AFMG Network Forum

mannequinhead · Member

Hello Again,
I am still learning Ease and worry that my calculations, mappings, and auralisations are very inaccurate because I'm not accounting for the considerable absorption of people and furniture in the countless rooms I have been creating for learning/testing purposes lately.

Can anyone recommend how to properly model people and furniture? For example, if I have an audience of people sitting in wooden seats that sit on top of a carpeted floor, do I replace that portion of the 2D carpeted floor surface with a 2D audience surface? Do I replace that portion of the 2D carpeted floor with a single solid 3D cube-like representation of the occupied space? Do I model the audience area in 3D and then displace it slightly above the concrete floor? Do I model each audience seat/person individually? Do I model "per Person" materials differently than I would "per Square Foot" materials? I've done a decent amount of research in this forum and elsewhere, but haven't been able to find a clear answer to this question.

The Ease-included materials I am referring to are:

Generic, People, Students, in Tablet Arm Chairs
Generic, People, Standing, per Person
Generic, People, Wooden Seats, per Person
Generic, People, Wooden Pews or Seats, per Square Foot
Generic, People, in Upolstered Seats, per Square Foot
Generic, People, in Fully Covered Seats, per Person
Generic, Bed, Single

Any help will be greatly appreciated![/img]

mannequinhead · Member

In case my initial question was too wordy, perhaps someone could help by just explaining how they would model a "per Person" material versus a "per Square Foot" material.

Tim · Member

Dear mannequinhead,

For most applications, there is no need to model individual seats and people in EASE.
The simplest method for modelling an audience is, as you've already indicated, replace a portion of the floor with a 3D representation of the occupied space. You can simply create a single-coat face over your floor surface and extrude to create the 'audience'.
Select an EASE material from those you've indicated.
You might also like to create your own material and apply a scattering value to the material used for your advanced simulations.

FWIW, There are times where I may model individual pews or seats, for example a traditional church or lecture theatre. But for most applications the above method is acceptable.

Hope this helps.

Regards

mixbyjm · Member

I know this is old post...
I'm curious, do we need to change the surface to two-fold? for 3d surface that represent the occupied audience space?
Thank you

Tim · Member

Dear mixbyjm,

You do not need to create a two-coat face when using the method indicated previously.
However, if your 'audience' Face is floating within the room, then yes you'll need to have a two-coat Face. Keep in mind that both sides of the two-coat Face will add to the acoustic absorption within the room. Not a problem if this Face is a relatively small % area compared to the total surface area of the room.

mixbyjm · Member

Tim
Thank you for your reply.
May I ask you one more, which one is the most effective/realistic?
Thank you

Tim · Member

Dear mixbyjm,

Well... that's an 'it depends' question/answer!
How much detail is in your model?
How large is your audience area compared to the rest of the model?
etc.

I've found for simple calculations in EASE models, I'll just model the audience area as a single-coat Face, assign a suitable material and extrude by 1.2m. This typically provides a satisfactory result.