© COPYRIGHT 2014 BY ARTIM GMBH BIAS IS A PRODUCT BASED ON RESEARCH PROJECTS DONE AT THE INSTITUTE OF MUSIC ACOUSTICS

AT THE UNIVERSITY OF MUSIC AND PERFORMING ARTS VIENNA

NEW!

DIAGNOSIS AND THERAPY TOOLSFOR BRASS AND WOODWIND INSTRUMENTS

BIAS consists of Hardware and Software. The system contains:

the USB-Measurement head the Analysis-Software

The Analysis-Software consists of various packages. Choose one of the packages which meets your requirements best or select one of the preconfigurated packages with discount..At present following Packages are available:

Basic Software Package Physical Modeling Package Optimiser Research& Science Package Database Module for Woodwinds VIAS Package for stringed instruments(separate info folder)

PREECONFIGURATED SOFTWARE

Basic Edition (Brass or Woods) Basic Edition (Brass and Woods) Extended Edition (Brass or Woods) Extended Edition (Brass and Woods) Professional Edition Enterprise Edition

REQUIREMENTS

common PC or Notebook USB-Port (version 1 or 2 or 3) Windows XP or Windows 7 / 8 Apple MacIntosh OS X (virtuell with e.g. Parallels Desktop) new!

no special knowledge of computers no special knowledge of acoustics

Lateral cut of the BIAS measurement head

WHERE CAN BIAS BE USE OF

1. DIAGNOSIS

objective evaluation of the intonation analysis of response problems search for an appropriate mouthpiece for a

particular instrument localisation of areas of disturbances inside

the instrument identifying air leaks in valves or waterkeys documentation of the acoustical properties

of an instrument identification of a particular instrument identifying alterations to the original instru-

ment quality control

2. THERAPY

improvement of the intonation improvement of the response accurate alteration of the instrument´s pro-

perties corrections at the leadpipe new design or redesign of an instrument mouthpiece design cloning an instrument

GENER AL INFORMATION

DIAGNOSIS AND ANALYSIS TOOLS

Input Impedance

Shows the acoustic properties of the en-tire instrument (acoustical fingerprint). Each color coded curve stands for a valve combination. The peaks represent the fre-quencies of the natural notes. The higher the peaks, the easier it is to play the note. The cursor can be used to detect the na-tural notes manually.

Weighted Impedance Curve

This kind of graphic rendition (various weights from pp to ff can be selected) cor-relates very well with the feeling of the player. It points out possible changes in intonation and response depending on the played dynamic level.

Pulse Response (Disturbance Analysis)

This kind of analysis provides you with the exact acoustical length of the entire instru-ment or particular parts of it (e.g. slides). Leaky valves, waterkeys or inexact solde-red valves can be located easily because such discontinuities cause a "peak" in the curves.

Statistic Functions

Calculates by a mouse click the mean va-lue of hundreds of instruments or creates "tolerance bands" with any width. This also works with the intonation and the pulse response. Highlight with one mouse click the typical intonation properties of the instruments of a particular manufacturer or the mean values of particular slides or lead pipes. Useful for quality control.

BASICEDITION

OTHER FEATURES:

DIAGNOSIS AND ANALYSIS TOOLS

Transient Response

Opens a plot window showing the tran-sient phenomenon (note onset) for any selected frequency until a standing wave is established and the steady state is reached. Allows to study the effect of into-nation and dynamic level on responsive-ness and sound of an instrument. Export the transient response data as a "wave-file". With this function the sound of an instrument can be made audible for different frequencies and dynamic levels.

Evaluation of the Intonation

Points out the deviation from the equally tem-pered scale in cent for each playable note. The reference can be the note a4, or a any frequency value, or a particular valve combi-nation (configuration). Using various weights, the behaviour of the instrument depending on the played dynamic can be analyzed. Addi-tionally helpful to find alternative fingerings.

New Export Options

Export your data for further processing with another software. On the left an ex-ample of an intonation plot with Microsoft Excel. You can export Impedance-, Pha-se-, Intonation- and Pulse Respons data inkluding temperature and damping va-lues.

