Old 01-31-2011, 06:32 PM   #1
hamish
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Default Learn acoustic and DSP theory

Hello REAPER users. Someone once said knowledge is power, and besides your gear and your ears one super essential thing is a good understanding of how it works.

A good understanding of subjects such as acoustics and the physics of sound wave propagation, sampling theory and DSP and psychoacoustics can give you the ability to design sound, from mic positioning through to working out what gear to buy (without coming on the forum and deciding based on some gear popularity contest)

As I've been doing this myself for a while (I started studying with 'YAMAHA Sound Reinforcement Handbook' about 14 years ago while doing a few years of live work and recording) I'd like to share some of the best sources of information on these subjects.

So read up, study hard and crack the sound barriers people!!

Last edited by hamish; 02-04-2013 at 04:14 AM. Reason: enhancements
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Old 01-31-2011, 06:36 PM   #2
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Default the GOLD

SENGPIELAUDIO - [the last word on audio engineering?]

http://www.sengpielaudio.com/index.html

or http://www.sengpielaudio.com/Calculations03.htm [if you don't speak German]

FAVOURITES ***

calculate the level of mixing up to 30 incoherent sources - http://www.sengpielaudio.com/calculator-spl.htm ***

sound pressure (SPL) drop off is to the inverse of distance (not the inverse square) http://www.sengpielaudio.com/calculator-distancelaw.htm

************************************************** ********************************

AES/RANE PRO AUDIO REFERENCE - 'par' the definitive resource created by CEO of Rane, Dennis Bohn

http://www.aes.org/par/

************************************************** ********************************

SOUND ON SOUND MAGAZINE - [the best online music magazine]

http://www.soundonsound.com/articles/Technique.php [EDIT, march 2011: Now with 'Reaper Notes', thanks to the forums own Geoffrey Francis, et. alia. and popular request I guess...]

************************************************** ********************************

SHURE - [shure microphones have a lot of educational material online, but unfortunately much
of it is sadly dumbed down and more misleading than helpful. There are some useful articles, but
quite hard to find in all the sales pitches]

compare sensitivity data for two microphones - http://shure.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/77

explanation of proximity effect - http://shure.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/2844

(This shure.custhelp.com/app/answers part of the site seems to have some good stuff)

************************************************** *********************************

INFINITE WAVE - [the sound engineers SRC benchmarking]

who has the best downsampling anti-alias filter, Ableton or audacity? - http://src.infinitewave.ca/

************************************************** *********************************

VESTMAN MASTERING [invaluable tips on recording and mixing from a super-pro]

http://johnvestman.com/site_map.htm

reference CD's - http://johnvestman.com/commercial_cds.htm

************************************************** *********************************

DAN RUSSELL Professor Dan Russell has made some animations explaining wave physics, this one about driving room resonances is excellent

http://paws.kettering.edu/~drussell/...s/driving.html

************************************************** *********************************

STEVE CRUTCHFIELD, at John Hopkins University another excellent animation, a Java applet that helps to understand what happens when you convolute a signal 'The Joy of Convolution'

http://www.jhu.edu/signals/convolve/

Demo of how to use this Java applet




************************************************** *********************************

DAVE BENSON Professor Dave Benson has put his mind-bending book 'Music: A Mathematical Offering' online for free download from his homepage at the University of Aberdeen (Scotland)

all you ever wanted to know about tunings, temperaments and the ideas of Jean Baptiste Joseph Fourier - http://homepages.abdn.ac.uk/mth192/pages/html/music.pdf ***

************************************************** ********************************************

STEPHEN W. SMITH - As posted by my friend from Oslo down the page, another free, quality source online.

in depth DSP, DFT to FFT - http://www.dspguide.com/pdfbook.htm


************************************************** ********************************

Last edited by hamish; 02-10-2017 at 03:45 AM. Reason: new link
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Old 02-01-2011, 10:59 PM   #3
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thx, should be a good read!
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Old 03-01-2011, 06:43 PM   #4
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Default SHURE Microphone Techniques

Updated links post above re this online booklet.

This pdf is one of the better documents produced by shure. [edit] Off the list, this book is too dumbed-down.

http://www.shure.com/idc/groups/publ...c_sound_ea.pdf

It has really good fundamental info on micing for a variety of instuments for live sound or for recording. [edit] it has nice pictures anyway?

Last edited by hamish; 03-21-2011 at 02:29 AM.
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Old 03-01-2011, 07:06 PM   #5
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Thanks for sharing, I'll take a look at those.

