Course Launches April 1st, 2020.

Registration Open

UPDATE
Due to the lockdown, some contributions to course material are slowed down.
Course starts on 07.04.2020.

The Course

The intent of this online course is to offer designers of sound reinforcement systems a comprehensive curriculum in room acoustics, which is, however, tailored to suit their needs, when they deal with sound reinforcement systems.

The course, therefore, focuses on the topics that a sound system designer shall face in his/her renovation and/or new sound reinforcement systems with heavier weight on the applied side of the extensive and fascinating discipline of room acoustics.

Deep theory and analysis are introduced only, when they serve directly the objective of sound reinforcement system design. Mathematical formulas are reduced to minimum to give way in the course to physics concepts behind the properties and behaviors in an efficient and practical approach.

The course material, which includes videos, slides and other documents, shall be available for enrolled students starting 01.04.2020 at 12:00 CEST. The material shall be available for online access for twelve months until 31.03.2021 12:00 CEST. 
The students can complete the course at the speed that suits them within this 12-month period.

For Whom Is the Course?

This course is for the designers of room sound reinforcement, public address and voice alarm systems, who need to have solid, but unnecessarily extensive knowledge about the intemately related field of room acoustics.

It is assumed that the students have a reasonable level of engineering general knowledge and understand the basic definitions and terminology.

Testing and Certification

After each lecture, students shall have the chance to take a number of quizzes to test their progress with the course topics.

At the end of the course, there shall be a final set of quizzes to test the students' knowledge of the entire course and how far the met the objectives.

A Certificate of Successful Completion shall be issued to the students, whose overall score based on all quizzes in the course including the final set is 75% or better.

Course Curriculum

1. Fundamentals

1.1 Nature of sound
1.2 Basic definitions
1.3 General characteristics of speech
1.4 General characteristics of music
1.5 Human ear and Hearing process
1.6 Loudness perception
1.7 Localization
1.8 Wave equation

2. Propagation of sound

2.1 Wavefronts
2.2 Spreading loss
2.3 Speed of sound
2.4 Refraction and diffraction
2.5 Influence of air conditions

3. Absorbers

3.1 Mechanisms of absorption
3.2 Absorption coefficients
3.3 Employment of absorption in rooms
3.4 Typical absorbers

4. Reflectors

4.1 Geometrical reflections
4.2 Scattering
4.3 Employment of reflectors in rooms
4.4 Typical reflectors

5. Sound Field

5.1 Direct field
5.2 Diffuse field
5.3 Near field
5.4 Far field
5.5 Free field

6. Noise

6.1 Noise sources and influence of acoustics
6.2 Metrics of noise
6.3 Noise implications
6.4 Overview of noise control

7. Room Acoustics Metrics and their Targets

7.1 Impulse response
7.2 Amplitude response
7.3 Reverberation time
7.4 Clarity measures
7.5 Speech intelligibility
7.6 Echo criteria

8. Acoustical Design Considerations

8.1 Primary structure
8.2 Secondary structure
8.3 Outdoor applications
8.4 Speech venues
8.5 Music venues
8.6 Multi-purpose venues

9. Variable Acoustics

9.1 Why variable acoustics?
9.2 Mechanical approach
9.3 Electronic approach

10. Some Common Room Acoustical Issues

10.1 Lack of early reflections
10.2 Sound concentrating surfaces
10.3 Strong individual reflections
10.4 Shadow zones
10.5 Uncontrolled coupled spaces

11. Working Project

11.1 Objective
11.2 Approach
11.3 Planning
11.4 Assessment and conclusions