Hi there Steven, and Welcome!
The Room...
We'd need to know a lot more about how the room is treated at present. The REW data isn't grossly terrible, but it's also nowhere near fantastic: There's some major issues in the low end, with large swings in levels, some modal activity, floor and ceiling bounces, desk surface issues, etc., but without knowing what you already have in there, we can't really help you with what else you need to do. Please explain what treatment you have, including how it was made and what materials were used to make it.
That said, the first thing you'll have to do is to get all the unnecessary stuff out of there, and clean it up to get proper symmetry and proper geometry. Take out the sofa on the right, the side table on the left, the video screen in the front left corner, the "things" standing up against the right wall, and all the other stuff. All of that has to go. The room has to be bare to start with, for your treatment, and it has to stay that way after it is treated. Symmetry is critical, so you can't have anything on one side of the room that is not matched by something identical on the other side.
Take it all out, and leave just your desk with the DAW on it, and your speakers.
They are currently set up 42.5" from cone to cone in an equilateral triangle. Placed 17" from the back wall and 39.5" from each parallel wall on the sides.
That needs to be fixed! That's probably the source of some of the problems visible in your REW data.
It also doesn't make sense! You said the room is 8'2 wide, which is 98". If they are each 39.5" from the side walls, then they cannot possibly be 42.5 apart! 39.5 + 39.5 + 42.5 = 121.5 = 10' 1-1/2". so there's something wrong with your math here... From the photos, it looks like the room is about 8' wide, not 10' wide, so I'll assume that the 8'2" is correct and your numbers for the speaker positions are wrong.
Set up your speakers so they are tight up against the front wall, with just a 4" gap between the rear corner of the speaker and the front wall. That gap is for you to put in a 4" thick panel of OC-703 later, between the speaker and the wall. Therefore, the rear corner of the speaker will be touching the front face of the 703 after you do that (see below).
The speakers are too close together, and angled incorrectly. Move them further apart, so they are 28" from the side walls- I'm talking about the location of the
acoustic axis here, not the sides of the cabinet. The acoustic axis is the imaginary point on the front baffle of the speaker, from which the sound appears to emanate. It should be indicated in the speaker manual, or on the manufacturers website. If not, you can estimate: it will be on the imaginary line that joins the center of the woofer to the center of the tweeter, and it will be much close to the tweeter than the woofer. Probably around the point where the tweeter waveguide meets the front baffle. Imagine a line that pokes out from that point on the speaker, perpendicular to the front baffle: that is your acoustic axis, which you will use for aiming the speaker. So set up the speakers such that the acoustic axis of each is 28" from the side wall. That will put the axes 42 inches apart. (28 + 28 + 42 = 98" = 8'2" )
Now set up a mic stand perfectly vertical, on the room centerline, exactly 60" from the front wall, and set up your chair so that the center of your head will be 46" from the front wall. The mic stand is just there as your aim point. Aim each speaker so that the acoustic axis is pointing exactly at the mic stand. Use a laser on top of the speaker, centered on the acoustic axis, if you want extreme accuracy.
Now also make sure that your speakers are set to the correct height: 47.25" above the floor. Once again, that's the height of the acoustic axis, not the cabinet. In your case you could go a bit higher, but no more than 49".
Your speaker stands don't look very substantial, so I'd suggest replacing them with something heftier. They need to be massively heavy: Many people build them from steel and fill them with dry sand to get the mass. You should also use Sorbothane pads under the speakers, to decouple them from the stands. Allow for the thickness of the Sorbothane when building your stands, so that the height works out correctly.
That sets up the correct geometry for your room. Do one set of REW tests (explained below) like that, with no treatment in the room, then do another set once you get the basic treatment in (see below)
REW Graphs
My readings were done with a Nady CM-100 from my mixing position exactly at the point where the monitors meet in the equilateral triangle with both monitors on.
That needs to be fixed too! The mic is fine, but the rest is no. The mic must be set up exactly where the center of your
head will be, not at the point where the axes intercept.
Yes, I know that you've seen that famous diagram on the Internet, copied and repeated everywhere, showing the famous "triangle" with the apex in the middle of your head. I don't know where that came from originally, but it is wrong. It does not apply to humans! If you look at that diagram, you'll notice that the speakers are aimed at your eyes!
