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audiokid 21 February 2013

I just received a pair of Event Opal and yippy yahoo is all I have to say. I've had my eyes on these for over a year and they arrived today. I'm obviously on the sonic honeymoon so I'm not going to be able to give a solid review on them for a while but my first impression is... NICE

They look beautiful and sound very well matched for my CM (18 x 24). The sound is what I hoped for, a clearer upper mid which will complement my other pairs. I have a good mix of monitors now. I feel I've been mixing too bright before, now lets hope I can achieve better mixes.
I've read comments like they are weak in the mids but I have to say that the mids are are nothing short of the complete opposite. These sound really smooth and clear.

There is an array of adjustments and http://www.eventele… measurement software that comes along with these to tune the bass in more precisely so that's the next thing on my list to do. They look great and the build on them is just excellent.

First impression, I'm blessed. I'll be back here in a month with a more accurate opinion.

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audiokid Fri, 02/22/2013 - 12:07

Event EQ Mesurement
http://www.eventele…

Just wanted to share more information and visuals on the Event EQ software for us. Check this. I moved the Opals in 1 foot, raised them 4 inches and here are the measurements.

 

L2

 

R2

Room

 

Everything sounds great. Two thumbs up on this software!

What an excellent tool and confidence builder knowing what I am hearing is this accurate in my room. I have 13 RealTraps plus foam so it obviously helped. I never though my mix room was this right on though. I've marked the sweet spot for height and distance to mix. Slick.

This software works for any set of monitors.

Lol, I can't even listen to my other speaker anymore. These are that good.

No BS here:

Attached files

RemyRAD Sun, 02/24/2013 - 04:01

Chris it almost looks like you've done too good a job in bass trapping your room? That's cool. I mean it looks like a laboratory device. It is rather intriguing. Someone's got to come up and compete with those Danish speakers. Are these also one of those like molded aluminum alloy cases/boxes?

They sure don't look cheap?
Oh you know who.

Oh yeah I just watched the video. I think I heard those in Nashville at the show and they were good. It truly gets away from those old 4311 sounds LOL. I don't think I'd turn a pair down.

pan60 Sun, 02/24/2013 - 12:09

RemyRAD, post: 401105 wrote: Chris it almost looks like you've done too good a job in bass trapping your room? That's cool. I mean it looks like a laboratory device. It is rather intriguing. Someone's got to come up and compete with those Danish speakers. Are these also one of those like molded aluminum alloy cases/boxes?

They sure don't look cheap?
Oh you know who.

Oh yeah I just watched the video. I think I heard those in Nashville at the show and they were good. It truly gets away from those old 4311 sounds LOL. I don't think I'd turn a pair down.

i am never getting rid of my old JBL's they my live out life in a closet but i am keeping them: )~

audiokid Sun, 02/24/2013 - 12:22

We definitely get used to our sound. And if it works for you, it works.
But, I can honestly say I thought that too until these arrived.

RemyRAD, post: 401105 wrote: Chris it almost looks like you've done too good a job in bass trapping your room? That's cool. I mean it looks like a laboratory device. It is rather intriguing. Someone's got to come up and compete with those Danish speakers. Are these also one of those like molded aluminum alloy cases/boxes?

Remy, surely you can't be serious. That's what 13 RealTraps in well designed CM with angles and the right position gets. Ideal for mixing. I believe these are Made in OZ.

I've been listening to mixes from Grammy Award engineers I trust . Their mixes sound great on these. So, what a confidence builder for me.

I am so impressed by these and this software and they are only $3000 CDN. I say they live up to the hype.
Conformation on how vital better monitors are. Wow.. My other monitors are nice, but nothing like these. I feel like cotton just came out of my ears. My other NF monitors are nice ( Neumann KM120, Dynaudio BM6A) but nothing like these. The difference is huge.

These are staying. I wish I did everything I'm taking very serious now, 10 years ago. I've always been aware of great acoustics but never took the monitors and how you set up your monitoring chain serious enough.
I put money into gear when I should have invested in a better speakers and monitor controller system. I would be way better off now. But, the products are better now too.

