# Mixing under a slanted ceiling?



## krops (Aug 14, 2019)

Does anyone have any experience with or tips for mixing in a loft room with a slanted ceiling? It’s relatively spacious and carpeted, so it’s not too reflective, but I don’t know where to face my monitors. Would it be better to face them towards one of the sides with the slanted ceiling (long ends) or should I face them towards the wall (short ends, one has a door and one has a window)? One of the long ends has almost no wall (the ceiling extends almost all the way to the floor, leaving only 40 centimetres) whereas the opposite side has a wall of 180 centimetres.


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## JohnG (Aug 14, 2019)

Maybe a picture? A crude drawing?


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## krops (Aug 14, 2019)

Crude drawing it is. The room is actually almost square, but the taller wall (180 cm) has been placed there to provide some extra storage behind it. The window is on the far side of the drawing, the door on the near side. Cheers


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## Nick Batzdorf (Aug 14, 2019)

Not a side wall, because you want your room to be as symmetrical as possible front-to-back.

For a while it was in fashion to design studios with the speakers on a higher wall and a smaller one at the back- sort of a weird concept, but for example Westlake Studios in Hollywood has at least one room like that. I think they called it "compression"... I forget.

Anyway, maybe you got lucky.

My suggestion is to listen to both placements, but if I were going to bet I'd say you'd want to put them on the higher wall.


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## Nick Batzdorf (Aug 14, 2019)

Wait - the *tall* wall is only 180cm (just under 5')?

Then maybe I'd forego symmetry and think about what's the most convenient first.


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## rhizomusicosmos (Aug 14, 2019)

For consistency in the side reflections (considered the most important) I would place them on either of the walls with the slant. My thought would be to try the taller wall first as then the rear slanted wall will naturally provide some diffusion. You could also add extra diffusion for a LEDE effect.

But these considerations are not so important if you are near-field monitoring as the room will have less impact. How far away will you sit from the monitors? If they are close, then you can give ergonomics more weight as Nick suggested.


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## wst3 (Aug 14, 2019)

Once upon a time, when I was designing studios that were not purpose built, I tried a number of different schemes in spaces like yours.

The thing that worked consistently better was to face one of the sloped walls, in your case the taller wall. This puts the side walls pretty far apart, which helps. Having the shorter wall behind you may also help.

Here's the catch - when one is designing a critical listening space in a room with parallel walls, and parallel floor and ceiling the calculations are relatively simple, and repeatable results are possible.

When you start playing with geometry you need a modeling program, and they are expensive, and not completely reliable.

There is a middle ground, I often splayed the side walls a little bit, and sometimes I would build some slope into the ceiling. One of my favorite designs was essentially a triangular floor plan with the rear "point" flattened. There were other factors that helped those rooms work well, not the least of which was that they were built in basements, with cinder block walls surrounded by dirt.

You learn to use what you are given<G>!


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## jcrosby (Aug 15, 2019)

My room is somewhat similar. Are you planning on having the vault runs down the sides of the room or vice versa? In my room the vault runs down the front and rear of the room... Although not ideal, this is definitely the way to go in your room... Having uneven sides means an uneven stereo image. If you already have challenging dimensions don't make it even more challenging by adding a lopsided stereo image...

I spent a ton of time and money listening and treating the room but it was worth it after all was said and done. After treating the room (a 2nd time) I wound up with 3 modes, The main mode is 6dB dB at 100 Hz... the two other notable dips were about 3dB, (400 and 1k)... Other than that, the rest of the spectrum was generally flat within about a dB and overall it's a surprisingly good sounding room... Sonarworks handles those few bumps, and my stereo image extends beyond the side walls... (More height would be nice but this seems to be the limitation of my room, I'm guessing this is the restriction imposed by the irregular vault... I can't complain though, overall it's a great room to work in and clients absolutely love the sound of the sound of it.)

The main take away is as mentioned above, we work where we have to... And with some thoughtful listening, measuring, and acoustic treatment and you can make pretty horrible spaces workable with the tools we have these days... For a lot less than what it would have cost 20 years ago to boot...

Assuming you're setting up the room with the vault running in front of and behind you, the one thing I'd recommend is take those ceilings seriously. A normal vault, (where the angles are your left and right sides), focuses the the sound toward the center axis, a vaulted front and rear will do something similar where you get a lot of energy focused back toward your listening position. (Mostly low end... The further back in the vault you move the subbier it gets, same with the front of the room; this all gets focused back to your listening position... Absorb those ceilings as best you can..)

