Vocal booth help

[Stylaproduction]

Ok so i realise this thread mite seem somethin of a repeat, but im after some specific help on acoustically treating my vocal booth.
I wish id read these threads before i started building, but i didnt so it is wat it is. im after some help in making the best of a not so great situation

My booth is 2.4m x 1.2m with a window in 1 wall. Walls are stud walls filled with 75mm rockwool the solid stuff, on top of this is sheetbloc, resilient bars 19mm planc board and then double boarded with 12.5mm mineral board.

At the moment i am yet to install the ceiling and a second pane of glass.

ok enough babble my questions are:

1)Should i install my celing at an angle (it will be same material as wall)

2)do i install my second pane of glass at an angle?

3) Wat is the best acoustic treatment for this booth? i need it to sound as high quality as possible for rappers and especially singers. at the moment there is not a great sound coming out...boxy

i was just about to purchase some acoustic foam on ebay but i stopped short when i read these posts. is th 703 really the way to go and is this the equivalent of the rockwool stuff i used to insulate the walls? should i use both? carpet??

any sound advice would be appreciated...

im using se electronics se2200 mic, se reflexion filter and focusrite voicemasterpro

 

[stealth_prod]

First off welcome.

Second, I am no pro on acoustics but in my experience you are going to have a good amount of trouble with that size booth. You will see alot of people recommend going the one room approach with rooms that small.

Are you recording primarily vocals? Have you tried recording in the open room?

You are probably going to need bass trapping and absorption inside. Someone who knows more about it might be able to give you more specifics.

I say good luck with your project, just dont expect super results.

 

[Stylaproduction]

Thankyou for your reply. the booth is prettymuch essential as i often have 5+ people in the studio so u can imagine the background noise. In your opinion do u think the absorbtion and bass trapping will have negligible effect??
and wat should i go for in terms of foam (cheaper auralex alternative) rigid rockwool? both?

 

[frederic]

7' x 3'? That's tight.

Foam is useful for dampening higher frequencies and does very little for low frequencies.

Rockwall is better, as it dampens more broadly, but you need some thickness for it to be effective. Are you putting the rockwool in the wall between the studs, or making baffles to be attached to the wall of the vocal booth, or both? Both is better but it cuts down the size of your vocal booth pretty quick.

What is your wall surface going to be? Drywall? Drywall reflects some of the acoustics back of course as you would expect.

Here is an idea with no warranty: An acquantance (sp?) of mine tried an experiment - he framed out the vocal booth (smaller than yours) with 2x6 studs, and densely packed rockwool between the studs. The outside of the studs, facing the console room, had two layers of drywall - 5/8" I think - the inside wall was... really heavy broadcloth, pulled taught and stapled to the studs, covering the rockwool.

His idea was to use the walls themselves as a broadband "panel", in leau of having any room for panels inside the booth - his booth is 4'x4' - A six inch thick panel makes that room 3-1/2' square. panels on each side of the booth on opposite walls makes it 3' square. Certainly not a comfortable space.

Personally, I think it sounded pretty good consider the very tight space and limitation of materials. Others disagreed, though I think a big part of the disagreement was due to the huge-ass window he shoved into the wall - glass reflects sound as you know, and while you can do the double-pane thing to reduce sound from going through the glass, in or out, it still reflects sound inside the booth all over the place. I think he would have faired better without the window, or a maybe a smaller one, but what's done is done, right?

I have a slanted ceiling in my vocal booth - it's almost 8' at the front and about 7'5" at the back - it's a fairly steep slope for a small booth. I had no choice in this because the ceiling of my vocal booth is directly screwed into the rafters, and the whole vocal booth is over a stairwell. The floor flips up to use the stairs. The stairwell, is my bass trap. This corny idea actually worked.

The slanted ceiling did make recording in there odd - certain standing positions sounded better than others, so a little experimentation for each singer (because of height) is required to get the best sound possible.

Like with you, the space wasn't exactly optimal. It was either over the stairwell or no vocal booth at all.

Also, to your friends who like to yap in the console room, by all means, tell them to go outside and smoke or something if they are impacting your ability to record a vocalist. Recording takes precedence to socialization.

 

[stealth_prod]

Also, to your friends who like to yap in the console room, by all means, tell them to go outside and smoke or something if they are impacting your ability to record a vocalist. Recording takes precedence to socialization.

I agree with this tenfold. I do not use a vocal booth so if someone does not know how to shut it, they are politely asked to either cork it or leave the room.

Please understand that having a booth does not make you more/less professional.

