet and verified it also in MAPP 3D where you have the ruler function from object to object. I guess EASE Focus 3 doesn't have this ability.
Nope! The improved intelligibility and clarity in all seats and ~8dB more gain before feedback on the pastor's mic was a much bigger "win" for them than having a stereo image in a few seats. The center aisle (where no one sits) is the only place where the prior left and right mains met within a 5ms window to provide something resembling stereo, so no one really got a stereo image before anyway.
@@MichaelCurtisAudio any chance you could make a video about this? (Designing for or the requirements to have a stereo image in a church situation like this?) Also, if you could also cover the comment above (how the reverberant space serves as the stereo effect in a way). I’ve met a few designers that are hardcore mono for church, since there should still be about a 1-2s RT for a church to encourage congregational singing. Some FOH engineers keep pressing hard for dead rooms so they can add effects themselves to try to create that stereo experience, but it makes the congregation feel like they’re singing alone (and discourage congregational singing) Great video! Was everything done with the speaker angle plotting in EASE?
If you're wanting to stay in a similar price range to the speaker shown here, you can go with two K12.2's, two K8.2's, and two KS118's for under $8k. If you have a bit more budget and want to stay with point sources, I would look at Fulcrum-Acoustic speakers.
My assumption would have been to aim the Main and the Relay at their own section’s center seat (middle middle), not the back row. I missed the reason for this. Thanks!
You can make it as complicated as you want but the simple answer is that you wanna decrease the level variance as much as possible, if your range ratio increase more than 2to1 you have to aim speaker up to compensate the level in the back. You calculate or just aim up in ease until you get 6db front to back.
@@YiPSKiPPListened again and again and I still don’t get it. Considering the trim height which I would still expect middle of the middle as why would we want overshoot into the rear zone? He has to turn down the back zone due to the overshoot.
I wonder what impact this solution would have on intelligibility particularly for speech now that the dry/wet ratio has been negatively impacted from hanging the speaker much higher up in a potentially very reverberant space?
Great point here! Yes, raising the speakers up and away from the audience does decrease DR ratio, but only for the front seating. If both speakers were kept at the front, the back half of the room would be farther and farther away from the two mains, having the worst DR ratio.
Agreed, obviously the delays are essential in a reverberant space...I suppose my main question (as someone who doesn't use modelling software for design) does modeling software flag up for example DR ratio within its predictions or does it only focus in on SPL coverage across the frequency spectrum? I'm just concerned that too much time 'on screen' could lead a designer to overlook potential issues the software doesn't address, and perhaps push further and further into those issues in pursuit of perfect SPL. Also as a followup question...is modelling software capable of flagging up delay issues? At large outdoor concerts recently I've seen a popular design implemented with a goal post truss both sides of stage with two line array hangs per side of stage (4 in total, two mains and two outfils). These outfills are spaced 15-20M further out than the main hangs, and therefore there can be no 'correct' delay time depending on the location of the listener. On software I'm sure it predicts a nice wide coverage pattern, but when listening live particularly to something with a fast transient (eg snare drum) a pronounced 'gymnasium' effect can be heard due to the multiple arrival times, from the 4 hangs. You will hear all 4 hangs when you're in the front 1/2 of the listening space, regardless of the direction they are pointing in. I have a theory that the design software doesn't highlight this as an issue, but as I don't have much experience with the various modelling softwares, I would appreciate your thoughts.
Would you be able to use a cardioid sub as a relay? Or would there be too many phase issues to make it worth it. Obviously having a sub in the middle of the audience isn’t that practical but hypothetically speaking
Great question! You absolutely can, but sometimes, aesthetic, or other design priorities prevent that from happening. I show a project where I implemented a pretty cool cardioid relay sub array here - ruclips.net/video/Za6TJLesgQo/видео.html
Hi, i'm new to sound design and tuning. I have little confuse about subwoofer cardioid. If we make our subwoofer into cardiod setup using multiple subwoofer, does this setting also make the subwoofer to be long throw or not?
If by "long throw" you mean the coverage pattern is narrowed, then yes some cardioid setups do end up narrowing the sub's coverage pattern, namely end-fire approaches.
These bob mccarthy methods are specially useful in scenarios like this when you don't have prediction files. All this mess he's doing is not necessary when you actually have prediction software.
The QSC main and the CP8 relay speakers are not delayed, as, essentially, they are at the same point on the X-axis. The second QSC delay speaker is delayed as it is at a different point on the X-axis/room. Hope that helps
@@BritPotI think he made a point that the second K12 is not delayed either with the thinking that both speakers “own” their direct field and thus no delay necessary.
