2024-02-29 Assignment 1
Exploring Sound Qualities in Architectural Design
- Alumni Lounge
The Alumni lounge is a quite big cafeteria on three small different levels linking the alumni plaza to the inner main hallway of the southern side of the HIL. The floorplan has a quite original form, I would describe is as elongated, being structured with rounded walls per moments sometimes concave others convexe making it a rather complexe space to describe.
The exterior facade are made of glass (envelop) and the structure is made of exterior steel pilars, creating a covered courtyard in front. The other, interior walls are wooden panels separating the cafeteria from the hallway and gta exhibition space.
The Alumni lounge is a space to gather, discuss, have lunch, a coffee or a beer depending on the hour of the day. You always have a noisy background made of commercial music, the dishes and people taking.
Regarding the acoustics of this room, I would personally describe this space as bubbly, woobly and quite disturbing. To understand each other you much talk quite loudly and be focused on the discussion because many noises and things happening can catch your attention easily. Sometimes I like spending time there and others not at all, because this space is quite demanding acoustically and can becomes easily overwhelming. Many people are taking, different langages, the music is loud, people are walking through, pushing chairs, bring their dishes back, them being washed and put away, people sneezing, the coffee machine and microwave are working and I’m tapping on my computer (man made sounds).
To descibe the space with the terms proposed by chatgpt I would rather say it’s live, kind of boomy and quite dense.
2. HIL G65 Voluptas studio
The Vouptas studio is a working open space (approximately 10mx15mx2.60m), filled up with tables, chairs, lockers and wooden panels. The room has 2 panels walls (modulable) on the eastern and western sides, a fixed one on the north side and a glass window facade on the south one. The floor has a PVC ground layer and the ceiling has got relief and regular cavities altering neon lamps and acoustic panels. Those panels allow to reduce the reverberation time and have better acoustics throughout the working space.
Regarding the global acoustic atmosphere I would say that the whole space responds quite well to the produced sounds. People are taking in different little groups, a guy is on the phone, chairs a moving, keys opening a locker, touch type on the computer an mouse clics, a woman leave the room with heals and the door closed, some steps follow here and in the background very gently we can heard the ventilation system if we focus on it and I’m carefully listening to all of the surrounding sounds, now I can even hear my own respiration.
if I had to describe the sounds in the space to a friend I would say that its round, quite nice with close people to talk but the more your to understand people in the background our two backs facing is starts to be more blurry and much less understandable at least you have to focus much more for it to be intelligible. And with the given vocabulary I would describe it as balanced but for some noises we could say a little boxy but warm and maybe per moment a bit muddy describing discussion taking place on the other side of the room.
just a small recording of a girl taking to her friend next to her and 4 meters away from the mike
2024-03-07 Assignment 2
Exploring the Emotional Impact of Everyday Sounds
- Alumni plaza
west side of HCl building
People taking different langages, voices coming from every sides, laughs, the growl of an airplane, a guy blowing the smoke of his cigarette, steps on stones, people eating, tu tut from a construction machine, the bus passing by, a glass breaking on the ground, people pushing around the red plastic seats, a fork scratching a plate, engines, the label of my black tea being blown by the wind and touching my cup, a trolley’s wheels and a bicycle falling,
Lots of different ones, coming and going, but behind every sound stands a human action, could be pushing, turning on, driving, eating or talking.
The most catchy sounds are the ones coming out of this ambient permanent back ground noise, could be a sudden horn or a scream catching directly your attention and placing you in a watchful and attentive emotional situation.
As the alumni plaza is an opened space but still has many buildings near by, so you still have some sound reflections making you feel somehow surrounded.
As a personal experience I would describe this space as a nice space to gather, the acoustics are not at all disturbing and let you discuss without having to focus really precisely on one’s words. Acoustically the plaza is not at all overwhelming and lets you spend time in the sun taking a nap as well as eating, discussing and playing across the whole space without getting disturbed even if many people surround you.
2. Emerson garden
east side of HCl building
an engine, high pressure water, steps in the stones, birds singing, bigger bird singing, a car leaving, calm, wind, a big passing by, a dog barking, water flowing and an echoy voice resonating against the building
on that side much more natural sounds, much calmer and less overwhelming, but still some man made noises in the background
Regarding the emotional impact on the human body, for those two different places, i would say that we have a constant background noise (overhead sounds), voices fort the first one and birds for the second one, and that our attention doesn’t seem to focus on any particular base noise (like the beamer in the acoustics room when you don’t think about it). But when we hear a sudden noise our attention immediately focuses to the direction of the sound (open space so easy to find out where) and tries to figure out what I could be, trying to make it understandable by putting the puzzled information together (visuals, sounds and memories relating to similar situations). Actually, each of us relates a sound with a situation related to feelings and emotions and reacts according to it. I would say that the human ear filters all the sounds and only focuses on the “important” ones who could be dangerous, disturbing or discomforting and so are captivated and the mind gets alerted (catchy sounds). By discussing afterwards in the lecture, actually this filter is made according to frequencies attending your ears.
