Spectre Sound - Final update. LOTS of pics.

[OzNimbus]

Ok, as promised, my final update. I've finally got a lull in the action long enough to update my website.
There's quite a few new pics up here: http://www.spectresound.org/construction update final.htm

As well as a personal thank you to those who helped me out
http://www.spectresound.org/news.htm



As for my asessment of the new rooms: Two words: "FUCKING AWESOME."
To elaborate: The control room has got a center image so clear I swear you could reach out and grab it. The stereo field is huge, and razor sharp. I can mix for eight hours straight and my ears don't get tired. Mixing is a hell of a lot easier. I used to spend hours in my last studio, trying to get the guitars & drums evenly balanced. Now it takes a whole 30 seconds. I'm not kidding.
But, most importantly, is the TRANSLATION. In my last studio, I was plauged by the "mud effect." I'd get great sounding mixes in the room, but in the real world, they'd come out waaaay too bass-heavy. This is not an issue anymore. The problem has disappeared. What I hear in the control room is what I get outside. I feel like Atlas, and someone has just removed the world from my shoulders.

As for the drum/live room: It's great too. No standing waves. Man, does that ever make miking up a drum kit a hell of a lot easier. Now I can spend more time on getting great performances as opposed to spending 8 hours tweaking out mics. Seriously. I'll spend a half hour miking up a kit, and then maybe 20 minutes adjusting positions. When you're not fighting the room, it sure makes your job easier.

Another thing I've noticed: The live room has a vibe. Every group that has come in has absolutley nailed thier parts in the live room. Maybe it's the extra space, or the fact everyone can see each other clearly. Maybe it's the decent headphone amp I finally splurged on. Whatever it is, I'm winding up with some really happy clients!

Anyway, to wrap this up, I'd like to personally thank John Sayers for his advice.. I'd also like to thank Micheal Jones, Blue Bear, and everyone else here that offered words of wisdom. Thank you all, I couldn't have done it without you.


--crisp salute--
Glenn "Oz" Fricker
Spectre Sound
www.spectresound.org

 

[Blue Bear Sound]

Looking real good there Glenn!

I really like the front of your control room -- looks even better with those V8s soffited-in!

 

[OzNimbus]

I really like the front of your control room -- looks even better with those V8s soffited-in!

Yeah, the V8's really do the trick. Man, do they every sound great in soffits.

 

[RICK FITZPATRICK]

Hello Glenn, That is VERY cool.
Say, I haven't been on the board for 3 months so I may have missed their dialog with you. Did you post a plan? Did you design it yourself(with the boards help I'm sure )Build it yourself? What is the material or finish on the soffit face? Is the blue fabric on the ceiling covering 703? Everything looks fantastic. I'm extremely curious who specified the acoustics and what means was used to determine them. I have yet to see the starting point, and methodology for establishing what exactly gave you the acoustic results. Recording wise, your system is very interesting also.
Sorry for all the questions but damn, thats why I'm here, to learn.
Sooooooo, while I'm here...............
Are these floating rooms?
Is RC used?
Are any standard size doors used? Got any section views of the door jambs.
Who did the millwork?
Are these room within a room type construction?
Hmmmm Only 32,965 to go. How much time ya got
I'm a CAD millwork detailer , so I tend to focus on those very things, like doors jamb/threholds, fixture and structured interiors. Hence the questions. I'm getting ready to detail my own studio.
Is your studio based on any kind of acoustic type of rooms, as I see the slot resonators(or is that slat?)Ha! I get that confused.
Well, enough already. You don't have to really answer all of those. I just like to.....
lets say.......bla bla bla

fitZ

 

[OzNimbus]

Did you post a plan? Did you design it yourself(with the boards help I'm sure )Build it yourself?

The general plan was posted. The final plan was not. We wound up spinning the control room 180 degrees from what was posted.
Construction was by my good friend Steve Chaisson (also a wizard with custom guitar cabs) and myself. I did the wiring, Steve did the back-breaking stuff. My father is an electrician, so I picked up alot of his knowledge as a kid... He came up with the 'isolated ground' wiring scheme, and it works absolutely fucking amazing. No hum whatsoever. Even out of my bass guitar that was a nightmare to record in the last studio.

What is the material or finish on the soffit face? Is the blue fabric on the ceiling covering 703?

The soffit faces are MDF covered with a special "curse of the pharaos" cloth. We just thought the Egyptian motif was cool.

As for the ceiling, you're close... it's stuffed with Roxul 'Safe n' Sound' rockwool.

Everything looks fantastic. I'm extremely curious who specified the acoustics and what means was used to determine them. I have yet to see the starting point, and methodology for establishing what exactly gave you the acoustic results.

Thanks for the compliment. As for "specifying acoustics" I really couldn't say. I just worked with what was up on the SAE site. As it said, it's not the dimensions, but the angles, that make it work. I also had a copy of Everest's "Sound studio construction on a Budget." That, and I bugged John when I was really stumped. ***THANK YOU JOHN***** and bugged everyone else on the board who cared to answer.

