Post production, training & recording facility - layout

My own personal thinking is that the framing could be done in a more firmly connected manner then being recommended. There is a chance that a ten foot span could be crossed with the right material, but the reduction in height caused by the notch will reduce the overall ability of the material to span and support. The only golden ratio that I know of that is actually called "golden ration" is based on 1.618 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_ratio and that number has been around for centuries. The rest are just room ratios ;)

the ceiling could be suspended using isolation mounts to ensure proper support. the room height-width ratio looks to leave a number of gaps in the modes which as Stuart pointed out will be problematic.

Hi guys Apologies on the delay, been swamped with work and been trying to get hold of the designer - but he has been away and cannot get hold of him yet??? Thanks for the replies and opinions, I thought some of the methods were a bit strange. What's annoying is I was going to do this design myself with the help from this forum and Rod's book but thought it be best, easier and less of a headache just to pay a professional, which now seems like a waste of money. This guy was recommended to me by an acquaintance, of which he designed and built their studio - which I have been to and does look and sound good, they are also now making decent money. He has also designed some pretty famous singer / songwriters studio's - so it seemed like a safe bet, even with his eccentricities!!! Ok, so - 1) I'm not 100% sure the exact control room height - need to confirm this with him. 2) I need to find more information out about how the ceiling is actually supported. 3) I'm also not sure what soft board is either or what possible benefits it may have?

AVare wrote:

I also don't get why he seems to be using staggered studs for the walls, when you seem to have space to go with totally separate fully decoupled studs, with the resulting improvement in isolation. What is the reason for that? Is it that you don't really need much isolation, so it isn't a priority

Space is an issue, but isolation is very important as well - so not sure? What is the best material / wall construction combination to use - price dependant, but still with a high level of isolation?

AVare wrote:

And that doesn't even address the issue that the entire design shown there is not even providing any isolation! It is all fully coupled, and therefore pretty useless as isolation. There are numerous flanking paths there, so that wall / ceiling will not isolate well, even if it does pass code.

Could you provide me some information regarding correct ceiling and wall construction - Rod's book talks about Independently framed ceilings achieving the best isolation but worried about the extra 3 to 4 inch loss in headroom, so thinking his semi-independent ceiling with isolation hangers is probably the one to go with??

AVare wrote:

I'd also question the control room layout: You have the door in the rear corner, right where the bass trapping should go, and from the soffit angles it looks like your mix position is going to be exactly at 50% of the room length, which is the worst possible position...

? Good point, I will put this to him as well In fact, it looks like the whole design needs to be re-looked at anyway- so I might as well throw in a spanner. I have been thinking recently that a second suite would be very beneficial possibly more than a live room. But would still require a small room to record vocals/voice over etc but ideally still big enough to record drums So what would be the smallest space a room could be to achieve fair drum recordings? What I'm now thinking is maybe lose some of the training room, make a semi decent size control room, an edit suite and smallest possible live / vocal room? I've attached an old edited sketch up file, the Office and Storage rooms are built and cannot be changed the rest of the space (blue floor) is all open - The training room is at the end - as it's got a busy road on that side, but it's not yet built. The stairs shown in front of the training room in previous design images are not built either, they were put into previous designs as in the future we may build another floor on top and this will be access from ground floor through to the 3rd floor. Any opinions for a new floor plan into this space? Thanks

here's an idea

Thanks Gulfo That could have worked if we hadn't converted the basement (our existing storage - to another level of the store) Basically we are an audio equipment store, middle floor is Music Technology/Studio and DJ equipment, basement is Live Sound/PA and Lighting. We now have a warehouse, but need as much storage as possible for small products and other bits and bobs on site, that's what that storage room is used for. The Repair room, Storage room, Toilet / Kitchen are now built and being used. So only the front half is available for the studio phase. We also really need a training room, I'm Cubase and Ableton Certified and currently do One on One training - and with the store expanding and people demoing and buying equipment and software downstairs it makes sense to have short course training available upstairs, even it is just max 4 person stations. So training room stays. That leaves me thinking making either : * 1 large control room and Large Live Room (Well fairly large for my area) "As the previous paid for design" * 2 small Control Rooms and a Small live room. I did an idea below - I did ratio of both control rooms to Sepmeyer -1.00 : 1.14 : 1.39 That works out at L x W x H = 4.25m x 3.49m x 3.06m And the live room in the middle - as long as we can record drums in the room and get decent result, I'm happy with it being small. Opinions / comments or ideas please? Thanks