2024-03-14 Assignment 3
Empirical and numerical estimation of room acoustic properties
- HIL Alumni
Analyse of the reverberation time RT60 (room response) with my recording of claps at 1.50m from the mike in the quite loud alumni lounge, (done with the help of the envelope of the recorded clap in half wave and log scale).
I would rather say that yes we can see echos in the impulse decay seen as discreet late peaks on the audiogramme.
For the simulator, i didn’t manage to make it because the geometry of the space is rather to complicated to describe in the app as it’s done for shoebox spaces.
2. HIL G65 Voluptas studio
Analyze of the reverberation time RT60 (room response) with my recording of claps at 1.50m from the mike in the studio space (done with the help of the envelope of the recorded clap in half wave and log scale)
And as I would guess pretty much all spaces have this echo and so the impulses decay can be seen as late peaks in the audio recording as the previous one.
2024-04-11 Assignment 4
Recording 3 chosen sounds
from the window, streets, bells, cars, birds and people
from my desk, the clock, the tabs of the computer (a bit upset so a bit harsh ups) , my breath and the birds
from my kitchen, the oven, the scrunch of a package, the tea being served, the clock and people gathering in the room
2024-04-18 Assignment 5
Characterization of room acoustic treatments
- HIL Alumni
For the HIL Alumni lounge, we have the main effective absorption system suspended on the ceiling even if it doesn’t act like one. For sure as every other room, this space has many more little absorbers making a difference in the perceived sound.
Those wooden suspended panels are all inclined in the same direction, creating a pattern across the whole ceiling. In this case, the panels act not like common effective elements. The act like reflectors to redirect the sound agains the ceiling and enclosed higher space created by this pattern. They are also used as “revetment” for the ceiling hosting the electric system and lamps and finishing it off. The wooden panels are placed in a row making the system modular and adjustable to the dimensions of the spaces. A basic panel is 200x60x1.5cm and is curved on both sided (for design questions). This whole system takes approx 50cm on the height of the space down from the ceiling.
Regarding the frequencies I would assume that those kind of panels only reflect all kind of frequencies but absorb only high ones because they are quite thin and don’t act like other materials as mineral wool or dense rubber absorbing lower ones.
Coming to the question of reflectors I would assume that the glass of the windows (acting also as transmitters), the floor, tables, and other flat and hard surfaces are the main reflectors and don’t help in the whole intelligibility of the space.
2. HIL G65 Voluptas studio
For my first chosen room, the Voluptas studio, the main effective absorbers are added on the structural ceiling, and forsure, other elements act like absorbers but aren’t placed in the space for this specific reason.
The acoustics porous boxes aligned on the ceiling create an effective surface because of their little holes that create a porous structure capable of capturing sounds and letting them get trapped. Losses of energy occur due to thermal conduction and viscous friction among the material. The ones proposed here are metallic shoeboxes of approximately 150x20x10cm spaced regularly, and organised around bigger ones 150x50x10cm. The different boxes create a regular pattern across the whole surface of the ceiling thus lowering the ceiling from approx. 10 cm. And actually, some of them were actually transformed to have another use. Some of them, hosting neons and their electric system, permit the continuity of the ceiling in the same plants the absorbers and so, creating a flat visual ceiling for the users.
Regarding also the other element that could add some absorption we could have people, their clothes, bags and other items (membranes or porous materials, wool, carpets, and so on)
I would assume that those kind of absorbers are mostly catching high frequency range sounds.
On the other side, the space is filled up with reflective elements such as the windows (that also act as transmitters), wooden panels, tables, the floor and other walls (without relief and hard surfaces and materials).
For sure hundred of other surfaces and elements act on the acoustics of the voluptas studio by being reflected, diffused, absorbed or transmitted but are much less impactful as others.
As already described in the assignment 1, the space hasn’t got any specific forms or architectural geometry to especially note.
2024-05-02 Assignment 8
Assembling all puzzle pieces
not sure if we should do this one as we haven’t discussed it!
2014-05-11 Final Assignment- Bunker Cello
For this final assignment, I chose to focus on the civil protection shelter space we have under my parent’s house in Lausanne. The house is part of co-owned property having a large common garage and a shared bunker, currently used for storage. Actually, as the bunker is made of two different spaces linked by a reinforced concrete door, I decided to assume they have different acoustics properties since one is a concrete box and the other one is a furnished one (wall finishes and furniture) and so, in this final assignment better understand their acoustical differences.
Exploring Sound Qualities in Architectural Design
- The furnished box
The first space is a shoe box space of approximately 9m x 5m x 2.8m. The plan is designed on a rectangular base and giving access to the garage through the other further described space. The walls, ceiling and ground are made of concrete and above, layered on top of the ground, wooden OSB panels were added. And along the walls, slats were added too, pinching insulation between the concrete base and the “living” space.
This “living” space is currently a shared storage space and often unused. A few times per year, people come to discuss about the neighbourhood, the organisation of the co-owed property, sometimes parties take place and sometimes neighbours offer soup and eat together. But actually, the purpose of the space is to be able to host civils in case of a disaster.
