I've got some questions on room designs (pics included)

Hello everyone, I hope I read the rules on posting well enough, I'll try my best to not waste anyone's time. My name is Keith and I'm 26. Been playing music in bands since I was 15. I went professional 3 years ago and build a home studio bit by bit from my income from playing live. I'm moving my studio out of my 2 room home setup that I have at the moment to a proper building in our local town. (Stornoway, Isle of Lewis, Scotland) here is the website for the studio at the moment (home setup) http://www.weestudio.co.uk There is no worry for annoying neighbours with noise so it's just room acoustics that I'm hoping to improve not sound proofing. I'm converting two rooms to be a control room/tracking room studio. The walls are plasterboard at the moment. As you can see from the picture I have attached that I will be moving a wall to increase the size of the tracking room. I have read loads on this forum about the soffit technique for putting monitors into the wall, slot resonators on the side of the room and bass trapping on the back corners. All the brilliant tips on how to build things and what angle things should be at are really helping. (Sorry just realised, should be 9'9" x 13'10" in the 'after' tracking room) I have 2 questions What to do with doors? As you can see from the picture I have doors on corners of the rooms, where I would need bass trapping. Does anyone have any good ideas about how to get around this problem? Also I have PMC TB2+ monitors powered by bryston 8b amp. I'm worried that since the bass port is on the rear it will hinder the bass rather than help. Should i soffit mount those speakers or buy monitors with a front bass port (like the dynaudio BM15) and use the PMC's as nearfield? (At a later date once I have more funds) The only thing to consider is that the wall between the 'Entrance Porch' and 'Control Room' is brick. All the other partitions are plasterboard. I have a budget of £1000 (which needs to also pay for materials for a custom desk). I also have 14 bass traps created, which im hoping can be used as bass traps for the ceiling? (as you can see from my tracking room from my home studio): <- this is the tracking room of the old studio to show the bass traps. The floor of the new studio is a really hard floor which doesn't need attention. I have a couple of friends who are joiners so I will get labour cheap. I will be recording everything from singer/song writers to heavy celtic rock (bagpipes etc). My main aim is to get the rooms sounding correct so that I don't have to rip equipment out a couple of months down the line to re-do any joinery work. If there's anything I've forgotten to say or show please let me know. I do love this forum full of professionals. Respect! Keith Morrison

You have a hard floor, that is blue? Anyway, please fill in your profile to include your location...I know you said Celtic, but , it's like a rule around here ;)

Sorry, I had said where I was on the post but forgot to add it to my profile. Also yes, the floor (of the new studio) is rock solid :-) Keith

so it's just room acoustics that I'm hoping to improve not sound proofing.

Are you SURE about that? Last time I was in Scotland, I remember hearing some rather loud storms, with things like wind and rain, that made a lot of noise around the place I was staying in. Are you saying that those types of noises will not be an issue, when they get into your recordings? :) You also show a bathroom on your plan, so I guess someone flushing the toilet in the middle of a once-in-a-lifetime vocal recording, just isn't a problem? No roads outside? No people will ever talk in the rest of the building while you are recording? No planes will fly over? No dogs bark? And you don't even need isolation between your control room and live room? I'd say that you might need to re-think your "no isolation at all is needed" statememnt. I've never seen a successful studio where there was no isolation around and between the rooms.

What to do with doors? As you can see from the picture I have doors on corners of the rooms, where I would need bass trapping. Does anyone have any good ideas about how to get around this problem?

move them? :) Yeah that sounds like a rather facetious answer, I know, but it looks like you have no choice. Question: Do you need a door directly from CR to LR? Maybe you can solve one issue by getting rid of that door entirely. That means you'll have to go out the CR and up the passage to get into the LR. Is that a big deal? If it is a big deal, and you really do need a direct door, then how about making the central window between the rooms into the door? It could be a glass door, if you need the sight lines. The other door (main CR door) also needs to be moved. Is there any reason why it cannot be moved to roughly where the word "Entrance" is, on your sketch? that would put it more or less in the middle of the wall, which looks like it would be a good place. Just a comment here: Your CR seems to be wider than it is long. Not a good idea. Your speakers should fire down the longest axis of the room, generally speaking, not across the short axis. So how about if you set it up facing to the right?

