Hi,
I've recently found I have a reason to completely dig up all of my property to replace a trashed septic system - so while I'm at it I'm going to build a detached garage/second floor bonus room. Based on local codes, I can get approval for 22'x26' two car garage. I want the building to fit in and echo the house architecture, which implies kind of a timberframe ceiling/roof. (See pictures).
Studio use - personal song writing and small rock band recording projects. Also, I play in a fun band and will want to use the space for practice/jamming.
Generally, I don't record whole bands at once. I'm typically a one track at a time guy and it is usually me playing. However, it would be nice to be able to do the whole band at once now and again.
I've looked at a lot of the floor plans and it seems like often people chop spaces up into little rabbit warrens with a bunch of isolation rooms. I'm wondering about an all in one big room approach with heavy use of wheeled gobos so I can reconfigure the room flexibly. I mean, really, the only things I ever mic are drums, accoustic guitar, and vocals. I use DIs for guitar and bass (with amplitube software amp models) and virtual instruments for everything else. Tracking I imagine would be done with headphones for all.
Environment - I live in a rural area - it is very quiet here but I have neighbors - focus would be on keeping sound in rather than out. I expect to do heavy sound insulation of the main room - massive walls and ceiling and raised floor on rubber pucks to decouple from garage below.
And the questions:
I know this seems to run counter to the conventional wisdom - so I'm floating it here - am I nuts? Can a large single room setup be successful? What do I need to watch for? I could see doing a single control room primarily for mixing (box in the room in one corner) and leaving the rest open if I get a major gain there. Since I'm usually tracking myself I'd be inclined to make it fairly large as I'm pretty likely to be sitting at the desk with an acoustic guitar trying to track a part and I'm always banging the thing on stuff if the room is too tight.
Instead of that, I'd be inclined to surround the desk area with movable panels and hang clouds for mix time. I'm hoping near field monitoring in a larger room implies less need for hard core treatment but I'm new here.
Pic 1 - floor layout - stairs moved outside. Tried adding room from other thread. Might work. Most of the time, I'm self-tracking or I'm recording the band practicing (and I'm playing) so I think I just want one big old empty room.
Pic 2 - Architect also suggested more common peaked roof so I drew both kinds of beams - hence the long ridge beam - I'm still leaning to hipped roof as I like the symmetry it affords in the corners but I could be convinced either way.
Pic 3 - Ceiling in my house from the real estate listing - we want to echo this in the design of the new building but on a smaller scale.
Design Questions - Early Conceptualization
Originally posted at johnlsayers.com, topic 10603.
We can see you've done your homework!
that was a joke, right X? :)
(just checking)
Hai 6stringgeek,
Before anything, my I ask you to follow THIS link?
After that, please take some time to read this forum again and again. Buy "the" book and get familiar with building a "sound" room. As in X's words "gotta do your homework".
good luck, hope to see you designing very soon!
Did that. Been lurking for weeks. Apparently I missed something. Be a sport and tell me the one item on that page I missed. Because I've already read it like a dozen times and I apparently can't even see it anymore I've read it so many times. As to the rest - I'm not finding much good info for the self recordist - all designs seem to involve more conventional commercial studios. FWIW, I have half a dozen books on studio design, including Rod's, have read them cover to cover, and none of them seem to be talking about the kind of facility I'm interested in working in. Specifically, they all build little control rooms and separate tracking rooms and if its just me, that's going to be a PITA. Finally, they all seem to leave ceiling configuration analysis out. Lots of wall analysis, nothing about ceiling height other than 'volume is good'. K, I got volume in spades. But I got slopeage too. It is quite possible that this group isn't oriented in the same direction that I am - which is fine - just say 'we only do commercially oriented facilities' and I'll move on. I asked a simple question - is there any experience with all in one large room designs using only gobos - if so - has it worked well when it has been tried? Because I really don't see any of the facilities posted here so far working for me.that was a joke, right X? :) (just checking) Hai 6stringgeek, Before anything, my I ask you to follow THIS link?
It helps to put yourself in the viewers seat. If your scrolling left and right and up and down, what does that do to the whole experience?
It's in the "Read this..." about picture sizes, but it is mostly a simple matter of helping people to help you :)
And yes RO, it was a joke, thanks for noticing :)
Okay six, be patient with us :)
All we ask is to invest some time to do stuff yeself, this is not a "draw me a design, please" forum. You're already half way there, so why not set up a floorplan first (forget about 3D stuff for now). Focus on what you want, where you want it and put them in scale (use dimensions on ye drawings)
As X mentioned so gentle, resize them pix please (yes, it's in them stickies. That's why I asked) to max 700px so poor peeps without huge widescreens don't have to scroll to read your posts. I for one just don't read it at all.
Yes, a one room can work. But it prolly needs another setup, atleast for your desk that is. What's the height of your room btw? What's your budget? What's the current state? Any adjacent buildings? neighbors? etc. etc.
I've done more drawing and tried a few things - see pictures above.
I think the one control room I drew could work - I scored its dimensions from another thread - something about a group worked on it together. I might have to scale it up a smidge as I do a lot of self-tracking and I hate constantly turning around and banging the guitar on stuff. Also not show - a vast array of vintage synths I have to fit in there somehow.
Ceiling heights are on drawing - 7.5' at walls to 13' at peak. I expect I'll need to put some kind of lid on the room to produce symmetry on the ceiling.
Also need to squeeze in 3/4 bath and kitchenette yet.
Aloha,
Resized your pics (700 pixels wide)
Aloha 8)
the ceiling symmetry - maybe make it a corner control room instead so you can use the full ceiling height and then put in overhead treatments and cap with a false cloth ceiling if needed. this why it should simplify the boundary surface construction because you're just building walls up to the existing ceiling... then a frame in the CR for the cloth...
So do I want it higher at the front or the back of the room?the ceiling symmetry - maybe make it a corner control room instead so you can use the full ceiling height and then put in overhead treatments and cap with a false cloth ceiling if needed. this why it should simplify the boundary surface construction because you're just building walls up to the existing ceiling... then a frame in the CR for the cloth...
The back (CR)