Speaker Room Calibration
The placement of speakers are very crucial to the listening experience of any form of audio, be it from studios, to theatres, to your own living room. The setup of the speakers are very crucial to the listening experience of any medium, such as music or movies, etc. It is usually important to prevent having sound imbalances where one speaker could be clearer than the other, ruining the stereo imaging, and also the level of noise that may arise based on a mixture of speaker placement, and the shape of the room that it is contained in. Often times the room is not necessarily made with th
oughts on the acoustics unless it were a theatre or a studio pre-made with intentions of the speaker placement. The aim is to achieve a minimum variance response out of the speakers and so acoustic treatment is applied to the room to improve performance of the speakers within the room (McCarthy, 2010).
Speakers setup in studios are possibly even more important than how listeners setup in their own environments. Specific equipment and monitors are necessary to fully experience a “richly layered sonic story”. As studios are the main place of production of audio, it is important to have the fullest listening experience in order to manipulate sounds and frequencies accordingly. It initially depends on the room as well and which spots in the room would you listen to the audio being played. Schematics often show that the placement of speakers and listeners should be arranged as an equilateral triangle with each speaker facing the listeners ear. This placement creates a great base sonic field to build up on with different monitors placed around depending on the acoustics of the room (Perry, 2015).
For those who like to have the greatest listening experience in the comfort of their home, the arrangement is very similar to the equilateral triangle mentioned previously, also depending on the placement of the listener where they prefer to lounge and listen. However, 5 or 7:1 surround sound speaker arrangement is as important as a basic 2 speaker setup in order to create an immersive experience for the listener when watching films. Setup of these extra speakers towards the side or behind the listener is important as well. As the primary stereo speakers face the listener’s position, these extra speakers can be placed not too far in a corner of the room, facing forward to omit according to the acoustic frequencies. A subwoofer is added to the setup as well, in order to help the listener feel the audio emitted even better (Crane, 2015).
References:
Crane, K. (2015). Speaker placement for home theater. Crutchfield. Retrieved from https://www1.crutchfield.com/learn/learningcenter/home/speaker_placement.html
McCarthy, B. (2010). Sound System Design and Optimisation: Modern Techniques and Tools for Sound System Design And Alignment (2nd ed., p. 435). Oxford UK: Elsevier Ltd.
Perry, T. (2015). Room Setup 101: Speaker Placement Secrets. Arqen.com. Retrieved from http://arqen.com/acoustics-101/room-setup-speaker-placement/
