Blog — Creative Acoustician

Creative Acoustician

Running with a bicycle on your back

Running with a bicycle on your back

I am almost embarrassed to tell you that I haven’t jumped on the dwg bandwagon until 2022. On the other hand, I have a feeling that I am far from alone among acousticians. It is common that we “paint” on PDF files instead of working with “real” dwg files. This has been a thorn in my eye for many years. PDF painting works fine if you are only going to do one (1) drawing and no updates, preferably in a small building. But that’s not how it works! To do multiple revisions of drawings in large multi-storey building can easily take hours to do in Bluebeam Revu, because it is not the right tool for the job. For example, I recently did an update of a school with new floor plans – 18 drawings in total. With Revit, I could update them in minutes, what would previously take at least half a day. I was smiling the whole of last week.

Acoustics, EngineeringRikard ÖqvistDecember 6, 2022revit, cad, dwg, civil engineering, acoustics, drawingsComment

Rainbow barf boosts productivity

Rainbow barf boosts productivity

When I go on stage as a performing musician, my mind activates another setting. I get much more focused and find it a lot easier to enter the “flow” state. And when practicing at home, I often find my thoughts drifting away to irrelevant things. I’m probably not alone in this behavior and it’s also not surprising. There’s no “skin in the game” when practicing. There is no cost of messing up. But when you’re on stage, you will make a fool out of yourself if you don’t deliver. Hardcore, no extra lives when you mess up. I have found a very simple way to trick my mind that I am performing at a concert even when I am practicing at home.

Habits, MusicRikard ÖqvistNovember 29, 2022RGB, music, drums, studio, DIYComment

A sine wave shaped staircase

A sine wave shaped staircase

Any practicing musician knows that continuous practice over long periods of time will resemble a sine wave shaped staircase, with varying frequency. You experience good days and bad days, sometimes also clustered into good streaks and bad ones. Never has this been clearer to me than today when I am in my fourth year of daily drum practice of one single song: Bleed by Meshuggah. Any normal person´s gut reaction will probably be that a bad day feels like a failure. But a couple of weeks ago I realized that those bad days are the most important days of all. Because they reveal the truth. They show you what you can really do, without any sugar coating. Tonight, with a high fever, sleep depravation and a severe man-cold is a wonderful day for drum practice. Tonight, I will learn how far (or close) I really am to the goal of nailing this song.

Music, HabitsRikard ÖqvistNovember 21, 2022meshuggah, habits, practice, drums, bleed, incremental improvement, compound interest Comments

Early adopter (VR)

Early adopter (VR)

A couple of weeks ago, my right-hand controller for my VR headset HP reverb G2 broke. It started to disconnect and reconnect at random, which was extremely annoying and interrupted my workflow and immersion. When I bought my VR headset about 1-2 years ago, I specifically chose the HP because it was marketed as a great productivity headset for professional use. Indeed, it is, when it works, that is. Unfortunately, the HP reverb is in a class of its own when it comes to technical problems. A while ago I wrote a post about divine intervention in a positive sense. This little VR story is perhaps the antithesis.

EngineeringRikard ÖqvistNovember 14, 2022virtual reality, early adopter, technologyComment

A good conversation

A good conversation

Monday evenings is writing night for me. I’ve been doing it for several years straight. And still, here I am, half past eleven when I should been in bed long time ago, blogging together this week’s piece. For some reason, I often end up in “talking mode” with my wife on Mondays, which is easily the worst day of the week to sit down and talk. Because I know that it is my sleep hours that will fuel the conversation. On the other hand, you will be hard pressed to find anything more meaningful way to spend your time than deep conversations with your wife. And thus, it is probably a price worth paying.

Diary, Parenting, PhilosophyRikard ÖqvistNovember 7, 2022flow, conversation, marriage, kids, habitsComment

Divine intervention (again)

Divine intervention (again)

Sometimes things happen, that are so unlikely that they can only be explained by some kind of divine intervention. We’ve had two of those occasions recently during our renovation project. The first one, and most unlikely, was the impeccable timing of our electrician who arrived here just in time to install new wiring in my office at the same time as the construction workers had torn down the old roof. To have a house without a roof is obviously a bad idea, so this type of work is dependent on weather conditions. Then they work very fast to remove and replace the ceiling in a day. So, we’re talking about a time window of 4-6 hours, maximum, when the roof is gone (i.e. half of it). And there will never be a better time to reinstall the electrical wiring. I booked my electrician months ago, with a gut feeling that “this day will probably be the day when the roof is removed”. And he arrived with the precision of a Japanese bullet train, exactly when the roof was gone.

Engineering, DiaryRikard ÖqvistOctober 31, 2022renovation, construction, diy, electricalComment

It’s not over till the fat lady sings

It’s not over till the fat lady sings

For weeks on end, our home and office has been like a construction site. But today, our last (planned) renovation project – a brand new office air heat pump – was installed. This calls for celebration indeed, however, I don’t think we have earned it just yet. There are still plenty of extremely small things that I think needs to be taken care of before we can claim “mission accomplished”. Things like scanning the lawn for leftover screws and nails, small chunks of insulation, packaging materials, leftover wood etc. And finally, a proper house-cleaning. One should be careful to claim a project is over prematurely.

