New Home Studio - Looking to deaden the room for mixing/monitoring (diagram included)

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mjbath

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Hello,

I have a room that I'm setting up a new studio in. I have kind of put the cart before the horse and used some sound dampening stuff form Auralex but I haven't formally done a sound sweep of the room. I posted my diagram to the auralex site and am waiting for their analysis. I wanted to post here after reading several other posts on the topic to see if there's anything off the top that you guys would suggest regarding the space I'm working with. My main issues remaining as far as I can tell with only using clapping as my test is that my window and small open hallway is giving me some reverberation. I'm considering putting a curtain over the window and putting a curtain divider at the start of the small hallway from quietcurtains.com but it seems pretty pricey to go that route. Any feedback or links on things I can do to solve those two issues or things to consider from the start would be appreciated. I can also get some pictures of the space and what I have if it's helpful.

Thanks!
 

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The desk needs to be placed along the shortest wall. Hand clapping tests only reveal high frequency reflections. Also, according to the experienced and knowledgeable (I'm not one of them!) people here, your Auralex foam will not much good to your room unless you have properly treated it (bass traps in corners etc etc).
 
What Dain said - desk on the 102" wall; corner bass traps, point-of-first-reflection traps on sides (long walls - probably where the TV is on that wall), ceiling cloud. Forget using the closet as a vocal booth (where do people get that from?) Record in the bgi room. Try singing in your closet - do you you really think it sounds good?
 
Thanks for the replies! In terms of the length of the room it's only a foot longer in that direction and if I put it there I would have no where to mount the TV as it would be in the window. Is using the one foot shorter side of the room going to be a big issue or is it just a strong recommendation? I ask because if it's a nonstarter for some reason I'll have to really think about what to do. Plus it seems then my first point of reflection would start going down that open hallway which I don't have a curtain on yet.

I do have corner bass traps, from Auralex again, and have attempted to think through the point of first reflection for the monitor speaks and I think (I'm not an expert obviously) I have at least some treatment in those areas that would be issues, though I don't know which frequency ranges I'm absorbing or not.

In the meantime I'm waiting for a USB Isolator which I hope is going to fix the problem that my laptop's USB power going to my audio interface is causing some interference and noise with my monitor speakers every time I plug in the power charger for the laptop. I got one from Amazon called "Multi-purpose USB Isolator (Built-in DC-DC)" though I can't put the URL here as I don't have ten posts yet.

I'll look around at what a ceiling cloud is.

The only reason I would want to use the closet was that I would want to have a second person in the main room monitoring things and wouldn't want their noise coming through the microphone. The closet is actually pretty big (5x7 roughly, though it has shelves at the moment). I thought the closet would be a small space that would be easy to deaden such that I could isolate the vocals and add in effects with my software after recording. And during recording have sends in the vocalist's headphones with some of those effects added. That's at least what I've read elsewhere. I've recorded my vocals personally at one studio which used a very small room that was roughly 4x4 with sound treatment and I liked the results. The other studio used a large room but it was fully sound treated and felt like a very dead room for sure.

Any thoughts on what to put over the window? Is just a simple curtain sufficient or do you guys know where to get some custom size curtains of good material for sound dampening?

Thanks Again!
 
I'm sorry to say this, but those Auralex "bass traps" aren't really bass traps at all. Foam simply cannot trap bass substantially no matter how wide it is. That's what I heard here, and I can bet you a hundred bucks it's true. Look up GIK Acoustics. Those are the kind of traps you want, and you can build them yourself relatively easy or order pre-built ones. I bought foam at first too, but have since ordered "real" panels from GIK since I'm not at all handy with DIY stuff (or maybe I'm just lazy). I plan to use a few sheets of the foam as well but my main priority right now is bass trapping, and I think it's fair to say you might want to consider it yourself.

A ceiling cloud is an acoustic panel just like the ones you need on the wall, just right above your head from your mixing position. As for the window, once (if) you get/build some bass traps they are, judging by your drawing, likely to cover a significant part of the window once they're placed diagonally.

