Vocal Booth

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In this months TapeOp magazine there is an article on building inexpensive portable sound barriers. The guy basically takes a door and some wood and bed foam and creates them. The article says they run about $40 a piece and he mentions using two of them put together with the corner of the room behind you, to create a makeshift vocal booth. Might keep the sound in better than the blanket approach although I suppose you still have sound coming over the top.

He also used them for bass traps and all sorts of applications. I'm thinking about going that way. Then you can just put them along the walls when your not using them and they are out of the way.
 
originally posted by bass master "k"
The guy basically takes a door and some wood and bed foam and creates them. The article says they run about $40 a piece and he mentions using two of them put together with the corner of the room behind you, to create a makeshift vocal booth. Might keep the sound in better than the blanket approach although I suppose you still have sound coming over the top.
Click to expand...

cool thanks for the tip, let us know how it works for you. if you can post some pics, or maybe scan the page from the magazine and post it. i basically use the booth i created to cut back on reflections. i'm don't really need a soundproof booth as of yet.
 
So, to recapitulate- what is the best material for bas trapping??

I bought some acoustical foam but they say this absorbs mostly mids to highs!!I need something for bass!!!

Cheers
G
 
Hanging sound blankets on ceiling hooks

I'd appreciate input on an idea I had for a makeshift vocal booth.

I have my computer in a bedroom, but the computer fan noise is intolerable, so I record vocals in the adjacent hallway with a 20 foot mic cord. The hallway is only 5 ft wide, and I sing towards a wooden door with wooden slats(looks like horizontal blinds) about a foot in front of me. The hallway extends 10 to 15 ft behind me. It's quite isolated from sounds outside.

I was thinking of hanging ceiling hooks that I could use to hang sound blankets on. One possible advantage of this is that I can have the blankets hung in two layers, by having the hooks placed with a larger square encompassing a smaller square. On the smaller square of hooks, I would hang a small piece of blanket horizontal so it covers the ceiling. I'd also probably velcro the blanket edges to avoid large air gaps. This method is better for me because I can fold the blankets up when I'm done without having to store bulky panels/frames.

Any thoughts on this method? Should I use the same or different materials for both layers, and what would be recommended? Anything needed on the walls themselves? Any other thoughts on additional acoustical treatment for a long narrow space? Thanks
 
very interesting

So after receiving quotes for some prebuilt iso's, I've turned to forums such as this for inspiration. I find the PVC, blanket idea very interesting. My thinking is to do something like this for a few months until I can get up the cash for something more solid...or figure out enough from the forums to build my own "permanent" booth.

A little about me, I do voice overs and as such I'm trying to create a very dead space to record in. The room is in a quiet area so (unless the neighbor is mowing the lawn, or the wife is doing laundry) I don't have to worry too much about external noises.

To those of you that have built these PVC booths, how about an update: Are you still happy with it, any modifications you've had to make, what would you do differently...things like that.

Thanks in advance
 
GeorgetheParrot said:
So, to recapitulate- what is the best material for bas trapping??

I bought some acoustical foam but they say this absorbs mostly mids to highs!!I need something for bass!!!

Cheers
G
Click to expand...

Foam needs to be about 10cm thick to absorb lows. You need a material that absorbs highs, mids, and lows. Most fabrics will absorb highs and mid frequencies. It's hard to find material that will absorb low frequencies well. If you don't get something that absorbs the lows, the vocals will be muddy and boomy. I've been in my friend's home-made booth which had cheap 2cm acoustic egg crate foam lining it- It was very boomy in there, and the vocals he recorded weren't very good to be honest.

I have found an effective and cheap material to use which does all of this. It's called "10cm mineral wool" fabric, and comes in a roll just like a roll of fabric. It's more effective than foam and pretty much anything else. Available for £9.20 per metre length (1.7m width) from here: http://www.customaudiodesigns.co.uk .

So, you can spend £38 and use this to line a booth . They also deliver to the US. And just for the sake of making it look nice, you might also get some egg-crate acoustic foam for £25 from here http://www.sonatech.de and line the booth with it ontop of the 10cm fabric wool.

I'm not sure yet how to go about sticking material around the booth. Does anyone know if this will work?

ps- by the way I found this cool link on how to build a professional booth for under £500 http://www.projectstudiosolutions.com/ if anyone's interested. I can't afford this at the moment, but I may do in the future. - It looks really nice.
 
So, any updates? I am going to do this as well. I was thinking about going with schedule 80 pvc pipe so I can double up on the blankets. Has anyone tried adding bass traps inside the booth to absorb the lows?
 
Anyone still reading this thread considering building a vocal booth, or frames out of pvc to hang blankets from you can buy a grommet kit from home depot for like 7 bucks. It makes a cheap and nice looking way to hang your blankets.
 
Great thread guys. I wish I had come across this before buying the materials to build my iso booth!!!

On other threads, know-it-alls just keep posting "you don't need a vocal booth, you don't know what you're doing, I record great vocals in my nicely treated control space.....yadda yadda yadda." Finally, someone to just help if I WANT a f*cking iso/vocal booth!!

Once again, great stuff! Now can anybody help me out with diagrams/photos/or just good directions on where to start constructing my booth. I have a 13 X 10 rectangle room with a wall of windows on one of the 10 ft sides and a wall of closets on the other 10 ft sides. I already have some leftover materials from one of my dad's construction jobs. Here's what I have:

(4) 4 ft X 8 ft osb sheathing boards
(4) 4 ft X 8 ft plywood boards
(4) 4 ft X 8 ft gypsum board
plenty of quilts and blankets
heavy duty door hinges
auralex foam purchased from a studio that closed down

If anyone can help, please feel free to reply!! But no comments if you're not telling my how to get this project up and going.

BTW My Hardware/Software: Intel iMac, M-Audio Bx5a Studio Monitors, M-Audio AV40 Reference Monitors, M-Audio Oxygen 25 Midi Keyboard, MXL 990 Condenser Mic, MXL V87 Condenser Mic; Logic Pro 8, Garageband, Pro Tools 8.
 
You don't need a vocal booth, you don't know what you're doing, I record great vocals in my nicely treated control space....yada, yada, yada.

:D
 
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