Now its going to get fun. :)

audiokid Mon, 01/12/2015 - 20:12

I cannot imagine not loving Opals but like Donny put it so well, monitors are like shoes. If I could describe them, they are very much like full range. They have a great punch and the top end is hi fi sounding but not exaggerated. They are an excellent compliment to what you have now. I personally think my mixes translate very well. If you don't like them though, the used market is poor. You will loose a 1/3 right off the bat.

audiokid Tue, 01/13/2015 - 10:12

Not bad at all. I recall a similar hump around 160/ 220 and a dip in the 80hz's like this too. Just moving them a bit and playing with the curves on the speaker settings balanced it a bit more. I also analogize each side. One side can be quite different from the other. Is this both together?

Kudo's.

ChrisH Sun, 04/19/2015 - 15:07

So I got finally got the new control room painted and got my Opals up and running.
I spent 8 hr's trying different areas to setup within the room with speakers firing long way and short way.
Also, I played with monitor distance and listening position location, so needless to say I tried all my options.
With minimal bass trapping (each corner has a 4 inch thick bass trap from floor to ceiling, which I will be thickening them all up to 6 inches) I got the fallowing frequency response.
Looks like addition to thickening up my wall corner traps, I also need to add allot more 6 inch bass traps to floor and ceiling corners. What do you think, is there hope for this room to get a flat response?

Image removed.

DonnyThompson Mon, 04/20/2015 - 06:54

The +5 to +8db bump at around 200hz would concern me a tad, as this is your "whoomph" range. Increasing the thickness of your bass trapping might help to tame that, or, you may also want to first consider possibly adding an air gap between the trap(s) and the boundary behind it, to see if doing that first could be effective - before you pay to add more thickness, but... keep in mind that doing either of those things will also further attenuate the other lows that you are already concerned with decreasing too much of.

In that case, you might want to look at a trap/method that is constructed and "tuned" to treat a more specific range.

But, I'm no acoustics expert... there are other members here, who, while also are not perhaps considered to be experts, are still more knowledgeable than I am, and who might be able to shed some light.

Like Kyle ( kmetal ). He might know...

ChrisH Mon, 04/20/2015 - 08:10

Makzimia, post: 428198, member: 48344 wrote: ChrisH

That's the bass overkilled,a little. Nothing else really wrong there though as someone else pointed out in my other thread, that's fairly standard in a room if it's not completely custom built.

Can you please elaborate? Do you mean the bass is over-killed with treatment?

DonnyThompson, post: 428199, member: 46114 wrote: you may also want to first consider possibly adding an air gap between the trap(s) and the boundary behind it, to see if doing that first could be effective - before you pay to add more thickness, but... keep in mind that doing either of those things will also further attenuate the other lows that you are already concerned with decreasing too much of.

In that case, you might want to look at a trap/method that is constructed and "tuned" to treat a more specific range.

But, I'm no acoustics expert... there are other members here, who, while also are not perhaps considered to be experts, are still more knowledgeable than I am, and who might be able to shed some light.

Like Kyle ( kmetal ). He might know...

The floor-to-ceiling corner traps already have a 2 inch air gap behind them :)

It sounds like you guys are thinking I already have too much bass trapping? My thought was I needed allot MORE bass trapping, thinking that my low end lacking in nearly 20db was caused by modes.

KurtFoster Mon, 04/20/2015 - 09:57

DISCLAIMER! i am not an acoustician. i have set up a sh*tload of recording spaces that seemed to get the job done.

the way to deal with irregularly shaped rooms when calculating modes is to square them up mentaly and do the calculations from there.

i would assume we can ditch the measurement of the front wall with the notch and do the calculations on 169.5" X 244" X 107.75 " ... or 141" X 179.5 X 107.5 "run those and see what you get.

