How to diagnose the need for room treatment?
The human hearing mechanism tends to some degree to "latch on" to the leading edges of transient waveforms, and give them greater emphasis than what may follow a few milliseconds later. Re my earlier comments on this issue, in a post in a different current thread Shadorne referenced a Wikipedia writeup on the "Haas Effect," which is what I was referring to without knowing its name: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haas_effect A brief excerpt from that article: When two identical sounds (i.e., identical sound waves of the same perceived intensity) originate from two sources at different distances from the listener, the sound created at the closest location is heard (arrives) first. To the listener, this creates the impression that the sound comes from that location alone due to a phenomenon that might be described as "involuntary sensory inhibition" in that one's perception of later arrivals is suppressed. Thanks, Shadorne! Regards, -- Al |
Good point about the Haas effect. One should also note that there is a lower limit to time interval needed for distinguishing direct from reflected/delayed signals. If the arrival interval is on the order of 5msec +/-, the signals are not distinguished and the perceived source location is intermediate between the original source and the phantom source related to the reflection. Kal |