Powerful database filter Improved Import and Exportfunction Air temperature can be stored with the

measurement data Normalized pitch for a4 at Certificate print

outs (needs the room temperature at the time of measurement)

Display of five additional curve properties for enhanced analysis (Intonation window)

Multiuser and network compatible Password management Completely new database solution Windows Explorer look Drag & Drop Functions Convenient Zoomfunction Plotmanager for easy file handling Scalable Windows Free selectable color for curves and background

BASICEDITION

THERAPY TOOLS

PHYSICAL MODELING

With the help of this tool you can perform "vir-tual" alterations and verify the consequences on the intonation and the response within a few seconds. This can save a lot of time and money! Uselful to forecast the results of any changes in the bore.

How does the physical modelling work?

You enter the exact sizes of the instrument ("bore list"), click at the start button and BIAS calculates for this very instrument the intonati-on and response. If you alter any value of the bore, BIAS recalculates the the impedance and points out the new properties.

Each altered bore list and each new simu-lated impedance curve can be saved as "instrument" and loaded any time for com-parison.

Bore lists can be imported from CAD soft-ware, Excel sheets or simple text files.

NEW SIMULATION FEATURES:

Room temperature is taken into account Free selectable temperature (in °C) temperature Gradient Selectable Damping Factor free selectable damping values at any

position inside the tube. Influence of wall vibration and lip forces

according to newest research results published in the Journal of the Acoust.Society of America.

With the help of this tool you are able to im-prove existing instruments by altering only parts of the instrument (e.g. mouthpiece, leadpipe, bell section, and so on).

After some time of systematic experimen-tal work you will get the experience and a good "feeling" for the consequences on the response and the intonation arising out of particular alterations.

Above the icons for the simulation window, the bore list editor and the bore list plot win-dow.

On the right the icon which indicates the existence of a stored bore list assigned to a configuration.

Bore lists can be taken from CAD files, Mi-crosoft excel files, from simple text files or entered into the bore list editor of the simu-lation module. BIAS deals with simulated instruments like real measured instruments. Once stored in the database the data can be loaded any time for comparison or new si-mulations.

EXTENDEDEDITION

THERAPY TOOLS

THE OPTIMISER

The Optimizer is a very powerful tool for brass instrument makers, therefore one has to spend some time to become familiar with.

It is based on the "Rosenbrock Algorithm" which is successfully used in chip design, material research and other applications. You can use it to optimize real existing instruments or "virtual" instruments.

You can create a box with component parts of an instrument (like in the real world of in-strument making) and combine them to an instrument. All you need is the bore list of your instrument or parts of it. You define the desired intona-tion (target intonation) or response (target response). After this, you should define the areas where alterations are allowed (for in-stance, alterations of the bore of the valve section are normally unwanted).

It´s helpful to terminate the width of the bore alteration (in tenth´s of millimeters or in per-cent of the cross section) to avoid suggestions which make no sense. Additionally it can be advantageous to terminate the stepwidth of the optimiziation steps. You can follow the work of the optimiser in real time by watching its strategy and the results of the actual alterations on the re-sponse and intonation.

You can intervene at any time during the opti-misation process by changing the focus (e.g. the correction of particular notes is more im-portant than others, or you draw the attenti-on of the optimiser to the response instead of the intonation, etc.).

Screenshot of the main window during optimisa-tion process.

Component box: combining parts to an instrument

Commander Bridge

PRO-FESSIONAL

EDITION

A special feature of the Optimiser program is the calculation of the distribution of pressure nodes and antinodes of the standing wave

inside the instrument. This can be helpful for the decision where to position stilts. Additi-onally you can improve the intonation ma-nually very easily and efficient if you know, where pressure antinodes are located for particular notes.

THERAPY TOOLS

LOCALISATION OF PRESSURE NODES

Sleeve tools for quick and simple intonation improvement

Simple and easy to use tool for the bell section design.

Practical oriented smoothing tools

Simulation of mechanical processing steps

MORE FEATURES:

Improved integration into BIAS and VIAS

Direct access on the BIAS database by OLE functions

Bore lists created by the Optimiser can be stored into the BIAS database.

