Help with a tracking room

Shadow1psc

New member
Hey all,

I've got a blank room that is 13 x 17 x 8. There is one door on each 17' wall dead center (maybe 35" with frames). This room will be used solely for tracking (drums, guitar, bass, vocals. Keys too, but those will be direct out to the interface). I don't foresee my equipment changing much, so I will be working with a static placement of all my gear (and I'm currently flexible-ish on positioning if it matters).

I bought 48 1" x 12" x 12" acoustic panels to start with (this was actually for a previous room but never used), and plan to put in simple bass traps in all corners (low and high? all the way up? not sure here either). Is there a general rule of thumb I can follow placing panels since this is just for tracking? I'll have a (roughly) 3' x 3' x 3' drum set (maybe we just call the whole space 5' x 7', that's the rug size under it) and a couple of 30" x 30" cabs. I would like to have one of the 13' walls be the home for all my guitars, maybe hung - would this be a bad idea in favor of proper panels?

Apologies if I did not provide enough information, and thanks in advance for any help!
 
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Capture.PNG Maybe to give a clearer example, here's the best scale I could come up with. The desk is in limbo right now, I either need an existing desk to put my Kronos on, or that same dimension of width will be a kronos on a stand, and you can pretend those bookcase looking things are two 30" wide cabs. The box on the bottom wall left-side is where the snake has to go, that is the only requirement, so this was the arrangement I was thinking about to maximize mic cable routing.
 
Definitely some bass traps in all corners floor to ceiling. How tall is the room? What are those 'acoustic panels' you mention - foam? If so, put them aside to start, put the traps in and see how it sounds. If you are close miking bass and guitar amps, the room is not as important - treating for the drums should be #1 priority, then finding a good position in the room to do the vocals.
 
Yeah - Burn the foam (just kidding - it'd be poisonous) and concentrate on broadband traps. You can literally never have "too much" broadband trapping. You can *easily* have too much foam - ESPECIALLY in a room with a lack of broadband trapping.

All four corners, floor-to-ceiling is a starting point. As you're in a rectangle, you're going to considerably more than just that to deal with the comb filtering.
 
Yeah - Burn the foam (just kidding - it'd be poisonous) and concentrate on broadband traps. You can literally never have "too much" broadband trapping. You can *easily* have too much foam - ESPECIALLY in a room with a lack of broadband trapping.

All four corners, floor-to-ceiling is a starting point. As you're in a rectangle, you're going to considerably more than just that to deal with the comb filtering.

Room modes can cause bass buildup. There is a calculator somewhere the can show just from the room size where to treat. I'm not sure is it is public tho. [MENTION=89104]jhbrandt[/MENTION] would be the one to ask.

Did you read his stuck post above?
 
Definitely some bass traps in all corners floor to ceiling. How tall is the room? What are those 'acoustic panels' you mention - foam? If so, put them aside to start, put the traps in and see how it sounds. If you are close miking bass and guitar amps, the room is not as important - treating for the drums should be #1 priority, then finding a good position in the room to do the vocals.

Just about 8' tall, and yes I was referring to foam 'acoustic panels'. Is there a 'best' type of bass trap?
 
Room modes can cause bass buildup. There is a calculator somewhere the can show just from the room size where to treat. I'm not sure is it is public tho. [MENTION=89104]jhbrandt[/MENTION] would be the one to ask.

Did you read his stuck post above?

I read the sticky, and I think I even saw the room mode calculator in his handy spreadsheets, but I honestly wouldn't know what to do with the information it gives :(. I wasn't sure how much different I should treat a tracking room (where I plan to do 0 listening/mixing) vs. a listening/mixing room.
 
Tracking rooms are a bit different, but you kind of just need to test it by using it and see what happens. There is no formula for a good tracking room. Though usually bigger is better for acoustic instruments like acoustic guitar and drums, a loud amp with a mic, not so much.

Though flutter echoes are not good for anything, so you could get rid of them with blankets or whatever.

Foam treatments are basically the worst performing and most expensive. But they look kinda cool...
 
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