Last week I helped Carl with sound calibration of his home cinema. The main focus was on joining his three subwoofers in the best way possible. Carl had done a good preparatory work by experimenting with the placement of both subwoofers and bass traps and finally arrived at a solution that worked well in the room.
My job was to measure, analyze and calculate the best settings for each subwoofer - to make them work as well as possible together.
Because what you have to be prepared for when you place several subwoofers in the same room is that - as much as they play together, they can counteract each other in different frequencies just as much.
The red curve is my result, measured with my Brül & Kjaer measurement microphone. The green curve is Carl's own calibration measured with an Umik-1.
With my calibration we achieved ±1.5dB between 18-100Hz which is crazy good and ±3dB between 17-160Hz.
The Dolby Atmos standard for the LFE channel is ±3dB between 31.5-120Hz, which we beat with flying colors. 😊
It was not only the frequency response that became much smoother, but the impact of the combined bass wave became much more powerful and tighter - in an impressive way. Three sub basses that play in harmony with each other.
My calibration resulted in lowering the lower cutoff frequency from 20Hz to 17Hz - which was felt when we sat in the theater seats and listened. 😊
Furthermore, I showed what a difference it makes when the calibration is done with a high-quality measurement microphone and microphone amplifier. It's something you have to experience to understand. Because when I finished the measurements in DIRAC Live and put the filters into the AV processor, a completely new sound bubble was created in Carl's home theater.
The front speakers 'disappeared' and the front sound image merged nicely with both the surround speakers and the four Atmos speakers in the ceiling.
The sound got a nice height, width and depth. The dialogue became mustier and the whole soundscape felt more inspiring to sit and listen to.
Are you also having trouble merging your subwoofers into a homogenous bass soundfield?
I can fix that for you - on site or via remote calibration.
Want to take your home theater to the next level?
Contact me and we will book a time for a visit or do a remote calibration via FaceTime and Teamviewer (yes, it's possible to do remote calibration).
I want to take this opportunity to wish you all a very Happy New Year
Frederick
Immersive Sound Tech