studio building soft, EASE 4.0

  • Thread starter Thread starter goran
  • Start date Start date
Check out some of these sites:

http://www.saecollege.de/reference_material/index.html (There is a wealth of knowledge here written by John Sayers. He is a frequent contributor on this BBS)

http://www.prorec.com/prorec/downlo...6256B570031B581 (This is RoomTune. There are basic directions included with the self-extracting file, in Wordpad format)

http://www.studiotips.com/ (click on "calculation tools", then download - MODESv2p.xls ) This is in Microsoft Excel spreadsheet format.

Just a few places to start.

DD
 
Hey Don-of-the-Digits - 'way to pass on the info- So, am I "nearly famous" yet for writing RoomTune? Man, that was too easy ! BTW, Goran, there are several other useful calculators at the studiotips site, such as an absorption calculator and a slat resonator calculator. Look around while you're there.

Don't forget, if you have any questions about using RoomTune, just post them here, I usually check in at least every other day... Steve
 
Yeah, you be famous!!!! Aww, man - I guess we'll have to start paying now :D So when does the book come out???

DD
 
"So when does the book come out??? " -

Right after I get a new supply of those special suppositories for lube, otherwise it could really hurt. Funny, the' stuff used to just ooze out my ears, then I started collecting books by Everest, now it's too solid to flow without some encouragement (My wife always warns people not to encourage me, maybe 37 years has taught her something???)

'Way to go on the studio project DD; I hope to start mine by next year. Whole new can-o-worms most likely, as it looks like it will be the second story of a garage/shop, 36 x 48 overall. Probably have to get a height variance so I can have at least 14' ceilings in the tracking room, but being out in the country that should be no problem. Plan on a TrusJoist floor so I can clearspan the downstairs - spendy, but solid. Lotta stuff to figger yet... Steve
 
I have a RoomTune question...

I am looking for something to calculate placement of acoustical panels in a shell shaped church sanctuary/multi purpose room. The description for the download at prorec.com says "for squre or rectangular rooms" or something like that. Is this program geared towards that or is it something that might work for me?

Thanks,
Pete
 
Battleminnow, unfortunately RoomTune, which I wrote about 12 years ago, only does rectangular rooms. I have yet to find, and am not enough of a math whiz to write, anything that will PREDICT the performance of a non-parallel walled, much less curved surface, room.

The only thing that might help that I'm aware of, is to use a program like ETF, AFTER the room is built, to see what the characteristics of the room are.

Most rooms that I've heard that I would unknowingly put into your category, seem to be too live for good intelligibility of speech without some type of treatment. Usually they require a fair amount of absorption, maybe down to 300 hZ or so, to get the boominess out; beyond that it's hard to generalize. Every person that walks in and sits down changes the equation some - without measuring it, I've wondered how much crap those concave, empty seat backs cause. We're told everywhere that convex is good, concave is bad (see Polycylindrical Diffusers)

If you were to measure the reverb time of the room with an understanding crowd present (I believe ETF can do this, there are other expensive standalone gear also, usually rented along with the technician to run it) you would know about how much absorption at what frequencies you needed - from there, it's absorption tables and calculations, then cut and try, etc.

You can find out more about ETF here -

http://www.etfacoustic.com/

For a spreadsheet that calculates total absorption, go to studiotips.com in the calculations area and download SABIN_MO.XLS - it's not a quick process, and I haven't used this on any real rooms as yet, but it should work. It just takes some time to figure all the areas of all the various absorptive surfaces in a room. Also, I've yet to see any tables, etc, that have ALL the materials you're likely to run into listed in one place .

(Too late for this, I realize, but) the short answer is NO.

Yeah, I wish it did too... Steve

Oh, BTW, don't miss out on the DEMO page of ETF's site - (not really a "demo", but some good stuff here)
 
Last edited:
Idea

I know of a Univeristy that would possibly be interested in designing a new RoomTune for you that uses curved surfaces and irregular shaped rooms. If you get back to me very soon, I could get the project on the plate this year, at no cost to you. It is simple Calculus and Physics and then of course some coding. The work done by this CS dept is VERY good, and I think they would appreciate the project.

--MIKE
 
Mike, I think you would have some very appreciative members here, myself as much as anyone. I've been torn between the "devil you know and the devil you don't" for several years now. I know just enough Trig to get in trouble, no Calculus whatever, and just basic Physics so I would be VERY interested in your offer. PM me if you'd rather, although I'm not brash enough to think that there's anything proprietary in RoomTune... Steve
 
Well I just graduated from Ball State University, (Muncie IN) (http://www.cs.bsu.edu )last May, with honors from their computer science dept. Each year, the seniors do projects in groups of 4 dealing with real world comptuer science applications. These students have all taken calculus, physics and the like. Their job is to create a peice of software from start to finish, by next may. Their class just started Monday. They have until mid-september to choose their project.

This would take some committment on your part to show them what you have already and describe what you would like done, what type of interface you would desire and basically all the requirements. You can make it fairly hard, this is designed to be a hard project.

They will try to contact you probably every 2 weeks or so with questions and documentation about what they are doing. The first semseter (until Dec) is planning and the second semester is implemntation (coding). You will get a quality product and great help files and such.

The amount of time varies for each 'client-partner' as they are called, but I think free labor makes it worth it. An hour or so every two weeks isn't too bad.

I think there is a proposal form to fill out and turn in to be considered for a project. If I make some phone calls there, I am sure I can get it in the availability pool for this year.

Any more questions, please let me know. I think this would be quite fun, and a useful tool.

--MIKE
 
This sounds really great - my mind is already churning with possibilities, such as a 3-d Cad type interface with some form of ray tracing, for graphically figuring out the RFZ from degree of wall splay, or a spreadsheet interface with cells to place length and displacement out-of-plane so you don't have to know the curvature if you have a string and a ruler, built-in absorption calc with all common materials instead of just a few, etc - Let me know what you need from me to get this on the list and maybe an idea of what qualifies as "hard", vs. "impossible" - Like you said, fun AND useful... Steve
 
I just wanted you to know I read all that stuff. Iwill print this out and call my contacts by the end of the week. Some things might be near impossible, some might not be. I say start with everything you could think of, and then allow them to take out what they consider is too much. (within reason)

--MIKE
 
Sounds like a plan - I gotta work two 12-hour graveyard shifts next, so I may not check back for a couple of days - doesn't mean I'm dead if I don't answer for a bit, only comatose... Steve
 
I called and left a message. I hope to hear back this week.

--MIKE
 
I have the form that needs to be filled out. Now I just need your email address to have this underway. The prof would like the form by Monday evening, I think because his class is starting to consider projects on Tuesday. The form is pretty simple. When I get your email I will send the rest of the details...I suppose I could look in your profile for that address too. I will check it out..
-MIKE
 
There is software by companies like Ansys, Cosmos, Algor and a few others that are used for Finite Element Analysis for mechanical engineering. Some of them have modules for doing acoustic analysis.

I used to sell the software but we mostly dealt with structural and temperature problems. I wish I had still had access to them to try some acoustic stuff now that I actuallly have some room problems to play with.

Anyway those are some brands to check out if anyone can talk their bosses into buying them for work. They are definately not cheap ($2-25K) and some work as add-ins for most of the popular 3D mechanical CAD packages like SolidWorks, ProE, Inventor etc.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top