Spogg's organ...

[Spogg]

Well I think I’m thinking of it the right way!

As I understand it, we aim to excite an environment with a sine sweep or broadband pulse and record what we hear at the location an audience member would hear it. I believe that the impulse will be significantly affected by its point of origin since this will affect the early reflections and any resonances and cancellations relating to the point of origin as well as the listening point.

Since we have a technical disagreement I’ve found a couple of links that support my understanding:

https://www.soundonsound.com/techniques ... ir-utility
Grey box-out:
You can record IRs at different locations in the room, and as long as you keep the background noise low and the recording level sensibly high without clipping, the rest is down to artistic judgement. A common approach for concert halls is to put the speaker where the performer would normally be and the mics somewhere in the audience area.

http://tulrich.com/recording/ir_capture/
It's important to understand that a particular room actually has an infinite number of IR's associated with it, because the position of the sound source and the sound receivers (mics or ears) greatly influence the response. (For typical mixing purposes I just want something that sounds good, but I'm curious about whether capturing multiple IR's with different source positions would make it possible to closely simulate the sound of (say) a band in a room, where each instrument is received slightly differently.)

I did find that the source location is hardly ever mentioned in articles about recording IRs and I’m sure what you suggest would be at least adequate for many purposes. Of course if you did generate the IR source from the listener’s position you would get a very accurate impression of what the church would sound like if you were actually there singing or praying out loud.

Fascinating stuff!

----------------------

Regarding editing of the IR for the Bach piece: I tried to get the “sustain” idea implemented but the editing facility didn’t provide what I needed. So I made synthetic IRs in my IRA2 (I don’t think I ever published that one) which achieved the shape but sounded… awful. Much too muddy and confused in the early “sustain” phase. There’s nothing like the real thing!

[EDIT] I did publish the IRA2 : viewtopic.php?f=4&t=3879&hilit=IRA&start=40#p22285


Cheers

Spogg

[tiffy]

"Spogg's organ...

This is all Hugh Banton’s fault!

He aroused my interest in pipe organs, so I’m making a pipe organ synth. I just had to. It will be called the Quilcom Rank and I was hoping to have it ready for Christmas 2018, but it might not be. So here’s a taste of the sounds I’m getting, with some seasonal stuff included.

This is a link to a Dropbox folder from where you can play the pieces directly.

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/159d332uwpw3 ... ig2Ka?dl=0"

Thank you Spogg, this sounds great even on my laptop.

[wlangfor@uoguelph.ca]

I must say Spogg, Your organ sounds un-paralleled. I've tried HB3 and liked it, but Yours has a rich smoothness which surprised. I'll surely make tracks with it and thanks for Your hard work .

I like to make organ bits for Rap You see, it's a secret passion of mine. I often too like to add the sound of released steam like a hiss..... Your organ will probably be My favorite organ to date.

[tulamide]

As I understand it, we aim to excite an environment with a sine sweep or broadband pulse and record what we hear at the location an audience member would hear it. I believe that the impulse will be significantly affected by its point of origin since this will affect the early reflections and any resonances and cancellations relating to the point of origin as well as the listening point.

Yes, that's how IRs for convolution reverbs work. That's why I am so confused from your statements that it wouldn't be easy to record from right in the ranks??? You wouldn't. You set up the speaker or clap right in front of the organ (the artist's place is a good spot), and record it at the listener's position. The links I posted (some, not all) for IRs had different listener positions for you to choose from, and different origin positions as well, for example.

[Spogg]

... you produce the sine sweep or clap at a position, a listener might be.

You set up the speaker or clap right in front of the organ (the artist's place is a good spot), and record it at the listener's position.

These two statements appear contradictory to me. I took issue with the first one but I agree with the second one
Maybe it's a language thing

A flue pipe emits sound from the top as well as the bottom so I made the point that, in some cathedrals, you would need to climb high to excite the space from the area of emission of the sound waves. This would provide a more correct IR when recorded in the auditorium, somewhere central in the seating area.