PRO-FESSIONAL

EDITION

BIAS is distributed by ARTIM GmbH, a Spin Off Distribution and Application:of the Institute of Musical Acoustics at the University Mag. Gregor Widholmof Music and Performing Arts Vienna Email: widholm@artim.at Contact person for Software:ARTIM GmbH Dipl.-Ing. Dr. Wilfried KauselZiehrergasse 4 Email: kausel@artim.atA-2230 Gänserndorf Internet: www.artim.at Email: info@artim.at Fax: 0043 2282 8520

SCIENCE & RESEARCH EDITION "VIAS"

This Software Package is special dedica-ted to "advanced nstrument makers“ and scientific staff. The user is completely free in choosing the stimuli, measuring time and frequency range.

The VIAS features offer a large vaiety of data processing.

The measurement procedure can be ob-served in real time as well as the time func-tion of the stimulus and the measurement signal.

Measurement range: 0 Hz to 20.000 Hz.

Excitation by a sinusiodal signal with fixed frequency or sweep with free selectable start and stop frequency.

Logarithmic or linear Excitation

Logarithmic or linear Axses scaling (see fi-gure below)

VIAS offers a large collection of processing features:

measurement error correction smooth trim patch previous resample filter multiply (sum) divide (difference) coherences spectrum cross spektrum, stc.

VIAS displays all complex parts of the measurement separately:

magnitude phase positive real part positive imaginary part negative imaginery part negative real part

Beside various export- and importfunctions, VIAS also provides a simulation tool

Besides various import- and export options, VIAS offers sophisticated simulation tools:

calculation of the transfer function calculation of the termination impedance selectable room temperature free selectable temperature gradient at

any part of the tube

10 additional simulation modules beside the current used Mapes Riordan model, like: plane wave, spherical wave, or multi modal wave simulations from 2 up to 23 partials.

7 different materials selectable: rigid, lead, gold, brass, iron, silver and custom (free configurable)

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DATA PROCESSING

ENTER-PRISE

EDITION

SIMULATION

SCIENCE & RESEARCH EDITION "VIAS"

SOUNDASNALYSIS

By the use of a fictive excitation spectrum (select between differnt excitation signals) VIAS calculates for each measured instru-ment the sound. The result can be displayed in different kind of graphs (see screen shots below).

Lines

Areas

Intensity

Masked Intensity

The black curve indicates the emitted sound level for each note. The white curve is the "harmonic centroid", it indicates at which frequency the "barycentre" of the sounds-pectrum for each not is located.

ENTER-PRISE

EDITION

MAKING DATA AUDIBLE

VIAS forstringed

Instruments

New!

The calculated sound (based on the impedance data) of brass or woodwind instruments can be played via your soundcard and loudspeaker. This allows you to compare the sound of measured instruments in a more objective way.

Various virtual excitation signals up to free custom configurated signals are available.

As of now, VIAS can be used for "Quality Measurements" on stringed instruments. The software provides an admittance mea-surement module either in connection with a pulse hammer or with a shaker and an acce-lerometer. It can be also used for data acqui-siton for Modal Analysis.

The ARTIM GmbH offers two types of hard-ware:

The PCB-system consists of components produced for commercial use in laboratoriesand for scientific research.

The LC-system consists of components especially produced for musical instrument makers

See separated information folder!

BIAS for WOODWINDSBIASfor

Woodwinds

For the use of BIAS for the measurement of woodwind instruments a new database mo-dule had been developed and implemented.

In contrast to the brass instruments a folder for each fingering (playable note) is neces-sary. But you don't need to measure all fin-gerings - you can select which fingerings you normally want to measure as a "standard set".

You can measure woodwinds also separa-ted into single parts. The advantage is that the connection of the single parts with the measurement head is easier to handle. This method is recommended especially for flutes (headjoint and body are measured separately) and clarinets.

With a mouse click on this symbol, BIAS combines both impedance curves in a way as if the whole instru-ment would have been measured.

At present, flute instruments, clarinets and saxophones are implemented. Oboes and bassons will follow.

For most of the instruments, adapters for the connection with the measurement head are recommended. You simply can manufacture them yourself according to our specifica-tions and your needs or order them at the ARTIM GmbH.