@@MichaelCurtisAudio yes thanks for the response. I have 4 Cerwin vega earthquake EL-36dp and 2 JBL dual 18 SRX 928. We don’t usually play onstage they are on ground level with us
I use the LAR calculation all the time!!! Looks About Right! 😂
This was my favourite vide of yours to date. Great explanation of the thought process and methods that brought you to a great solution for that venue. Thank you for sharing.
Thank you so much! I've got a few more similar to this one in the hopper.
I discovered your channel a few days ago and I'm so happy I found you :) I can't believe you put out all this info for free... thank you so so much
Hey Micheal, thank you for showing the analytical process to improve that soundsystem. It really shows how important positioning of the speakers is in this case. When I was watching 2 questions came to mind: 1. Would'nt a C-weighted curve be a more accurate representation of the response at higher volumes? 2. Wouldn't the STI also be an important metric for this application? Introducing Relays definetly improves direct sound converage but seeing how much the STI changes (and if directional sources or acoustic solutions are advisable in the future), would be interesting.
Hey, Tim. Great questions and insights here.
Although some perspectives do use C-weighting when working at higher volumes, I personally use A-weighting for point sources knowing that I have such little control over frequencies below 200Hz or so since frequencies below that point are basically omnidirectional. So I want to measure knowing what I can control.
And yes, STI is helpful, but such few design softwares I use incorporate that metric and I also knew that the church would not be investing in additional sound damping for now, so my main guiding principle was HF coverage.
@@MichaelCurtisAudio Hey Micheal, since A-weighting already has a 20dB decrease from 1000 Hz down to 100 Hz, frequencies over 200 Hz are also effected in your measurements. Also I would argue, you do have some control over the low frequencies (EQ, Amplification). Also keep in mind we are measuring something (trying to represent reality). If you say you cant control frequencies below 200 Hz and therefore use A-Weighting, why not highpass the measurement over 200 Hz and get an even clearer representation of the frequencies you can control. Also I'm wondering: if you don't have a metric measuring "Crystal Clearness" (for example STI) how do you quantify that? I know Flat Response and Loudness in the 1k-6k Hz range contribute to Speech intelligibility but other factors are also important (background noise, Reverberation, psychoacoustic masking, Distortion etc.). So How can you be certain about your result, without that metric. Don't get me wrong, I don't want to be nitpicky. Just thinking loudly and trying to understand more through asking questions.
Fantastic! And I'm glad my gut feeling idea was exactly the way you took the project
Thanks, Michael Curtis For your great Explanation on Handling the Sound by additional Delay speakers to achieve a clear sound in your Event in a big or large room.
You're very welcome!
Great video. The step by step walk through your thought process was helpful.
You're very welcome!
Good video. Interesting approach. And good use of the Ease software
Enjoyed the church content - Thanks
Love your vids and love how i understand all of this even how you went about fixing the problems. I have a client that will need a system setup soon wish me luck the issue is their a start up with mixed speakers plus its in a awkward shaped room with a wikd echo so yeah either its gonna be a lot of pain or a lot of fun😅
It's always a difficult, yet rewarding puzzle to solve!
Hey Michael! Great video! What is the software you're using here? Thanks!
EASE Focus 3 - ruclips.net/video/La_7mnu3Hr0/видео.html
In all seriousness, the difference between this project and a Looks About Right project is that your design prediction software gives legitimacy to intuition. The other cool aspect is once the work is completed and tuned, you can take real measurements to compare against the starting point and compare against the prediction. It is about objective data to prove what is subjectively evaluated by the client.
Yes, it's always fun to compare my Smaart traces post-tuning to what the software gave me before the tuning session!
Great stuff Micheal, I'm curious to know how you would have approached the situation if there was a screen/projector in the middle?
Great question! I still think the trim height of the speakers would have been above the projector image. But if they were blocking sight lines, I would have gone with a LR pair of narrower coverage speakers, then another LR pair for the relay.
Just curious about your thoughts on system design and accounting for room reflections when choosing speaker coverage. Like is it better to go narrow and avoid slap than go wide well beyond the physical limits of the walls?
Hi Michael. Great example as always. I am currently working with a local church and we have a QSC 212C in the air. I confirmed with QSC support we can do this.
The solution is a suspended shelf. Sub placed on its side with Cardiod mode active. Basically 4 mount points from the ceiling down holding up a wooden platform. Tastefully done of course. So long as you are minimum 36" below the ceiling and the top of the sub you are within full manufacturers specs. Same as placing sub under a stage requirements. Of course be sure to include some safety cables in case the shelf should fail and of course have a competent qualified contractor do the shelf to withstand a 3X weight (minium) of the sub. So basically a suspended shelf that can hold ~ 300 lbs. You can run the sub in cardiod mode.
