The infamous "amp in the room" vs FRFR discussion

Lohengrin said:
That triggered something in my mind. What about beamforming?

...plus, in my understanding, this technique is widely employed in sonar devices, and maybe that's good news becase I think that's an area where Cliff has a worked before... :D
Click to expand...
in radio (and i’m extrapolating, sonar or audible sound) you need several radiators and a computer controller to do beamforming. basically you need to set different radiators to interfere with/reinforce each other to send the beam in the direction you want.

beamforming a narrow band radio frequency signal requires an array of antennae tuned to that frequency. a lot of recent wifi routers do this with 4 or 6 omnidirectional antennae, but we’re talking about very small frequency bands (2412 to 2484 mhz and 5035 to 5864 mhz) so it’s easy to get antennae that are flat across this spectrum. since it’s basically impossible to get speaker drivers that are flat across the audio spectrum (20-20,000 hz) and even harder to get omnidirectional drivers...

even if you just wanted to beam form in one direction, you’d need an array of at least 4 to 6 coaxial FRFR drivers, all pointing in the same direction. imagine a circle of Atomic CLRs in a 6 foot tall, six foot wide cabinet. i don’t know about you, but i can think of a lot better uses for $6k

someone is going to bring up the apple homepod, which is a tiny but almost omnidirectional speaker. do any of us know what its frequency response is?
 
Last edited:
DLC86 said:
The good news is I found a neat solution for this issue.
I just placed a crossover before the cab block and sent the high end to a "smoothed" IR and the low end to the same IR but unprocessed.
It worked as I expected with the crossover frequency set around 1KHz, it was the most ampintheroomish tone I've heard coming from my CLRs, especially when doing this with a far-field IR.
Click to expand...

Anyone else try this? I haven't had a chance yet...
 
Ok, big update here. Thanks to Jason's tips, I made a huge advance in getting the "in-the-room" tone I was looking for. The key is to use a second "room" cab that has modeled the amp much further away. There are fewer of these (with the text "room" in the title of the IR), but I found four I like in the Factory 1 and Factory 2 cab lists. I added a "room" cab in parallel, and then a Large Room reverb that I like and it just pops.

The clip below builds up the tone. You should be able to hear the difference in the cab types. I tried to play the same thing each time. Turn up the volume with great headphones. Here is a description of each step in the clip (I'm using my Custom Strat with Kinman pups in quack position):

1 - Amp and main cab only on. No effects or reverb on. This is my core AC-30 cab tone. I blended four cab IRs for this. It has a lot of mids, and not heavy on the bass. Room level is 5%. Proximity is 1.00 for all IRs.

2 - Amp and "room" cab on only. This is the key to the "in-the-room" tone. I turned off the main cab in step #1 above. I blended four room cabs and also panned them different amounts which gives it an even more real room feel. The proximity setting is also important. I set proximity at 3.5 for all four cab IRs. Room level is 25%. There is no reverb here. The room cab has a reverb like effect to it already. The level for this cab is a little higher than the main one in step #1.

3 - Amp with both the main cab and "room" cab in parallel with no reverb yet. The volume increases here because the cabs are in parallel. I think the cabs together are fantastic.

4 - Added Large Room reverb block to #3 above. This brings it all together.

5 - Added the dotted 8th digital modulated delay.

 
Hopefully the new Farfield IRs Cilff
Is working on will move this concept a little further
If i can imagine being able to get a great close micd IR and then blend that with the same speaker but a far field should be able to
Get a bit of the best of both words
Add in the cab block room some reflections and it should /could get intresting results to bridge the gap
 
RandyVanMartini said:
Huh? I must have missed this! Do tell......
Click to expand...


FractalAudio said:
Close mic'd IRs sound very different than listening to a cab at a distance. For this very reason we have scheduled some studio time for a "Far Field IR Pack". We're going to try a variety of techniques to try and capture some far-field IRs. Technically you need a large space where the reflections occur after the IR has finished, like an airplane hanger or something but I've got some ideas on how to do it in a studio.
Click to expand...

thats Cliffs reply from another thread, in Jan, they were in the studio last week I think
 
I'm not getting it. sounds like too much going on to me, the crispness, which is key to that song is lost in that final section IMHO.

It sounds ok at low volume but crank it up a bit and there is too much going on for me
 
Last edited:
I found my headphone amp-in-the-room secret sauce...

mono delay right after input 1
4ms, feedback 0, mix 100 (that's the ~4 feet from cab to face)

enhancer right before output 1
stereoizer, width+depth ~50, or to taste
(that's the stereo comb filtering needed for your ears to tell you the sound is coming from a space in front of you)
 
I always have the amp in the room sound, because my rig is always stage volume loud, so I have no need to try to simulate it.
But I accidentally stumbled accross a fake out method, that pretty much fills up the room.
I use a delay block set to a fast delay, almost adding a doubling effect. You can experiment with the settings, but keeping the delay speed lower than 50ms seems to have the best effect and helps get rid of the real noticeable delay.
I have to give credit to Leon @2112 , for turning me on to the phase reverse technique a while back, in one of his Excellent tutorial videos.
I've been playing with it, trying out all sorts of settings, which led me to this. It may not be what you are looking for, but it fills up a 400 sq ft rehearsal studio.

20191121_091220.jpg20191121_091246.jpg
 
Lax said:
If you're a bedroom player and have an amp in the room issue, just get a combo practice amp in there :D

Headphone players don't have the issue
Gigging musicians don't have the issue
In-ear users don't have the issue
Producers and studio musicians don't have the issue

I practice / rehearse / gig / and record, and am yet to find a situation where I asked myself for this amp in the room stuff.

The axefx is a killing machine in term of mic'ed amp tone, ready for a lot of monitoring solutions.
You can get a power amp and a cab, or a subwoofer, or a big PA system, but if you play for yourself and wanna hear an unmic'ed amp, maybe you're just searching for an amp :D
Click to expand...
+1 on this. After about 200 gigs with FAS products (most often with an FRFR cab), I never had any issue with the way the speakers sound on stage. It took a bit to get used to after playing mostly Mesa tube amps for 25 years. But my ears are now used to it and I can use global EQ if I need some hi cut. I also never received as many compliments on tone from sound guys and folks in the audience as I have when using FAS gear. IMO, the amp in the room stuff is cool but it’s an extra that I would probably never use. Most guitar players I know are going IEM and clean stage setups so they don’t even think about amp in the room.
 
I've found I get plenty of amp in the room out of either my Mission Gemini 2 or my pair of sidefill monitors on stage when I crank them up to taste.

When I crank the Gemini 2 at home to jam (much much louder than stage volume) I get the same feel I do from an amp and a 4x12. If I crank it the wrong time of day, the cops are coming. LoL!!!
 
Last edited:
curious said:
IMO, the amp in the room stuff is cool but it’s an extra that I would probably never use. Most guitar players I know are going IEM and clean stage setups so they don’t even think about amp in the room.
Click to expand...
This is true. We've been 100% In-Ears for 2 years now. I bring a stage rig for looks and feel. I tried not bringing one, one time, and felt something was missing. It affected my sustain and feedback, when needed.
 
It seems like line 6 has tried to model speakers in their new Powercab 112 plus. Has anyone heard it?
 
Only way to get the amp in the room sound from a cab is to go.......

XITONE!

All others fall short in that respect: the axe 3 has a perfect match in Xitone’s purposeful design - the 12” Active Wedge
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom