What makes a good recording room ?

[grimtraveller]

What actually makes a good recording room ? Or to put it another way, what makes a room bad for recording ?
In a house, is it a given that a room, unless "treated" will have a detrimental effect on whatever is recorded in it ? What factors determine it's goodness or badness ?

 

[Greg_L]

I personally don't think the room matters that much for tracking if you're close miking stuff. Note that I said "that much" and not "at all". It matters a ton for things that use the room for sound - like piano or drums or vocals. I can position my drums in different spots of one room and get vastly different sounds. The room matters a bunch when mixing. A good or bad sounding room is totally subjective and depends on whatever you're trying to achieve. A stairwell will probably suck for most things, but might be just right for a certain sound you're trying to get.

 

[moresound]

One can't really tell till one records in said room, then the proof is in the pudding.

 

[Dogbreath]

My initial thought was...yeah, treated. Control the boom.

Then I started thinkin about some of the stories I've read where the band went into some off the wall place to record this song or that song. Maybe for the ambiance, maybe not. Like a big room in a mansion or the attic of a "haunted house".

So I think it really depends on what you're going for. I think you can use whatever space you've got to git er done but when it comes to mixing, that's a different story.

 

[Capt Hair]

I don't think there's necessarily a "bad" room for recording. As someone else said, it depends on what sound your going for, and even then there's some real subjectivity to that. If you wanted to record a more flat vocal, you wouldn't want to be in a open hall but in a treated booth, is the hall a bad place to record...no, just not for what you need.

In a house or garage situation though, which i would assume most of us are in. I'd consider a good room one that has frequency control across the spectrum.

 

[Massive Master]

In a house or garage situation though, which i would assume most of us are in. I'd consider a good room one that has frequency control across the spectrum.

Which is extremely (E-X-T-R-E-M-E-L-Y) rare in buildings of typical construction.

No selection of gear can make up for a bad room - The best studios aren't even known for their gear selections - They're known for their tracking rooms.

 

[witzendoz]

I can tell what a room is going to sound like as soon as I walk in, there may be some hidden problem like down in the low end, but just walking into a room and talking can tell you a lot.

Listen to the room and see if it has a natuaral feel, no slap back echo or excessive reverb, does not sound too dead, clap your hands, listen to the decay. Also if the room has a good sound it feels nice to be in, if it's too dead it feels like your ears are being sucked out and you feel constricted. If the acoustics are good you tend to feel like you are in an open room, which is why vocal booths (arghhhh I said it) in cupboards are not a good place to sing in.

Alan.

 

[clivus]

What actually makes a good recording room ? Or to put it another way, what makes a room bad for recording ?
In a house, is it a given that a room, unless "treated" will have a detrimental effect on whatever is recorded in it ? What factors determine it's goodness or badness ?

IMHO a 'bad' room is one that has excessive buildup of low or low mid resonance, or acoustic interferences (flutter echo, comb filtering etc.).

 

[chavernac]

The same as above. Build up frequencies in the low mid that you will have to eq out in the mix.

AS for reverb... well it depends. If the room sounds nice, it could be nice for drums. Otherwise, as dead as possible ( knowing that you ll add it back in the mix with a plugin)

 

[grimtraveller]

I've just been watching a programme on Deep Purple and how they made the "Machine Head" album. After their first two choices of space {alluded to in 'Smoke on the water'} fell through, they ended up at the Grand Hotel, in Montreux. They were recording with the Rolling Stones' mobile studio. But what really struck me was the Grand Hotel itself. They didn't choose it for any great sonic reason or because of it's acoustics. They chose it because it was closed during the winter months and because after the Casino they were originally going to record in burned down and they were thrown out of it's replacement, the Pavilion theatre because of the noise, they had no choices. They took the only remaining empty space presented to them.

They set up their stuff in corridors and alcoves and put mattresses all over the place. It was evident from the programme that 'sonic considerations' as we rate them now, weren't ranking very high. There was a similar kind of scenario when the Stones recorded "Exile on Main Street" in the cellar complex of the house Keith Richards was renting in the south of France.

