Small Studio in Isolated Building

I've recently acquired a new house and included on the property is a small cottage of sorts in which I had the wonderful idea of building a studio inside. :D I will be 100% honest in saying that I have NO experience in building a recording studio. :? I do however, recording experience but only during live shows. I book local bands for a few of the local venues and offer a live recording of the bands' set. I have been doing a ton of reading lately and I know have a ton more to do before I start this project. I do have construction experience and I'm very good numbers, formulas, etc. :mrgreen: I guess I'm looking for some help in planning how to set up my studio. I'm interested in helping the local bands by offering them a cheap solution to the larger studios around. I'm not looking for top of the line here, but I do want to offer the best that I can with what I have available. I have a Lowes within 15 minutes of my house so materials should be easy to come by. Some notes about the building, it does not have any HVAC so I will have to account for it in the build. I don't have any db readings as of yet, however, the building is in my back yard. My neighbors are not very close but I don't want to keep them awake if recording continues late. As far as the construction of the building goes, I honestly have no clue. It appears to be a 2"x4" frame with 3/8" drywall walls. I do not have any clue as to the insulation in the walls but from being inside of it, it does not sound the greatest. My budget has greatly increased lately with my new job, however I would like to see this project brought in under $10K but I am flexible. Like I said, I want to offer the best I can with what I have available. Walkthrough: Front (and only) door, the door on the right leads to a small bathroom with shower, toilet, & sink. :arrow: What I would consider to be the live room. :o I'm not to sure what to do with the two windows as of right now. :? A small (4'x5.5') closet, would be a nice vocal booth with a little work. 8) What I would consider to be my control room. :wink: The void between the hallway and the "control room" is the bathroom from earlier. :| My quick, rough SketchUp of my idea for a layout. :) All dimensions are +/- 1" Live room - 19'2"W x 15'9"D x 8'H Control Room - 5'6"W x 7'6"D x 8'H Closet - 5'6"W x 4'D x 8'H Front Door - 36"W x 6'3"H I'm sorry if I missed any of the required info or if I somehow messed up on posting this, but I hope some of those in the know can help me in my quest to design a studio worthy of the beauty of music.

Nice beginnings... First, I recommend that you build a 'one room' studio in your 'live room'. Use the room that you were going to make into the control room a booth. Tear out the closet in the main room - too small. The minimum recommend volume for decent modal response is 1500 cubic feet. The kitchen is way too small but would make a good booth. What isolation will you be needing? How close are neighbors? The building seems to have a crawl space underneath. If you need isolation, you will have to do a lot of work. The STL of this type of construction is probably not better than 30db, so considerable 'beefing up' will be in order and you will need to deal with the floor. Cheers, John

Hey John, thanks for the reply. So, if I understand you correctly, put myself and the band in the main room and make the kitchen into a booth? Isolation, well, I'm not exactly sure how close the neighbors are but I know I can hit their house with a rock if I threw it. I would like to make it as quiet as possible with the space I have. The underside of the building appears to be completely open. I could probably raise the whole building or possibly fit my skinny body underneath to gain access to the flooring. It doesn't seem like it has anything under it, I'm assuming just a frame and a plywood floor. I was looking at John Sayers http://johnlsayers.com/Stuff/Small_Studio.skp. It seems to be close to the same dimensions as my main room. With that design in mind and "beefing up" the walls and floors with using the kitchen as a booth, what could be possible? How much would I be able to build up the walls before loosing to much space inside the building? How about the floor, what should be done to it, in an ideal situation that is, I know I haven't given the best description of the structure. I will work on mocking up a new idea with John Sayers design and post it later.

you should probably set up your monitors and play some things which are representative of what you record and/or are good references for you and take a sound meter in and around the building to identify just how much isolation you might need. maybe you can beef up the floor inside if getting under the building is hard or perhaps build some block wall along the exposed area to seal it.

So, if I build a block wall underneath the building, it would be enough? Fill in the block with concrete or is that overkill? Setting up inside of it is not feasible right now as I am renting it out for some extra income. I'm sure I will need to do work in it, that's inevitable.

you'll need to measure but just guessing, some concrete block filled with sand or concrete up to the existing flooring will be a better isolator for the sound coming through the floor than the open space you have now. you'd want to examine how feasible this would be plus consider any need for venting underneath etc. the other option is adding mass under the existing floor and one option could be using cement board or drywall in-between the floor joists. adding mass to the existing structure means you need an engineer to verify the structure can handle it. i'd also consider removing and replacing the kitchen wall per John's idea to make it an isolation booth. optionally the control room could be set into the corner of the big room.

What measurements would be needed? I'm pretty sure I could manage to get a block wall built all around the building, possibly even a second wall prior to it, if it would make a difference. Or maybe a combination of concrete board in between the frame and a concrete block wall all around. Or am I going over board, is there such a thing?

using a sound meter to measure the sound levels inside and out to get a sense of how much more work you have ahead of you... i think if you added the block wall then it's likely the additional mass underneath (unless the floor is resonating inappropriately) would not be necessary.