Also, this might be a good resource for those interested in DSP: http://www.dspguide.com/

It's a 600+ pages book available online for free, and also as hardcover for those who prefer paper. I read it back in the days and I could understand a lot of the concepts and algorithms even though I'm not really strong mathematically.
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Old 03-01-2011, 07:15 PM   #6
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Hey, Thanks I'm checking it out now.... (is he any relation to J.O.? does it run in the Smith family)
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Old 03-01-2011, 07:19 PM   #7
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Quote:
Originally Posted by hamish View Post
Hey, Thanks I'm checking it out now.... (is he any relation to J.O.? does it run in the Smith family)
I'm sorry, I don't know. I just read the book.
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Old 03-17-2011, 05:48 PM   #8
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added really cool little page 'The Joy of Convolution'

http://www.jhu.edu/signals/convolve/

draw signals with your mouse and then drag your source signal (on the left) through the IR, (on the right) go on, click away.

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Old 03-17-2011, 06:18 PM   #9
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Ooops, just read this in the SHURE mic booklet:

Sound moves through the air like waves in water.

WRONG!

Water waves are transverse waves and sound waves are longitudinal waves, so the best analogy of a sound wave is the wave of compression that you can send down, for example a slinky spring toy.

Have therefore removed the following links in the SHURE section:

http://www.shure.com/idc/groups/publ...c_sound_ea.pdf

http://www.shurenotes.com

http://www.shureasia.com/support_dow...home-recording

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Old 10-24-2012, 05:12 PM   #10
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Default Surround Theory

The Gerzon ambisonics theory is great to study, even if you never get to use or own a soundfield mic. It is based on using pressure and pressure gradient mics.

Martin Lees pages are good -

http://members.tripod.com/martin_leese/Ambisonic/

For a great visualisation of the 3-D soundfield components (which can be related to figure8 pressure gradient and Omni pressure mics) look at this \\//

http://members.tripod.com/martin_lee.../Harmonic.html

(Just the images under the heading 'Zero- and first-order components' for practical recording)

Gerzon however died back around 1984/1985 and after him the next great advance in surround sound comes with William Gardener and the MIT HRTF measurements.

A great way to read about practical use of surround recording and mixing, including contrasts of binaural, ambisonics and ambiophonics and their development from the 1990 to present are the papers in english by Professor Angelo Farina

http://pcfarina.eng.unipr.it/Public/Papers/list_pub.htm

(of course if you read Italian you can access them all)

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Old 02-03-2017, 03:57 PM   #11
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Default David Griesinger's homepage

Heaps of papers by David Greiesinger (designer/developer of the iconic Lexicon reverb units) are available via his homepage.

http://www.davidgriesinger.com/

Lots of very interesting info on acoustics, psychocoustics, reverb and miking
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Old 02-03-2017, 05:28 PM   #12
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Quote:
Originally Posted by hamish View Post
Ooops, just read this in the SHURE mic booklet:

Sound moves through the air like waves in water.

WRONG!

Water waves are transverse waves and sound waves are longitudinal waves, so the best analogy of a sound wave is the wave of compression that you can send down, for example a slinky spring toy.
Hi hamish, I can see you are indeed busy.

This is very interesting and will take a little time to indulge.

Concerning the SHURE reference to sound waves and water waves, I haven't read what was being said so I could be wrong.

But just looking at it from the surface, I would think they were just saying the visual aspect of water waves is like the concept of sound waves in the air.

At any rate, looking forward to digging into this.
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Old 02-03-2017, 06:10 PM   #13
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Tod View Post
At any rate, looking forward to digging into this.
Great! I can't read it all by myself I have only read 2% of the material available from the links here.

The water wave comparison comes up too often The 2D plot of sample values in our REAPER media waveforms can look like water waves. Also water waves, sound waves and light waves do share some behaviour similarities, like reflection and diffraction.

But just think of the motion of the two different media (air and water) and the respective waves. In a water wave particles oscillate up and down at 90% to the direction of the wave. In a sound wave (let's say 'plane' wave moving through unbounded air) the air particles oscillate parallel to the direction of the wave.

I can't think where and when this is going to be significant in study of acoustics, but it should at some point.

Happy Reading
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Old 02-04-2017, 07:01 PM   #14
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Originally Posted by hamish View Post
RANE PRO AUDIO REFERENCE - ['par' the definitive resource by CEO of Rane, Dennis Bohn]
[edit - don't know if this still exists on the net, the old link just redirects to AES homepage]
One of my favorite quick references ever since it was first released. The AES link is correct, like the homepage says Dennis retired 2016 and donated the PAR to AES so they can maintain it. The small tabs near top of the page will lead to all the specific PAR pages.
http://www.aes.org/par/
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Old 02-05-2017, 06:25 PM   #15
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Quote:
Originally Posted by xpander View Post
One of my favorite quick references ever since it was first released. The AES link is correct, like the homepage says Dennis retired 2016 and donated the PAR to AES so they can maintain it. The small tabs near top of the page will lead to all the specific PAR pages.
http://www.aes.org/par/
Awesome! Thanks mate.
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