Building a new studio in the UK

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shutupandshave

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So, where to begin.

I have just bought my first house, and being a keen musician, with a fair bit of gear that I've acquired I've decided to build a recording studio/rehearsel room in my garden.

Unfortunately it's not going to be one of those super monstrous wonderful studios that many of you Americans seem to have.

The thing I have, is labour. I'm in a couple of bands, and so that's an extra 6 people to help me build (and want to help me build), also my wifes father built a house (and she has many friends that have done that), and there are electricians etc in the family.

I think the hardest part is going to planning it.

I have family that were on the local planning council (for where I currently live) and friends that are still on various planning councils so I can see if my designs need planning applications, and whether they would get through (huge bonus).

Unfortunately - although I can pull together a computer and put it back together in a matter of minutes, or even tell you what note you're humming (on a good day), I know very little about desks, compressors, stonewool, 2x4, microphones.

If people are interested, I would be happy to share ALL the plans I make, with regular photo updates in exchange for a little advice about what I need to build things with (sometimes explaining things slowly), and what gaps I have in my studio gear.

My primary concern is that it is soundproof. Annoying neighbours is something I dont want to do primarily because it's not a nice thing to do but also because it's a good way to have anything I build torn down (even if I put in a planning app).

I am going to measure up the garden properly in my new house this weekend, so until then I guess everything is on hold until I draw up some plans.

My gear is the following...

Digi 001 card running on a fast PC
Behringer ADA8000 (to get another 8 channels into the 001 card)
Proteus 2000, used primarily for it's pre-loaded sounds going into the SPDIF on the 001 card - making a total of 16 simultaneous instrument channels and a stereo keyboard channel.
Alesis 32 Studio (compact desk - doesn't look cool and has a little bleed, but more than suitable for the time being) - I chose this because it had 16 direct outs.
Focusrite Platinum VoiceMaster Preamp which I was planning on using for the vocals.
GT66 mic for vocals
a few beta 57a's, sm57's and 58's
AKG D112, C1000s

A few pairs of headphones and no headphone amp.

At the moment I am looking to try and get hold of a pair of studio monitors and stands, and was hoping for a bit of advice on what to get there.

As far as instruments go, I have a 1962 P bass, a Gibson SG, a studiologic SL880 and a CS1x (which I dont really use very much), as well as a few acoustics scattered around and a couple of cheaper guitars that dont really get played anymore.

I was hoping to get a pair of Rode NT5's as overheads for the drums. I dont think I'll be micing each drum - just putting a couple of overheads on, and maybe a 57 and the c 1000 s on the snare. Perhaps another 57 outside the bass drum for a bit more definition.

Is there anything that's plainly missing (other than about 30km of cabling)?

I am just planning to use this personally at the moment, although with there being no studio's in Swindon (where I am moving too), and it being a big town, I may be recording other bands (probably for a very nominal fee, just to cover maintenance fees - as I believe music should be as cheap as possible, and it will give me an opportunity to learn).

Thx a lot for reading this, and I hope a few people are interested in helping me a bit along the way, because I dont think I can do it on my own.
 
Let us know your space and budget. You should be able to get some help drawing up plans.
 
My budget is very little, but I am going to do it properly (if that makes any sense). Perhaps £2000 (about $3500) for the contruction materials alone. Labour is going to be pretty cheap, as a lot of the members of the bands I am are very keen to help, and have building experience. I have not yet budgeted for acoustic treatments or cabling.

I know I am going to be looking at cheap alternatives for professional sound-proofing/treating equipment, and I suspect there may be corners cut, but I want to keep that at a minimum.

I've scanned in a rough draft of my plans (I wanted to get advice from you guys before I started drawing up some proper plans).

http://www.free-collective.com/stuff/garden.jpg
http://www.free-collective.com/stuff/studio.jpg

The outer dimensions of the actual studio/rehearsel space will be 8 metres by 4 metres I think.

There are a couple of issues that I'm thinking about here.
1) I am moving my shed next to my neighbours as I've gotten some advice from my planning friends and they cant see how my neighbour can object to my shed (if the noise doesn't disturb him) when he has such a shed.
2) I am thinking about using the double wall construction - as detailed at the bottom of this experiment (http://www.auralexuniversity.com/NeighborsReal.html) for the live room, and the single wall construction in the control room, as it'll need less soundproofing. Is the soundproofing going to be sufficient for the control room to not disturb anyone?
3) I am going to want to use this space as a rehearsel room as well as a studio, and although I love recording, it would be nice to have a comfortable control room, as well as my 5 piece band in the live room. I have come up with a few options.
i) we all have enough space (I think the inside dimensions would be about 3.25 by 3.5)
ii) we put the drummer and the amps in the live room, and the rest of us play headphoned in the control room (good for rehearsels, but not very personal)
iii) I lessen the control room space.
4) I am probably going to shelve the amps, so that I have (for example) a bass amp on the floor, then a guitar amp on a wooden frame (That is built around the bass amp) above it, then a keyboard amp on the floor, and another guitar amp above that.
5) Am I right in assuming that I need a double layer of plasterboard (I was going to use 8' by 4' sheets), then some mineral wool, then a gap, then mineral wool, then 8'x4' plaster board again.
6) I figured out I'd need about 600 metres of 2x4, and about 150 8'x4' plasterboard (gyprock) panels.
7) is there any merit in having roofing felt in between any of these layers, and if so where, and what kind?
8) I was planning on essentially putting something identical to one of my live room walls, as a roof... is this going to be okay?
9) What do I do about the floor? I was going to build a concrete base, for the building as a whole, but what do I need to then do?
10) What do I do about the doors to prevent sound leakage?
11) Weatherproofing! I was thinking about building an exterior metal skin, as it would be better (and cheaper) than soundproofing the outer gyprock layer (which I dont think I can do anyway).
What is the easiest way to weather proof it. If I go with my shell, do I need to build the studio first, then the shell, or the shell first then the studio. Practically speaking, it would be easier to build the shell first because I cant see how I would tighten bolts for the metal skin with a studio next to the outer wall.

I know this is a lot of questions, but I was hoping that people can offer advice on as many as possible.

What materials are the best for building the sound proofed walls?

It looks like I am going to be moving in about a month, so I would like to get as much of it planned before I move, as I can.

edit: as far as cabling going, I was looking to run 2 16x4 snakes into the live room from the control room. Although I only have a 16 channel desk (and card) at the moment, it is because 1) it offers the chance to expand, and 2) if all the mics need to be on once side of the room, they can be, without cabling running everywhere. The 8 returns I would use as headphone points.
I was going to run the 32 inputs into the back of a patchbay, and then patch straight into the desk. As I know nothing about the "best way" to do this I was hoping for a bit of advice here too.
 
Sorry, I could really do with some advice now, as I'm about 4 weeks from moving into my new house, and work starting.

Are there things I need to be thinking about that I haven't bought up, is there any additional information that I can add to make my questions answerable?
 
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