Bad acoustics.. how to avoid

[EddieVergunst]

The room which I am recording in (my garage) has the worst acoustics possible. Low ceiling, parallell walls, etc. Any ambient micing I've tried always ended up sounding like shit. Now I'm wondering, as I mostly do guitar amp recordings, if there's a way to somehow isolate the guitar amp so that the acoustics are not picked up. I've heard someone say using sound absorbing blankets should help. What exactly is so special about these blankets? What material?

Thanks

 

[Son of Mixerman]

IF your room sucks then remove the room right?

Well, the blankets help absorb the frequencies that are typically in what you might call the ambient frequencies. Pretty much any old blanket thats medium heavy will work. Down comforters a bit expensive but moving blankets "look" more professional. You can get "loaded" blankets that are really heavy and really expensive but building gobo's are cheaper. I have 5 comforters the I use for this kinda of stuff.

SoMm

 

[apl]

See Ethan Winer's excellent articles.

 

[TexRoadkill]

If you can locate any rigid fiberglass insulation in your area then you can build some small panels that can surround the amp. Packing blankets or foam attached to plywood would be your next best bet.