Control Room Design

hobo

Recording Engineer
I am designing a studio to build in my in-laws' separated garage. The interior space is 22' wide x 20' deep. There is no existing interior structure, and the exterior walls are cinder block.

I am trying to design a smart control room. The size will be 14' wide by 8' deep, which is unfortunate (I believe you usually want it to be deeper than wide?). Here is the layout:

ControlRoom.png


I did my best to keep it symmetrical, and added as much bass trapping as I could without sacrificing serious room space. I plan to have some shallow book shelves on the back wall to diffuse the sound, and various wall hangings, chairs, a few tall lamps and maybe a fake plant or two.

I am purchasing a pair of Yamaha HS50Ms for monitoring.

Will this be sufficient? Are there any sound considerations that I have failed to take into account? Is there a better way to do it?

Thanks for all of your help.
 
It's small. I would recommend turning it the other way.. long ways.

Are those double walls? What are they made of? Book shelves actually make better absorbers than diffusors.

How high is the room? You should try to get at least 1500 cubic feet to start.

Cheers,
John
 
room

Yes, they are double walls. I will have two layers of drywall with the joints staggered, with 2 x 4 studs as the structure. The orange color is going to be insulation.

The room will be maximum 8' or a little more - I have to go in between existing joists that are for the roof, because I don't want to connect the room to the existing structure (better isolation). That means I can put my joists up between the existing ones, making a slightly vaulted ceiling.

Hmm, perhaps I should turn it sideways and take out the closet. Symmetry is good for a control room, right? Does that include the furniture and things in the room as well? It might be tough to get 1500 cubic feet. The side of the building that the control room is on is 20', and I could probably get 16-17 of that for the length.

Thanks for your reply.
 
Symmetry is required in a mixing environment. Yes, shoot down the long way. 16-17 feet is great.

Cheers,
John
 
bass traps?

What kind of bass trapping should I have? I don't have a ton of space for it, but I might be able to put in some corner traps (like the ones in the front of the control room in the picture above).
 
Yes, corner traps like that will work well. Do you have any space at your wall / ceiling junctions for traps? Use these to free up square footage.

You should treat at least the ceiling and 2 of the walls and remember that a diffuse environment is preferable to an anechoic one. Never let untreated surfaces face each other.

Cheers,
John
 
John is giving you good advice in this thread. You want L/R symmetry and for the speakers to throw the long way into the room. You will need lots of broadband absorbtion in the room. Treat the back wall especially well to minimize reflections to your listening position from the rear. Try to set up your listening position 30% into the room.
 
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