Acoustics, DiaryRikard ÖqvistOctober 25, 2022noise, heating, health, workComment

The snowball effect

The snowball effect

We are now (hopefully) in our last two week of renovations. Our houses have been in dire need of not just upkeep, but improvement. On the top of my head, I can think of two reasons why everything seemed to break down at once. Some of the broken stuff should have been fixed last year, but much of the schedule had to be postponed due to a little baby boy. That’s the obvious one. The not so obvious one is that we might have started a momentum of fixing things, that is hard to stop once you get it in motion.

Diary, Habits, PhilosophyRikard ÖqvistOctober 17, 2022house, renovation, diy, momentum, incremental improvement, growth, progressComment

Conversations reveal solutions

Conversations reveal solutions

Last week I had a call with my nurse, a routine thing because I recently turned 40 years old. I had left some test samples and answered a lengthy questionnaire regarding just about every topic regarding my physical and mental health. Or Body and Soul, which are the terms I would prefer. In the questionnaire, one of the topics was “Is there anything in your life that you want to reduce?” or something similar. My gut response was screen time. I spend way too much time behind screens and just a little while of free thought here and there would make a huge difference. When talking with my nurse for an hour, I cracked an idea that is ridiculously simple on how to achieve it. Isn’t it fascinating how you can often find solutions to your problems yourself as soon as you articulate and define your problem to someone else?

Diary, Photography, PhilosophyRikard ÖqvistOctober 10, 2022soul, mind, addiction, screen time, dogs, walkingComment

Tools and knowledge

Tools and knowledge

Last week we tore down our old ghastly kitchen FTX unit, which left a gaping hole in our kitchen above the stove. And today I had the pleasure of observing a kitchen carpenter working his magic. I had sent him a couple of phone pics and an outline of the idea a couple of days in advance. This morning he turned up with his van and portable workshop and before long we had a brand-new kitchen cabinet instead. The thing that impressed me the most was the speed of his progress. It is a beautiful thing to observe a professional doing what they do best, when knowledge and tools harmonize perfectly.

Acoustics, DiaryRikard ÖqvistOctober 3, 2022work, knowledge, incremental improvementComment

Silence

Silence

The shoemaker's children go barefoot. In my case, that was exceptionally true up until today. I’m an acoustician, which means I have devoted my life to improving the world by improving sound quality. That’s why I have been so embarrassed by my own personal living environment. We had in our kitchen one of those old kitchen cupboard FTX ventilation units including a kitchen fan with the suction power of an asthmatic sucking air through a straw. But that’s not even close to the real problem: The noise. The old unit produced an earth-shattering 42 dBA and 62 (!) dBC in our kitchen. Throughout my whole career, I have never come across anything worse in any dwelling. It was up until today the literal definition of how to NOT practice what you preach.

AcousticsRikard ÖqvistSeptember 26, 2022acoustics, ventilation, sound quality, noise, health, sleep, annoyanceComment

Scheduling accidents

Scheduling accidents

About two weeks ago, my three-year-old son broke his left index finger in an accident at kindergarten. The little guy went to the hospital and got patched up with a plaster. Two weeks, and then re-check was the verdict. Usually, he is like the Duracell bunny, which I solve with physical activity, especially biking. Now, however, he is temporarily disabled from our usual energy burning activities, and that means excess energy. A lot of excess energy. We could perhaps put him on a treadmill connected to the power grid and let him single-handedly solve Europe´s energy crisis. That’s why I realized quickly after he came home with the plaster, that this thing will not last two weeks. I’d be impressed if it would last the day. This, in combination with teaching an intensive university course, is a recipe for disaster. It’s very difficult to change the course schedule on short notice. My past self however, has been taking good care of us. When I scheduled the course, I added not one, but two reserve bookings in the end just in case. Tomorrow I am heading to the hospital for the second time to re-make the plaster which came off again. I would be beyond stressed right now if it weren’t for those reserve slots. Now I feel inner peace instead.

Parenting, Habits, EngineeringRikard ÖqvistSeptember 20, 2022scheduling, parenting, work, consulting, planning, pessimism Comments

Don’t think, just dad

Don’t think, just dad

Last weekend I learned a secret dad technique. I have been working on a small IT central in our walk-in closet for a while, with a patch bay, router etc. Basically, the hub of our home network connecting all the rooms and buildings. I had a small shelf system that was supposed to carry a couple of devices, but it had been lying around for several weeks and it annoyed me more and more every time I put my eyes on the unfinished project. But this time, something snapped in me. I couldn’t stand looking at that mess anymore, so I simply grabbed my tools and ruthlessly started working. Meanwhile, our two sons and Labrador retrievers were busy tearing the home apart. It’s standard practice and the primary reason why the IT central was still unfinished. My wife was screaming for help, but I just replied, “No, that’s your problem now, I am busy” and locked the door. To say that it wasn’t popular, is a slight understatement. But sometimes you must make a choice. Take a hit now or suffer death by a thousand cuts. I chose the former. And it was a good choice.

