Birth of a Studio

[witzendoz]

The new Witzend Studios

Late last year we sold the family home which had the studio in it, if fact the whole ground floor was studio. Moved to a smaller home and purchased a small Office / Factory unit. The following photos are a pictorial of building the new studio.

I carried out most of the work myself as there is a building boom here and builders are just too busy to do anything but build houses. I first gutted the old office walls and ceilings then started taking photos as I went. There are still a few things to finish off but the building is more or less complete.

Cheers

Alan.

[elementary]

Nice work, looks great!

Some bigger pics would be cool too

[zed32]

nice looking place you got there.

[Track Rat]

Looks like a Tascam Console. I have an M-3500. Looks pretty cool sir.

[witzendoz]

Thanks for the comments

The console is a Tascam M3700 (automated), I record to a Tascam MX2424 24 track Hard disk recorder or a Tascam MSR16S 16 Track Analog recorder. Both recorders are synced.

Cheers

Alan.

[superspit]

Please.....more pictures....of both control and sound rooms!!.Pleeeeease!
This is great!
Superspit.

[Raschad]

Just looking thorugh some forums. so this one and it appealed to me as I am just finishing turing my basment into a studio of my own. From the looks of it we went though a veyr similar process. What kind of sound do you get in the live room? looks like it'd be fairly live.

word em up.

Raschad.

[pandamonk]

Looks really great. Well done!!

[witzendoz]

Hi Guys,

Thanks heaps for the good feedback. Here are some more photos,

dividing walls were constructed out of steel frame channel with particle board (16 mm, 5/8”) x 2 on double stud frame between the control room and recording room. The wall between my workshop (outside world) was a double stud frame wall with 10 mm, (3/8”+) sound barrier gyprock inside and 2 sheets of 20 mm (40mm, over 1 1/2 “) outside. The ceiling is 2 x sheets of sound barrier gyprock (20 mm) with the cavity filled with high density polyester sound proofing material.

The wall leading to the workshop also contains a bass trap in both corners with the cavity filled with high and low density polyester.

Cheers

Alan.

[Gorty]

Originally Posted by witzendoz

The new Witzend Studios

Late last year we sold the family home which had the studio in it, if fact the whole ground floor was studio. Moved to a smaller home and purchased a small Office / Factory unit. The following photos are a pictorial of building the new studio.

I carried out most of the work myself as there is a building boom here and builders are just too busy to do anything but build houses. I first gutted the old office walls and ceilings then started taking photos as I went. There are still a few things to finish off but the building is more or less complete.

Cheers

Alan.

Hey Alan,

Nice job you have done there! When I clicked on your post and saw your name "witzendoz"..I recognised the name "Witzend" I live in Rockingham, just 20 mins away.

I'd love to come and check it out first hand!

[witzendoz]

Hi,

Here are some more photos and info,

The floor is a click together timber laminate floor on a isolation underlay. The hanging ceiling panels are pine frames covered in coloured Hessian with low / medium density polyester on top. By hanging from the ceiling instead of fixing to the ceiling you get more absorption due to the sound refecting from the ceiling around the panel hitting the top of the panel. The walls have a strip of corrugated foam around the drum area at head height and a full band absorber on the wall mid way. There are also a couple of polys made from light weight pine and filled with low density polyester.

I have used polyester through out as I hate working with fibreglass and you don’t have to seal polyester as it has no fibres. The wall at the control room window is just the polyester with not covering at this stage (will get around to covering it soon).

The control room has the same ceiling panels as the recording room with a couple of panels on the side walls. The corners each side of the window at the moment are temp bass traps (rolled up polyester with Hessian covers) which will be repleaced with more substantial bass traps later.

The back wall (no photo yet) has a home made diffuser on it, the window in the early photos has been blocked in.

How does it all sound. Better that I thought possible straight up, usually I have to mess around a bit but the recording room sounds great, live but neutral live if you know what I mean. The control room is very neutral, there is a slight sub hump at 30 hz but the new bass trap will get it, however I am being very fussy.

Hope I haven’t bored you but I love helping other people build studios, this is my 4th by the way.

Cheers

Alan

[witzendoz]

Cool Gorty,

sent you a personal message with my contact details
Cheers

Alan.

[Gorty]

Originally Posted by witzendoz

Cool Gorty,

sent you a personal message with my contact details
Cheers

Alan.

Alan,

Sent you a pm.

Gorty!

PS. I can't find your message?

[witzendoz]

Hi Gorty,

If the PM does not get to you, ring my mobile from the white pages listing, note that the address listed is not where the studio is.

Cheers

Alan.

[rayc]

Nice work in the greater west!
The resources boom really has its low points but then again you did it yourself so that's even better.

[hoops]

Cool studio. Well done. Looks like a comfee place to record.

[YoungRecords]

hey WITZ what size is your studio glass?..and where did u buy it?..thats the only thing im stuck on for my studio, and how many panes did u use?

[witzendoz]

Hi,

The glass is one sheet of 5mm and one sheet of 6mm. I recycled the glass from the old studio. The thicker the better but the sound through this window is very low level. For example a full rock band playing almost no sound gets through. If you can afford it (and support it as glass is heavy) get thicker glass, but this window worked out fine for me.

However the way the window is installed is important. The wall is a double stud frame (2 separate frames, one for the studio wall and one for the control room wall), each window (studio and control room) is in it's own frame, the studio frame fixed to the studio stud wall and the control room frame fixed to the control room stud wall. The 2 window frames are not joined together. This is the secret to stopping the sound transmitting through the 2 sheets of glass. The glass in the recording area is the 6 mm sheet and this is also angled so it reflects up to the ceiling, I think about 6 degrees (the most I could get in the frame size).

Between the window frames (inside the wall) there is a gap open to the wall cavity as the cavity is filled with high density polyester sound absorber. This soaks up any sound trapped between the window panes. I covered the gap with black cloth to make it look neat.

The glass is supported in rubber (neoprene) channel to help stop transmission and to let the glass flex if required.

Hope this was some help.

Cheers

Alan.

[Lectric_Lab]

Hey Alan, new member here. I really like the studio, nice job and impressive gear. Do you record the drums live mixed with full band all in same space?

[witzendoz]

Hi,

Yes I often record the drums in the room with the band. I set the drums up at the far end of the room, (furthest from the control room window), And place screens around them. The screens are old office partitions with windows and mounted on wheels, when I am not using them I store them in the work shop out of the way.

I then set up the guitar amps / bass amps further down the room and screen them off with the smaller movable screens, you can see these in the photos against the walls, a large black one and 2 smaller green ones. I also some times use road cases to screen off amps as well. There is some spill but not really enough to be a problem, I am a big fan of recording bands live in the room just like the old classics where done, the band gets a better vibe also.

Recording vocals with a band are a problem unless the band is an acoustic type act, but most bands do the vocals separate anyway. Sometimes if the band want s to do a quick live demo I record the vocals with a SM58 and give the singer a couple of fold back wedges, like a rehearsal room set up, this captures a great live sound like the band on stage.

Cheers

Alan.

[YoungRecords]

Thanks for the Info, that Really helpe'd me!!..the only thing i was thinking i might of got laminiated 3 pane glass "Window".but i ever thought of that 2 seperate wall stud frames, i heard of it before, but now it gives me alot to think about..thanks Alan!..good looking studio good job!