The only thing to consider is that the wall between the 'Entrance Porch' and 'Control Room' is brick. All the other partitions are plasterboard.

OK, so that means that you could even rip out the existing wall between CR and LR, and re-design the whole setup? That might be a good idea, actually.

I have a budget of £1000 (which needs to also pay for materials for a custom desk).

I don't want to sound like a wet blanket, but that won't go very far for what you need to do. The desk alone could cost you that much, depending on how fancy you want to make it. And the entire £1000 won't go very far to doing all the things that you need to do to make that into a good studio. Is there any chance you can increase that budget, and do things over a longer period of time? Maybe live without the custom desk for a couple of months, while you get the basic shape, layout, isolation, and treatment of your room organized first? - Stuart -

Thanks for the great reply. Your totally correct with asking me to re-think the no sound proofing statement. I was only thinking about the studio becoming a problem to neighbours. There is no residential buildings in the area hence why I thought this might not be a problem. You are right, wind, rain, dogs, sheep, toilet..... I can only move the control room door south by about a foot, then the wall turns into brick. Ripping out the wall between the control room and live room and rethinking the design is definitely do-able. I don't need a door from the two rooms either, I was just thinking of leaving the door there since it is there already. Getting the rooms right is definitely the priority. The custom desk can wait. I'm going to have a look at the suggested studio designs now that you've given me the idea of re-designing the whole set-up. I would like to keep the control room on the south and the live room on the north of the building, just because the road is on the south side.

would this be a good setup for me? (without the vocal booth and sliding doors) If so what would i replace the sliding doors with? Slot resonators? Sorry if these questions are total noob!

If so what would i replace the sliding doors with? Slot resonators?

I'd probably start out with plain walls, then measure the room to see what it still needs, and install "what it still needs" on those plain walls... or leave them plain, as the case may be. You can predict the acoustics of a room roughly, and design the basic treatment roughly, but nothing beats actually testing the room once it is mostly finished, doing some real measurements in it, to see where the remaining issues are, then add additional treatment as need to deal with those issues. So if you have some empty wall available, then you have space to put in the "additional treatment", whatever it turns out to be. Anyway, based on what you say the brick wall at the entrance is fixed and can't be moved, and I guess the windows on the bottom and right walls are also fixed? But do you need them? Will you actually use those windows for natural light, or could you plug them if necessary? At the very least you will probably need to replace the glass in them with some thick laminate glass, but since that stuff is expensive ant your budget is limited, it might be easier 8and certainly cheaper!) to just design a plug that you can fit in the window frame and seal up. What else is fixed an cannot be changed? - Stuart -

Thanks again for the great advice. I don't need the windows and they can be sacrificed. The outer walls (and windows) cannot be changed. Also the entrance, toilet and stairs cannot be changed.

How does this look for a window plug? Id love to create these with a handle so I can pull them off to get the day light and fresh air from time to time. Think this is do-able?

How does this look for a window plug?

Something like that should work fine. It should be possible to make them removable, but take care with how you seal them in place. Ideally, you need an airtight seal.

keithie_boy wrote:

How does this look for a window plug?

Not preserved: windowsetup2.gif

Id love to create these with a handle so I can pull them off to get the day light and fresh air from time to time. Think this is do-able?

why not just add another window that can be opened - you will retain the natural light and you can open them when you aren't recording.

of course! great idea thank you! :-)

hey guys, Here's an update to my plan. Do you think I'm on the right lines? I have been donated a large double glazed window which I'm hoping to put between the live room and control room. The main things I will be changing is the angle of the wall between the live room and control room, and adding a wall (and 2 windows) on the south side of the control room to keep the nasty outside noises from getting inside. Also moving the control room door a foot south to allow for a bass trap in the corner, and putting the live room door in the middle for the same reason. Keep in mind that the floor is rock hard and reflective but I will be putting bass traps on the ceiling to stop flutter. I've not created a double wall between the live room and control room, or the rooms and the hall way to save on the budget. PS thanks to john sayers for the wee pictures of the chair and sofa :-)

that's getting there. couple of suggestions.

ah brilliant, that will save me moving the control room door also. The big bass trap that you changed in the live room, will i put that plasterboard or a fake wall with bass hangers? thank you :-)

I'd make it a slot resonator wall.