Looking at the photo of the sanctuary you have I'm thinking the sub shel is just in front of the first (front most) A frame and above the sight line for the video screen. Should still give you the minimum 36" distance between the ceiling and the top plane of the sub. Will lessen the burden of front to back volume on the sub. Plus if they upgrade in the future can still use the suspended shelf for other subs.
Would love to hear your thoughts on the Western Pennsylvania Red Neck engineering approach. LoL
Thank you so much for sharing this! That's a great idea and one I've actually implemented in a different setting. I should have been clearer in saying that the sub has no native rigging hardware, but yes of course you can get it in the air with the solution you prescribed.
Hi Michael! Great example! Fantastic explanation of all considerations. What's about delaying / time aligning the various speakers?
Thank you so much! I would first level set each speaker at on-axis mid depth in their audience zone. Then I'd walk the "seams" of the zones and find where the speakers are meeting at equal level. That's where I'd place the measurement mic and find out the propogation time difference and insert the delay on the speaker that arrives first.
Thanks Michael! I'm enjoying your channel a lot!@@MichaelCurtisAudio
I was wondering Michael, as subs are omnidirectional, in this instance wouldn't placing the sub somewhere more central in the room (under a bench or at the side for example) have been a better way to create a more even dispersion of the subs? (Then just add the appropriate delay to the sub so it's inline with the mains). Was there a reason for not doing that in this instance? I noticed no one really does center placed subs so I wondered if there was a reason for this as in my mind it seems like this would solve some issues, i'm just trying to figure out why it wouldn't work (aside from perhaps space).
Hopefully, you see this; I'm designing (attempting to) an audio system for a mid-size church. Roughly 100 people. Our new sanctuary will be 65'W×60'L. We're using RCF ART 932 tops, which have 100° wide coverage. Will 2 of these be enough? I feel like the front center will not be covered well, I considered placing a 3rd 932 mounted horizontally to avoid comb filtering.
It depends on your trim height and how close your audience is to the stage, but shooting from the hip that should be enough, at least from a horizontal coverage perspective.
@MichaelCurtisAudio Thanks for the reply! So the centered horizontal 932 shouldn't be necessary? It as an option if we need it.
Edit: These speakers will be flown about 20' in the air. Seating will be roughly 10-15' from the platform, but with it being in a church, the altar area being covered is vital, hence why I'm considering adding the center speaker.
Is it possible to use this system design software (or others) to calculate for the inclusion of acoustic absorption panels?
The "full" version of EASE is able to do this. $1,200 I think?
Super nice. Thanks!
Please Michael, how do we do a proper sound design for a concert by taking into consideration the noise of the crowd especially when the artist is singing?
Most times I fall into the problem of calculating based on the coverage of the speakers, taking into consideration the size of the auditorium as well. But I found out, it still doesn't cover properly when the crowd is singing alongside, usually it feels like their voice is overpowering the speakers. I end up overdriving my equipment to make the speakers subdue the crowd
What's the proper way to fix this issue?
You need to account for higher SPL in your design. Just having the speakers that can cover that area isn’t enough.
@@jonathanhatchmusic that's my challenge. How do we calculate for the crowd. How do I know what more volume is required to suppress a crowd?
Hi MIchael - Thanks for another excellent video. Just diving into EASE Focus 3 after having been mostly in MAPP 3D. Out of interest, how did you measure the distances in side view (to be able to incorporate the Z values) to enable you go calculate your range ratio? I can only seem to measure in Top View which is assumes the same Z co-ords from point to point. Thanks in advance.
Just been able to get it with your audio maths survival spreadsheet and verified it also in MAPP 3D where you have the ruler function from object to object. I guess EASE Focus 3 doesn't have this ability.
Thanks ! Great Job!!
Thank you so much!
Were they happy? Did you get any pushback from essentially turning a stereo hang into mono?
Great question for me
Nope! The improved intelligibility and clarity in all seats and ~8dB more gain before feedback on the pastor's mic was a much bigger "win" for them than having a stereo image in a few seats. The center aisle (where no one sits) is the only place where the prior left and right mains met within a 5ms window to provide something resembling stereo, so no one really got a stereo image before anyway.
Stereo is meaningless in any reverberant space. The space IS the stereo encoder.
@@MichaelCurtisAudio any chance you could make a video about this? (Designing for or the requirements to have a stereo image in a church situation like this?)
Also, if you could also cover the comment above (how the reverberant space serves as the stereo effect in a way). I’ve met a few designers that are hardcore mono for church, since there should still be about a 1-2s RT for a church to encourage congregational singing.
Some FOH engineers keep pressing hard for dead rooms so they can add effects themselves to try to create that stereo experience, but it makes the congregation feel like they’re singing alone (and discourage congregational singing)
Great video! Was everything done with the speaker angle plotting in EASE?
Michael, we have a similar sized church. We do not have any speakers or subs yet. What would you recommend for speakers and subs?
