Will these acoustic wedges be enough to give me a good start?

Condawg

Condawg

New member
Here's a picture of my current setup.

ccHNdMP.jpg

(I know my speakers are fucked, that's something I'll work on another time.) That picture is about 1/4 of the room. I've got a scissor boom stand coming in the mail to attach my mic to the part of the desk closest to the camera, so I'll be recording with my back to the wall with the cables hung on it.

Are these acoustic wedges enough to give me a good start in making this space better for recording? Figure I'll place them just like they're arranged there on the wall behind me.

I know that's not enough, but it's what I can afford right now. If that's all well and good, what should my next step be?

Thanks
 
Not gonna do anything but rob you of some high end. 95% of the problematic energy is in the low end. Broadband trapping - As much of it as you can stuff in there.
 
Good to know, thanks. Are broadband traps the same thing as bass traps? Pretty new to all of this, just wanna get the best sound I can out of my space.
 
Check out the forum on this site that has all of the info you seek. HERE

Read the 'sticky/stuck threads'. They are at the top because they have the most relevant information for each topic.

We try to organize the chaos here. Take some time to read and you will learn very quickly as I have.


:D
 
Until you know the problems in the room you can't plan the solution. There are loads of tools to help tame a troublesome room, each designed to work on a different area. There are frequency dependent devices in narrow and broadband types and you can reduce, reflect and refract. The one you need depends on the individual case. I know a guy who was given the acoustic treatment from a closed bbc studio. He moved it all to his home studio and ended up with the most odd sounding room that seemed to suck bass and bounce the hf around like the whispering gallery in St. Paul's cathedral in london! It didn't sound like that at the BBC
 
Condawg said:
Here's a picture of my current setup.

View attachment 86615

(I know my speakers are fucked, that's something I'll work on another time.) That picture is about 1/4 of the room. I've got a scissor boom stand coming in the mail to attach my mic to the part of the desk closest to the camera, so I'll be recording with my back to the wall with the cables hung on it.

Are these acoustic wedges enough to give me a good start in making this space better for recording? Figure I'll place them just like they're arranged there on the wall behind me.

I know that's not enough, but it's what I can afford right now. If that's all well and good, what should my next step be?

Thanks
Click to expand...

Always check out the independent lab results for any product before you buy also
 
I can't currently afford to buy or build any bass traps, so I'm looking for a temporary fix. Would hanging a heavy blanket on the wall behind me work? I'm headed to Walmart today to pick up a bookcase, might pick up a heavy blanket while I'm there to try it. Anything else I can get at Walmart for cheap that'll help me with my space?
 
What's your budget? Foam and blankets will absorb some high frequencies leaving the bass and low-mid mud.
If you can find a local source for OC703, 705 or Roxul rockwool, you can buy a few sheets and make your own bass traps at a lowe price than all the 'acoustic' foam. I built 6 2'x4'x4" panels for about $240 and had to pay $50 for shipping of the Roxul and paid too much for burlap at Walmart.
 
mjbphotos said:
What's your budget? Foam and blankets will absorb some high frequencies leaving the bass and low-mid mud.
If you can find a local source for OC703, 705 or Roxul rockwool, you can buy a few sheets and make your own bass traps at a lowe price than all the 'acoustic' foam. I built 6 2'x4'x4" panels for about $240 and had to pay $50 for shipping of the Roxul and paid too much for burlap at Walmart.
Click to expand...

My budget fluctuates. I'm unemployed, all of my income is from freelance work, so week to week it varies. I've already spent ~$100 on audio equipment this week, wouldn't want to spend more than $50-75 more in the short-term. I won't be able to afford doing nearly as much as I want to this space for a bit, so I'm just looking for any cheap temporary stuff I can do to improve the sound as much as possible without breaking the bank, especially since it'll eventually be replaced.

That sounds like a great price for six panels. That's definitely something I'd like to do in the future.
 
Condawg said:
My budget fluctuates. I'm unemployed, all of my income is from freelance work, so week to week it varies. I've already spent ~$100 on audio equipment this week, wouldn't want to spend more than $50-75 more in the short-term. I won't be able to afford doing nearly as much as I want to this space for a bit, so I'm just looking for any cheap temporary stuff I can do to improve the sound as much as possible without breaking the bank, especially since it'll eventually be replaced.