You are going to have the boxy problem because you essentially made a box. Lining it with auralex will not cut it for such a small spot. Give some of the acoustic guys time to step in and maybe help a little better.

 

[Stylaproduction]

Thanx for your responses guys. absorbtion and trapping right....
The booth is pretty much essential tho, i jus wish i would have planned it better. Asking the guys to leave is an option but i dont know if this will hinder the social aspect that leads to good creative work.
I think i could record singers in th control room, but as for the rappers they need to be in the booth.

 

[Jeff_D]

I'd tear down the booth. Use the rockwool and the lumber to make absorbers for your room. Make a gobo to setup your mic in front off. I've never worked with anyone that was too stupid to not keep their mouth shut when there was recording going on, so I suppose you'd just have to make them wait outside. Your booth sounds boxy because it IS a box.

 

[tigerflystudio]

seriously, these guys are speaking the truth. i was in exactly the same position myself recently - jumped in and started making a vocal booth thibnking it was important and that (maybe) I'd get a better sound.

Boy, was I wrong. As soon as I started using the open room, the vocals sounded much better and I realised it right away. Truth is, unless you build / buy a VERY well designed booth, you'll only encounter more problems than tracking without one.

If you only have 1 room then just ask the 'band' to be absolutley silent whilst tracking the vox / open mic stuff. If anyone's starts chatter-boxing and ruining your takes, the rest of the band should / WILL kick them outside!

 

[Stylaproduction]

ok guys i hear what ur saying...jus treat my control room with absorbers and traps....i guess i was jus trying to see if there was anyway to rectify my booth...but im seeing that really is not an option for good quality vocals.
So should i 100% tear it down rather than try and treat the damned box??? really dunno if these guys will shut th f up tho as they usually come for 10hr sessions as a group.



this is pretty much how my space looks at the moment...although i was thinking of rotating my workspace 90 degree so th booth would be behind me (if i kept it) Where would be the best placement for absorbers and bass traps?
I am a real amateur in terms of acoustics (obv) and how do i find my reflection spots?

 

[Jeff_D]

See if this helps...
http://www.realtraps.com/art_room-setup.htm

 

[frederic]

You want "air" behind you because of the monitors, so you'd want the desk placed along the short wall so you can use the length of the room to your advantage.

If the vocal booth isn't framed out, you might consider not making it square or rectangular, as that will enable parallel reflections back and forth, over and over.

Creating a "dead" vocal booth of this size is very difficult even with dollars and materials to throw at the project. Acoustically, it's probably one of the toughest things to design and build.

 

[Weasel9992]

Creating a "dead" vocal booth of this size is very difficult even with dollars and materials to throw at the project. Acoustically, it's probably one of the toughest things to design and build.

Great post. No matter what you do it'll always sound boxy and muddy because there isn't enough space to trap it adequately. It's the exact thing that we're talking about when we talk about a room that's too small to be useful.

Frank

 

[Stylaproduction]

Thanx for your feedback guys.. i guess i may as well tear down that booth...so much blood sweat and tears went into it lol. ill have to treat the control room and record in here.

1 thing i overlooked is th fact that i have another room adjacent to this room it is about th length and width of a corridor roughly 1.5m x 3-3.5m much larger than my booth...u think this is workable?

 

[frederic]

Here is what I would do, if I had your space.

I would tear out the vocal booth and treat the room accordingly, with broad-band absorbers and such, focusing a bit on bass that will inevitably collect in the corners and screw things up.

Then, I would make two "portable" rockwool panels, with heavy cloth on both sides, make stands for them or just make them tall, and put them in front of the vocalist/rapper with the mic in between. The frame of the panels is just 2x4's glued and screwed together, nothing terribly difficult or expensive.

This way your mixing room is larger, and feels better, you can leverage that room to benefit your vocals, yet still control reflections from getting into the microphone.

Anyone in your studio who cannot manage enough self-control to shut their yap for 10 minutes, send them on an errand to get pizza - their treat

Because the panels are portable, you can use them with other instruments as well. Maybe that's not an issue today, but maybe someday down the road you want to add a sax track or a couple of horns or something - these panels will allow you to record those in your console room as you did the vocalist/rapper.

There are a lot of old threads around here on how to make the panels... and they're not terribly expensive to make, or time consuming. I think the most difficult aspect is finding a thick cloth that's not an obnoxious color

 

[Stylaproduction]

Frederic ty very much for your suggestion, i will give this some serious thought as it shouldnt be 2 hard to construct. jus like building a portable stud.

i took a pic of it to show u how it looked a cpl mths back (i have since gt rid of that hideous monitor and gt a flatscreen)

i know that th workstation is in th wrong place and th monitors too high..