Blue Bear was a big help by getting his control room resonators done before mine. His pictures were a total inspiration. That, and the handy hemholtz frequency calculator on the SAE site, helped me to tune them.

Recording wise, your system is very interesting also.

Thanks again. I'm a firm beliver in "what comes out of the speakers" not "what's the logo on the rack." If it sounds good, it is good. Even if it did go through something made by Peavey.

Are these floating rooms?

No, it's a converted garage, so the floor is solid concrete. Belive me, I've got more than enough isolation. Floating the floors would have been a waste of money IMHO.

Is RC used?

Yes, on the walls where we didn't build resonators.

Are any standard size doors used? Got any section views of the door jambs.

Yes, you can check out more pics at :
http://www.spectresound.org/construction list.htm
There's a comprehensive set of pics from start to finish.

Who did the millwork?

Call me an imbecile, but what is millwork?

Are these room within a room type construction?

Yep. The walls are 5/8 drywall, 1/2 inch MDF, 5/8 drywall, 3 1/2 stud, 5/8 drywall. There's a two inch air gap between the rooms and the outside walls... which are 8 inch concrete block.

 

[RICK FITZPATRICK]

Call me an imbecile, but what is millwork?

Hi Oznimbus, hey thanks a mill. That gives me confidence.
Imbecile? Not at all. Not everyone understands what it is
Oh, millwork is anything that has to be milled, machined assembled and prefinished in a shop. Cabinetry, jambs, doors, windows, base, veneers, casework, fixtures, and anything that requires a shop to custom make. And I've built TONS of it. Literally. Now I draw it. CAD/CAM
Usually, on projects built from the ground up, such as hospitals, hotels, stores and studios too! The millwork package is bid on by one shop or more. They do it all.
My job is to draw the shop drawings for an architectural mill/store fixture manufacturer for approval by the architects. Untill last year. Macys is my portfolio. I've done 300 of them. Everything on the interiors. Showcases, backislands, millwork, displays, loose fixtures, on and on and on. Thats why I asked. I'm involved professionally in that respect.
I've custom built all my stuff and will be posting the new plans soon.
Anyway, I'll check out your pics and plans. Interesting and very cool. Bet it sounds great. Can't wait to do it myself. Mine is analog though. 2 synched 16 trks. Some digital but.....I'm not into digital too much. Yet.
Good luck, and have fun!!
fitZ

 

[OzNimbus]

Well, we had a cabinet maker friend of mine come out and cut some wood for us. The slats in the control room were done by him. They were originally 4X8 sheets of oak veneer. He also did the mouldings around the patchbays.

As for the doors, my friend Steve hung them, but they were all prefab except the entrance door. We found some nice neoprene seals for that one.



As for the whole analog/digital thing... I was trained on analog, and to be honest, I don't miss it. I don't know how many times that 2 inch Studer the school owned went down when I needed it. Not to mention the cost of tape!

Of course, it's all about whatever works for you. Dual 16 tracks sounds pretty cool.

 

[RICK FITZPATRICK]

Thanks for the replies. I'd be real interested to hear about the electrical plan. Grounding issues are a mind boggler. Especially with my setup. Lots of potential(pun)
for ground loops. With all the -10 snakes and bays. Hmmmm, isolated ground? I've used a lot of Hubble isoated ground recepticles in my setups. Thier orange. The chassi
of the outlet(where the screws bond the outlet to the box)are isolated from the ground terminal, but I don't know if that is what you are refering to. I doubt it.
Anyway, thanks again.
fitZ

 

[RICK FITZPATRICK]

Ha, I was right. I just looked. Theres the Hubbles!!! Hey, is that 703 on the face of the monitor soffits? Is this a quasi LEDE design, or a hybrid? It just appears to be just that even if the slat resonators are part of it. Of course, I'm talking through my hat at the moment. What the fuck. If it sounds good, FANTASTIC!!
fitZ

 

[knightfly]

Hey Fitz, it's Hubbel (pretty sure) and the orange ones are Hospital grade specials. The damn abridged version of the NEC doesn't even mention them, you have to get the full version to even find out about them... Steve

 

[RICK FITZPATRICK]

Hey Steve, thanks for the spellcheck My worst subject in school.
I've been using these for quite sometime. Macys has an electrical scheme which must give the engineers and architects real headaches. I know it did for us, and we just built the fixtures. But because of all the computers at the cashwraps, and pos terminals, and scanners and such, they started specifying Hubbel isolated ground outlets in all the cashregister stations years ago.
I started usiing them for my little setup, not really knowing how to impliment them into the grounding scheme at first. I THINK I understand now. Of course, I'm no electrician, even though I've wired 3 phase shops and homes for years. That doesn't mean I understand all the math.
Don't really care too either. Too much to do.
Hey Steve, can you explain why a supply box has breakers with values that add up to more amperage than the supply lines are designated to handle? My house has 400 amps in breakers, and what appears to be #8 lines from the pole.
Hmmmmm.
fitZ

 

[knightfly]

Sure - it's assumed that you will NOT be using everything in the house all at once. Individual branch circuit breakers are sized to trip before you melt the wires on that circuit ONLY. The main (usually 200 amp) breaker limits current to protect the SUPPLY wiring.

