#bss octave

[domaine-du-fleau]

FINE ANYWAY - intro As he went to pick up a new mare from another country's stud (BSS Octave, by chelle on TES), Salomon takes the opportunity to swing by the Domaine du Fléau, just to say hi to his best buddy Artan and give a breather to his PRE. However, Artan seems to have something else in mind.

[juunshua]

mzfaithlehane replied to your post “fwskjh i'm watching chao yin zhan ji and jun keeps singing high and...”

As much as I would love Boo to teach them all, I fear that he might not be able to teach the baritenors that well because he might not know about their voice type. Yes, he’s the best singer out of SVT, but what if he ends up teaching them things that might end up damaging their voice even further? I have a lot of faith in Seungkwan not doing that, but in the back of my mind, I fear that it might end up backfiring if he does (which is a slim chance).

i have a lot of faith in boo because when it comes to singing because he’s done and said a lot of right things. for starters, on svt project, i remember him saying something about learning how to sing in a way that would not hurt his voice. current examples too: he doesn’t act like its the end of the world if his voice cracks (he let his voice crack be edited in - during that one interview where both him and dk cracked their voice in succession - and honestly didnt seem the littlest bit bothered by the fact that his voice did crack. on hongkira with booseoksoon, he literally kept singing the part of a song where his voice would crack ON PURPOSE to show that he hasnt mastered a part of a song yet like he did it multiple times.), he realizes that there are certain limits to ur voice depending on ur voice type (on hello counselor when they asked him to sing a song that was originally meant for a soprano, he did it, but he dropped the octave to sing a couple of notes, and later he explained: ‘well...whats more important is singing in the key thats meant for you.’ to others it might seem an excuse, but to me that statement meant a LOT. i mean he does sing songs that are meant for sopranos like he did on the karaoke thing with bss but he did it on purpose FOR FUN which is a different thing), the fact that his best vocal performance was earlier this year during masked singer (indicating that hes always improving), the fact that he has resonance and not just for like a single note (he can ‘optimize’ his singing), how he realizes confidence is an important first step in singing (the little comments he made to jh when he was singing habit). bumzu himself i believe thinks boo would be a great vocal trainer too out of all of svt (i agree).  if he were to teach, i wouldn’t doubt that he’d learn and know his material beforehand too. and even if he doesn’t take their voice type into consideration, honestly a lot of them just dont even have a fundamental grasp on the simple basics, such as breathing, im sure he could give them all breathing exercises to work on. more than anything, even if he doesn’t teach them things, maybe he could provide a direction or a first right step. but ofc this is all up to him, i dont necessarily expect him to teach because its not really his obligation to and he at least from him, he doesnt seem to have all aspects of singing down (lower register and head voice need so much work but considering his knowledge of the mix maybe hes just having trouble executing head voice even if he may know how it works? and its not like hes never not sung in head voice before but those were unintentional so like if he were to teach that stuff he wouldnt be able to show like a good verse bad example from his voice but if he were aware of it he could pull up examples of other singers). also who knows, he might be giving them pointers already and no one is implementing them; all he can do is tell them things and show them how it works, he cant sing for them you know? and thats the hard part. learning something is one thing, trying to implement every single time u sing after that is another. being aware of how ur singing is super highly important but most of them just dont seem to know how they sing they just open their mouth and do whatever their brain thinks of as ‘singing’. 

[nsantasoundjournal2017-blog]

Sound class #6 24/8/17

After our last two classes where we focussed on microphones and mixing consoles, respectively, today's class we looked at the final link in the chain, the speaker.

Put simply, a speaker converts electrical impulses into waves of air.

This is done through a mechanical process

Electrical impulses pass     though the cable from the mixing console (or amplifiers) to the speaker's     input

Internal cabling connects to     a fixed magnet where electrical impulses change the magnetic field

Moves a voice coil against     the magnetic field

Voice coil, attached to the     cone, moves the cone which in turn moves air particles and creates sound 

There are four main elements in speaker systems

Subwoofer

LF driver (woofer)

MF driver

HF driver - compression     driver(tweeter)

These can be all in one unit (internal) or separate where each element has its own unit (external)

Subs, LF and MF drivers are designed with the paper cone principle, as stated above, where electricity changes the polarity of a magnet which moves a voice coil attached to the paper cone.