Muramatsu flute: headjoint

Muramatsu flute: rest of the instrument

Muramatsu flute: combined curve by BIAS

Bb-clarinet Schreiber D16: fingering f3, e4 and c6

Bassoon Moosmann: fingering g3 and e5

FEATURES IMPEDANCE HEAD BIASbasic edition

BIASextendededition

BIASprofessional

edition

BIASenterprise

edition

SOFTWARE FEATURES BIASbasic edition

BIASextendededition

BIASprofessional

edition

BIASenterprise

editionMultiuser password managementMicrosoft Access databaseSpecial features and database modules for Woodwind Editions

INPUT IMPEDANCE: EXCITATIONloarithmic sweep excitationlinear sweep excitationchirp excitationany wave file as excitation signalfree selectable length of sweepfrequency range 20 - 4096 Hz 20 - 4096 Hz 20 - 4096 Hz 0 - 20.000 Hzfreely selectable frequency rangenarrow band remeasurement (glitch removal)single measurement / automatic measurement

INPUT IMPEDANCEzoom functioncursor function: frequency, amplitude, pulse response factor, show notesfrequency plot resolution 0,1 Hz 0,1 Hz 0,1 Hz 0,01 Hzfrequency data resolution 0,5 Hz 0,5 Hz 0,5 Hz 0,01 Hzamplitude range 0,5-3400 MΩ 0,5-3400 MΩ 0,5-3400 MΩ 0,5-3400 MΩamplitude resolution 1 Ω 1 Ω 1 Ω 1 Ωselctable referenc frequencyselectable filteringstatistics: mean (average) value of multiple measurements, tolerance band, etc.weighting: without weights, standard, piano, mezzoforte, forteexport function: CSV format, BIAS50 compatible mode, VIAS format, BIAS 7 formatsound analysis of measured or simulated instrumentsmaking data audiblecopy to clipbord

INTONATIONsounding - writtenstandard fingering - all fingeringssingle - referencedselectable weightingsdisplay mode: bandwith, envelope, curvature, phase, group delay, zero phaseselctable referenc frequencyexport function: CSV format, BIAS50 compatible mode, VIAS format, BIAS 7 formatcopy to clipbord

PULSE RESPONSE Calculatedresolution X-axis (mm) 1 mm 1 mm 1 mm 1 mmresolution Y-axis (relative Pascal) 1 Pa 1 Pa 1 Pa 1 PaPhase 1 mm 1 mm 1 mm 1 mm

SIMULATIONImpedance MagnitudePhasesound simulation, sound analysis, audible impedance dataDistribution of pressure nodes and antinodesselectable temperatureplot standing waveplot bore profilePressure TransmissionTermination ImpedanceRoom TemperatureTemperature GradientDamping Losses, material oroperties, values and location freee selectable

SCIENCE&RESEARCH PACKAGECapture and analysis software for admittance measurementsPrepared for calibrated time domain pulse response measurementsPulse recorder with simple averagingSupport for pulse hammer and accelerometerRealtime plot of the excitation and response signalRealtime plot of the impedance and admittance plotsX- and Y-axis scaling: lin. and. log Plot of Magnitude, Phase, Real Part, Imaginary Part, Coherence, Cross-SpectrumVirtual brass and bowed instrument sound Virtual timbre over frequency: line, area and intensity plotsX-axis scaling in musical notesRMS, harmonic and spectral centroid

OPTIMISERIntonation targets wizardSophisticated optimisation targetsInstrument DesignerSimulation of mechanical processingSimple sleeve insertion Arbitrary / smooth and mandrel shapesHeuristic auto optimisationReal time user interactionUser weighted optimisation targetsIntonation optimisationMatching optimisation (reconstruction)Impedance envelope optimisationResonance quality optimisationCo-optimisation of several instrument configurations

Electronic part: 2 microphones 1/4", 1 electro mechanical pressure transducer, two channel preamplifier, poweramplifier, two channel DAQ (Analog in/out at 16-bit resolution, max 48kS/s), USB interface chip. Mechanical part: 21 capillary tubes 40 mm length, 0,5 mm bore. Material: Polyamide, brass, aluminium. Dimensions: Height 120 mm, Diameter 80 mm. Weight: 0,9 kg. Power consumption: 250 mWatt

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