Do I have the right acoustic panels?

[GoodTimesRec]

I found the files I made to test it out at the time. I left everything in the room the same, just put in the stacks of bass trap triangles. There's a big difference in punchiness! This is just the Fathead ribbon mic I have a few feet ahead of the kit. I am not lying I was shocked that they made as much a difference as they did! My room is literally a bedroom (albeit I sacrificed the largest/master bedroom for this) so I gotta absorb/treat the hell out of it. It's like all the frequencies that were fighting each other when bouncing around the room toward the mic are not doing it as much, and just the drum-to-microphone is coming through more

[Orson]

Its all very good but your only maximum depth is a few millimeters wide in the center of your base panel. The rest is losing its depth at 45 degrees.
It is nowhere as efficient as a rectangular panel as 'x' amount of rockwool panels thick. Your advantage is it takes up less space in the corners with a good depth in the center and thats it.

[GoodTimesRec]

I guess you gotta make compromises in a home studio, non-purpose built room!

In addition to the panels that were already in the room at the time (RealTraps MiniTraps plus homemade 4" thick Rockwool panels), I have subsequently hung a couple cloud panels up since I put the bass traps in last year. It all adds up, and stuff is sounding pretty tasty in there

[Orson]

I guess you gotta make compromises in a home studio, non-purpose built room!

In addition to the panels that were already in the room at the time (RealTraps MiniTraps plus homemade 4" thick Rockwool panels), I have subsequently hung a couple cloud panels up since I put the bass traps in last year. It all adds up, and stuff is sounding pretty tasty in there

Totally agree. I even have a thick oversize towel as a curtain. If it works use it.

[GoodTimesRec]

Yes! Speaking of, I need to get some curtains to cover the sound curtain and make it look less industrial

[JamEZmusic]

Hello mate! It's good to hear from you, I was wandering how you were doing.

Ok I'm doing that! if you say it did wonders for your room then I trust your experience I have not listened to those recordings yet but I will in a second.

There is a guy selling RW3 pretty local to me, I can pretty much drive up to collect any time. It's pretty cheap, very dense and pretty easy to work with too, I was surprised. It's not like the cavity fill that goes in between brickwork at all that I used to work with a lot.

Cutting into triangles seems like the way to go! That air gap around the back works out well too because I can keep in a straight line up from the skirting board. I have enough materials lying around the yard to be able to build all the panels and traps without needing to buy anymore stuff. I should have some carpet adhesive if I give that a very thin layer it should stick the bits of RW3 together. Only thing I am slightly worried about is getting the fabric over the top of it nice and tight with no horrible creases. I will perservere with it.

I think cutting 4" strips (i'll measure)... of an 8x4 sheet I have lying around should work well, then I was going to put some black screws in it to keep it off the wall a set amount and just have a bit of tough string.... or wool.. to hang up up like a picture frame on a single hook, the ceiling will be trickier. If all goes to plan as I think it would then i'll have 2 panels to my right + left, 3 on ceiling and bass traps up at least the 2 front corners. the other corners are not really accessible because a door is covering one, and a built in wardrobe the other. I am still thinking of moving into the much longer room but I dunno... it's a lot of work.

And to top it all off I was just tracking my bass and my tv flickered off and I am unable to get it working again. sucks! So now is the time to make these much needed changes, new desk, dual monitor setup. acoustic treatment. A tidier rack. I'm hoping the whole thing will not cost me anymore than 400£

I'm doing good mate, all things considered. Lots happened since last we spoke. I am in and out of family court so I can get reasonable access to the children again (she's being as awkward as possible) it's been a tough year with lockdown and my ultra isolation from the world. Barely touched a fader since we last spoke. Been on it for 3 days solid though. I got a PLAP multitrack of a cover Warren Huart did of (Knights in white satin) so I am practicing my tracking techniques trying to emulate the closest possible sounds/waveforms as his recordings, lots of test recordings + tweaking of what little hardware I have available to really get to grips with recording at a high level, I can't sing/wont sing so I am just going to replace the vocal line with either my electric or acoustic I have no idea yet. He has a nashville tuned guitar layered in and I have a spare knocking about so I am off to buy a pack o 12 strings so I can try that out also.

All good over here, just a bit miffed at the moment about the tv. typical.

I will let you know how much studio build goes because I will be starting that on wednesday if all goes to plan, I was supposed to over this weekend but my work got cancelled and all of my tools are left on site haha.

Edit: I just listened to those mp3. What a difference! Massive improvement, much more punch + Dry sound. I do not record drums, I'll be recording acoustic guitar + guitar amps primarily. I can't wait to hear the difference for myself. That's not to say I still won't shove an ambient room mic up outside the studio in hallway or in the tiled bathroom. But those mics are usually the (just in-case mics)

[GoodTimesRec]

Glad to hear you're doing alright! And good to hear about the kids, I have a close friend going through the same thing and all they want to do is be able to hang w/their children. Very glad she's not being a total jerk about that.

You know, that's crazy; the power spiked or something about a month ago and I lost a computer monitor. It was over 5 years old but what the hell it just turns on and off, it's not like it has moving parts or generates a ton of heat! Better luck with the next TV.

Great idea to match/meet the Huart tracks, that's honestly the way to go: getting it as close as possible at the source. And getting a sense for what to listen for when you track your own stuff. Hearing "that's what it's supposed to sound like" and getting used to that in your monitors is so key.

Definitely spend more time than I did making your bass traps look good . I did not prioritize looks on my triangles. The fabric probably could stand to be hit with the clothes steamer, because more than a year later there's still wrinkles from how it was originally folded up, ha. I have doors in two of the corners of that room, so I can only put stacks of those triangles in the two corners as seen in the picture. When it comes time to track something, I just place a couple rectangular panels in the two door'ed corners and seal myself in the room a bit. It's a little bit of a pain to place/move it each time I go in and out of the room but it's not the end of the world.

I was shocked that the triangle traps made that much of a difference! I totally thought I was going to eat the money I spent on making them, but the A/B test resolved me to making more. I want to see what they can do in the closet with the guitar/bass cabinets. Since I put all those traps in there I record as much as I can in that room now, even though it's easier to sit at the computer in the other bedroom (which does have panels in it, just not like the drum/recording room). Everything sounds SO good. You can use more distance on the microphones and not have things sound smeared or muddy. The punchiness of the drums an how much better they come through in mixes is just huge to me. It's like hearing an out of focus vs. in focus camera if that makes sense.

I also love that close mic and direct overhead setup for acoustic guitar in that room. The guitar is also punchier. Everything recorded in that room just sounds like the instrument instead of instrument smeared with room.

[Orson]

That air gap around the back works out well too because I can keep in a straight line up from the skirting board.

On one video I watched, they specified a gap behind sound panels so that any sound that passes through the panel, hits the wall and bounces back into the panel again. This way it gets treated twice and doubles the efficiency of the thickness of your panel.

Dunno but it kind of makes sense I think?

[mikahawkins1]

I think those are correct. If you can then please post a few pictures.

[TalismanRich]

On one video I watched, they specified a gap behind sound panels so that any sound that passes through the panel, hits the wall and bounces back into the panel again. This way it gets treated twice and doubles the efficiency of the thickness of your panel.

Dunno but it kind of makes sense I think?

I don't really see why a gap would be needed. If an sound wave passes through a panel and hits a wall and bounces back, what would any gap do? The wave STILL has to try to pass through the panel, whether there is a gap or not.

Sometimes I wish I had my old wave table from high school. It might be fun to test the wave behavior of various configurations. Its probably all done by computer simulation these days.