For HF, on the other hand, a compression driver is used.  It uses all of the same components just used in a different way.  Compression drivers use a very small inverted speaker cone and a phase plate insert to direct the HF sound out of the housing.

Some compression drivers also feature a horn. A horn is an external housing from the compressions driver to direct and steer the HF sound.  Nearly all PA speakers will feature a horn.  The horn is also known as a waveguide (as it guides the sound waves in a certain direction). 

Understanding the components of a speaker, we now looked at dual concentric speakers.  I had never heard of this term before, but once Russell began explaining, I understood that he was talking about coaxial speaker systems.  These speakers systems place the tweeter/compression driver in the middle of the LF driver.  The whole idea here is that both elements exist in the same space and therefore there is no phase irregularities between the two elements compared to when the elements are separate in conventional speakers.

 We very briefly looked at piezo transducers. These are ceramic membranes that when an electrical impulse is applied, the ceramic will change shape and thus create a soundwave.  These can then be attached to another surface and therefore, essentially use the entire surface as a speaker.

 We looked at the idea of dispersion ratings of speaker cabinets.  Essentially, the dispersion rating is the shape that the sound comes out of the cabinets. This is done with a horizontal and a vertical reading.  These measurements are in degrees and the determination point is how far off centre before there is a -6dB reduction in level.  For instance, a speaker may have a dispersion rating of 100o x 50o. This means that the speaker can adequately cover 100o (50o from the centre of the speaker) horizontally and 50o (25o form the centre of the speaker) vertically.

This principle becomes very important when designing a system to adequately cover the audience, especially when looking at speaker systems

The first type of system is a point-source system. This is the traditional method of sound amplification - a full range of sound produced from a single point.  This can then be augmented with multiple speakers, however the principle still remains that each speaker is a single point in the system.  Multiple speakers can be combined in an array that can increase the coverage.  This is typically done on a horizontal plane, otherwise more speakers will mean more volume. 

The second type of system is a line array. This is system works exactly as the name suggests - a line of speakers built into an array, typically vertical. The difference here is that each box has multiple elements with very limited dispersion.  The idea is that when multiple boxes are combined in an array, the dispersion rating increases.  For example, if one box had a rating of 120o x 5o and you combined ten boxes together, you now have a dispersion rating of 120o x 50o.  For this to work effectively, the boxes need to be arrayed at certain angles to each other to get coherent coverage.  This is known as a J-curve, due to the inherent J shape the array makes.  The idea here is that no matter where you are in the audience, you will be able to hear the same content with the same coverage.

Another consideration in speaker design is whether the cabinet is sealed or ported.  As the names suggest, a sealed box is a sealed, air tight design.  These cabinets are punchier and tighter sounding with quicker response to changes in frequency than ported boxes.

The other design is the ported, or bass reflex design. In this design, the cabinet has an opening that allows outside air to enter the cabinet and move in sympathy with the LF driver.  This is because when a cone enters the rarefaction stage, there is low air pressure in the cabinet.  Therefore air can enter the cabinet and fill it.  When the cone enters the compression stage, the air is in high pressure and is then forced out of the cabinet.  This overall helps to convey the sound.  

 We then looked at speaker systems for the stage - foldback systems.  A foldback system is a network of speakers on stage to support the talent, giving them what they need/want to hear in order for them to perform the best they can.

 These speaker systems can be manipulated by many different processors.  Today we looked at using a Graphic Equaliser.  These processors are used to manipulate the frequency response of the speaker system ie. Tuning the sound system.  These can have varying number of frequencies to change, however a 31 band GEQ (1/3 octave) seems to be the most common as it allows for greater control and manipulation of the frequency spectrum, especially in the low and mid frequencies. 

There are two types of GEQ processors - Gyrator and Constant Q

Gyrator GEQs vary the Q/bandwidth depending on the amount of boost or cut.

Low boost/cut has a wide Q

High boost/cut has a narrower     Q

Gyrator GEQs also affect surrounding frequencies

E.g. cutting 800Hz and 1.2kHz by 6dB will also cut 1kHz by a similar amount

On the other hand, Constant Q GEQs, as the name suggests, have a constant Q no matter how much is cut or boosted.  This also means that surrounding frequencies are far less affected by various boosts and cuts.