B
bitrot
New member
I have read the posts here about diy tube traps and basement treatments, but I have some other questions regarding this treatment and my goals:
I am a weekend warrior with a home "studio" in the corner of my unfinished basement (1800 sq feet, unfinished, joists on 8 ' ceiling, concrete walls and floor). My space is both control room and recording room, and I can't change that. I'ts all I've got. My computers are very quiet (I've built iso boxes for them, more or less), so that's not really an issue.
I have just aquired some more sensitive large diaphragm condensors, and am recording acoustic guitar, sometimes at loud volumes.
I have a solid, semi-pro monitering system: tannoy passives with a matched amp, and solid Midiman Delta converters. My moniters are placed correctly over my console (well, my mackie 1202...) and desk. My desk faces the open basement, and the moniters are about 14' feet from the wall behind me and about 5' from the adjacent wall. If you were to draw a rectangle, I'd be in the northwest corner facing east.
Before I treated the walls the wrong way (carpet, target foam, etc), I had some slapback and ringing no matter where/how I recorded. So I added some target foam (1' out from walls) here and there in my studio area, and the ringing was dampened. Then I was hearing a lot more bass than I should have (regardless of position in basement or proximity to mic) in my acoustic guitar recordings, so I rolled up a target foam pad, shoved it in the nearest corner and rounded the corner out with a thick sleeping bag over it. My "bass trap". This seemed to work well for that corner, but as I moved around my studio space, the bass seem louder in some spots than others.
So I went nuts making a 14' X 28' "enclosure" using hanging carpets and cheap foam in the northwest corner. Now all my highs are gone, the mid to mid-lows seem emphasized and muddy. Typical newbie errors, as I have read. I am taking all that down and starting again.
So here are my questions:
1) given my situation (I cannot put up dry walls, don't have time and money is devoted to other more domestic house projects), do I even need to enclose a space for recording? I hear bigger rooms have less mid-bass problems than smaller rooms, and 16000 cubic feet seems pretty good to me, even with an 8' ceiling. In short, can I record in the middle of the basement, and just deal with the highs freqs with wall treatments? And maybe add a few bass traps in the corners?
2) Has anyone built diy pipe insulation tube bass traps, and how did they work out? It seems like most bass treatment is effective in an enclosed room with given dimensions... I am not sure how these would work in my situation, with a very large room, but low ceilings. If I did make them, do need them in the actual corners of the whole bassment, or would they be effective in corners of a a hanging-carpet, walled off "space"?
3) does anyone else here have a corner studio in a large unfinished basement? Perhpas we could exchange notes on what you've done for your recording vs. control room spaces.
I am a weekend warrior with a home "studio" in the corner of my unfinished basement (1800 sq feet, unfinished, joists on 8 ' ceiling, concrete walls and floor). My space is both control room and recording room, and I can't change that. I'ts all I've got. My computers are very quiet (I've built iso boxes for them, more or less), so that's not really an issue.
I have just aquired some more sensitive large diaphragm condensors, and am recording acoustic guitar, sometimes at loud volumes.
I have a solid, semi-pro monitering system: tannoy passives with a matched amp, and solid Midiman Delta converters. My moniters are placed correctly over my console (well, my mackie 1202...) and desk. My desk faces the open basement, and the moniters are about 14' feet from the wall behind me and about 5' from the adjacent wall. If you were to draw a rectangle, I'd be in the northwest corner facing east.
Before I treated the walls the wrong way (carpet, target foam, etc), I had some slapback and ringing no matter where/how I recorded. So I added some target foam (1' out from walls) here and there in my studio area, and the ringing was dampened. Then I was hearing a lot more bass than I should have (regardless of position in basement or proximity to mic) in my acoustic guitar recordings, so I rolled up a target foam pad, shoved it in the nearest corner and rounded the corner out with a thick sleeping bag over it. My "bass trap". This seemed to work well for that corner, but as I moved around my studio space, the bass seem louder in some spots than others.
So I went nuts making a 14' X 28' "enclosure" using hanging carpets and cheap foam in the northwest corner. Now all my highs are gone, the mid to mid-lows seem emphasized and muddy. Typical newbie errors, as I have read. I am taking all that down and starting again.
So here are my questions:
1) given my situation (I cannot put up dry walls, don't have time and money is devoted to other more domestic house projects), do I even need to enclose a space for recording? I hear bigger rooms have less mid-bass problems than smaller rooms, and 16000 cubic feet seems pretty good to me, even with an 8' ceiling. In short, can I record in the middle of the basement, and just deal with the highs freqs with wall treatments? And maybe add a few bass traps in the corners?
2) Has anyone built diy pipe insulation tube bass traps, and how did they work out? It seems like most bass treatment is effective in an enclosed room with given dimensions... I am not sure how these would work in my situation, with a very large room, but low ceilings. If I did make them, do need them in the actual corners of the whole bassment, or would they be effective in corners of a a hanging-carpet, walled off "space"?
3) does anyone else here have a corner studio in a large unfinished basement? Perhpas we could exchange notes on what you've done for your recording vs. control room spaces.
, I'll let you know.