This is all stuff I've learnt from reading on this very forum. I would strongly advice you to do the same. Read all the sticky threads first before asking any more questions. Good luck and have fun :)
 
mjbath said:
Thanks for the replies! In terms of the length of the room it's only a foot longer in that direction and if I put it there I would have no where to mount the TV as it would be in the window. Is using the one foot shorter side of the room going to be a big issue or is it just a strong recommendation? I ask because if it's a nonstarter for some reason I'll have to really think about what to do. Plus it seems then my first point of reflection would start going down that open hallway which I don't have a curtain on yet.
Click to expand...

Maybe your drawing is wrong. 102" = 8.5 ft, the dimension the other way is 12 feet (plus that open area). If you make/buy real bass traps (4" thick Roxul or OX703 or 705 in a 1x4 frame), you can hang them from hooks on the side walls (or over the window or tv screen) for when you are mixing. These will also work nicely as movable gobos to isolate mics when recording.
As to the 'vocal booth' idea. If you want to sound 'dead' when doing vocals go for it. :eek: Foam will suck up all the highs, and you'll find yourself trying to EQ them back into the mix. If you fully line the booth with proper trapping (4" thick) it can at least evenly absorb the audio frequencies. If you've got someone at the control desk while a second person is recording - the person at the desk should shut up, be quiet and listen with headphones, you shouldn't have to isolate the vocalist because the engineer is making noise!
 
That wall is 10' 2" (10 foot + 2 inches)... sorry the apostrophe indicating feet isn't super clear. So the difference in wall lengths is 1 foot 10 inches rather than almost 4 feet. In both of the studios I've recorded in that purport to have recorded some good local band CDs their rooms were pretty dead for vocal tracking. Yeah, they EQ things back in the way they want them but I thought the microphone would pick up all the frequencies (before they're reflected/absorbed) and then they can deal with post production EQ'ing and adding in the right amount of reverb depending on the track the vocals would be put in. Anyway, I'll have to do more research on that topic since you seem adamant that it shouldn't be that way.
 
Again: foam will absorb the highs, but leave the low-mids and lows to bounce around, creating muddy sound.
Have you ever seen a picture of a professional recording studio with a small closet-size foam-lined "vocal booth"? Maybe there's a reason you haven't. ;)

Even though your room is closer to square than I thought, I'd still go with the desk on the 10'2" wall. The wall where the tv is is going to need treatment whether it is the wall in front of you, behind you, or to the side of you.
 
Thanks again for the reply...

What do you think of the realtraps bass traps for absorbing the low mids to low frequencies? They're pretty pricey but claim to really get the lows.

Do you know of any step by step site/link to tell how to test your rooms acoustic properties with regards to reflection?

I believe you on the vocal booth thing... when I search "professional vocal recording booth" and look at the images section on bing or google I see everything that looks like a small closet type setup. Do you have a link to a picture of what you would consider the ideal vocal recording space (if I'm only recording vocals over already mixed tracks)?

For putting my setup on the 10'2" wall did you notice it would be right in front of a window? Are you calculating the point of first reflection and other things when you recommend that wall or is there some other consideration?
 
If you've got the corners trapped, then heavy curtains over the window would be more than adequate for the wall you are facing.
Build the traps yourself, or buy them. You want a minimum of 4" thick rockwool.

studio-2-vocal-booth-wide-view.webp

Don't worry about 'ideal', instead figure out how to make your space work for you. Some people use those foam-and-metal-and-plastic reflection devices that mount around the mic. Until I got some treatment in my room, I used my largest room, set up near one end, and sang toward the longest dimension to prevent early relections from being picked up by the mic.
 
mjbath said:
What do you think of the realtraps bass traps for absorbing the low mids to low frequencies? They're pretty pricey but claim to really get the lows.
Click to expand...

You can't go wrong with RealTraps. Or the GIK Tri-Traps. Highly recommended :)
 
I paid someone with experience to come in and treat my room. It was worth the investment and made my mix's translate much better!
 
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