That way, each circuit can draw what it needs but is protected against overcurrent for its own capacity. The main breaker ensures that the wires INTO the house don't melt/burn things down, which can typically be caused by two things - one, you are dumb enough to turn on everything in the house at the same time, with 2 microwaves, 3 vacuum cleaners, a toaster, two irons, 4 space heaters, 6 baseboard heaters or a heat pump, etc, etc... The second would be a dead short somewhere within the box. Breakers will NOT protect against lightning - by the time the breaker heats up enough to trip, the damage is done.

Review - individual breakers are sized to protect the wires that go from them to the load (whatever gets the power)

The main breaker is sized both for INPUT wire size and the specific breaker box. A 200 amp box gets a 200 amp main breaker. Period.

The only conceivable way you would ever trip a main breaker in a 200 amp circuit would be if you were baking a pizza, had several space heaters going, were ironing clothes, cooking side dishes in a couple of microwaves, were washing one load of clothes and drying another, had just taken a long shower so the hot water heater was trying to recover, and then decided to arc-weld a broken track on your D-9 bulldozer. That much load would just barely trip a NEW 200 amp breaker - a used one would trip with probably one less space heater and one less microwave...

Keep in mind that circuit breakers are actually HEAT devices, not CURRENT devices - you can draw 50 amps through a 20 amp breaker for a fraction of a second and it usually won't trip (electric motors under startup can draw several TIMES the current they run at, and tungsten heat elements also draw lots more current at turn-on than after warm-up) - but if you try to draw a SUSTAINED 18 amps you'll be lucky if it doesnt kick out. (Breakers weaken every time they trip, just a little)

Prob'ly forgot something, so sue me...:=) Steve

 

[RICK FITZPATRICK]

it's assumed that you will NOT be using everything in the house all at once.

Ha! not in my household. Seems like everyone uses EVERYTHING at once! I'll have 5 adults living here. Damn, better check this shit out.! Or inform the household to cut back!

Thanks Steve.
fitZ

 

[OzNimbus]

Ha, I was right. I just looked. Theres the Hubbles!!! Hey, is that 703 on the face of the monitor soffits? Is this a quasi LEDE design, or a hybrid? It just appears to be just that even if the slat resonators are part of it. Of course, I'm talking through my hat at the moment. What the fuck. If it sounds good, FANTASTIC!!
fitZ

Yeah, the outlets look like hell, but they sure work great. The trick is to use FOUR wire. You've got your hot, neutral, & ground, plus an extra RED wire that goes directly to the isolated ground on the receptacle. The receptacles are "home runs." Meaning, each is it's own dedicated circuit. One breaker per receptacle. That also means the iso ground gets a direct line to the house ground and is not shared with anything else.

As for the design, it's a quazi RFZ room. Again, look on the SAE site because that's what I went by. The side walls are splayed at 6 degrees, which might not be apparent in the pictures.
I have an extra shelf up front between the soffits for wall-to-wall hangers.... That's about the only thing I deviated on.

One more time (so pay attention) the soffit faces are MDF covered with cloth because we liked the design.

-0z-

 

[TexRoadkill]

looks great. I'll have to check out the music samples when I'm at home.

 

[Beezoboy]

It must be tough using a mixer sideways?? You should get a stand for that, or maybe a whole new desk with some built in patchbays and racks. That seems like it would be more flexible and more professional looking.

Also why do you have a 8 minute, 15meg file as one of your recording downloads? Maybe you could save on download time if you just posted a clip of it?

Great studio and great recordings, these are just suggestions.

Beez

 

[DJTonyMOMO]

WOW THE STUDIO LOOKS GREAT. I'M JEALOUS

 

[Bulls Hit]

That looks fabulous.

I love the look of your timber floor. The drum kit must sound awesome.

I'm about to embark on a studio build, on a much smaller scale than yours. But you've inspired me, now I can see what's possible

 

[OzNimbus]

It must be tough using a mixer sideways?? You should get a stand for that, or maybe a whole new desk with some built in patchbays and racks. That seems like it would be more flexible and more professional looking.

Also why do you have a 8 minute, 15meg file as one of your recording downloads? Maybe you could save on download time if you just posted a clip of it?

Great studio and great recordings, these are just suggestions.

Beez

I only use that mixer for the preamps. Once they're set, that's it. I've rewired the pre's to totally bypass the mixer section.... Therefore it's out of the way when I don't need 'em.


As for the 8 minute epic, that was actually a remix that the drummer wanted to hear.. hence the entire length.

Oh, and BTW, all of those soundbytes were from my LAST studio!! The one where I had a huge dip at 200 hz right at the mix position.... wait until you've heard what's coming out of the new place..... what a difference!!!!


-0z-