Take a tour of my studio

  • Thread starter Thread starter Neeps
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Neeps

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Hey guys,

I'm looking for advice on treating my studio to create a better acoustic environment for both recording and mixing...

Here's some links...

The layout

The guided tour

I'm particularly interested in advice about turning my wee room into a vocal/acoustic guitar booth...

My band records acoustic music... guitars, mandolas... more guitars... maybe fiddles... you can listen to us by clicking the can if you are interested...

Currently we record and mix in the big room... but circumstances now allow us to record in the wee room... but because it it so small the acoustics are crap... I'm collecting mattresses and duvets at the moment to use as sound absorbers... will this be any good for recording dry vocals/acoustic guitar...

Please have a look at my room plan and video and tell me what you think...

The video is in mp4 format... windows media player can play it... you can download it then right click the file and choose open with media player...

I tried to let you see what mics I have in the video but it didn't work...

So thge mics are...

Red5 Audio RV15
2 x Studio projects c4's
AKG c3000b
SM58

Feel free to ask any questions... or hit me with ideas... I thought I could treat the big room for mixing and make the small room dry for recording... the fact that it is seperated by a room should give me some good isolation from the control room...

the neighbours must like our music cos they never complain... so that's not a problem...

The priority is getting a good recording since we may even send the wav files to be mixed by someone else...

Cheers
Al
 
Sorry... I'll see if I can post some photos

Is it just homestudioguy?... can anyone else get the video?
 
i got the video :)
but i have not experience with acoustics, but i think you may get told the small rooms are just too small..(small rooms have problems with bass) but if you could make the two small rooms into one goodish room that would help alot ;)
 
guitarboi89 said:
i got the video :)
but i have not experience with acoustics, but i think you may get told the small rooms are just too small..(small rooms have problems with bass) but if you could make the two small rooms into one goodish room that would help alot ;)
Click to expand...

I'd love to smash in the wall between the two stupid pointless small rooms but my landlord might get angry if I did...
 
Handsome Al said:
Sorry... I'll see if I can post some photos

Is it just homestudioguy?... can anyone else get the video?
Click to expand...
I cant either. I have the file, but it won't play in Media Player or Winamp.
 
Handsome Al said:
I'd love to smash in the wall between the two stupid pointless small rooms but my landlord might get angry if I did...
Click to expand...

Are you positive he they wont? That would open up alot of opportunities in that room.

Other than that, yes you have the right idea. You'll have to layer the room in absobing materials. If you have some money to spend, you should invest in better treatments than matresses and duvets though. They will just suck out the highs and leave the room sounding like mud.
 
Why on earth did you post an MP4 file? Only Quicktime natively supports the format.

A regular Sorenson encoded MOV file or WMV file would have been a better choice.
 
brzilian said:
Why on earth did you post an MP4 file? Only Quicktime natively supports the format.

A regular Sorenson encoded MOV file or WMV file would have been a better choice.
Click to expand...

Windows media player works

if ya got the updated version
 
Al,

> Here's some links... <

I had no problem viewing the video. On my PC it came up in the Quicktime player.

> because it it so small the acoustics are crap <

It's not clear to me if you may now use the small room, or if you must now use the small room. If you can, I advise you to continue using the big room, and just monitor with headphones while recording. That's what I do, and it's never been a problem. If for no other reason, and there are other reasons, using one large room lets you keep the instruments and microphones farther away from the reflective surfaces. It's those nearby surfaces that cause all the problems. The room you record in is infinitely more important than what microphone you use. When I recorded that cello part for your band I did it in my large room using headphones.

BTW, I like the Pink Floyd art. :D

--Ethan
 
brzilian said:
Why on earth did you post an MP4 file? Only Quicktime natively supports the format.

A regular Sorenson encoded MOV file or WMV file would have been a better choice.
Click to expand...

I recorded the movie with my pocket pc... and mp4 was the format that the device used... I then checked that windows media player coud play the file and it could... but I guess I have an up to date version... I couldn't find a piece of free software to convert the file to .mov or .wmv... so I posted it as it was...

and the reason I posted a video instead of pictures was because the pictures on my pocket pc were coming out very grainy... I know the quality of the video isn't that great either but... it was better than the pictures...
 
Ethan Winer said:
Al,
It's not clear to me if you may now use the small room, or if you must now use the small room.
Click to expand...

We can still use the big room... it's just that I thought a booth might come in handy...

Ethan Winer said:
If you can, I advise you to continue using the big room, and just monitor with headphones while recording.
Click to expand...

That's what we do at the moment... but we find it hard to get great sounds recording the acoustic guitars...

I had reasoned that we were getting poor acoustic sounds because of two possible reasons...

(i) Poor mic placement

I had thought that recording in a seperate room would allow us to audition different mic placements in the control room via the monitors... this would help to place the instrument in the mix...

(ii) Bad room acoustics in the big room...

The big room is quite live and is a nice enough room to play the guitar in.... but I have no idea whether it is good room to record in... it has parallel walls... so will flutter echoes be a problem?

How do I go about measuring the acoustics of the room so I can make decisions about it?

Ethan Winer said:
If for no other reason, and there are other reasons, using one large room lets you keep the instruments and microphones farther away from the reflective surfaces.
Click to expand...

So you would expect that the best place to record in the big room would be in the center as far away from the walls as possible... right??

My main suspect for the crap sounds we are getting recording the acoustic guitars is number (i) poor mic placement...

Suppose the big room is okay for recording in... can I monitor in one of the wee rooms to help make decisions about mic placement...

Or will the acoustics of the small room scupper that idea as well?

Or should I think about getting a better set of headphones that block out the sound of the room... I can't really make decisions on mic placements because I can hear the sound of the actual instrument while I monitor in the headphones... at the moments I need to record then auditon.... move the mic... record then audition... move the mic... record then audition... blah blah... in an endless cycle that is so annoying that I end up settling for a less than perfect sound...
 
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