I wonder if this would be more better for ya, only in reference to orientation and initial layout. It isn't the final suggestion as you can plainly see I took the wall out so I could flip the rooms :)

Hi Thanks for the input xspace - but will need access into the training room. Those stairs come up from under the training room from downstairs - well there not in at the moment and may never go in - but we want to keep that space free encase we do build another floor on top. That would be the only possible entry from the street for this floor and the possible 3rd floor without going through the shop. Whats your thoughts on the control room / live room size and the Sepmeyer -1.00 : 1.14 : 1.39 ratio? Thanks

i think you go back to your paid for design. too bad you could not take part of the office space and part of the training room for storage and keep the larger space...

Hi Thanks Gullfo It is to bad, in the future I think we may turn the store room into another conrtol room - it can then face onto and share the live room as well. He's another plan, back to the one we paid for - but I have changed the size's of the room. Let me know what you think CF - Lowden - 1.00:1.30:1.90 = LxWxH - 5.22m x 3.57m x 2.57m Thanks

i would change the layout of the control room but the positioning seems fine.

i would change the layout of the control room

Most definitely! There are a lot of things with that original design that just don't make much sense, to my way of thinking. Glenn's plan is much, much better. About the only thing I'd change on that is to soffit mount the speakers. - Stuart -

Ok cool, thanks gullfo and soundman, will stick with that layout. What about the room size / ratio? What did you do that design at gullfo? Or what ratio would you advise for that size room? Agree with soffit and will soffit fit

I took your dimensions which I think qas 1:1.3:1.9 but in general there are likely a range of ratios in there that will be fine. Do a search on room ratios and you should find a thread from Eric Desart which shows which ratios are best and you and tweak your dimensions as needed to fit your space

Thanks Glenn Going to go with your design. Could you put the measurements on the design, Length, Width, Height. Also the width of the walls. What wall material and construction method are those walls based on? I now just need to working out the exact size of the wall and ceiling construction to make sure it will all fit. Actually one thing I have not considered is the concrete pillars that come up the wall also join to a concrete beam that runs accross the ceiling. I have just measured this and : From floor to bottom of beam is 285cm From floor to ceiling is 317cm (Picture attached) This loses a huge amount of height were that beam runs across, I would imagine the ceiling construction would take up at least 30cm - so would I have to drop the entire ceiling 30cm (or so) down below that beam leaving the maximum finished headroom 255cm?? This isn't far off the last design I did earlier: Lowden - 1.00:1.30:1.90 = HxWxL - 2.57cm x 3.57cm x 5.22m But all this would depend on the ceiling construction and thinkness required. The ceiling above is solid concrete, it's a flat roof with nothing on top - would I have to treat the bottom of the beam as my lowest point to work from? Thanks

This loses a huge amount of height were that beam runs across, I would imagine the ceiling construction would take up at least 30cm - so would I have to drop the entire ceiling 30cm (or so) down below that beam leaving the maximum finished headroom 255cm??

Not necessarily! You only need to loose a few cm, if you plan carefully. You can interleave your ceiling joists with those concrete beams, such that the actual ceiling sheet rock sits just a few cm below the bottom of the beams. You could also look into angling the ceiling, so that it slopes up from a lower point at the front to a higher point at the back, depending on where those beams fall in your room. A third option is just to put soffits on them, once again depending whereabouts they fall in your room. Careful planning can gain you ceiling height. - Stuart -

couple quick questions, what type of equipment (audio monitors, desk etc) do you have (or plan to have)? are the dimensions in your SketchUp 100%? does that wall between the rooms and stair case exist? if not, i should assume its a proper mass wall which will be part of a 2 leaf structure?