Anyway, I've still failed to get what exactly what I want from convolution so I’m making my own reverb specifically for a cathedral pipe organ mix (not for each Rank), using Martin's FDN reverbs and applied what little I know about acoustics. At the moment it's sounding pretty good on headphones; very diffuse and the tail kinda "shimmers" like the second YouTube video. I don’t yet know if it will be significantly better than remix1, but if I think it is I’ll upload a version with the new reverb.

Thanks again for your input tulamide.

Cheers

Spogg

[RJHollins]

Rarely is the Organist sitting out in the Audience.

2. I have several Convolution Reverb programs with extensive Libraries. From a wide variety of Cathedrals and Churches, Presets are from different locations, distances, mic spread, positions. None being from the Performer's position.

All 'Pipe Organ' that I've recorded were built within the structure of the building. Several encompassed the entire 'room' as a Surround installation.

There are two different scenarios. Either something 'true-life' ... or as a 'Synthesizer' patch.

[Spogg]

Fascinating RJ!

So you’ve made recordings of real installations then. Amazing!

In the case of an organ encompassing the whole building, how on earth could you take the “best” IR? In my imagination I would want several for re-synthesis of the environment; at least 1 for every department, and maybe more.

Would you be willing to share your favourite cathedral IR recordings? If not, no probs.

I do think the “Pipeverb” I just made sounds a bit better than the convolution reverb I was using. But it could be cognitive bias because I spent several hours on it. The link takes you to the new MP3 version:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/gtqr7xi5xacjb ... b.mp3?dl=0

I’ve made no changes to the source sounds and mix, so the only difference is the new reverb. The Pipeverb is very tweakable to give the impression of various environments.

I must say I offer up huge gratitude to Martin for making the FDN reverb module

Maybe see what you think while I go away and wrap what seems like thousands of presents…

Cheers

Spogg

[tulamide]

Rarely is the Organist sitting out in the Audience.

I never said that.

... you produce the sine sweep or clap at a position, a listener might be.

You set up the speaker or clap right in front of the organ (the artist's place is a good spot), and record it at the listener's position.

These two statements appear contradictory to me. I took issue with the first one but I agree with the second one
Maybe it's a language thing

I think so, too. My car example should have made it clear, or else I would contradict myself with that example.

For example, in a car, you would record the impulse response from the driver's seat, if you want the listener to have the feeling of driving the car. You wouldn't record the impulse response in the engine bay, although the sound is produced there.

I read your statements as if you were implying to record the response right in the pipes, or directly in front of them.

[RJHollins]

Fascinating RJ!

So you’ve made recordings of real installations then. Amazing!
In the case of an organ encompassing the whole building, how on earth could you take the “best” IR? In my imagination I would want several for re-synthesis of the environment; at least 1 for every department, and maybe more.
Would you be willing to share your favourite cathedral IR recordings? If not, no probs.

Hi Spogg.

Sorry I wasn't clear ... the Recordings I've done are actual performances. [Remotes]
There were no IR's used. Already had the natural acoustics.

The IR Presets are those from AltiVerb [commercial plugin]. These I have used in other types of Mixing situations. Last I recall was for a Piano performance with less than ideal room that I 'enhanced' with convolution verbs.

I remember there were a few websites [Chambers?] that used to post IR's. Don't know the situation today if still available.

My work today is in Mastering. [some Mixing]. My processing tools are based around Acustica-Audios 'N-4 [Nebula, and ACQUA] plugins. These are dynamic, multi convolution design, with 1k's of impulses [irs] are involved with a single Preset. [rather than static designs used by Altiverb, SIR, WAVES].

[Spogg]

@tulamide
Yep, just a misunderstanding!

@RJ
And another misunderstanding!

And you make the distinction between a synth preset and a “true life” recording, and I totally agree that no synth, or sampler, will ever be indistinguishable from the real thing.

The brief I set myself was to use FlowStone to make myself a dedicated pipe organ synth that would sound as good as I could achieve without relying on samples or extracted waveforms. It’s been fun so far and I really appreciate the positive comments I’ve had to date. Whilst it never even could sound perfect it’s quite a bit cheaper than installing a cathedral’s worth of hardware!

I’ll publish it after Christmas…

Cheers

Spogg