Tech Feature

I discovered ribbon mics late in my career, after I’d been engineering for 20 years. I only knew the classics before that, such as the RCA 44 and 77-DX, which looked great in glass cases or featured in photos of music stars of previous generations. About 2001 I started using some of the newer generation of ribbon mics and I fell in love with them: the Royer R-121 and R-122, the AEA R84 and R88, along with standards such as the Coles 4038 and Beyerdynamic M160 and M500. I was hooked, with my ribbon mic collection eventually topping out over a dozen mics, ranging in date of origin from 1932 all the way to the present. But I used them primarily in the studio and became very familiar with their strengths. I learned to love the figure-8 pattern and recognize where it truly excelled.

This month, we are going to talk about plywood. Plywood is everywhere in professional audio. It is used in trailers and ramps, speaker boxes and cases, stands and stages. Even though plywood is ubiquitous, we rarely pay it much mind. At least if you ignore the constant complaints about how heavy it is. Plywood is a versatile material, and an excellent introduction to a class of substances known as composites. The behavior of plywood is a good example to delve into in terms of thinking about some of the properties of materials in general. This month, our aim is to uncover some of that in a way that shows why plywood is preferred to solid wood for many structural applications.

Other than dead silence, feedback must be the most hated thing in professional audio. Feedback has been with us since the first microphone was placed in front of a speaker and is something every audio technician learns to manage. As long as loudspeakers are returning sound information back to presenters and performers the potential for feedback will remain. This month, we’ll define the cause of feedback, and then see how some aspects of monitor speaker design can contribute to causing feedback.

Energy is integral to every aspect of life, including professional audio. Energy also has a swirling tornado of political, economic, and environmental considerations that kick up quite a cloud of confusion when trying to make sense of how to think about this important topic. For this month’s column, I have the ambitious goal of conveying an engineer’s perspective on the myriad details surrounding the production and use of energy. My hope is that, by touching broadly on a number of different disciplines, FRONT of HOUSE readers will gain a clearer perspective about the big picture surrounding the present and future of energy.

Sound is fundamentally about change. Changes in pressure on the eardrum lead to bone movement in the inner ear that triggers changes in neurons that cause the brain to perceive sound. And for pro audio, the initial change in air pressure results from a loudspeaker whose physical movement caused the change in pressure.

Sometimes, Placement is Everything

Some of the most common questions I’m asked when teaching the Smaart measurement software classes for Rational Acoustics concern microphone placement. Among these are: “Where do I put my mic to get a useful measurement,” “does the position/aim of the mic matter,” and “how many measurement positions do I need?” When you think about it, it’s an interesting proposition to assume we can make a useful measurement of complex electro-acoustical systems loaded into a performance space having a volume in the thousands of cubic meters and have the result somehow summed up at tiny microphone capsule points in space.

While big subwoofers tend to get the attention of both sound companies and audiences, the compression driver keeps its intricacies hidden from view, as shown in Fig. 1. This month, we’ll tease out some of the components within compression drivers and help explain why these small devices are every bit as complex — and often more expensive — than their booming big brothers. Along the way, we’ll talk a little bit about how the way something is made influences the cost of production.

Previously in FRONT of HOUSE, we discussed some of the complications behind getting product certified — such as UL — for safety or electromagnetic emissions. That topic quickly devolves into alphabet soup, and can become rather expensive headache for companies designing product. It also drives tradeoffs beyond those involving the raw performance of a product.

When new audio gear arrives, the box is opened, the manual briefly scanned, but then many people just start making noise. Even the most meticulous reader of manuals will typically skip the preamble and “declaration of conformity” pages at the front of the manual. Yet locked within these pages are much of the blood, sweat and engineering tears shed during the design of your favorite pro audio products.

How to Set Up Your Own Private Wireless Network

The majority of digital console manufacturers offer one or more ways to control your console remotely. In some cases, this can be done from a laptop running an offline/online editor, and in other cases, it can be done from a tablet or smartphone application.