I know the mobile truck had stellar gear in it and albums recorded in that vein were mixed in high class facilities. But I was interested that certain bands of that era improvised 'room treatment' if at all {mattresses ! } and were more bothered about setting up and playing. Particularly when you consider that the drums and all the amps were miked and nothing went in DI.
Interesting.

 

[Bobbsy]

Something important to do is separate "tracking room" from "mixing room" even if, for most people on this forum, it's one and the same.

As Greg_L says, when you use close miking techniques on music, the room is of rather less importance than some think. Oh, you don't want the hollow, slightly resonant sound that the vast majority of modern houses give you but this can be somewhat controlled just by soft furnishings, curtains and thinking about mic placement.

Of course, this changes dramatically when you're either using more distant mic techniques or recording the spoken word. In either of these situations, every little echo and resonance comes back to haunt you. You either want a "nice" sounding room (for distant miking) or as dead an acoustic as you can get (for the spoken word).

It's when you get to mixing that the room acoustic can be a real issue. Since mixing is, by definition, done a few feet from the monitors and in one very static position, all the things previously mentioned (low/low-mid resonances, standing waves, comb filtering, flutter etc.) can affect what you put in the mix because they distort your "view" of what you're hearing. If you're room emphasises the bass, for example, there's a good chance your mix will be lacking bass when you listen elsewhere.

Anyway, back to the original question of what makes a BAD room: parallel walls and parallel floors and ceilings, all with hard surfaces. Unless you get very lucky, this will be exactly what you don't want. It's also how most modern houses are built.

There are lots of good threads in here on basic acoustic treatment for home studios--but, even if you don't have the time, money or landlord permission to do it properly, you can help yourself by breaking up the hard, parallel walls and then thinking about where you place your mic and musicians. It's not an all or nothing situation...just do what you can. Even a basic folding frame made of plastic pipe and some moving blankets can make a big difference.

 

[Beat Poet]

I've just been watching a programme on Deep Purple and how they made the "Machine Head" album. After their first two choices of space {alluded to in 'Smoke on the water'} fell through, they ended up at the Grand Hotel, in Montreux. They were recording with the Rolling Stones' mobile studio.

Well there's the thing, sometimes you do actually need a rough and ready room to achieve a sound/atmosphere that's right for the song. I think there's a song on the latest Interpol album where Sam ended up recording the drums in the bottom of a lift shaft.

 

[c7sus]

My initial thought was...yeah, treated. Control the boom.

Then I started thinkin about some of the stories I've read where the band went into some off the wall place to record this song or that song. Maybe for the ambiance, maybe not. Like a big room in a mansion or the attic of a "haunted house".

So I think it really depends on what you're going for. I think you can use whatever space you've got to git er done but when it comes to mixing, that's a different story.

Except when the band goes off someplace to record their record it isn't to a cube-shaped bedroom it's to an interesting space that has a good sound or vibe already that they can build on.

 

[Elton123]

I can tell what a room is going to sound like as soon as I walk in, there may be some hidden problem like down in the low end, but just walking into a room and talking can tell you a lot.

Listen to the room and see if it has a natuaral feel, no slap back echo or excessive reverb, does not sound too dead, clap your hands, listen to the decay. Also if the room has a good sound it feels nice to be in, if it's too dead it feels like your ears are being sucked out and you feel constricted. If the acoustics are good you tend to feel like you are in an open room, which is why vocal booths (arghhhh I said it) in cupboards are not a good place to sing in.

Alan.

+1 A good room will be obvious the minute you walk in. Like mentioned, its comfortable to be in. I recently got to tour Nightbird studios in LA(NightBird Recording Studios at the Sunset Marquis in West Hollywood, CA - News). We were in the tracking room and the gentleman was telling me about the place. All I wanted to was throw a mic up in front of him, he sounded so good!!!

 

[grimtraveller]

A good room will be obvious the minute you walk in.

If it was that obvious, the question wouldn't be worth asking.