So that would work out well for all people who have had their ears surgically transplanted into their eye sockets, but for the rest of us, the speakers should obviously be aimed at our ears, which stick out on the sides of our head, a few inches away from the middle of our brains... In fact, research shows that even that aim point is too far forward: it should really go about 12 to 18" behind your head, with the axes grazing past the side of you ears, not actually touching your head at all. That's why your speakers will be aimed at that mic stand, 60" from the front wall and 14" behind the center of your head. That's the optimal location to get a good wide sweet spot, proper stereo imaging, and a clean, broad, accurate sound stage.
Therefore, the place where you set up the mic is the spot that is mid point between where your ears will be, which is NOT the same point as where the axes intercept.
The mic also needs to be pointing forwards, exactly between the speakers, but angled upwards towards the ceiling at 60°.
Do your REW tests like that. Carefully measure the exact location of the mic in the room, in all three dimensions, so you can always get it back to that precise point for all future measurements. This is important! It MUST get back to that exact spot, accurate to within 1/4", for ALL measurements.
I am not sure what to post for the graphs
Just the actual MDAT file, unless you spotted something that you think is important in one of the graphs, then post that as well.
From the graphs, it is apparent that you did not calibrate REW correctly, using a good quality hand-held sound level meter. You need to do that. Calibrate REW at a level of 77 dB(C) for each individual speaker. In other words, first set all your gear to flat response, no EQ anywhere, no dynamics, nothing but a clean signal path going in and out, with the gain structure set correctly all across the system at -20dBFS (and/or 0dBu), so there will be good S/N and no clipping.
Now turn off the left and right speakers leaving only the sub on, play the sub calibration signal in REW, and set the sub volume control so that you see a level of 77 dB(C) on your hand held meter (set to "C" and "SLOW") when you have it in the mix position. Now turn off the sub, turn on only the left speaker, and do the same, setting the volume control to get a level of 77 dB(C), but using the speaker calibration sound, NOT the sub calibration sound: Now repeat for the right speaker alone, at 77 dB(C). Now turn them all on together, and you should be getting a level of a bit over 86 dB(C), which is the "standard" calibration level for cinemas and studios. With that level playing in the room and visible on your meter, use the SPL calibration tool in REW to tell REW what the real level in the room actually is. That's the only way that REW will know what the level is. After you calibrate, you should see 86.5 dB on your hand held meter, and 86.5 dB on the REW meter. When you see them both showing the same number, you have calibrated correctly.
Now do your actual tests. We need a set of seven tests initially, to get the full picture of what the room and the speakers are doing. Do all of these with full spectrum sweeps, from 17 Hz to 22,000 Hz. For each test, set the delay to a time that is long enough for you to get out of the room completely, plus 5 seconds.
Do one test with just the sub on, and label it "--S Empty", one test with just the left speaker on and label it "L-- Empty", one test with just the right speaker on and label it "-R- Empty", one test with both the left and sub on, labelled "L-S Empty", one with both the right and sub on, labelled "-RS Empty", one with just the left and right speakers on but no sub, labelled "LS- Empty", and one with all of them on together, labelled "LRS Empty".
Then put the initial basic treatment in the room, and do another set of tests, following exactly the same procedure, but changing the "Empty" to "Basic" for each label.
The "initial basic treatment" is:
- One "Superchunk" style bass trap in each front corner, floor to ceiling. Make them as big as you can, at least 18" on each side, and hopefully 24".
- One panel of 4" thick OC-703 behind each speaker, up against the front wall. Make the panel big enough to extend from about 6" below the level of the desk surface to about 2 feet above the top of the speaker cabinet, and wide enough to extend at least 16" each side of the speaker. That implies that these panels will meet the edges of the superchunks on the wall side, and will nearly meet in the middle of the front wall, being about 10" inches apart.
- One panel of OC-703 on the ceiling, centered midway between the front baffle of the speaker and your ears.
- One panel of OC-703 on each side wall, centered midway between the front baffle of the speaker and your ears.
Post the REW MDAT file after you complete all of the above, and some photos of how the room with all that treatment in place, then we can help you with your next round of treatment, and adjustments of the speakers.
- Stuart -
There is no reason why they should be set at exactly 30°, nor is there any good reason why the distance between the speakers should be same as the distance from each speaker to your ear. So why do so many places on the Internet get that wrong? Good question... no answer... just "perpetuated myth", i guess. They all quote each other, without thinking about what they are saying...