In my case I went totally ham and covered the entire ceiling, it paid off in spades as the the soundstage is really nice... Like I said the impression of more height would be amazing, but at this point I'm convinced this is just the reality of working in a room where sound gets focused back at the listening position... Overall I really can't complain and people genuinely always comment that the room sounds 'gorgeous', etc... ( If you want to check out how I treated my ceiling check my profile link below... 2nd picture onward are current, and you'll get a pretty clear idea just how heavily I treated my ceiling...)

jcrosby about me


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## krops (Aug 17, 2019)

Wow, that's some serious room treatment, @jcrosby

I'm just a hobbyist, so I'll just be sticking up some humble rubber foam pads, but I'd like to work *with* the room as much as possible. Here's an actual photo of the room in its current, messy state. The higher wall has some roller blinds in front of the storage space. The thing on the far right is just a tabletop, FYI.￼


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## gsilbers (Aug 17, 2019)

here is my take. i did study acoustics and worked in pro studios. i do have a nice3 room. turns out that for me i rather face the window and see outside once in a while when working. i used to have it like most studios seen in pictures where its against a wall, with the tv screen.. you know... classic pro composer studio but just felt so darn depressed with no natural light or just seeing a wall and screen. 
but i also worked at remote control and used to have that sort of junkie xl/hans zimmer setup (like a decade ago) but i dont anymore and work a lot more simple w 1 mac. moral of that story is that it depends what works for you. if i had that space i would be facing the windows. sometimes i read a lot of how poeple get crazy with acustic in a home studio like if it was a mastering studio. these are close range monitors we use. its bascially large headphones. we try to make it sound ok for headphone users and home use and car playback... thats about it. if you are mixing for large theatres like the big boys then .. well.. go to a big big studio. for your picture i would be more worried about how much insulation there is in the roof/walls and how much you can hear the street outside. if its quiet enough then a few owens corning 703/705 panels for reflections or those ebay foam (if its not too bassy of a room) and see how much reflection there is and how much more you need. and that small pocket room on the left of the picture might get boomy on the bass so keep that in mind. but so far.. make it cool and inspiring and see what else you need once you play some music.


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## germancomponist (Aug 17, 2019)

My first thought is: I would install the speakers on the left wall. ... Also experiment with the option to use no stands, but put them on the floor ... . Very often, especially in small rooms, this sounds much better, especially the low frequencies.


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## ThePrioryStudio (Aug 17, 2019)

gsilbers said:


> but so far.. make it cool and inspiring and see what else you need once you play some music.




Yes, this. 

Studios, although great to have them acoustically correct as best as can be. My opinion is, make it a place you want to work in, not a place that you have to put up with. Set it up how you would want to sit which would give you the more space to work, then look at doing a treatment after. gikacoustics panels are well made and relatively cheap. Something above the listening position, something behind each speaker and a thicker bass trap panel behind. 

There is also sonarworks to totally tweak the room sound once you have these small things in place.


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## synergy543 (Aug 17, 2019)

Low ceilings edges will give you lots of annoying reflections. In another house, there is a room like this and its not acoustically pleasing. You definitely want to use absorption on the ceiling where it might provide a direct reflection to your ears. Your walls are too low to be near either side. I would work with the symmertry of the room (keeping the listening position near the center of the roofline) and face the window. Before you do anything though, put up some speakers, and a listening chair and try different things an move both the speakers and the chair around. This will let you find both the problem spots and the very best listening position.


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## jcrosby (Aug 19, 2019)

krops said:


> Wow, that's some serious room treatment, @jcrosby
> 
> I'm just a hobbyist, so I'll just be sticking up some humble rubber foam pads, but I'd like to work *with* the room as much as possible. Here's an actual photo of the room in its current, messy state. The higher wall has some roller blinds in front of the storage space. The thing on the far right is just a tabletop, FYI.￼


True, the treatment in my room was certainly not cheap, but this is also my livelihood so I can justify it... If you put yourself in the hobbiest category I wouldn't worry about acoustics yet. If anything this is something people come to later when they understand _why_ they might want a refined sounding room. (Which as you can see above varies from person to person...)

Technically the distance to the ceilings and extra corners magnify a lot of problems, but it's not the kind of thing you should do because you feel like it's_ something you're supposed_ _to do_... You'd basically just be signing yourself up for a really expensive hobby where you'll be better served by approaching things differently...

Buy some nice really phones instead and do most of your mixing in them instead. Approach your monitors as second perspective or a reality check.. (I would still put something on your ceilings but it doesn't have to be high end, especially if you feel like it's still just a hobby...)


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## krops (Sep 2, 2019)

Thank you for all your helpful comments. Here is an updated photo of how it looks now that I’ve started getting things up and running. No foam or anything yet, as I wanted to giventhe room a "chance" first. So it definitely sounds different than my previous room, which was a lot smaller. What strikes me, though, is that the while the right speaker sounds ok when soloed, the left speaker appears to completely lack lower frequencies. (They are just an old pair of Behringer Truths, but they’ve served me fine for many years). Could this be explained by the shape of the room? As you can see, I’m off-centre in the room, as the room isn’t completely symmetrical, as mentioned earlier. Could this explain the lack of bass in the left monitor, which also has a window behind it?


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## Dex (Sep 2, 2019)

It certainly could. I trust you’ve tried swapping the speakers to make sure it’s not a damaged speaker?


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## rhizomusicosmos (Sep 2, 2019)

If both speakers are working fine, I suspect it is because your right speaker is closer to the corner, so its low frequencies are more affected by boundary reinforcement than the left speaker. So it is actually that the right speaker has boosted bass rather than that the left speaker lacks bass, though probably neither is neutral.