Focusing on the acoustics, the inside space is soundproof and super calm, you really feel left out and separated from the outside world even if when a car comes in the garage you hear it slightly. The sounds come really quickly back and you feel that it’s actually quite a small space and you can easily find it oppressing since all the noise you make stay trapped and get reflected. Actually, the sounds we can hear are only human made and done within the space, since all natural sounds are left outside quite far away at the entry of the garage.
With the Chatgpt list of words to describe the space I would describe it as boomy, boxy, muddy, reverby and quite reflective.
What can I hear in the furnished box when I focus ? nothing really, juste a wrouuum when a car comes in or leaves and a few kids shouting but the mainly silence . It’s time to try out, I’m whistling (a bit wrong hahah) to break up this oppressant feeling I have alone in the bunker and trying out saying numbers to try to describe the acoustics.
2. The concrete box
The second space is a shoe box space of approximately 9m x 5m x 2.8m with a little stall at the entrance. The plan is designed on a rectangular base too and giving access to the garage. The walls, ceiling and ground are made of concrete without any other layering.
This second space is currently a shared storage space and often unused as the previous one. A few times per year, people come to clean up, sort out, grab something or have a billard game night. But actually, the purpose of the space is to be able to host civils in case of a disaster, exactly as the other one next to it as they are connected and work together as one space.
Now focusing on the acoustics, the feeling is quite different from the previous one but pretty much the same in a descriptive way (difficult to find other words). The inside space is soundproof and kicked out of other sounds. I would define it even more oppressing than the furnished one since you are in an uncomfortable raw concrete box. As already said, all sounds you can hear are human made and directly made in the bunker or from the garage.
With the Chatgpt list of words to describe the space I would describe it as the other one even if when you hear a discussion both seem quite different, boomy, boxy, muddy, reverby and quite reflective.
But what can I actually hear when I’m focusing on sounds in this concrete box? nothing really, pretty much like the previous one just a little louder since you are closer, at least it’s what I felt. When nothing is happening behind the blinded doors you can actually hear a constant noise coming from the ventilation system breaking the silence you were in. But it’s time to try out, a few whistling notes (a bit wrong hahah) and saying a few numbers to find out how both are different acoustically.
Exploring the Emotional Impact of Everyday Sounds
While exploring the acoustics of these two quiet rooms I had to find a sound to create, to better understand the emotional acoustical impact in these two spaces.
Since I play cello and it’s a quite familiar sound to my ear, I wanted to try playing my instrument within those two boxes. I was wondering what would a melody sound like within a space like a reinforced concrete bunker since it’s not at all conceived to hear music neither play an instrument as spaces I was used to during my classes, practice, orchestra concerts and auditions.
- The furnished box
2. The concrete box
After playing a few times the same melody and recording it while playing it was much more complicated then I thought to dissociate what I was playing and what I was hearing and trying to describe acoustically. I think I should have asked someone else to play and I should have focused only on listening and comparing both spaces. For me both were quite strange, really boomy and quite disturbing since the sound stays “quite close” and doesn’t “dissipate”. But I think that even if the rooms are quite different acoustically I wouldn’t be able to dissociate both only by the recording of the cello. Was a nice experience but didn’t really helped me to understand both rooms proprieties.
Empirical and numerical estimation of room acoustic properties
- The furnished box
The estimations of the room acoustics, more specifically the reverberation time (room response) , were made below by popping 5 balloons in a row approximately 2 meters away from the mike. To calculate the RT60, I used audacity for the recording and then traced the estimations. Unfortunately the little peaks seen in between are probably due to my movements to pic up the ballons on the ground before popping them.
The reverberation time for the furnished room is 1.12 seconds for 60 dB.
2. The concrete box
Repeated the exact same procedure for the second room:
The reverberation time for the concrete room is 2.83 seconds for 60 dB.
With this two RT60 we can see that the insulation and the wooden slaps clearly make a difference in the room response, they were needed and aren’t useless, they were right to add them even if the acoustics are not perfect!
Regarding the late peaks we can’t see any in both recordings, so I would assume that there aren’t any echoes in the impulse decay.
Characterisation of room acoustic treatments
For the finished box, as said higher, the walls, ceiling and ground are made of concrete and layered with finishes. For the floor with wooden OSB panels, and for the walls, with insulation (glass wool 4cm), a black fabric and wooden slats nailed down on the insulation and concrete.
By adding these layers, the space has clearly change acoustically compared to the concrete box. By only adding insulation and wooden slats, the speech intelligibility has increased, the reverberation time has gotten lower, and the space is much nicer to be in, than if nothing had been added.
So regarding the main effective absorption system is made through these layers, letting the sound be absorbed mainly by the glass wood insulation and get trapped rather then being directly reflected as it would have been on the concrete. The second room has exactly that effect, the concrete box hasn’t got any effective absorption system except the furniture since there is no other elements throughout the room.
But knowing that both are quite bad acoustically and have a quite bad speech inteligibility, the difference that those panels add must be quite small. I would assume that some specific frequencies are actually absorbed by this system and others are just reflected.
