What treatment to little room ?

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Krzyfn

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Hey, this is my room:
room.JPG

blue is door,
red is window,
green is segment, (unable to move, erase, or anything)
yellow is couch,
brown is table,
and the last one is my computer with pink monitors.
I use it for recording vocals and e-guitar and mastering.
I have naked concrete walls. One is covered by segment. The most important is i guess wall behind my couch (becouse of monitors). Floor - panels and little carpet (1.3m/1.8m) laying on the center of the room
Have you any idea to treat this room efficiently using DIY methods?
 
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well there s loads of things you could do to improve acousticaly that room, and in the end you might end up spending a fortune. some little things that you could do in my opinion, is to move your monitors in the centre of that wall so you ll be siting and mixing from the centre position, then treat the early reflections (the walls left and right from where you ll be siting, also the back wall and even the ceiling) with sound absorbant material. You said your walls are made from concrete so i supose there will be a problem in low frequencies, so you ll need bass traps (as many as posible). a difuser on the back wall would be usefull too, but of course all these things cost.
 
concrete walls really need to be covered with at least one layer of drywall, or get some rugs or theatre type drapes and hang them on the concrete walls (you won't be able to treat this type of covering though). IMO you should move your mix station from the window area, put it at the other end of your room, put your couch in front of the window.
 
'then treat the early reflections' what do you mean by this sentence ? On my left i have a segment and im not suppose to do anything with this furniture. On my right is a piece of table and next - wall (with a bookcase hung over).
Bass traps. Very well, but what exactly, how many, where? How can i know it? I have mxl 990mic and krk rp5 monitors so i can make some tests, but how?

Changing anything in accoustic of certain room should be preceded by specific tests i guess. Don`t you think?

What`s the problem with window ? I wanted to hang there a curtain.
I have concerned having a curtain hung on my back wall, but lots of posts here state that curtains do not eliminate lo freqs.

What do you think about door? ^^

Moving my station to another wall could be harmful, becouse my comp. table is very small and one of monitors stands on the table.
 
krzyfn are you greek? you sound greek actualy, if you are it ll be easier for me
 
no, im from Poland ^^. My english is sometimes hard to understand i know it ;).
 
Krzyfn said:
Have you any idea to treat this room efficiently using DIY methods?
Click to expand...

you can put diy absorbers in each corner = wall-floor wall-ceiling if need be = and overhead of the mix position is an absorber called a cloud. on each side is one to reduce side reflections, and on the back wall is one to reduce rear reflections. try to center your desk on the wall. one problem with your space is its almost square... which means room modes are stronger...
lastly, put a heavy drape over the window when you need the front wall to be less live. these steps will help.
 

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It would be of help if you could move toward the center of the room side to side and also move your setup toward the back a bit. Being right next to the wall will cause problems in the bottom end and your listening position should be back farther.

I don't know your budget nor the cost of DIY materials there but this is what I'd do:

1 panel at least 50mm directly behind each audio monitor on the front wall for SBIR.

1 panel at least 50mm thick horizontally between the speakers to help with depth and imaging.

2 panels at least 50mm thick on the side walls at the reflection points.

2 panels at least 100mm thick on the rear wall above the couch centered on the wall left to right.

1 panel at least 100mm thick straddling each of the 4 room corners at a minimum - more is better.

Bryan
 
Whow Gullfo - good work.
OK. Now my station is of the centre of the room, in front of the wall with window. Im seeking a good drape to hang.
Saying 'absorber' you don`t mean common foam ?
I`ll try to show you photos of my room.
'Segment' is a wall-unit, or a big bookcase (covering all the wall). I have checked it before in a translator ^^.
Regards.
 
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if you follow Bryan's advice on the size and number of rigid-fiberglass-covered-with-cloth type absorbers, you'll be in decent shape. the rigid fiberglass (or mineral wool, rock wool - examples include 703 Corning, Roxul, etc) should be 3lb/cuft (48Kg/cu m) and you should use fireproof (or treated) cloth which allows reasonable air flow (such as burlap, speaker cloth, etc to ensure good bass absorption and minimal high frequency reflections).
 
That segment (or bookcase) on the left wall really isn't helping anything at all. All it's really doing is stopping you from treating the wall on that side the way it should be treated.

If you can move it out of the room that would be best.

