Smallest bedroom studio possible...

C

CrimsonWarlock

New member
Here is my situation: I had to break down my previous little studio to make place for office space as my business was(is) expanding. I also lost quite some living space in the process so now I'm living on the upper floor above my office. The only space currently available for me to create a mixing room is a very small bedroom. It has an L-form, but the main usable space is 2 meters deep and 3 meters wide.

I'm mainly doing synth-based composition so I only need room for my DAW, nearfield monitoring and a few keyboards. I will record a little vocals and guitar sometimes but I will have to lay out some cables and use another bedroom as recording booth ;)

My main question is this: is it possible, with some acoustical treatment, to create a usable monitoring environment in such a small space ?
Clearly, there is not much room for acousic stuff. The room also has a low ceiling (2 meters) and I'll take it that standing waves might be the first and biggest problem in such a small room.

If this is possible, I will post a drawing of the room with exact measures and my plans for positioning my equipment.

Any ideas, pointers ?

Oh, don't point me at the SEA website, I've already burried my head in there :D

Peter.
 
Not that I've tried, but I wouldn't think you could get anything usable out of that small a space. With the rear walls that close, you would want absolutely NOTHING coming back to you from behind or your stereo image would be totally blurred, so I would think you would have to foam the ENTIRE room including ceiling with 4" acoustic foam. That would make the room (closet) so dead you'd have to add some reverb just to the monitors in order to simulate a real room, or your mixes would end up washed in reverb when you heard them in a normal room. The chances of getting that bandaid to work would be slim.

If you have no choice, foam the hell out of the place and play some commercial CD's (so-called reference CD's) that you are familiar with, in the room and hook up a dedicated reverb to the monitoring system, tweak the reverb til those reference CD's sound as "normal", ambience-wise, as you can get them - that's probably gonna be the best you can get in there. Do what you can to get a symmetrical listening position, BTW -

The good news is, you won't have to leave your studio to change into your Superman costume, since you'll already be in a phone booth... Steve :=)
 
Hey knightfly,

I agree right away that this room is to small, but I'll have to do with it. It's for 6 months to one year. After that (hopefully) I'll move to a new house with enough room to build a decent studio.

I had a much better studio space before, with the mixing room being around 60 square meters but I had to give that space up :(

So I'll try to make it as dead as possible and throw in my ref-CDs (I do track and mix for twenty years so I do have dedicated CD's for that ;)). I like the reverb idea, but not sure it will work as it will change the sound of my current nearfields. I'm going to switch to new nearfields soon, and as I have to learn their response, it might be the right moment to start experimenting. I'm working now with a complete digital environment (DAW) but I do have a nice rack-reverb laying around that I can dedicate to this.

Someone said that limitation could be great for inspiration but I think this is not what he meant :D

Peter.
 
Warlock, My space isn't much bigger. I ended up with 7'x 10'x 12' controll/mixing room. Standing waves WILL be an issue. I had to make both the controll and the tracking room (7'x 16'x 12') as dead as possible or it sounded like I was in a pipe. I'll tell you from experience that foam diffusers alone won't do it as the room modes that'll be most audible will be below the effective absorbing frequencies of foam. My rooms are carpeted with all wall areas covered with Markertech 3" eggcrate type foam absorbers and I still had ringing. A couch in the controll room became an effective bass trap and did wonders but that wasn't doable in the tracing room. I ended up building some slate resonators for that side.
 
TrackRat,

Thanks for the info, at least it tells me it's possible. One question though, do you add reverb to your monitoring like Knightfly suggested ??

Going to whip up a first drawing with the CAD-program, I'll post it later today (hopefully) :D

Peter.
 
Definately not. Just my opinion but but that seems like a very bad idea (no slam intended knightfly). I think it's a far better idea to play shit loads of CDs that you're familiar with and in the genre' of the style of music that you'll be doing and LEARN your playback system/room. Criticly listen and try to memorize where the bass is, how the top is resolved on your system, all the subtle nuances. When you get to KNOW your setup, mixing and tracking gets more predictable and more important, repeatable.
 
Aha, that was my first thought too, but Knightfly's idea seemd viable to me. I was wondering if such a small room could actually be compensated by A/B-ing with reference material but I agree that it seems the clearest way to go. Of course doing listening-tests with mixes in other (more spacey) rooms would help a lot too I think.

Peter.
 
Guise, remember the first words of my post? "Not that I've tried," - My comments about the reverb come from all the books I've read where people state that if the CONTROL room is too dead, you will overcompensate the amount of reverb you add to your tracks, and conversely. I don't know if my idea would work, (not that I've tried, remember?) but in a pinch (and, my wiccan friend, you appear to be in a pinch) that is one trick I would try.

All I would do in this hypothetical experiment is try using just enough of a small room 'verb, set as flat as possible, to make those ref CD's sound like I was listening to them in a real room. That might make it easier to tell if a track was too dry, and it might not work at all.

Some of the best things I've come up with over the years were total accidents and some seemed like really dumb ideas. Some REALLY WERE dumb ideas, and others worked. Think of how few people would know who the Beatles were if nobody experimented - or, if you really want an example, how 'bout Les Paul?

The foam is a given, but I would consider mounting it on separate backing boards so you can move it easier later, since it's temporary and the 4" stuff ain't cheap.

The 'verb trick may be totally stupid, but at least if you try it and it doesn't work you have a scapegoat - plus, it's not like your a total nooby and won't KNOW it didn't work and screw up 6 months worth of recordings...

I wouldn't swear to this, but it's my gut feeling that even if you listen to 100 CD's in your anechoic phone booth, and think you're used to it, that sooner or later you'll start putting more 'verb on tracks without even thinking about it; kinda like the ear gets used to whatever volume levels you throw at it, til the blood comes out and you realize it was too loud... Steve
 
Oh, Trackrat (and anybody else who's not sure) I don't consider differences of opinion a slam - think how boring music and the world would be if everybody had the same ideas.

From some of the posts I see, I realize not everybody writes (or is capable of writing) exactly what they mean, but generally I'm not that way. I re-read and check spelling on every post I write, and make sure that the meaning is as clear as I can make it. Comes from eons ago when my high school english teacher decided my grade should come from how I did HIS job of grading all the other kids' papers, and from teaching electronics/troubleshooting/repair in Military and commercial facilities...

Most of the time if I am not speaking from experience, I note that in my posts. If I AM speaking from experience (instead of years of study) I'll try to state the conditions involved.

Also, since I've been apologized to several times because someone (Hi, Rick) thought they had pissed me off when in fact they had just missed the joke I was attempting, here's one more insight - I have a pretty serious temper, even though most of the time I'm either "techy" or being a smart ass - soooo, trust me when I say this; if you ever DO piss me off, there will be no room for doubt.

As repectful as everyone here is when people deserve it, I doubt any of the regulars here will ever see that side of me. The little "green" asshole a while back has no idea how close he came to finding out, but I was on graveyard shift at the time and I try not to say much of anything under those conditions...

Anyway, too late to make a long rant short but remember, discussion is what makes this board, bring it on... Steve
 
Knightfly,

Thanks for the lenghty answers ;)

Not much room for debate here as I agree with most of your ideas. I did think that the reverb trick might give more trouble then it's worth, but at the same time it's intrigueing enough for me to try it (and I do have a spare reverb lying around, remember :D).

I do think (like you) that the characteristics of this small space might grow on you and make you add more and more reverb to mixes over time. So it's clear to me that it's important to do a lot of "reference" listening to mixes in other rooms available.

As for the mounting of the foam, you can be sure I will make it so that I can re-use it in another room in six months or such ;)

Peter.
 
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