Southview Arts Plans New Room

Hi, It has been a while since logging on - hope all is well in your universe! I am planning fast and furious as I want to have the building closed in by fall... A new space - life goes on... at least I got the gear.... for Southview Arts Recording Studio in VT - USA. http://www.southviewarts.com This will be my third build. Was originally planning - and discussing with folks here - a traditional control room, iso booth and performance space studio in the detached garage, but it became impractical when I found that the slab was defective. The building moved an inch and a half this spring during the thaw! Now I am planning a single large room, attached to my house. I primarily work with singer songwriters, often cutting takes with seasoned session players as their bands, live. Most often I build their songs track by track. Being a commercial recording person... there are times when I will record anything that the pays the bills. I have done multiple mix to picture projects, scored films, foley work, voice overs and/or dialog replacement with producers on a phone patch, books on tape, college entry demos, yoga tapes... more than 20 years into this ride I have seen many different types of sessions. I have a piano, hammond, wurlitzer, bass amps, guitar amps, guitars, tons of crap, but all of it essential! :lol: I plan on shooting (and streaming) video at times as well. The space will also be home to a house concert series that can have as many as 40 or so audience members, usually with solo or duo performers. Presently the design is: 24' x 36' with 12' walls, cathedral ceilings with no internal posts or supports, a "hot roof", and radiant floor heat. While I am hoping for some isolation from the house so I can work at nights, while my kids pretend to sleep, I am not expecting to spend too much $ on isolation. I live 200 yards from my nearest neighbor in a very quiet area. Not in a flight path, nearest road is 150 yards away and is a very small dirt road. So I am fortunate in these regards. Looking for thoughts and any mode calculations or acoustical response thoughts. Especially wondering if having a 5 degree change in the long (36') outside wall will really help with ant modal issues. Any other feedback? I have attached three dimensioned pdf drawings of the present design concept. I should have north and south exterior elevations up soon. Oh, budget is $150k. Thanks! Jim

Do you want one room to track, mix, and have small concerts? How about something like this. Could be a fun room:)

Hey! Thanks for taking the time to think and draw thoughts on my space, that is so cool! Nice ideas for sure. Some of the questions that quickly come to mind include: You splayed the walls, what effect will/can that have? I have been running some mode calculations and the existing ratios seem at least reasonable. You put a couple small bass traps in the corners. Are they targeted for specific frequencies or more a broadband absorber? With 2x6" wall construction with relatively little attention paid to reducing sound (in or out) how much of the lo end will just be absorbed or pass through the walls? How does one computes modes when the ceiling starts at twelve feet, then goes up in a cathedral ceiling? Not being a physics buff, I am working on the cubic space, but modes? I am out of my league... Here is Bob Golds Mode Calculator I have been looking at. I have attached a pdf of what the modes look like using 23 x 35 x 12... http://www.bobgolds.com/Mode/RoomModes.htm Thanks again! Jim

Howdy, The north exterior view.... Jim

Ok, a bit more information. With the rectangle design the is the volume of the space is 9,359 cu.ft. I have attached two drawings of the space but with a 5 degree splay of the west wall. Will this make a significant difference in the modal reaction of the room? Or enough to justify the eyeball rolling of my builders! :roll: Thanks! Jim

Jim - you'll get a better reaction if you actually post the pics instead of pdf's.

Hi Folks, Here are some images posted in the message. Plan A Plan B with 5 degree splay South View

Hmmm, Is that the outer wall your moving to 6 dec? Or just an internal slat wall? With a space that big, I would worry about angling your walls 1) you will need to angle the opposite wall as well to keep the symmetry...losing floor area. 2) Angles walls are for smaller areas where the 1st Reflexion point interfears with your listening postion. Have you looked at palmsprings idea?

Two comments: One to agree with Lil: Your room is not symmetrical. In order to have symmetry you need to make either: A) both side walls straight (not splayed) or B) both splayed. On splayed and one not splayed is going to mess up your stereo image and sound staging. The other about your speaker angles and mix position. To me, it looks like your speaker axes are intersecting at 90 degrees, when it should be 60 degrees. With a room that big, you certainly don't need to tighten your speaker angles so much! - Stuart -

Hey guys, This is great! I will stick with the original rectangle that seemed to mode calculate out ok, is symmetrical and will be cheaper to build! I agree totally with the speaker placement - the architect, who knows nothing of audio - dropped them in for me. He is being very kind and working with me so I won't complain! I included the cross section in the message below. I am planning on having my "control room" at the north end which is the longer ceiling slope. Does this make sense sonically? Thinking tube traps around the mix position, speaker placement nearish the front wall, and maintaining as much open space for flexibility in the room.... However it will be me for the most hours, and it has to sound good! Thanks SO much for your feedback! Jim [removed] West View or Cross Section Elevation Plan A, the symmetrical room...

I think you need to decide if it's a recording studio or a concert hall. To break up standing waves in concert halls and aid in "natural amplification" the the back/side walls are angled. This is just a rough mock up- ***not to scale**** Red- bass traps soft walls Green- Timber slots Grey- soffits

Thinking tube traps around the mix position, speaker placement nearish the front wall, and maintaining as much open space for flexibility in the room.... However it will be me for the most hours, and it has to sound good!