KurtFoster Mon, 04/20/2015 - 10:09

i can see how i would set this room up. what are your plans? what will you be recording?

you could loose the notch at the top of the room and create an iso booth by framing a wall and installing a sliding patio door. you can find doors that have double pane glass and are pretty good at isolating sound ... you can also find them for free or cheap used on C/L...

this would give you a more symmetrical room to figure modes and set up your gear.

kurt

ChrisH Mon, 04/20/2015 - 10:50

Kurt Foster, post: 428209, member: 7836 wrote: DISCLAIMER! i am not an acoustician. i have set up a sh*tload of recording spaces that seemed to get the job done.

i would assume we can ditch the measurement of the front wall with the notch and do the calculations on 169.5" X 244" X 107.75 " ... or 141" X 179.5 X 107.5 "run those and see what you get.

Calculations:

169.5" X 244" X 107.75
There's no red or pink weighted modes for these dimensions, but there's two yellows, one at 27.5 hz and one at 55

141" X 179.5 X 107.5 "

Also no red or pink weighted modes for these dimensions, but there's also two yellows one at 36.7 and another at 61.7, however the 1/3 octave (Bonello) graph is much smoother for this room.

Kurt Foster, post: 428210, member: 7836 wrote: i can see how i would set this room up. what are your plans? what will you be recording?

you could loose the notch at the top of the room and create an iso booth by framing a wall and installing a sliding patio door. you can find doors that have double pane glass and are pretty good at isolating sound ... you can also find them for free or cheap used on C/L...

this wold give you a more symetrical room tto figure modes and set up your gear.

kurt

I landed on the fallowing monitor and listening position setup.

I tried all possible monitor setups in that room, some were deemed unusable but either the fallowing setup in the picture or firing from the top down were equal in frequency response.
I chose the way it is setup in the drawing because it feels more roomy and keeps the couch away from the door

ChrisH Mon, 04/20/2015 - 13:34

Kurt Foster, post: 428222, member: 7836 wrote: ok so you need a trap that targets 50 to 60 hZ. how low do your monitors go?

Okay, thank you!
They are Event Opals 35Hz - 22kHz

kmetal Mon, 04/20/2015 - 19:35

Lol yet another non acoustician here... In good forum form, I will answer with more questions. Lmao

What are the traps made of and how?pics?

Is the RFZ set up?

How / why have you determined 6" trap as a solution?

How did you test the speakers.? What was the basic procedure ect? What software.. Is that the left speaker or the right? Both summed? In stereo?

That response looks good, to me on that graph. But I'm not sure that that is the best graph to use. Not sure as in I don't know. I recall in rods book something about layering time slices of different samples, and gate times, for different purposes during testing In other words, one testing method takes the room away, to test the actual performance of the speaker. The other tests the rooms response at the listening position. I don't doubt your attentiveness Chris H, I just want to make sure we are all looking at the most relevant information, as we try to break it down.

Anyway, based on that graph, if you made a trap centered around 200hz you would be smoothing things out nicely. As you drop in octaves you will loose efficiency (absorb less). Maybe a resonator like in the book, it hits 66-155. Realistically your speaker size aren't generally efficient down in the 30s and Those aren't frequencies that can develop well in small rooms. We run a 30hz hpf on the 15s at the studios. A bass trap with w 30hz center frequency would be pretty deep and or rigid, I think it comes down to the constraints of the rooms itself.

You seem to have questions in similar areas I do, so it's certainly a good learning experience for me watching this thread .

ChrisH Wed, 04/22/2015 - 17:41

kmetal, post: 428246, member: 37533 wrote: Lol yet another non acoustician here... In good forum form, I will answer with more questions. Lmao

What are the traps made of and how?pics?

Is the RFZ set up?

How / why have you determined 6" trap as a solution?

How did you test the speakers.? What was the basic procedure ect? What software.. Is that the left speaker or the right? Both summed? In stereo?

That response looks good, to me on that graph. But I'm not sure that that is the best graph to use. Not sure as in I don't know. I recall in rods book something about layering time slices of different samples, and gate times, for different purposes during testing In other words, one testing method takes the room away, to test the actual performance of the speaker. The other tests the rooms response at the listening position. I don't doubt your attentiveness Chris H, I just want to make sure we are all looking at the most relevant information, as we try to break it down.

