More absorption made it worse?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Supercreep
  • Start date Start date
Supercreep

Supercreep

Lizard People
Hi -

We used to have cheap foam on the ceiling of our 9.5x14 tuffshed, and four self-compressed "bass traps" straddling the upper corners.

Went whole-hog and put in full size superchunks from floor to ceiling in each corner and 8 2x4 panels of SAFB - half of which are 4", the other half 2" thick, along the two long walls.

2" auralex on the "peaked" ceiling.

Laminate floors.


I wasn't expecting night and day.... well, I guess I was. What I really wasn't expecting is for the mix to sound so ridiculously bassy that my first effort can only be described as thin and reedy.


What is the meaning of all this? I don't have enough hair left to pull out.

We'll be moving in 18 months - so I guess this is a "lessons learned" type of question.

Debrief me- what happened? Our results were better before all this glass went up!
 
Is it a matter of you mixing it badly because of the room response, or are the instruments muddy as you're recording them?

Did you actually test the bass response of your room? It would be interesting to know how it performed before and after the switchout.

EDIT: Hey, your music is pretty fricken cool! That drummer has some life to him! I'm impressed. Is one of your influences the band Muse? Oh yeah, Muse all the way man. Oh and dude, I hear some Three Dog Night in there too. Gooooood stuff.
 
SonicClang said:
Is it a matter of you mixing it badly because of the room response, or are the instruments muddy as you're recording them?

Did you actually test the bass response of your room? It would be interesting to know how it performed before and after the switchout.

.
Click to expand...

I have to tell you that I have no idea.


I never tested anything except by ear.

I think I'm hearing too much bass now - where before it sounded more natural. Too much high end absorbtion?
 
Allz I can say is www.realtraps.com Ethan has a ton of cool stuff including videos on room treatment and you can really learn a lot. I've been studying for months about this stuff and I still have tons to learn.
 
i dont get it is this a mix room or a tracking room? is it the instruments that sound bassy or a mix? does it just sound bassy in your room or everywhere?
 
FALKEN said:
i dont get it is this a mix room or a tracking room? is it the instruments that sound bassy or a mix? does it just sound bassy in your room or everywhere?
Click to expand...



It is both. It is a 9 1/2' X 14' tuffshed.

I guess the instruments sound ok as we're recording, but the mix is too bassy. Then we listened to it outside the studio and it sounds thin.
 
Last edited:
Again, your ears really isn't capable of fully telling just how good the frequency response of your room is. Maybe some people can do it after years of knowing what sounds good and what doesn't, but you should really test it. Have you watched the video on this at realtraps.com? It's a great video.
 
what kind of monitors? is anything else in the chain between the mix bus and the monitors? are your monitors positioned right up on a wall or in the corners?
 
FALKEN said:
what kind of monitors? is anything else in the chain between the mix bus and the monitors? are your monitors positioned right up on a wall or in the corners?
Click to expand...

Pushed up against the wrong wall to escape comb filtering are Behringer B2031 powered monitors.

Not the greatest monitors you'll ever hear, but the difference between the songs we recorded for our last batch (prior to all the room treatment) is pretty dramatic. Really hazy and unspecific low end problem. I'm having trouble dialing it in. I'll watch the video a little later tonight.. Thanks for all the help. You guys are awesome.
 
Well I have a few guesses.. I guess :D

You were used to mixing with bass nulls to compensate to the real world and now you don't have those.

You changed the amount of HF that was bouncing back (as you pointed out) and now your not used to it.

Mixing is an aquired art/taste that you "learn" and you could just have to settle into the new enviroment. :confused:




Ok so I'm just throwing darts in the dark.. :p
 
VSpaceBoy said:
Well I have a few guesses.. I guess :D

You were used to mixing with bass nulls to compensate to the real world and now you don't have those.

You changed the amount of HF that was bouncing back (as you pointed out) and now your not used to it.

Mixing is an aquired art/taste that you "learn" and you could just have to settle into the new enviroment. :confused:




Ok so I'm just throwing darts in the dark.. :p
Click to expand...

This sounds like it to me.

Give it time for your ears to adapt to the new sounds and you will know what should be there and shouldnt.

Any pictures of the room, or layout? This could highlight the problem.
 
I'd advise stepping up your comparisons of your mixes with reference CDs to re-tune your ears to the new space.

Have you done a frequency analysis of the room?
 
It has taken me almost a year after I treated my control room to get the monitors adjusted right, placed right and listened to enough stuff in there to get good translation. Not that it's typical to take that long but that's what it took me.

I don't know if you can have too much bass trapping.
 
HangDawg said:
I don't know if you can have too much bass trapping.
Click to expand...
Everything I've heard from Ethan would suggest no, you realistically can't have TOO much.
 
HangDawg said:
It has taken me almost a year after I treated my control room to get the monitors adjusted right, placed right and listened to enough stuff in there to get good translation. Not that it's typical to take that long but that's what it took me.
Click to expand...

Hey the exact same thing happened with my room. It took me a long time to get used to the new room when I finally moved my computer into the control room. Before I had been mixing in my bedroom.
 
VSpaceBoy said:
Everything I've heard from Ethan would suggest no, you realistically can't have TOO much.
Click to expand...

In fact, you can never have enough bass trapping! :D

--Ethan
 
I'm going to remember that. Thanks again Ethan.
 
Hmmmm..........room sounds like shit............have to spend some time getting used to it. I'll have to remember that one. :D

I think you should start from scratch, measuring and tuning along the way so that you can figure out what works and what doesn't.

Can a room have too much hi/mid absorption? Dense fiberglass/rockwool does absorb all frequencies to different degrees. How much bass is being absorbed by your superchunks and traps? What about the hi's and mid's? What should the response curve of an optimal listening room look like (a flat response curve?)?

Isn't the point of acoustically treating a room to help give an accurate representation of what's recorded? If things sound too bassy and translate bad, how is the room making mixing easier? I don't think this is something you should be trying to get used to. :D

Supercreep, I think the blind is leading the blind around here when it comes to room acoustics.
 
He wasn't comparing what a room "should" be like, or what "other" rooms are like. He was comparing a) room to b) room with superchunks etc

I think the blind is leading the blind around here when it comes to room acoustics.
Click to expand...
Wow that was pretty harsh.

There are LOTS of people around here (one of which already poked his head in this thread) who have vast understanding of room acoustics. My personel comments were only guesses as to what mentioned but there would be no way to know whats going on in there without taking some before and after measurements.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top