Vocal Booth

[trickless]

Booth with the "door" open and top down. The blankets slide open easily with the twine rings. I don't really call it a booth, I prefer to call it my fort.

As you can see I made it large enough to fit my lame "drum set."

I recorded some acoustic guitar in there a couple weeks back and had plenty of room even w/ the drums in there. Didn't sound too bad either.. Less funky reverb, but in no way completely dry. The more blankets I throw up the more dead it gets..

Now I just need to find the time to finish and play in my fort..

Later,
Pat

 

[Hi_D_Ho_Man]

Mine looks alot like yours. I used those nylon cable ties to hold the blankets up and just tucked them in at the bottom. for the door i left the cable ties with enough slack to slide back and forth like a shower curtain. did u glue yours, or just jam the pipe to the fittings really good?.. pics coming soon too

 

[jugalo180]

thanks homeuser

went to Lowes (like a Home Depot store) and told the guy there I wanted to make a booth out of pvc piping. He recommended 3/4 size. I told him 4 legs, and a square at the top and bottom. Total cost for 7ft high, by 3 1/2ft wide booth was about $25.00. I put it together in less than 5 minutes. Actually I trimmed so it was a little smaller

i read this post and the very next day went out and done the same exact thing. it did take under 10 minutes to assemble. i had these 3 king size comforters that i used to enclose the frame. i went to walmart and got some jumbo safety pens. i draped one comforter over the top then to another and penned it like and L, or right angle, then i penned the other on the opositte side the same way. i didn't feel any need to have any buttons or velcro to close it because the large comforters were big enough to over lap. i just let them hang and they close good enough on there own. to make it sweet, i hung a long black light from the pvc, it sets it off. the black illuminates the white paper with my raps so i can see, plus i don't have to worry about that light bulb getting it hot as hell in there or catching something on fire. the black light brings me that club energy. but if you want it to really look good, use white comforters, i have one on mine and it looks tight when the black light is on.

my vocals sound a lot better because i'm not getting any reflections from being in the closet. the closet was treated with blankets, which absorbed the high frequency, but the lows were still reflected. i took the mic out of the closet after seeing cross's set up. my room was too live so i was actually hearing the slightly but, annoying highend reflections. this vocal booth sounds the best out of the two hook ups and it only costs 30 bucks for the pipe and joints. be sure to get the right joints to assymble it. the booth freed my closet back up for my cloth, and now i don't have to worry about being cramped up.

all hail homeuser. BOW YOUR HEADS!!!! lol.....

 

[jugalo180]

whoa

i didn't know it was like 3 pages in this thread, damn i didn't see your pics trickless untill i posted my message, and it was like bam!
looks good.

 

[Hi_D_Ho_Man]

Not much different from Trickless's

I recommend the pipe u use to be 1 1/4 inch sch40(stronger grade)

 

[Hi_D_Ho_Man]

if u want to glue it to make it stronger,first:

1. loosely piece it together to make sure that your design works.

2.mark and label every point where piece of pipe and fitting join. [i.e. pipe end A and fitting A line up exactly HERE] Glue sets relatively fast and if u dont have it set right u may end up trashing some material


the sliding door

 

[Hi_D_Ho_Man]

This is the ceiling. I had some extra pipe I scrapped them across the top and threw an extra blanket across for the ceiling The thing is it gets really stuffy so i flipped one end of the blanket back

 

[trickless]

Cool forts guys!

Pipe across the top is a very good idea. Since my fort is so big, the blankets sag in the middle using the twine to support the ceiling. Alas, I'm short enough that it doesnt bother me... but I just might get some extra pipe to make it sturdier.

For now I'm fine with just "jamming" the pipes together.. seems to hold really tight. When I take it apart sometimes I REALLY have to pull on the pieces to get them to seperate. Plus I didn't want to glue it so I could take it apart and make it smaller as needed.

Yep 1 1/4" PVC would've been sturdier, but 1" PVC is holding it's own.

Rock on!
Pat

 

[jugalo180]

yep

i have the 1 1/4 pipe, it is pretty sturdy. if you pen your blankets to the blanket at the top instead of connecting the blankets to the thread the weight from the blankets should stop it from sagging right? i have one blanket at the top with the two king sized ones penned to it and it fits like a glove.

 

[ColdAsh]

Anyone tried this on a larger scale? (eg for recording drums)

 

[jugalo180]

yo

originally posted by coldash

Anyone tried this on a larger scale? (eg for recording drums)

look up at trickless's picks. further at the top of this page. he has his set up for drums.

 

[MusicMan91]

Would this PVC Piping really help isolate the sound for recording vocals/drums/guitar?? Because if it would, it would save me a lot of hassle making something with wood and plexiglass.

 

[jugalo180]

originally posted by musicman 91

Would this PVC Piping really help isolate the sound for recording vocals/drums/guitar?? Because if it would, it would save me a lot of hassle making something with wood and plexiglass.

as far as reflections go it is very good. i only use mine on vocals so you would have to get a decent answer from trick or someone using drums in their booth. the trick is not to be too close to the wall, that way you avoid low end reflection, because the blankets are absorbing the high end. my (guess) is that 3ft from a wall is good.

 

[trickless]

Would this PVC Piping really help isolate the sound for recording vocals/drums/guitar?? Because if it would, it would save me a lot of hassle making something with wood and plexiglass.

It should help a little bit.. but it's not really an iso booth. On the outside it's still pretty loud.

I say if you have the time/resources/space for a room inside a room thing then go for it. Or like suggested before cubicle panels would work well too.

The PVC was not chosen for any sonic value. I just decided it was cheap and I could take it apart as needed. The blankets are the absorbing material. The thicker the blankets and more layers you use determine the effectiveness of it as an iso booth.

I'm just using it to try to trick my condensers into thinking I'm not recording in the middle of a small funky sounding basement.

Pat

 

[tallman1]

Hey guys. Clean up your vocal booths. Your mothers don't live there, you know.

 

[trickless]

Hey guys. Clean up your vocal booths. Your mothers don't live there, you know.

Cleaning? Who has the time for that??

I like to think of the mess as "Random Natural Diffusion ©"

Truthfully, I have a very small basement for which the music gear and screen printing gear must co-habitate. My roomates run a Tshirt printing comapany outta the basement.

Pat

 

[jugalo180]

pics

i finallly have pictures of my vocal booth. thanks to trickless for trhe brilliant idea of assymbling one from pvc piping.

 

[jugalo180]

inside

inside

 

[trickless]

Looks cool man!

... but it wasn't my idea exactly.. I'd seen people mentioning it before and decided to post some of my plans and experiences.

It's been 3 months since I built it and I've only recorded in it once!! It's still up though and I practice drums in it. Hopefully memorial day weekend will bring enough time away from work/life to record.

Rock on!
Pat

 

[jugalo180]

cool

well, thanks for bringing the plans to our attention. if it wasn't for me reading your detailed plans, i may have not taken interest in it. thanks