Anyway, based on that graph, if you made a trap centered around 200hz you would be smoothing things out nicely. As you drop in octaves you will loose efficiency (absorb less). Maybe a resonator like in the book, it hits 66-155. Realistically your speaker size aren't generally efficient down in the 30s and Those aren't frequencies that can develop well in small rooms. We run a 30hz hpf on the 15s at the studios. A bass trap with w 30hz center frequency would be pretty deep and or rigid, I think it comes down to the constraints of the rooms itself.

You seem to have questions in similar areas I do, so it's certainly a good learning experience for me watching this thread .

My traps? Made of 4 and 6 inches of 705.
The RFZ is not setup.
I tested with Event's Studio EQ Software and Mic.
The particular graph is both speakers, left and right individually were surprisingly very very similar to both simultaneously

UPDATE:

Okay, so as far as room dimensions go..
I took completely accurate measurements of the entire area of the basement I have to work with. The bottom left corner room is the room that we have been discussing (the dotted wall is the wall i'd put up to make the room symmetrical and gain a possible vocal booth or closet).
The top right room is what I planned use use as a dedicated tracking room (notice the ceiling is 10 inches shorter).

I did mode and 1/3 octave (bonello) calculations for every possible set of dimensions I could go with and the 14ft 6in X 12ft 6in X 8ft 11in (going to triple check dimensions before I start framing) is actually a solid set of dimensions to start with.
No serious mode problems and the 1/3 octave (bonello) is pretty smooth with no nulls.
Here's what I am envisioning..

Image removed.
What do you all think?

kmetal Thu, 04/23/2015 - 04:21

Man that's gonna be nice. Just brainstorming before sleepy time. The person passed out is the bassist, it's always the bassist :)

Ps. I also have no doubt you thought of this and or calculated it already, and Fwiw, to anyone interested, I just downloaded the 'acousti calc' app for iOS, man this thing is loaded for a free app. Not sure if is for android. Also, I'm finding Microsoft onenote, to be tremendous for organizing project related data, I saved Chris s pic right off the post here, and drew on it. Another freebie. Thanx apps. For now...

kmetal Thu, 04/23/2015 - 18:40

Well the skecth was rough. But I think the layout might be worth thinking about. Maybe not the way I have it, but different from the raw idea.

The main thing I looked at was maximizing the useful space. The mix room is the money room Imo, in smaller spots. A couple feet, bang for your buck, would probably make a more significant difference in the mix room. As long as the drums and singers can comfortably fit, in their respected tracking areas, what more do you really want.? As soon as you push it, it just makes sense to build from scratch, without the limits of a pre existing structure. In other words it's always gonna be nice comfy and cozy with a nice tight small room sound if utilized best. You add on the adjacent hall, which is the echo chamber you didn't know you had already, and your cooking with serious fire friend. Tile that bathroom. You now have a 'natural' short hall, and tile chamber, verb halls.
Some of the most famous sounds out there on records are back halls, and spare rooms. Even in some of the biggest and best most intently designed studios.

I didn't do the math heavily, because I don't realy know how to interpret it properly. It looks like around 60hz is the modal area of concern, with the larger control room. An octave? Up from your monitors fundamental.

The second thing I wanted to think about was cutting down on parelell surfaces, especially in the tracking areas. Rectangular areas are the easiest to predict so that's why I aimed toward cubic footage and predictability in the CR. the tracking rooms, it's a bit more forgiving and the angles don't have to be as precise, for a project like this.

Other than that man, I ws just brainstorming. Ya know? In a couple more years you might see my work on TV, but I find this stuff fascinating and challenging, and I err on the side of caution, with what I say, because, I am not certified in this type of thing.

I just think it's important to look at things upside down and sideways. It helps to see thru other people's eyes a little bit ya know?

Fwiw, in my home studio areas, my monitors didn't work right until I switch them into the room the size I'm suggesting for your CR. the low end was night and day. I went from having to put it where I like it in a (12x13' room), then 2 ticks, to its was decent. also, remember a rear wall with a trap is gonna want a couple feet, to really dig where you want it. Add a couch, and a couple dudes and their girfriends. That's where those couple feet, the bathroom, and the well appointed AC system, separate a pro home joint from a joint at home. Imo, again, this is an area of limited knowledge.

