Build a Home Studio in 11 Days or Fail College: Go.

  • Thread starter Thread starter Chitta
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I would do what Les Paul said and make it look exactly like a living room with sofas and lamps. I would avoid most people's conception of a recording studio like the plague.

If you watch any of the Pomplamoose videos on YouTube they seem to have a complete lack of room treatment, no bass traps or any of that logic. I saw a sheet hanging on a wall in one video. Big Woop. They sound great. If you close mic things the sound of the room is close to irrelevant.

I would avoid doing stuff that falls under the category of "playing recording studio".

Pomplemoose has it right - screw the bullshit, get a Neumann and put your energy into great performances and arrangements.
 
Dintymoore,
I like your attitude.
Unfortunately, If I say that to the chair of my department.....
Fail college.
But you're right, it's always the music that should come first, then the tech.
However, I'm a nerd and it's hard for me to suppress my desire to learn more about sound and its quirks and sweet spots.
At the end of the day, I see no harm in trying to make a good sounding room.
 
Towards the end of every semester we see post like this from someone seeking help to pass a certain class.

You would think that we would all have a butt load of honorary degrees by now.






:cool:
 
dintymoore said:
Pomplemoose has it right - screw the bullshit, get a Neumann and put your energy into great performances and arrangements.
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Why bother with the Neumann if you're not gonna treat the room. An untreated room will have more affect than what mic you have (to a degree). :p
 
The definition of "good sounding room" varies greatly depending on whether you're talking about a listening room or a room to perform/record in.

A buddy of mine owns a duplex, and one side has been turned into a huge, open space with an open loft. The bare wood floors and non-parallel walls and vaulted ceiling make the room very live with a phenomenal natural reverb. Fantastic place to record vocals, guitars or drums. Lousy place to try and mix or listen critically.
 
pandamonk said:
Why bother with the Neumann if you're not gonna treat the room. An untreated room will have more affect than what mic you have (to a degree). :p
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YES YES YES. I can't tell you how many times I've worked with clients to treat a terrible room that they have $100K worth of gear in. It makes exactly zero sense to do that in a terrible-sounding room.
 
pandamonk said:
Why bother with the Neumann if you're not gonna treat the room. An untreated room will have more affect than what mic you have (to a degree). :p
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Check out the Pomplamoose vids. There's pretty much no room treatment and it sounds great.

I personally think that the whole room treatment thing is pretty much "playing recording studio". If you look at Abbey Roads and Motown there's next to no room treatment.

Few rooms are that bad that if you close mic it even comes into the picture.
 
dintymoore said:
Check out the Pomplamoose vids. There's pretty much no room treatment and it sounds great.

I personally think that the whole room treatment thing is pretty much "playing recording studio". If you look at Abbey Roads and Motown there's next to no room treatment.

Few rooms are that bad that if you close mic it even comes into the picture.
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Abbey Road certainly has been acoustically designed with plenty of acoustic treatment. What you DON'T see, however, is a bunch of auralex foam stuck all over the place.

When it comes to control rooms, acoustic treatment is essential! For recording small rooms, like those is home studios, generally sound shit to most people. Acoustic treatment is therefore essential in most home studios. Larger rooms tend to sound more pleasant which reduces the need for acoustic treatment, however most live rooms tend to be flexible (ranging from completely dry to very lively) with the use of acoustic treatment.
 
dintymoore said:
Check out the Pomplamoose vids. There's pretty much no room treatment and it sounds great.

I personally think that the whole room treatment thing is pretty much "playing recording studio". If you look at Abbey Roads and Motown there's next to no room treatment.

Few rooms are that bad that if you close mic it even comes into the picture.
Click to expand...

Wow, that was quite interesting! I'd never heard of Pomplamoose before...very unique sound they've got!
 
dintymoore said:
Check out the Pomplamoose vids. There's pretty much no room treatment and it sounds great.

I personally think that the whole room treatment thing is pretty much "playing recording studio". If you look at Abbey Roads and Motown there's next to no room treatment.

