Enhancement of the Acoustic Design workflow through VR Technology: The case study of conference Room in a historical building.

This thesis project aims to investigate the integration of Virtual Reality (VR) technologies for the creation of immersive acoustic environments, focusing on a conference hall in the historical building of the Egyptian Museum of Turin. The study arises from ongoing research at the Department of Energy (DENERG) at Politecnico di Torino, which employs VR to reproduce complex acoustic scenarios using 360° audiovisual recordings and simulations. Measurements conducted in the conference room highlighted acoustic issues in terms of speech intelligibility, which is the main thing to guarantee in environments intended for listening. To correct problems found within the room, an acoustic correction project was started, leading to the design of two solutions: one that is limited to an acoustic treatment without visually altering the existing spaces, and the other one that involves the installation of some acoustic baffles that visually enhance the room. The two solutions are acoustically identical. Therefore, the main objective of this thesis work is to reproduce the conference room using a geometrical acoustic software in order to predict the effectiveness of the proposed solutions. The project was divided into two main phases. Firstly, the 3D model of the room was calibrated by comparing the measured and the simulated objective acoustic parameters. Based on the differences found, the absorption coefficients of the room materials were modified. This process was repeated until a faithful reproduction of reality was achieved. Once the model was calibrated, the acoustic baffles were implemented into the model. From this setup, simulations were obtained that were used to create several auralizations employed during the testing phase. Simultaneously, a stereoscopic immersive 3D render of the conference room was developed using a photogrammetry-based model, incorporating the acoustically treated elements designed for acoustic correction. In the testing phase, the audio-video results were combined in order to verify the effectiveness of the design project. During this phase, the influence of the visual component on the auditory perception was also tested. The aim was to investigate the auditory-visual integration and the combined effects on the perception of the designed environment quality.