Which is another area of calculations that mystifies me. How to quantify how much trapping your actually doing?

ChrisH Fri, 04/24/2015 - 09:01

kmetal, post: 428379, member: 37533 wrote: Well the skecth was rough. But I think the layout might be worth thinking about. Maybe not the way I have it, but different from the raw idea.

The main thing I looked at was maximizing the useful space. The mix room is the money room Imo, in smaller spots. A couple feet, bang for your buck, would probably make a more significant difference in the mix room. As long as the drums and singers can comfortably fit, in their respected tracking areas, what more do you really want.? As soon as you push it, it just makes sense to build from scratch, without the limits of a pre existing structure. In other words it's always gonna be nice comfy and cozy with a nice tight small room sound if utilized best. You add on the adjacent hall, which is the echo chamber you didn't know you had already, and your cooking with serious fire friend. Tile that bathroom. You now have a 'natural' short hall, and tile chamber, verb halls.
Some of the most famous sounds out there on records are back halls, and spare rooms. Even in some of the biggest and best most intently designed studios.

I didn't do the math heavily, because I don't realy know how to interpret it properly. It looks like around 60hz is the modal area of concern, with the larger control room. An octave? Up from your monitors fundamental.

The second thing I wanted to think about was cutting down on parelell surfaces, especially in the tracking areas. Rectangular areas are the easiest to predict so that's why I aimed toward cubic footage and predictability in the CR. the tracking rooms, it's a bit more forgiving and the angles don't have to be as precise, for a project like this.

Other than that man, I ws just brainstorming. Ya know? In a couple more years you might see my work on TV, but I find this stuff fascinating and challenging, and I err on the side of caution, with what I say, because, I am not certified in this type of thing.

I just think it's important to look at things upside down and sideways. It helps to see thru other people's eyes a little bit ya know?

Fwiw, in my home studio areas, my monitors didn't work right until I switch them into the room the size I'm suggesting for your CR. the low end was night and day. I went from having to put it where I like it in a (12x13' room), then 2 ticks, to its was decent. also, remember a rear wall with a trap is gonna want a couple feet, to really dig where you want it. Add a couch, and a couple dudes and their girfriends. That's where those couple feet, the bathroom, and the well appointed AC system, separate a pro home joint from a joint at home. Imo, again, this is an area of limited knowledge.

Which is another area of calculations that mystifies me. How to quantify how much trapping your actually doing?

Kyle,

I should have noted the room dimensions cannot change besides adding walls.
I'm renting this space out from my parents as I live in a little apartment across the valley.

There's an option to go with one large 24ft X 19 ft (I'll double check) has 9ft ceilings

kmetal Fri, 04/24/2015 - 09:59

ChrisH, post: 428383, member: 43833 wrote: Kyle,

I should have noted the room dimensions cannot change besides adding walls.
I'm renting this space out from my parents as I live in a little apartment across the valley.

There's an option to go with one large 24ft X 19 ft (I'll double check) has 9ft ceilings

In that case your original plan looks pretty good still.

Dude, if you can take the big space do it. That studio I work at has just about those dimensions for the CR. that's the cubic footage you need for full response. And seriously man, I never brag or anything like that, but the imaging and 3dimensional sound in that room is unlike anything. In the early 80s George augsburger approved the place.

What I'm saying is with a shell that size you could have a room that's not compromised like a typical home studio. Essentially you could make something that is truly professional. If you switch your spending from multiple walls for multiple rooms to just four walls and a ceiling your costs get focused, and reduced overall. Just in hvac alone you could save thousands.

It's a personal choice. I know from my experience working in larger multi room places, it's a pita by yourself. Walking thru a bunch of door around stuff to move a mic or worse a sound check on drums, in downright work. 80% of the time the rest of the studios lights don't even get turned on.

Obviously it's cool and all, but a killer control room is step 1 to me. If u had a million, okay make a real 'a' room. Imo just an open area will work for drums and a booth is fine for vocals.

Besides real estate wise, that CR could easily be a home theater or man cave. A compartmentalized series of rooms might not be as valuable. Just thinking on screen here. Sounds need physical space to exists. Too many people fight physics.

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