theater acoustics (1 Viewer)

[Bill Polley]

Well, I am building my theater now. Using the "golden ratios" for room dimensions, I am going to build my room to be 7'-3" high, 11'-7 1/4" wide, and 16'-10 3/4" long. The screen will be 96"X56" and I am planning to simply have 2 rows of 4 theater seats in the room. From what I have read, the dimensions I have chosen are best (as a ratio of 1:1.6:2.33) for minimizing room peaks and nodes. In conjunction with the room size, I also will be using my trusty BFD to further smooth the room response.

These measures should really tame the bass response (hopefully to nearly ruler flat!), but what about the rest of the spectrum. I have read that room reflections are what generally muddy the sound of even the best systems, so how should I treat my walls. Do I leave the front wall solid, to allow reflections towards the seating, and then deaden the ceiling, side and rear walls to eliminate reflected sound? Do I leave a portion of the side walls un-deadened to allow some reflected sound?

I had Kind of leaned towards the first idea. If you are outside, the sound only comes from the one direction. Any sound that should sound reflected, such as bounced off a building or the lively reflections in a gymnasium, should (I would think), be re-created by the surround speakers and therefore I would want all walls deadened. Then I wonder if I can get good width and depth imaging if the front wall is deadened. I am leaning towards a stiff front wall that will reflect sound, much like an ampitheater. Perhaps the front wall, and the first four feet of the side walls and ceiling should be reflective. This would provide for a reflective depth, width, and height, without being so far out as to allow first reflections to be directed at the listening positions.

I have read that there should be a balance between reflective and absorptive materials, but I have never read any good "tried and true" facts. Anyone have any good actual designs that are proven to sound great?

 

[Wayne A. Pflughaupt]

Bill,

I like parts of both plans. The amphitheater analogy is a good start, but it is outdoors after all. I think a better analogy would be a well-designed concert hall. Like the amphitheater it typically has a lot of reflective surfaces where the performers are. But the audience area has combinations of soft panels for dampening, and irregular surfaces for dispersion.

Bringing that home, you could keep the front where the speakers will be live and reflective, as you’ve noted. I don’t think there would be any need to dampen the ceiling as long as you had wall-to-wall carpeting on the floor, soft seats, etc. – at least that has been my experience.

That leaves the vertical surfaces. I think I would be more concerned about the back wall than the side walls. About the worst thing you can have is the sound from the front of the room bouncing off the back wall and headed towards the front again. Dampening the back wall might make the room too “dead.” Thus I lean towards dispersion. This is pretty easy to accomplish in say, a living room, where things like book cases, etc. accomplish dispersion for “free,” as it were. I expect a dedicated room will have none of that, so what you could do, instead of building the back wall flat like the others, is build it out in a zig-zag or saw-tooth pattern. This would break up and disperse the sound instead of reflecting it back to the front.

These things might very well get you the acoustics you want without any treatment for the side walls at all. However, if the room still sounds too reflective, you could then add a series of dampening panels to the side walls.

My knowledge of acoustics is rudimentary. You might want to send a PM to HTF member Terry Montlick. He’s an acoustics specialist.

Regards,
Wayne A. Pflughaupt

 

[Bill Polley]

Once again, thanks Wayne. After doing a bunch of research last night, the advice from the "experts" that came up often was to actually deaden the FRONT wall, the rear wall, and the side walls in a band at about ear level. This apparently only allows reflected sound to reach the listener after several reflections, thus lowering the SPL of the reflective sound. First and second reflections will all but be eliminated. Yet the room will remain neutrally "live" sounding. This assumes carpet on the floor. I will probably take it a step further and deaden the spaces between 2 or 3 ceiling joists where the angle of first reflection to the listening area occurs.

 

[sridhar]

Hi,

To re-create a large venue theater in a small room, accoustic diffusers are installed above ear level and accoustic absorber are installed below ear level.

You could checkout the following links for more info,
@ auralex.com

This thread on hometheatertalk.com has some great info,

hometheatertalk.com/ubb/Forum1/HTML/006838.html

 

[Mike Co]

A common studio techniques is non-parallel walls facing each other, including ceiling & floor.

 

[Bob Hill]

Just thought I would throw in some dimensional ratios that help decrease the number of standing waves in a room.

A. .79 1.00 1.26
B. .80 1.00 1.25
C. .62 1.00 1.62
D. .67 1.00 1.80
E. .62 1.00 1.44
F. .80 1.00 1.20

 

[Terry Montlick]

Hello Bill,

Any sound that should sound reflected, such as bounced off a building or the lively reflections in a gymnasium, should (I would think), be re-created by the surround speakers and therefore I would want all walls deadened. Then I wonder if I can get good width and depth imaging if the front wall is deadened.

You've got the right idea. In a surround sound movie, ALL the acoustical ambiance is contained in the multiple sound channels. Any extra reverberation that your home theater adds is, in general, not desirable.

Don't worry about the quality of imaging for the front soundstage. A non-reflective home theater front wall actually improves it. The sound will come from left, center, and right speakers only, not from any extra reflected sources from the front wall. Again, any acoustics are built into these channels.

This goes against much of the popular wisdom for the past 50 years of stereo music recording and reproduction. It confuses a lot of people, including many professionals. A movie sound mix can be totally different from a music sound mix. For the latter, there can be close-miking, with mostly just direct sound. Music recordings often rely on listening room reverberation to make them sound their best. It's just the opposite for movies.

Fortunately, movie sound reproduction has tight standards, so that a movie sounds essentially the same in every commercial movie theater. There's no reason why every home theater shouldn't sound just as good!

Regards,
Terry