If you're wanting to stay in a similar price range to the speaker shown here, you can go with two K12.2's, two K8.2's, and two KS118's for under $8k. If you have a bit more budget and want to stay with point sources, I would look at Fulcrum-Acoustic speakers.
So helpful!!
My assumption would have been to aim the Main and the Relay at their own section’s center seat (middle middle), not the back row. I missed the reason for this. Thanks!
12:29
You can make it as complicated as you want but the simple answer is that you wanna decrease the level variance as much as possible, if your range ratio increase more than 2to1 you have to aim speaker up to compensate the level in the back. You calculate or just aim up in ease until you get 6db front to back.
@@YiPSKiPPListened again and again and I still don’t get it. Considering the trim height which I would still expect middle of the middle as why would we want overshoot into the rear zone? He has to turn down the back zone due to the overshoot.
I would dispute the “relay vs delay”. There is no such distinction.
That said, “delay” has always been the wrong word but we just live with it.
I wonder what impact this solution would have on intelligibility particularly for speech now that the dry/wet ratio has been negatively impacted from hanging the speaker much higher up in a potentially very reverberant space?
Great point here! Yes, raising the speakers up and away from the audience does decrease DR ratio, but only for the front seating. If both speakers were kept at the front, the back half of the room would be farther and farther away from the two mains, having the worst DR ratio.
Agreed, obviously the delays are essential in a reverberant space...I suppose my main question (as someone who doesn't use modelling software for design) does modeling software flag up for example DR ratio within its predictions or does it only focus in on SPL coverage across the frequency spectrum? I'm just concerned that too much time 'on screen' could lead a designer to overlook potential issues the software doesn't address, and perhaps push further and further into those issues in pursuit of perfect SPL. Also as a followup question...is modelling software capable of flagging up delay issues? At large outdoor concerts recently I've seen a popular design implemented with a goal post truss both sides of stage with two line array hangs per side of stage (4 in total, two mains and two outfils). These outfills are spaced 15-20M further out than the main hangs, and therefore there can be no 'correct' delay time depending on the location of the listener. On software I'm sure it predicts a nice wide coverage pattern, but when listening live particularly to something with a fast transient (eg snare drum) a pronounced 'gymnasium' effect can be heard due to the multiple arrival times, from the 4 hangs. You will hear all 4 hangs when you're in the front 1/2 of the listening space, regardless of the direction they are pointing in. I have a theory that the design software doesn't highlight this as an issue, but as I don't have much experience with the various modelling softwares, I would appreciate your thoughts.
Would you be able to use a cardioid sub as a relay? Or would there be too many phase issues to make it worth it. Obviously having a sub in the middle of the audience isn’t that practical but hypothetically speaking
Great question! You absolutely can, but sometimes, aesthetic, or other design priorities prevent that from happening.
I show a project where I implemented a pretty cool cardioid relay sub array here - ruclips.net/video/Za6TJLesgQo/видео.html
Hi, i'm new to sound design and tuning. I have little confuse about subwoofer cardioid. If we make our subwoofer into cardiod setup using multiple subwoofer, does this setting also make the subwoofer to be long throw or not?
If by "long throw" you mean the coverage pattern is narrowed, then yes some cardioid setups do end up narrowing the sub's coverage pattern, namely end-fire approaches.
How would you go about this if the existing speakers didnt have a gll file that can be opened in prediction software like Ease focus 3?
These bob mccarthy methods are specially useful in scenarios like this when you don't have prediction files. All this mess he's doing is not necessary when you actually have prediction software.
Great, does it mean the relay speaker front fill and the second QSC at the center are not delayed ?
The QSC main and the CP8 relay speakers are not delayed, as, essentially, they are at the same point on the X-axis. The second QSC delay speaker is delayed as it is at a different point on the X-axis/room. Hope that helps
@@BritPotI think he made a point that the second K12 is not delayed either with the thinking that both speakers “own” their direct field and thus no delay necessary.
What would you recommend if I have 2 single 18 subs plus a dual 18 per side
Can you provide some more detail here?
@@MichaelCurtisAudio yes thanks for the response. I have 4 Cerwin vega earthquake EL-36dp and 2 JBL dual 18 SRX 928. We don’t usually play onstage they are on ground level with us
How can you see the average spl weighting in Ease focus 3?
In the upper left you can change the frequency weight to Z or A weighting, then choose the "Levels" tab on the bottom center.
@@MichaelCurtisAudio Thanks!😊👍
What is the software you’re using?
EASE Focus 3 by AFMG.
Such great and informative video!👍
Do you have an email I can contact you? … for consultation?
I have learned so much from your channel! Thank you!
The Africa thing, no you can’t the Earth is round.
Then how is the sun able to cover an entire hemisphere?