Daizen's Studio - London

Hey John and the peeps on the forum, I’m in the process of converting my current basement bedroom. The walls are made of bricks as far as I can tell, but its pretty isolated apart from the windows. I record contemporary pop music that is heavily influenced by R&B and Hip-Hop, so lots of sequencing with single tracking of live instruments and vocals. The main priority of the studio design is the acoustics. I want to be able to create final mixes of records in this place. I want to know where would the ideal place to put my monitors be. I’ve got the Genelec 8030A near-fields on stands and a pair of Genelec 1038B for main speakers which I want to flush mount. I was planning on placing the control surface facing the windows. Since these widows leads to the outside world I thought the sound would go straight out and act as good absorbers. Also given the space, I’m lost on how to go about with partitions and frames. I’m thinking of getting a seperate ready-made booth, but I only was going to do so since I thought it might be impractical to build one in the room. The booth only needs to hold one person in there at a time, and should at least allow a guitarist to play in there comfortably seated. I’ve provided diagrams of the current room and it consists of just the living space and the kitchen area. The flat was originally a basement, which explains the inconsistent dips in the north wall, and the horizontal pillar thing on the ceiling sectioning off the kitchen area (amongst other things). There’s no restrictions to complaining neibors or anything that requires any further sound isolation. I’ve included my bed also, which turns into a couch, since it is necessary (gotta sleep somewhere). It takes up 2/3 of the bed size when converted, which is how it is during work time. Ive attached the Skp file below Many Thanks Daizen

maybe build some frames over the windows and add some slats and trapping. one the door side, add a small wall with door and absorber.

Yeah I was originally thinking of doing something similar to that. but I was thinking of building the slats at the edge of the built-in shelfs to create an wall like look. This way I could make the trappings thicker with a decent vacuum. I could also slant the walls which should help massivemly, if im correct. But please let me know what you think, I really appreciate the help. I was also thinking of adding this absorber material developed by siderise.co.uk, (I actually think its rookwool covered up) called Whisper Walls. If you get a chance check it out at: [url]<http://www.siderise.co.uk/product.asp?pagetype=properties&level1=Acoustic&productid=18>[/url]. I was thinkin of puttin it up everywhere in a overkill kind of way. I checked its acoustic coeffeciency chart and it does really good on absorbing everything from around 125hz up (if I recall right). For the lower regions I was thinking of creating bass traps in the rooms corners.

the CLS1 @ 50mm is probably what you want. in which case you can probably have them make the panels to the sizes and aesthetics you need.

Thanks Glenn, yeah I agree with you, Ive called the company and the actual supplier (www.acousticwall.com), who also puts the thing up for you, said theres two variations to the 50mm walls with one at 45kg and another at 60kg. Im in the process of getting a quote for the 60kg variation. By the way, this company apparently does international jobs; so for anyone whos intrested you should give them a call. But I have one problem left. Where to put the bass traps!? Ive read quite a few articles now including some of the stuff in the acoustic section of the forum. Im clear that every corners should be fitted with one, but if you see my space/studio its a bit weird. What would you suggest? Which corners should I do? Im a bit scared of doing an overkill with the traps. D

i'd use the alcoves for bass traps and put something over the front and back wall-ceiling corners to add trapping in spaces you're (typically...) not going to use.

so what do you recon about building traps for the ceiling to floor coners? Plus do you think it would be okay if I get the Whisper Wall material put over the bass traps? And would the absorbtion qualities of either be affected if I stick some Auralex diffusers on them?

if you have floor to ceiling corners you can work with, then by all means. the bass traps could have some of their front covered but ultimately you want the bass to go in and not come out. covering completely would effectively create a panel trap, which may not be what you need until all the broadband treatment options are exhausted. i think you could put the diffusers on the front of the traps, and depending on their size, maybe be the front of the traps. that said, you probably want to be a minimum of 5-6 ft between you and the diffusers to ensure you're experiencing the full effect of the diffusers, and to avoid potential response anomalies at the listening position (and this all depends on the size of the diffusers).

Great, So ideally in my space the diffusers would be at the back of the room, in context to your control surface setup. Im pretty keen on doing it like that. But Ive been reading some of the other posts and heres a little thing I need to understand: How should I angle the walls (partitions Im looking to build)? Im guessing I keep and utilise the splayed angle of the window area however does its angle (122 degrees) affect my speaker position and angle from listening position. I have a feeling you kept that in mind when you did the control surface diagram but because the speakerstand base is at a 8.9" radius it kinda cant go there. I need to basically create a reflection free zone so once again please, bless me with some wisdom. lol.

depending on the speakers directionality will partly determine RFZ angles as well as generally trying to make all the angles a minimum of ~20° per leg - maybe this means shortening up the wall length to get the angles (and then maybe soffit mounting becomes an option) or your monitors are just more straight on to your listening position (which is what i did in my original drawing).