Ideally you should do some measurements at your listening position to identify how far from neutral the setup is and then decide how to fix it: reposition the speakers; use EQ to correct the response; add appropriate room treatment. But really it's all about how important a "correct" speaker response is to you and how much time and money you are willing to expend in obtaining that.


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## rhizomusicosmos (Sep 2, 2019)

The Behringers have some room compensation settings on the back. Have you tried adjusting those?


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## krops (Sep 4, 2019)

Thanks again.

Yes, I did swap the speakers, just to make sure, and it didn't make a difference. I've also tried using the room compensation switches, setting the left speaker to 0 compensation and the right one to max (-6db). The left speaker sounds "boxy", for lack of a more precise description - almost as if there is a bandpass filter with a heavy boost (I can, to some extent, lessen the boxy sound by EQing out certain frequency ranges, but it appears that different sounds require different cuts), whereas the right speaker sounds tighter and less reverberant. 

I'm going to experiment a little more; the weird thing is that I find the right output more pleasant, but like rhizomusicosmos mentioned, that would be the speaker most likely to be coloured due to its placement.

Using the room compensation switches on the monitor does seem to lower the deeper frequencies on the right monitor (using a deep sine wave), but it doesn't take away the boxy sound when using other sound sources - specifically a kick drum loop, which I find useful for this kind of troubleshooting).


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## rhizomusicosmos (Sep 4, 2019)

Have you tried shifting the left speaker to be in a symmetrical position with the right? Can you shift the desk to be more symmetrically aligned with the window? As you say, experiment more.

My thoughts would be to try to move the speakers off the desk. Move the desk back from the wall and use some speaker stands on the floor behind the desk. The speaker stands would also allow you to trial different postions within the room -- once you find the sweet spot, you could shift the desk. But that may not suit your ergonomics as it looks like you have already invested in setting the speakers up with isolation pads in their current position on the desk.

If you want to try acoustic measurement to sort this out, there is good free software for analysis: https://www.roomeqwizard.com/. You just need a microphone. If you have a good quality omni, that might be sufficient for troubleshooting major problems or you could borrow/buy a measurement microphone (there are a couple listed on the REW site). Obviously the best result would be achieved with a calibrated mic -- one with a response that is known by the software and can be compensated for.

Nice lenses by the way.


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## synergy543 (Sep 4, 2019)

If you get a little mirror and tape it to the ceiling (moving it around from place to place), you can shine an LED flashlight on it and find where the reflection points are that go from your speaker to your listening position and then put some absorption on this spot to avoid annoying reflections. Simple treatment for such reflections can make a significant difference.


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## krops (Sep 16, 2019)

rhizomusicosmos said:


> Have you tried shifting the left speaker to be in a symmetrical position with the right? Can you shift the desk to be more symmetrically aligned with the window? As you say, experiment more.
> 
> My thoughts would be to try to move the speakers off the desk. Move the desk back from the wall and use some speaker stands on the floor behind the desk. The speaker stands would also allow you to trial different postions within the room -- once you find the sweet spot, you could shift the desk. But that may not suit your ergonomics as it looks like you have already invested in setting the speakers up with isolation pads in their current position on the desk.



OK, so I've now moved the desk so that I'm sitting directly beneath the beam at the very centre of the room (or what would be the centre if it weren't for the two "layers" of boxroom to my left. I've put a shelf up against the ceiling to my right to kind of replicate the wall on the opposite side. I feel like I've gotten closer, but the speakers still sound quite different, so I've turned room compensation to -4dB on the right speaker. That combined with a slight cut at around 277hZ on the left speaker (or a boost on the right) gets me in the ballpark.  Still don't know which speaker to trust though...

I've pondered making s sort of corner "screen" padded with foam behind each monitor, in the hopes that it would minimise the effect the room has on the balance. I will see if I can find some reasonably priced stands first, though, as I realise that the desktop is yet another factor in the equation.



rhizomusicosmos said:


> Nice lenses by the way.


Keen eye! Does anyone know of a CHEAP hobby, by any chance?


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## Mornats (Sep 16, 2019)

krops said:


> Keen eye! Does anyone know of a CHEAP hobby, by any chance?



Another photographer/musician here. I feel ya! Why couldn't I have taken up running or darts?


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## rhizomusicosmos (Sep 16, 2019)

krops said:


> I will see if I can find some reasonably priced stands first, though, as I realise that the desktop is yet another factor in the equation.


The stands won't necessarily remove all the influence of the desk as you will still have it between the monitors and your ears. They will potentially tighten up the bass and allow more flexibility in positioning relative to your listening position. Chris Henson has stands behind his desk, look at 4.54 in this video:


Really it's all about compromise and finding what works best with what you have.

Were you using this setup previously with no issues?




krops said:


> Keen eye! Does anyone know of a CHEAP hobby, by any chance?



I have one nice Canon lens (70-200 f2.8) but little opportunity to use it these days


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