Bryan
 
Hi there Krzyfn

If the bookcase (shelving) is made up of many open-fronted compartments you're going to get a lot of resonance inside each cavity.
In your current setup having it to one side of you will throw out your ability to mix properly as there will be a lot of low-mid 'woof' going on on that side.
Maybe move your workstation so your back is to the shelving unit, as the problem will then be more evenly dispersed.
Common foam can be used to line the back of each shelf to help absorb some reflections but unless the thing is full of books you'll still get some resonance inside each cavity. You need to shove as much stuff into those shelves as possible to help prevent/absorb reverb occurring inside each compartment.

The room itself having naked concrete walls is going to be a bugger to treat unless you're able to cover the concrete walls with thick absorbent acoustic foam or fiberglass and maybe get more furniture in there to help absorb the low end of things. Soft suede couches do wonders for soaking up the odd low frequency here and there (and are mighty comfortable to lounge around on when you're all out of ideas) :D

Maybe get the floor carpeted if you can't treat the entire room as it will help soak up a little bit of high frequency (especially if you get the really good, thick underlay)

You may even consider building a whole lot of thick, padded upright panels to set up around your work area in order to create a smaller 'treated' space. A room within a room, if you like.

I'm all out of any more ideas for the moment, but I hope some of these help.

Dags
 
Hey, a room within a room is quite good idea.
What do you think about a curtain hung on a special rail on the ceiling which can smartly cover my bookcase ?
I cannot put trashes in some of cells becouse there are e.g. glasses.
I think the way Dags suggested is the best one.
But can the curtain eliminate lows? What if it were very thick ?
Any suggestions could help.
 
Krzyfn said:
Hey, a room within a room is quite good idea.
What do you think about a curtain hung on a special rail on the ceiling which can smartly cover my bookcase ?
I cannot put trashes in some of cells becouse there are e.g. glasses.
I think the way Dags suggested is the best one.
But can the curtain eliminate lows? What if it were very thick ?
Any suggestions could help.
Click to expand...

Hey Krzyfn
The curtain will not get rid of any mid-low frequency resonance within the room. You need really thick absorbers to do that. Big bulky items such as the couch will help a bit, but you will probably need to look at some options for the other walls/corners such as bass traps or, as someone mentioned on this site, buying insulation, leaving it rolled up in its plastic and stacking them in the corners to absorb the lows.

Does the shelving unit/bookcase have doors over the front or are they open? If they have doors then you may not have the 'woofy' resonance problem I mentioned earlier that happens when sound bounces around inside the empty boxes (cells).
A thick curtain, such as used for theatre/stage blacks, could help to mute some of the really high frequency 'ringing' that would normally happen over such a surface (the bank of doors are effectively acting like a wall), and if you couple this with the free-standing padded panels/absorbers mentioned to create the 'room within a room idea' and some thick bass traps in the corners it could go some way to help control the sound in your environment.

Problem is, you may not have very much space left to work in once you have set up all this treatment :D

Best of luck!
Dags
 
Hey, there are some photos of my room:
station.jpg

-station

segment.jpg

-magic 'segment'

coach.jpg

-coach with concrete wall

pieceofwindowandsegment.jpg

-you see i guess

carpet.jpg

-it`s my floor.

Maybe some ideas? I have to do something. If not i will die ^^.
 
My goodness - you are rather cramped aren't you? :eek:

I think gullfo may have the best suggestion for the cabinets, though the size of the room may prohibit the amount of sound treatment you can install.
I would suggest getting a larger and thicker rug for the floor to soak up some of the high frequency reflections that are going to occur between wall/floor and ceiling/floor.
Building the free-standing thick absorber panels and propping them up behind the couch and against the bare walls could help knock out some of the inevitable small room reflection.
You could also potentially pack rolls of foam/insulation on top of the cabinets to muffle the area between ceiling and cabinet which is likely to resonate with low-mids.

Krzyfn - when you stand in the room and sing different notes loudly does the room seem resonate a bit?

I will rely on other more experienced room designers for their take on this but I am wondering if in this case trying to create an acoustically dead environment as much as possible is better, given the size of the space?
I would imagine that the room would be quite harsh to record in given its size, and playback could only be at a moderate volume at best.
Opinions??

Dags
 
OK. After seeing the cabinets (segments), I think a stop and regroup is in order. You're never going to get things sorted out with that on one side of you. Since the room isn't that much narrower than it is long, I think you should turn the mix position to face the right wall of the drawing with the cabinets at your back.

That'll give you some space to play with on the front wall, keep things relatively symmetric, etc.

Bryan
 
Bryan has a good idea - put the cabinets to your back. either way, i think you need to pull a drape over it because of the reflections and resonances and still the need to access it... maybe some absorbers on stands to trap in front of the cabinets could also do it.
 
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