Hi Gullfo / Soundman I'm going to go back down to the shop shortly and just re-measure - as this plan I did was measured and made well over 2 years ago. So just want to confirm its accuracy The other designer did his own measurement - but he has not given them to me - other than in the room measurements

Hi Gullfo Attached is a new floor space with exact measurements! The single stud wall on the left (west) is the wall of the storage room; it is a standard single wall with 12mm plasterboard. All other perimeter walls are solid concrete, I would say at least 1 foot maybe even 2 foot thick. The stairs and no other walls currently exist; we want to leave space for stairs in the future as we may build another level on top sometime in future. The stairs will go up over themselves (double back), so it needs enough space for a corridor to walk around the stairs to get to the next level. We will lose half of the training room, if and when we do build the next level - but as that will just be standard stud wall it's not much of a problem - we also gain another full floor of space. For the time being if we plan around that stair space, it can be used as a chill out area I've attached some actual photos of the space - it's currently a dumping ground. But that can all be moved in a few hours. Not decided what monitors yet. Between Adams, KRK's or Genelec's Thanks

here's round 1. it's basically got 9-0' high ceilings with the supporting 2x12 ceiling joists interlaced with the concrete supports. ratio of the CR is about 1:1.26:1.68. of course after i drew this out i realized that the front side walls in the CR should just be a continous 15° rather than staggered. otherwise i think this is about as close as you can get within that space. the live room has some space on the wall opposite the CR window for the second CR window. attached is the SU8 file as well as some images.

Wow, thanks Gullfo! That really helps to visualise it - and invaluable for the contractors. Question regarding the wall contruction? I'm assuming we are going for 2 x 16mm layers of plasterboard, rockwool, air, rookwool etc for double stud walls - what about the current outer leaf walls? *Concrete (north) wall - The studing is 1" off the wall, is 1" from the plasterboard - or do we do that like an inside out wall - or do we build the frame and board it on the ground and lift it into position with 2 x 16mm board - it's not a double stud wall, so not quite sure how that is to be constructed? *The single stud (West) wall (seperating the storage room) Picture attached - I stopped the builders plasterboarding that wall when they built the storage room - that's why you can only see 2 boards up. Now again in the SU it's only a single wall - so would we beef up the inside of the existing stud wall and use that as our outerleaf? And would that consist 2 x 16mm, rockwool, air, rockwool, 2 x 16mm? Thanks

beef it up on the outside and use it as the outer leaf. 2x 16mm plus insulation etc. do not add the second layer on the inside or you will create a third leaf.

Ok, cool - so (west wall) take those 2 boards that are on off - insulate the inside, put a 16mm board up, mud an caulk, add second layer 16mm, mud and caulk. 2" Air Gap, Stud wall, insulate, 2 x 16mm? What about the north concrete wall - Is that just a single studd wall with 2 x16mm each side with insulation between the studs? Again would we build the outerside laying down and then raise it up? I'm assuming due to the concrete wall - we only need a single stud wall? Thanks

uh, no. on the wall shared with the storage space - one side of that wall remains open. beef it up and make it 2x 16mm, insulation in between studs. on the wall by the training room, that wall will become part of your training room and will be open on one side and beefed up on their other. the wall along the (new) corridor will be open on one side as well. you're basically building a perimeter wall all around the new inner walls. the concrete walls remain as they are.

I'm sorry Gullfo Thats totally confused me! To give me a high STC that I will need - I thought I would need at least the following around all walls - 2 layers of 16mm drywall - studs (insulated) - air - studs (insulated) - 2 layers of 16mm drywall Could you break down constuction for the walls like above - sorry for being thick! Concrtete wall: Storage room wall: Corridor and Rear CR wall:

Wherever you have a concrete wall, that is already your outer leaf: You only need to add your studs and 2 layers of 16mm drywall there. If you were to add a SECOND set of studs with ANOTHER 2 layers of 16mm, then you would have a THREE leaf wall at that location. For those places where there is no existing wall at all, or where the existing wall is more than about 1 meter away from where you are going to build your new wall, then you DO need two sets of studs, each with its own 2 x layer of 16mm. That's what Glenn is saying. In other words, you want only two leaves around you at all points, never three leaves. The concrete is already one leaf, so where you have concrete walls (or other substantial single-leaf walls) you only need to build the second leaf. It is in the places where there are no existing walls at all (or the existing walls are on the other side of a very large air gap) that you need to build both leaves. And of course, the cavities inside all of those walls need to have insulation in them. - Stuart -