On Tue, Jul 26, 2011 at 04:35:39PM -0400, Marc Lavallée wrote: > I will do it in software. It's a domestic setup, so I don't need > expensive active speakers and cabling; I prefer to use very small > speakers with lamp cords.
Lamp cords ? Use at least 2.5 mm^2 ! > > the problem is that your listening room floor reflection will always > > be different from and stronger than the recorded floor reflection, > > which pulls the image towards the speaker circle. > > Then less reflections means less localization of the speakers? Yes, in general this is true, and it's quite logical - we use reflections to build up an 'acoustic picture' of a space, and in turn that is used to aid localisation. If the cues provided by room reflections dominate those reproduced from the recording you can't but identify the speakers as the source. > > the sad and simple fact is that _no_ surround rig can get the > > distance unambiguously right in any but anechoic conditions. > > and before you run off to shop for styrofoam, be warned that most > > recordings would sound utter crap in anechoic conditions, because > > nobody mixes for that. That is really a very valid observation. Almost all recordings rely on the listener's room acoustics to do part of the work. And studio control rooms usually have well controlled acoustics, but they are by no means anechoic. Which means that something similar is expected of the listening environment. > What I expect from listening to ambisonic recordings is a better > envelopment and a sense of realism not found in stereo recordings. I > also expect some new experiences from field recordings and > electroacoustic music for ambisonics. I also want to compare ambisonics > to other reproduction methods; maybe stereo and 5.1 are not so bad... They are not. Very nice results can be achieved with either. > The other use for all those speakers is to add a bit of hall > reverberation to some dry stereo recordings. Depends a bit on the type of music you are listening to, but in general that is a good idea for any type of music that is normally played in concert hall like environments. There is another thing which I can't explain ATM. I've been working lately most of the time in a studio that has a regular octagon of speakers for Ambisonic monitoring. But half of the work done there is just stereo. The thing is that I very much prefer listening to stereo using two virtual speakers panned into 3rd order AMB rather than sending L,R directly to two of the speakers. But I can't ATM explain why. > So floor and ceiling reflections also need to be controlled, even more > in a small room. Yes. I recently moved home, and my new working environment is a rather small and boxy room. Its only redeeming feature is that the ceiling is not horizontal but inclined by 15 degress or so. The floor is hardwood, nice for recording but in this case it doesn't help for listening. When I first listened to some reference recordings in this place I was 'not amused' at all. But putting a thick carpet in front of the speakers changed the picture quite dramatically. The room is still a disaster for good LF response, but otherwise it has become acceptable by reducing a very strong floor reflection. > The difficulty is how to leave some harmless > and lively reflections. Maybe that adding a few small diffusors would be > a good compromise. Diffusers are almost never a bad idea. Ciao, -- FA _______________________________________________ Sursound mailing list [email protected] https://mail.music.vt.edu/mailman/listinfo/sursound