 

[grimtraveller]

Except when the band goes off someplace to record their record it isn't to a cube-shaped bedroom it's to an interesting space that has a good sound or vibe already that they can build on.

Like mentioned, its comfortable to be in.

So is the vibe and comfort of the place important ?
Most of us don't live in castles, stately homes or at the bottoms of lift shafts ! I guess I just find it hard to believe that ordinary places like the ones most of us live in are by their very nature 'bad' in terms of recording. Mixing, I can see that.

 

[Elton123]

If it was that obvious, the question wouldn't be worth asking.

I understand. Although it should be obvious. It should also be obvious how the room is effecting the source. In order of importance I would put the room number two or three after the source and the performance. As mentioned, the room should dictate what you use as a mic and how and where u place it.

 

[Elton123]

So is the vibe and comfort of the place important ?
Most of us don't live in castles, stately homes or at the bottoms of lift shafts ! I guess I just find it hard to believe that ordinary places like the ones most of us live in are by their very nature 'bad' in terms of recording. Mixing, I can see that.

I certainly didn't mean to imply that. I wasn't talking about vibe, but comforting to the ears.

 

[moresound]

If a room is *bad* ..... it had better be *big* ..... so it can be BIG and BAD!


That's one big, bad room you got there Harry.

 

[Hakea]

What actually makes a good recording room ? Or to put it another way, what makes a room bad for recording ?
In a house, is it a given that a room, unless "treated" will have a detrimental effect on whatever is recorded in it ? What factors determine it's goodness or badness ?

Good question. I think that Greg probably nailed it with the first reply in the thread. It really would depend a lot on what you're trying to achieve.

I personally don't think the room matters that much for tracking if you're close miking stuff. Note that I said "that much" and not "at all". It matters a ton for things that use the room for sound - like piano or drums or vocals. I can position my drums in different spots of one room and get vastly different sounds. The room matters a bunch when mixing. A good or bad sounding room is totally subjective and depends on whatever you're trying to achieve. A stairwell will probably suck for most things, but might be just right for a certain sound you're trying to get.

I think that it's worth making a distinction between home and pro situations. Giving that this is HomeRecording.com and not LetsSpendaMillionBucksOnaProRoom.com then the priorities can be rather different. For me, audio perfection is not irrelevant but it's still pretty low on the list, for practical reasons. Mostly, I'll use work-arounds rather than try for a perfect room. So my priority list looks something like this:

• 1. Roomy and comfortable. I don't want to have to pack and unpack the gear every time I do anything. I want to leave stuff plugged in and also have room to add and subtract things when needed.
  
  2. Under my control. I want the flexibility to decide to runs wires around, drill holes in the walls, move furniture, or stick experimental baffling up if I feel like it.

Home hobbyist situations probably range all the way from trying to record a worse than average band in a tin garage on a single hand held recording device through to some quite sophisticated track by track stuff. So I'd guess that for us, there is no ideal room because we don't have a standard way of working or a consistently fixed set of requirements. The best we can usually hope for is somewhere that is potentially a bit adaptable, depending on what we want to do this month.

So my room has carpet on the floor, low walls, a tent like sloping roof, and not a lot of bare exposed walls. When I've run test audio files it soaks up some frequencies and boosts others, as you'd expect. But it's not much worse than my mate's studio, and he does commercial work in his, and has some treatments on the walls (admittedly not very good ones!). He's used to the characteristics of his room, I'm starting to come to grips with mine.

Like Greg said, if you're recording mostly straight in, and you can shift things around a bit and mic fairly closely when needed, then I don't think there's much trouble getting 'within reasonable tolerance'. I don't require perfection, just a reasonable good standard and an appreciation of where the weak points are. Importantly, I don't want to record entire bands at the same time, in performance mode, using longer range mics. So the room doesn't need to be all that good, it just has to be not totally horrific - or leak!

But, of course, if at some time down the track I get bitten by the 'room treatment bug' I may completely disown the above opinion and spend many bags of not particularly essential dollars on a holy grail that I probably don't really need. Hobbies are like that... a great opportunity to find excuses to spend more money and get mildly obsessed by things...

Chris