Few rooms are that bad that if you close mic it even comes into the picture.
Click to expand...

sorry dinty but i have to agree with these guys.

if you have an amazing sounding room without treatment and everything you record in there sounds like a million bucks.... don't f*ck it up lol :)

but if your in a 10x15x8 in an apartment and your mostly using it for mixing or critical listening instead of tracking then room treatment will help without a doubt.

and those Pomplamoose guys do have treatment it just shitty (notice the blankets on the walls). either way their tracks sound fine for home recording but aren't really comparable to a true professional recording quality wise.

the other part of that is even in a shitty room you can get good sounds if you take your time and find the sweet spot in the room where the instument shines despite the issues with the room, but this is time consuming and YMMV per instrument.

the most important thing is the song and performance because even if it sounds poor in quality a good performance can shine through anyway :D

aka:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DyO7lvzfw5Q
 
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Chitta said:
Yeah Buddy, and the dubious smell entertainment! Knew this would come, I'm dubious as well... but determined. :cool:
And we'll see how far that gets me.

First explaining the end goals a little.
I would like to have a room I can do some critical listening in. Maybe record a little guitar, and possibly some scratch or demo vocals. I'm not doing the post production for Avatar 2 and I'm not trying to rebuild a room outta blackbird studios. I've got an 8pre audio interface and a duet I use with Logic 9 on my macbook to record and still haven't upgraded my entry level monitors (Event ALP5's.)
Because of that, when I mix I switch between those, and my DT990Pro cans quite often (earbuds too.)
I'll probably never try to record drums in there unless I'm just screwing around.

I've got carpet in the room already and I'm not allowed to pull that up.
All I'm really trying to do here is make the room acoustically sound as good as it can, because I can't cut into the walls and it's the only room I've got to build in.


So MDLA I just did the room mode calculations because I just took measurements. (I actually don't have the keys to this place yet..... Friday I get keys.)
So the realtor took me in so I could measure.

I have a little more time now to talk so I'll say a little bit more about how much I'm really trying to bite off here, and I guess we'll see if I've got the teeth to chew it.

I was a big nerd in acoustics classes so some of this stuff isn't new to me (none of the concepts or equations are, a few of the practices are..)
The calculation of the room modes is really just to give me something to do while I'm waiting around to get in there.
The proof in the pudding will be when I get in there and here's what I'm intending to do:

Set up my monitors and a software oscillator. Set my SPL to a dBC (Thanks MiroSlav) and I'll record the readings ascending in semitones from 20Hz to 20k.
If I have some indicators that I should have standing wave issues below 500Hz that aren't showing up in the readings. I'm going to chalk that up to my 5.25in monitors and assume that if I upgrade my monitors I might run into something (stay safe assume the worst right?)

I'll do this at the listening position, then at three other places in the room, one near the back wall. The other two, places I may consider setting up mics.

Once I have all the data for where the quirks in my room are (in Hz.) I'll make the final decision on what insulation to buy for trapping.
For what makes logistical sense right now I'm thinking that I'll put bass trapping from floor to ceiling. in the to corners behind my work desk. I'll also put traps horizontally where the ceiling meets the back wall, in the two corners (not all the way across.)
I don't know as much about bass trapping as I would like to, I haven't ever done it before. I know about frictional diffusion and absorption coefficients but I'm certainly no guru on placement or knowing how much should be used for what sized room (I understand the smaller room, the more you need.) But after building it, I figure I'll let my ears and the SPL meter be the judges.

After all that madness I'm intending to build some diffusion. Like seen here:
07734
out of a ceiling tile as a base, then ply, pine 2x2's cut to random lengths.
Place these strategically to try to get rid of some early reflections.
More on making diffusers and some of the specific problems with my room for this later.
But I have an large bookshelf I was intending to use as a back wall diffuser instead of treatment meant for treatment.

After all this, I'm hoping to start piecing my gear together in a fashion that gives me the best access to all of it and makes some logical sense (as supposed to how it is now, half of it being in the closet..)

I don't have a closet in the room to stick things that hum, and honestly I don't even have a rack yet, although it maybe getting toward time to buy one.


See what a newb I am guys? THIS is why I joined the forum. And, intend to spend lots of time talking to the folks here.
So give me your critical thoughts, but please, gimme a little encouragement if you've got any to spare.... I need it.:o
So play nice (Stealth_prod :spank:) I love writing and recording and twittling the knobs and faders so I'll do it wherever I am, and if there's an old lady who doesn't like it on the floor above me, I make a mean apple pie and I'll bake her more than she can eat, and I'll walk her little yippy shaky dog because I'll do whatever takes to keep on making organized sounds.


