got this space to fill

[K.G.Bass]

Hi

we are planing to turn an old warehouse in to a studio. Its located in a neighbourfree location, so not much trouble with sound leak.

Ecxisting building is basically just walls and roof. dirtfloor. two or four small windows (forgot to mark them on plan) walls are about 27 inch of rock.

what I'd like in it would be a mixingroom, drumroom, vocalbooth and maybe one more isolated recording space to do a live recordings.

How would you fit it all in to this space?
(theres a plan attached)

for the main (or the drumroom we have about extra few meeter of hight under the roof)

any ideas or suggestions, advice toughts and so one are most welcome!

KG

 

[K.G.Bass]

a bit better picture of the sketchup file.

KG

 

[Ripthorn]

A couple of questions:

What kind of budget do you have?
What rooms have the highest priority (besides the control room and main room)?
How much space do you want for recording?
Where are the windows?

It looks like you have a lot of nice space and it is really nice that the walls are so heavy. Another question, is there any sort of ventilation system? If so, where is located? Is there already lighting? What sort of roof profile is it, sloped, flat, ... ?

You are probably going to need to put the control room at one end of the building lengthwise (though it probably won't take up the full width of the room). You might be able to put your vocal booth right off the control room and fit them both in one end of the building. then you would have your main room with your iso booths and drum room off to the back (drum room in a back corner and iso booths along a wall somewhere probably). Of course, this depends on answers to at least some of the questions above.

 

[K.G.Bass]

A couple of answers

What kind of budget do you have?
-at this point I dont wanto think about budget, but a best solution.

What rooms have the highest priority (besides the control room and main room)?
-control,vocal/voiceover and big(as possible drum/live room.
it be nice to have a smaller iso room for drums or piano for recording live sessions. Another issue is visual contact. I am not sure,should that be priority.

How much space do you want for recording?
-well, on that floor I'd like as much space for recording as I can get after haveing a good control room. the lobby, or resting area will be on the second floor, most likely on top of control room. as the main recording space will go in to hight as much as possible.

Where are the windows?
on the same side with the door. two, really small (lets say 60cmx40cm)

It looks like you have a lot of nice space and it is really nice that the walls are so heavy. Another question, is there any sort of ventilation system? If so, where is located? Is there already lighting? What sort of roof profile is it, sloped, flat, ... ?
-no ventilation,no floors,no walls inside the room at this point, no electrisity.
the roof is V shape ( I dont know the right term for it in english, hope you get the point )

At this point I am trying to figure out the rooms placement.

there has to be a staircase and a WC on first floor as well.

KG

 

[K.G.Bass]

what would be a good size for a control room in that situation?
lets start from that.

KG

 

[Ripthorn]

Okay Mr. Bass, here are some suggestions. Mind you these may not be the absolute best because I don't have any drawings or anything like that to play with in front of me. Along one of the ends, put the wc in a corner. We are going to keep everything as far away from it as possible because the sound of water flowing is terrible on recordings. It would probably be best if you could put the stairway going up over the wc (so that it sits under the stairs, but with plenty of room). outside of the wc, you need a hallway, probably on that runs all the way to the main door. This should be maybe 1.4 m wide (wider if you anticipate a lot of big gear coming in and out). When you get a little past where the stairs start to go up, you want a door off to the other side. This door will go into a soundlock which will lead into the control room. Your control room should probably be about 3m high (roughly) and you should have 5.5 m of width or so for your control room (looks like the vocal booth off of the control room might need to get cut due to the stairs and wc). To avoid too many nasty room modes, the control room should be maybe 7 m long. Make the interior walls non-parallel. The control room will eat the other corner on this end of the building. In the opposite corners, put one of your booths or iso rooms or whatever room is most important behind control room and main room. In the other corner, you can put another room or booth. Don't make the rooms have any exterior right angles and put windows in the walls so that the people in the booths can see each other and out into the main room and control room. Sightlines are extremely important when working in a studio. If you have a lounge or something above the control room, make sure to get very heavy floors to minimize the amount of noise from footsteps getting into the control room. Make sure you have a door going into the main room (this could be off of the same soundlock as the one for the control room).

As for the utilities and stuff, make sure you have a lot of electrical outlets and make sure all water pipes don't go by the control room or recording rooms. Make sure your lights are not fluorescent or halogen. Make sure you have a ventilation system that is low velocity and treat the ducts. For the floors, you will want to float them so that vibrations don't ruin any recordings.

I know this was long, but there is a whole lot to cover when building a studio basically from scratch. Hope this helps. If you have more questions, feel free to ask.