Diary, ParentingRikard ÖqvistSeptember 12, 2022family, relationship, kids, priorities, focus, network Comments

A lesson from physical labor

A lesson from physical labor

Last Saturday I spent digging around 15 meters of network cable in the ground. The only thing that remains now is to make a wall pass-through and install some wall outlets in the houses and then finally, all our houses are hard-wired with cat6 cables. It’s something that I have been waiting to do since we moved here, to get rid of the shaky Wi-Fi connection. But you must always rank-order your work and it took me four years to execute more important priorities before I could start solving this simple but highly annoying problem. And it felt so good to put it all back together. When I was done, it really struck me that there are few things that feels more satisfying than to complete some proper physical labor, to the degree that you can raise the “mission accomplished” sign.

Diary, Parenting, PhilosophyRikard ÖqvistSeptember 5, 2022parenting, work, exercise, scheduling, planning, productivityComment

You will never get any new old friends

You will never get any new old friends

Have you ever thought about which music that really makes your heart sing? I suspect most of us would say that it’s the music you grew up with that has a special place in your heart. I haven’t come across any music that speaks to my soul as strongly as the favorites from my childhood and teenage years, with a handful of exceptions perhaps. But the pattern is clear as crystal. The relationship with music that you acquire when growing up stays with you for the rest of your life. I realized this weekend that the same thing goes for old friendships. You can get new friends, but you cannot get any new old friends.

Philosophy, DiaryRikard ÖqvistAugust 29, 2022friends, friendship, celebration, familyComment

Through the eyes of a three-year-old

Through the eyes of a three-year-old

features, but the Carl Zeiss lens is still a very good lens. Thus, with the right person operating it, it can still produce some seriously beautiful pictures, even if it has limited monetary value today. My son has been showing interest in photography for a long time. On our forest walks, he stops me all the time and tells me “Dad, you must photo that” on just about every flower we pass. I think I have most of the Swedish flora in my iPhone by now. So, I thought to myself; Three-year-old Elis will probably have a ton of fun with it. Why not give this old high quality compact camera to him and see what he comes up with? I couldn’t stop smiling when I was glancing through the SD card when he was done with it.

Parenting, Art, PhotographyRikard ÖqvistAugust 23, 2022kids, parenting, dad, camera, photography, photoComment

There is no place like home

There is no place like home

The most frustrating thing about being an acoustician (for me) is the delay between you giving a recommendation to a client and the final result. This process typically takes several years. I have had many sleepless nights (metaphorically speaking) where I have thought about specific technical solutions like floor structures or junctions. And when I finally send my documents to be used for the construction of a building, that’s typically it. I never hear about it again, except for some control measurements at the building site in the best-case scenario. But I want to know how the final product turned out! Last week, I decided to do something about it and went on a road trip visiting eight of our dwelling projects.

Engineering, AcousticsRikard ÖqvistAugust 15, 2022photography, engineering, travelling, work, family Comments

The purpose of writing

The purpose of writing

This is the 140th week that I publish a blog post and I have finally figured out why I am doing it. I had no clue when I started what the purpose was, but I always knew it would come to me eventually. That, and the fact that I have become a better writer compared to three years ago, which is a useful skill no matter how you look at it. I am writing these blog posts to my kids. It is a one-way communication from my past self to them when they (perhaps) read this in a couple of decades from now. By summarizing the most important ideas I have been thinking about the past week, every Monday evening, the project has now become a journey. And a kind of time-machine, which now makes it 10X more enjoyable.

ParentingRikard ÖqvistAugust 9, 2022time, parenting, dad, father, writing, kids, childrenComment

Just do it!

Just do it!

A couple of days ago, me, my three-year-old son and my dog decided to put up a tent and spend the night outdoors. Easily the best decision this year. We simply put up the tent on our backyard. It doesn’t have to be more complicated than that. I had the best nights sleep in a long time. It is amazing how much the environment affects your sleep. The sound of clashing waves paired with singing birds is as natural as it gets. Combined with the sunset and sunrise you have your alarm clock figured out as well. I haven’t felt more alive in ages.

ParentingRikard ÖqvistAugust 1, 2022camping, parenting, dad, kids, dogsComment

Upkeep vs Improvement

Upkeep vs Improvement

For the past couple of years, I have been working on a little project; to restore an old disused Tennis court. The journey has been a bit shaky at times, but tonight I made a giant leap forward when I finally got my surface cleaning equipment up and running and managed to clean about 70% of the surface in a day. The total area is about 600 sqm, so it is quite a big undertaking. It felt so good to fire up the pressure washer with the surface cleaning attachment and see the grime and dirt just flow away, once again revealing the vivid colored playing surface that had been gone for so long.

DiaryRikard ÖqvistJuly 26, 2022priorities, parenting, tennis, cleaning, restorationComment