Next I'll post the gear that I intend to shove in here.
But really I need any experienced guidance you all can offer on the treatment thide of sings. (Catch the reference?)
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While I am no expert in this field I think your starting idea is good.

I would add "cloud" trapping over mix position and broadband trapping at first reflections unless you are planning on diffusing those points also.

Additionally I would add more trapping in the back corners and possibly add some to the front wall ceiling/wall joint.

I wouldn't worry too much about diffusers unless you are getting comb filtering or strange reverberation response.

In small rooms the adage is the more absorption, bass or broadband, the better.

also check out:

http://www.ethanwiner.com/acoustics.html

it taught me a great deal!
 
There's pretty much no room treatment and it sounds great.
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Well, I guess that explains why some people on this planet love fish eyes for dinner.

If you look at Abbey Roads and Motown there's next to no room treatment.
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Dear Mr. acoustics expert. Perhaps you should read this. It might enlighten you..but just for drill, have you ever heard of wavelengths...how bout room modes...how bout room dimensions approaching wavelengths of 20hz NEED VERY LITTLE TREATMENT..but I won't bother explaining it as I hate wasting my time. geeeezus...Abby Road indeed...what a marooon.:rolleyes::rolleyes:
 
Superchunk bass trap positioning

Can anyone see any issues with positioning a "superchunk" or triangular insulation bass trap made from mineral wool away from the corner?
I'm thinking, set out from each wall by about 3 in.
 
Hey another Q. I need to find out how to cut mineral wool by tomorrow (I'll be building the superchunks :) )
All I can find online is folks cutting fiberglass. Anyone have experience with cutting mineral wool?
 
TheMDLA Thanks for such great suggestions. I was thinking all the above although I wasn't originally thinking of have "cloud" trapping. Now I'm gonna try to make that happen with the given time.
Don't worry about diffusion? Seems crazy.
What about first reflections of the side walls and ceiling of a room that's 8' tall and only 12'5" wide?
 
Chitta said:
Can anyone see any issues with positioning a "superchunk" or triangular insulation bass trap made from mineral wool away from the corner?
I'm thinking, set out from each wall by about 3 in.
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That'll work just fine. We actually tested our Tri Traps pulled out of the corner a few inches, knowing that people would have to do that to clear bass board. The test results were identical.
 
Weasel9992 said:
That'll work just fine. We actually tested our Tri Traps pulled out of the corner a few inches, knowing that people would have to do that to clear bass board. The test results were identical.
Click to expand...

Weasel thanks for the Feedback there. I was actually thinking of raising the traps up 10 inches on a solid triangular wooden base (having a similar footprint to the trap.) saving the material this way (and floorspace) will afford me one more 2'X4'X4" broadband trap (I think that's a broad band trap....)

Does anyone who's reading this have an opinion on weather that's a good trade?
The downside being the more reflective material (wood) resting on carpet in to of the tricorners (under the superchunks.)
Upside:
1 more panel trap with 4pcf mineral wool.



Sorry for typos. Typed on touchscreen.
 
I got an extension :D

So I took the week off the studio and worked on my other classes. Now it's back to work.

Can we talk about how nasty mineral wool is? I just cut up 200lbs of that stuff the other night into 2'X2' Triangles. Jesus. How is it that everyone talks about building bass traps and no one talks about what a nasty job it is? :eek:
 
dintymoore said:
If you look at Abbey Roads and Motown there's next to no room treatment.
Click to expand...

There are two ways to get a great sounding room.

One is to use bass traps and acoustic panels to take a bad sounding room and control the reflections, killing high end flutter as well as low end buildup. The result will be a fairly acoustically 'dead' space with almost no reflections causing phasing problems.

The other is just do design a room from the ground up so that it doesn't cause low end buildup and weird phasey issues in the first place. Things like little to no parallel surfaces, angled walls and ceilings, etc. This will be a more "live" sounding room, but will also have little to no phase problems from reflections.

The former will look very "treated" to even an amateur. The latter will look untreated unless you know enough about the physics behind acoustical design to see that the very room itself is "treatment."

That's pretty much where Abbey Roads falls. I'd kill for a room like that.
 
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