floorspace layout, help me carve it up!

hi guys, here's my apartment. i'm trying to figure out how to orient things, which kind of soundproofing/trapping to use. the dimensions are close, but not exact if you're trying to figure out golden-ratios or modal buildup. my current idea is to put the speakers in the "mix area" facing back into the apartment. around this area would be the equivalent of an ASC "attack wall" with lots of tall cylander tubes for trapping/diffusion. then i'd add bass trapping by the sliding glass door wall, assorted diffusion in the room. maybe some helmholtz blocks somewhere, some rpg skylines, etc. the floor is hardwood. i could carpet it. the ceiling is 8', except as you go down the stairs it gets down to 16'. i was originally thinking of building a room within a room, but then that really shortens my walls, adding to standing wave problems. so even though my room is not symmetrical, at least the bass has over 30 feet of travel. close to 50 feet if i kept the bedroom door open. i was thinking about building a short wall near the "railing" to extend that wall back about 3 feet. at least then my left-right symmetry would be there up to the mix position and a little ways back. the closet by the sliding glass door could be a machine room for computers. the closet by the bathroom is definitely an iso booth. it's the most isolated part of the apartment. i've soundproofed with 2" and 3" foam and raised the floor up. i'll probably add some bass traps in there too to suck out some of the bass build up. the overall strategy is for mixing/mastering and hip-hop production. i don't give two terds about rock bands, so i don't need drum iso booths and places to put marshall amp stacks. i don't need multiple headphone feeds. it's one track at a time careful production using samples, loops and overdubs. i could do vocals out in the main room from time to time if needed. i was thinking about using absorbtive gobos or setting up the tubes to provide reasonable deadening of the sound. outside noise isn't a big deal. no big jet planes or trucks. not a lot of structural vibration. kids during day are sometimes outside, kind of annoying. considering blocking the sliding glass door with a wall and a door to kill that one element of occasional noise disturbance. maybe use some sheets of that heavy auralex soundblock rolls. never used it. maybe worth a shot with buiding a thin wall. also very open to building corner bass traps going all the way up to the ceiling. i'm good with tools, but i'm not a professional. i can also build gobos and 703 panels and get some guilford of maine cloth. as it stands the apartment basically sounds good. i think with proper treatment it will be a place to do mixes that translate well. i've played around with having the speakers shoot down the long way of the apartment, but the left-right symmetry isn't as good. and it doesn't "feel" as good. there seems to be more zen being in the cutout area by the sliding glass door. my current idea is to get a set of adam s5-a speakers and free-stand them. i could build a soffit mount setup into the sliding glass door wall (build a wall). but people have said the adams work fine free standing. the baseboard heaters need to be considered if bulding walls within walls and stuff. also the neighbors on the far long wall on the back (not the sliding glass door side, the other side) can be a bit rude late at night with loud voices. but i can overcome that and out-rude them by turning my speakers up. i could build a fake wall of some sort to block them out, but the baseboard heater complicates that somewhat. i also have a fairly ambitious weight-lifting set which needs to be accomodated. right now it's in the "mix area". but i'm planning to move it over by the closets/wall in the far corner on the way to the bedroom or something like that. it doesn't matter acoustically, but it's a size thing i have to accomodate. also, i'm very open to furniture layout ideas (where to put a couch or a plant). also i *do not* use a mixer! i like to be as minimalistic as possible to avoid comb filtering and clutter. i have a midi keyboard. i could put that along a wall for track creation and then sit in the center for critical mixing. i'm good with hooking up kooky computer things like multiple monitors or remote controls and stuff. i'm very sensitive to clutter, so any way to hide wires, let me know! i'm thinking the "attack wall" "quick sound field" using the cylanders could hide wires behind it. so let me know...thanks!

the pic doesn't want to appear?? cheers john

thanks for letting me know, Mr. Sayers. It comes up fine on my browser when I look at it. I saved it/uploaded it as a tif file. it was small about 95k. maybe i should load it up as a jpg?

yeah - maybe try a jpeg. ;) cheers John

ok, here's a jpg. hope it works!

I suspect the best way to go is to build a series of gobos that you can place around you in the current mix position - i.e. facing the sliding door to the verandah. like this. cheers john

thanks for your response and cool picture, Mr. Sayers. that's a cool place to put a couch. it's a good location point to have clients settle in at, since the couch would be at the top of the stairs a few feet in. it's actually a completely logical/obvious spot for it, but my brain somehow abandoned all logic on furniture and i wasn't picturing that, so thanks for "grounding" me on that element. my brain went into a weird star trek void. do you have any opinions on the ASC style of room treatments? I've become completely enamored of their "attack wall" and "quick sound field" ideas. my affinity for the ASC style is all theoretical, because i haven't been in a listening room set up like that. but man do i get "sold" when i go to their website. more than other treatment sites (although RPG diffusors are very attractive to me too). this site has me hooked: http://www.asc-studio-acoustics.com/