But some1 suggested that i alter th shape of it slightly, by changing th corner closest to th right monitor speaker and triangulating it.

Understand, please that i hear wat u guys are all saying about the joys of a correctly treated control room recording.
but while i will be able to do this on ocassions th majority of time requires total isolation. Cant ask them all to sit in silence for their 10hour sessions. and more than 50% of time is recording vox.

i will post up some more pics wen i find em..

wish i found this site b4 i built it!!!!

 

[stealth_prod]

Well first thing that usually bothers me about these types of booths is you go through all that trouble to make it, then put the desk right next to it. I like to monitor vocals while recording also but when you have the monitors right up against the wall of the booth, your kind of defeating the purpose.

I understand the having people in the studio talking thing BUT they have to understand that you are trying to do your job. You are not recording the whole 10 hr session correct? You will have gaps of time that they can conversate. If they can not understand that they need to be quiet for a few minutes then you need to ask them to leave. As most here have and will tell you, build yourself some gobos and record in the open room.

Sorry man this is the way things work, if they were to walk in to a full furnished pro studio and started being loud and not respecting the engineer, they would be removed. Why is that any different from you? If they dont have respect for you then why should they be there? Cause they are paying you? That means they are paying you do something that cant be done while they are being loud and obnoxious. Or let them be loud and show them how many times they need to re-record a vocal until it costs them enough they learn to shut the hell up.

 

[frederic]

Stealth is right...

Between each take there is often much time for annoying studio pests to yap their heads off. Once you push the red button, they should be respectful of YOUR studio and YOUR craft, and shaddap.

I haven't owned a pro studio in a very long time, but I have on many occasions thrown out band members, their giggling, semi-wasted girlfriends, even an unprofessional producer who decided to punch a tape deck in frustration.

What?

The console room is *my* room. Everyone else is a guest. No talking, no drinking, no smoking, no eating, no nose picking, touch nothing, say nothing, or very simply, get the fuck out.

The exception is the producer, he/she may talk, but the rest of the rules apply.

It's simply a respect thing. Would you like if I borrowed your car, spilled beer all over the place, bounced it off a few shopping carts, and returned it with a flat tire and say "thanks man?"

No, you'd wring my neck.

Treat your studio the same way

You can make broadband panels as I described several ways - you can make smaller ones and mount them on ordinary speaker poles that DJ's use, where you can adjust the height, maybe turn the sideways if they are rectangular, etc.

The easiest way is to make two or three panels that are above your head, and hinge them so they fold on top of each other, like a zig-zag if you look at them from the top. This allows you to set them up free standing, no stands and hardware necessary, yet you can fold them onto each other and stick them in the closet or a corner when you don't need them.

I helped a friend a couple of years ago make such a set of panels, and it's five panels, each 7' tall and 3' wide, and 6" thick. He put them on cheap basic casters he got at "harbor freight" to make moving them around that much easier. The five of them are hinged together, so he can leave them folded in twos for a smaller panel but a foot thick with an extra panel to act as a "wing" which helps keep it standing up, or he can surround two vocalists (backup signers) and record them together. It's almost large enough unfolded to wrap around a simple, basic drum kit also.

Just some more ideas for mental fodder.

 

[Stylaproduction]

ok guys so i didnt quite take all of ur advice but ty, i did order the rockwool, but couldnt bring myself to tear down my dear booth. so just to test it out i placed around 8 pieces of it around the booth and did a recording with my reflexion filter too.
i noticed a drastically improved sound...so dead and upfront i was quite pleased although there was slight high end flutter... so i intend to cover the walls of the booth in rockwool maybe 75% then chequer pattern some acoustic foam on top.
Do i need to leave some hard surface or is the window enough.

Also i think i ordered a lil too much rockwool so next i will be working on treating my control room and building bass traps/absorbers etc...soon to post a picture so thoughts please

 

[Supercreep]

I agree with previous responses: Tear out the booth, and put the space you have to use. There's no way to sex up boxy vocals, dude.

 

[Stylaproduction]

ok so i jus covered the walls with rockwool and covered with some thick black material. The sound is more or less totally dead apart from some high end flutter when i clap. i did a few recordings and im more than happy with the results...i think jus some bass traps and the wedge foam and im done.

can any1 advise me on bass traps? what to go for or if i can make em myself.?

Thanks for ur input