That sounds like a great price for six panels. That's definitely something I'd like to do in the future.
Click to expand...
I would take MJB's advice on going DIY. I would also take Jimmy's advice and read as much as you can around here.

In my opinion, you don't need to measure anything to know what you need.You WILL need bass traps in as many corners as possible, which includes floor/wall and ceiling/wall. Obviously, it's almost impossible to cover all those, especially on a limited budget, but if you start with the 4 main corners of the room, then a cloud on top of your listening area and a couple for your first reflection points, that's a good start for all rooms.

From there, you might need to do some measuring to see what else you need, but you WILL need what I just described. Whatever you can afford to get as much of that done as possible is great. I made about 27 4" thick panels for about $200, just to give you an idea. I don't even want to know how much that would have cost me to buy rather than make.
 
RAMI said:
I would take MJB's advice on going DIY. I would also take Jimmy's advice and read as much as you can around here.

In my opinion, you don't need to measure anything to know what you need.You WILL need bass traps in as many corners as possible, which includes floor/wall and ceiling/wall. Obviously, it's almost impossible to cover all those, especially on a limited budget, but if you start with the 4 main corners of the room, then a cloud on top of your listening area and a couple for your first reflection points, that's a good start for all rooms.

From there, you might need to do some measuring to see what else you need, but you WILL need what I just described. Whatever you can afford to get as much of that done as possible is great. I made about 27 4" thick panels for about $200, just to give you an idea. I don't even want to know how much that would have cost me to buy rather than make.
Click to expand...

I absolutely plan to go DIY, seems super practical and affordable, but even as affordable as it is, it's not something I can swing at the moment. Should I bother doing something temporary like hanging up blankets, or will that not make enough difference for it to be worthwhile and I should just wait until I can afford to build some bass traps?
 
Condawg said:
Should I bother doing something temporary like hanging up blankets, or will that not make enough difference for it to be worthwhile and I should just wait until I can afford to build some bass traps?
Click to expand...
Honestly, I don't know. Without knowing your room and situation, it's impossible for me to say. My first instinct is to say that blankets CAN help, but they also might make things worse. If you have a pretty good sounding room and you just want to kill some flutter/reflections, maybe throwing up a few blankets will actually not hurt so much. But, as has been mentioned already, 99% of the problem in 99% of rooms is the low end. So, throwing up blankets, which won't do anything for your low end, might make your room worse because now you've killed your high's, done nothing for your low's, and now low end is 100% of your problem and you have a strange, box-y sounding room.

I guess the only answer I can give is to try it, do a few quick recordings before and after you put blankets up, and use your judgement.
 
I ended up not being able to find any cheap, thick blankets at Walmart. Guess I'll just wait until I can build a few bass traps.
 
Where are you? Is there a Harbor Freight near you? Don't hold me to it, but they have moving blankets really cheap (I use them at work) and I have heard others say they are useable for a bit of reflection control.

I never went down the blanket route myself. Straight to the DIY rockwool, so I cannot guarantee their properties other than good protection for moving stuff.
 
I'm in southeastern Pennsylvania. Looks like there's one right down in Newark, Delaware, where I'm already going tomorrow to pick up cheap booze. Might swing around to Harbor Freight to check it out if my friends don't mind tagging along, but I think from what I've heard here, I'll just wait until I can build something more substantial that'll help with bass absorption.
Thanks for the tip, though. Never even heard of that store.
 
I was doing my mic work in my living room, as it was bigger and had more -non-90 degree corners than my music room, and wasn't quite as bad for flutter echo (this was before I built traps). However, I had to EQ for boxiness all the time. I put a Harbor Freight moving blanket behind me and it made absolutely no difference in the sound in that room. Now I have a really nice moving blanket that might get used some day for something ... YMMV
 
Thanks for the info, mjbphotos. Seemed like a cheap and possibly effective solution at first, but after everything I've read about using blankets, I'll definitely just wait until I can afford to build some stuff.

Here's a song cover I recorded with the new mic. Hoping that with that, someone can give me feedback on how the room sounds. I don't have a great ear for it.
 
Sounds pretty good to me. But, I'm really only posting to say that I think you play great.
 
Before I posted this thread, I had rotated my setup so that I'd be recording with a wall behind me, thinking it'd improve sound quality. I got tired of that and rotated it back.
Here's a cover I recorded today with it back to the original rotation. Is there much of a difference in quality? Should I rotate it back and just deal with the annoyances of it being like that?
 
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