You have the space, so I'd say get your speakers well away from the walls, to avoid nasty artifacts like comb-filtering. I'm trying to find my reference on that, but I seem to recall something like 2m (roughly 6'6") as being the minimum distance away from walls for that. If you can't afford 2m of separation, and you really want those speakers up close to the front wall, and you really want them to sound good, then how about soffit mounting them? (More correctly called "flush mounting", but everyone seems to call it "soffit mounting" these days....). That will tighten up your bass and imaging, and will look cool as well. It's a bit more work, but it will allow you to put the speakers practically right up against the front wall, and leave the entire rest of the room free (for playing hockey, football, golf, .... :) that's a big room! Envy! Envy!) What's the MAIN purpose of the room, by the way? I saw that you listed many purposes, but I guess there is one overriding one? Have you thought about maybe dividing it into a control room at one end, and a large live room at the other? You have the space. By the way, I guess your family must really love listening to what you do! :) And also that you don't mind ambient noises getting into your recordings: wind, rain, thunder, dogs barking, kids playing, cars arriving and leaving, people talking, radios, TV's, lawn mowers, phones ringing, washing machines, dish washers and hair dryers running, that kind of thing. The reason I say that is because I see from the plans that there isn't much isolation considered for the room: All that I see is RC on the existing wall, but that probably won't help you any, since the rest of the room is directly coupled to the entire house. Plus, you only have ordinary simple doors between room and house. Are you SURE that you don't need any isolation in that room? Can you really make recordings like that? Does your family really love hearing you work that much? :) - Stuart -

Thanks again, this forum is great. A couple of thoughts/responses sparked by your thoughtful comments. It most definitely is a recording space first and foremost. Isolation: Next to standing waves and or modes created by the space this was a big topic of internal discussion. I spent the last 13 years working in my studio that was 20 x 26 or so and was essentially one big room. I have grown use to and like the direct contact that comes with working with clients sans glass. When I cut that occasional heavy high school band, I long for a control room yes, but is it worth the expense? In my old space I went through great pains to create an iso booth of decent size, lots of heavy glass reverse walls, room in a room, double doors time and expense. Used it for a year or so and then it was used only occasionally! As I mentioned I am seriously in the country, in the middle of 10 acres of land. Rain noise IS a concern, but again I have to weigh the expense/benefit ratio.... An excellent point concerns isolation from the rest of the house... One option is to pour a foundation all the way and essentially build a separate building, its own walls and decouple it from the house, only connecting it at the doors. Problem is that even though to many $150k is a lot of money (it is!), in reality when building a building of this size it isn't! My concern is (no surprise) spending extra thousands - and having to cut from somewhere because that is the limit of cash available to use - how much separation can I realistically achieve? Additional, though I plan on being here for many years, I have lived a few years now and realize everything changes, resale value is a consideration. I have been very lucky being able travel a lot of the world making records with folks in very unlikely spaces... with care, most spaces can be reliable listening environments. With care and preplanning going in, can I create a listening/recoding space I can trust, without a traditional control room approach or am I just kidding myself?!? Question: If I poured a completely separate foundation (along the existing house side) and insisted on decoupling the two structures, what doors would have to be used, how would the openings to the existing house structure work (without creating a connection that passes sound) and the big one, what kind of additional cost estimates can be made? Big vague question I know. *** An edit update. I am asking my architect to add in double doors between to two buildings. We are pricing a "prefab" construction (in addition to getting pricing for "regular" construction) for the addition or studio building, sitting on it's own foundation and with it's own four walls. If I had double doors installed in the two openings between the buildings, and the buildings were decoupled do we think the sound transmission between the two spaces would be reasonable enough to keep the piece with family? Thanks again for your valuable insight, and time. Jim

lilith_envy wrote:

Hmmm, Is that the outer wall your moving to 6 dec? Or just an internal slat wall? With a space that big, I would worry about angling your walls 1) you will need to angle the opposite wall as well to keep the symmetry...losing floor area. 2) Angles walls are for smaller areas where the 1st Reflexion point interfears with your listening postion. Have you looked at palmsprings idea?

The 6 degree idea was the whole exterior wall, and if in order to keep symmetry I would need to do both walls seems cost prohibitive. And since it doesn't seem necessary for this large a space I am happy to let it go. I did spend time thinking about palmspring's idea and really appreciate the direction though since I am only occasionally going to host "shows" and have more of a need a big, flexible recording space, I am thinking less about a stage and also prefer have my gear at the opposite end of the space of the porch area. I am curious about the thoughts behind the interior angled walls (are they needed for this large a room?) and the bass traps (are we anticipating lo end issues in a room this size and dimension?) Cool design and very much appreciated! Jim

Howdy - a couple of options inspired by our discussions. This one shows the separate walls, and double doors... and another idea trying to find the best way to keep things decoupled...This one looses the walkway into the house from the new room by shifting the building more north...

If you are going to have a seperate slab and double walls, why not just seperate the two structures completely and build it with splayed walls? You have 10 acres, correct? See attached.

attached is a picture of the kind of room I was proposing

cool room for sure. I love the multipurpose part of that. You can do rehearsals, record those and even give a show for others. does it have a PA system? Is that an existing room btw?

Looks like a cinema set up with stage. You can see the fill speaker on the wall. Great Idea

yeah, it's a cinema setup with the front channels behind a perf screen. you could hang a coulpe of speakers above the stage and loose the screen and surround speakers for your purpose:)