Not to sound like I'm new at this but is there a way to know how much adding certain materials will actually effect the sound? In other words, if there is a 30db difference now, how would I know what to expect from adding the support? (Other than just doing it)

well we can make some assumptions about the TL of the block and that things are properly sealed, decoupled etc. since it's an existing structure that isn't purpose built, there will be many trade-offs to be made along the way.

Ok, now that I'm home and have real internet instead of my Blackberry, I just saw the layout you posted. I'll take a better look at it in the next few minutes. Thank you for all your help guys. I know this building isn't perfect for a studio, but I like to look at it as a good starting point for better things to come.

Wow, I love the layout! Not that it's that big of deal, actually, I think it will help, but the door to the bathroom is right beside the front door instead of in the main room and the front door opens in the opposite direction. Where you have the door is where the shower is actually located. If I'm thinking correctly, the door not being there is a good thing since it will be a more solid wall. One question I have, any recommendations for replacing the existing exterior windows? Thanks again!

I've been putting your layout into SketchUp, just for my own benefit, easier to know what is going on when I do it myself. Based on the "Room in a room" idea, I used 3" between the outside and inside walls. Using this, should I do the same for the CR/Live/Booth walls?

yeah, having fewer doors in the live room is better. for the windows - the ones you close up, i'd remove any interior bits and frame it out using plywood and add layers of drywall to get the mass up and get it sealed properly. leave the outside window if you can or want to, otherwise remove it and put on appropriate siding. on the ones you keep, consider some really good quality exterior grade windows one inside and one outside. otherwise you could construct them yourself with some heavy glass somewhat like what you'll want to do for a control room window. 3" might be more than you need, maybe half that because you want to include the space between the exterior and the interior (you do realize you need to strip the interior drywall to avoid a third leaf?) so if you have 3.5" stud depth, 1.5" air, 3.5" stud depth, you have a total of 8.5" of air. this is a reasonable amount of air space.

Yeah, I know I have to strip it, I just figured, the more air the better. I guess since I'm using such a small space, I don't need a lot. As far as the windows, I'd like to keep the Live room exterior window as well as the Booth exterior window. The Control Room exterior window looks at the fence dividing my yard and the neighbors, no need for it. In order to do so, I think I'll install one exterior and build one heavy on the interior wall. Any advice on hiding the gap between walls while looking through the windows? I know this is a lot of questions, but I just want to make sure I do everything correctly.

usually a strip of thin rigid insulation or neoprene covered with cloth will trim out the space between windows and keep things from being coupled. if you don't have Rod's book on building a home studio, you should definitely get a copy. you will find all the construction details (such as fire stops, bulking up exterior walls, etc) needed. in fact, Rod's 2nd edition is coming out this week so your timing is impeccable! http://www.amazon.com/Home-Recording-St ... 143545717X :yahoo:

Super sweet! I'm in need of some new reading material! Thank you so much. So far, all the books I've found have dealt with gear more than building the studio itself. I've been plowing away at SketchUp all morning, trying to figure out all the little tools. I must admit, it's a lot different than AutoCAD, but I'm getting used to it.

You can use AutoCAD and export to sketchup. It's 'sketchy' but works. I still haven't gotten the hang of sketchup... too busy. :P Here's a 'second' on buying Rod's book, it should answer a lot of your questions about construction and raise some more. ;) Concrete block (8 x 8 x 16) around the perimeter of the building, sealed well, cores grouted, and painted will give you around STC50-55. If the floor sound like a drum, the best way to solve this problem is to brace the flooring with addition posting underneath. This is done by placing concrete pads in a pattern beneath the joists and stacking cement block up to the joist. Use large shims to get the right height & make it snug. Do this in a 3 or 4 foot pattern beneath the main room and booth area. The earth is a very good damping material. Once you get your layout, position the operator in the control room/main room and draw site lines to the booth. If you can adjust windows and doors for best ergonomics, do it. Since you will be doing a major remodel you might as well get what you want. I would recommend facing the end closest to the booth and rather than the corner and possibly having only a small window to the booth. This is for symmetry reasons. You can angle the window towards the rear of the CR to point any early reflections toward an absorptive back wall. Cheers, John

I don't have access to AutoCAD anymore, so no worries on importing it. I'm getting the hang of SketchUp, after trial and error and web searching, I think I can do just about the same as AutoCAD's basic stuff. I WILL be getting Rod's book. From the sounds of things, the "foundation" will be my biggest endeavor in this project, which is not a problem by me. Instead of shims, would it be feasible to just dig a little and get the right height so the building sits on the blocks? I've got a decent layout mocked up in SketchUp, and the view from the CR window to the Booth is pretty decent in my opinion but I will upload it when I get everything in place so you can give me your opinion. :mrgreen: Unless I'm not following your reasoning. If I'm wrong, just tell me. :oops:

I'm sorry for the pics, I can't seem to get the SketchUp file below 5mb, even after the purge. View from up top View from the Control Room looking at the Booth

as a general rule, avoid using a lot of images and materials until you're ready to do something that requires them. this will significantly reduce the size of the file and also make adjusting your model faster.

Yeah, I've since deleted the console and stuff like that. I'm down to around 800kb, still a little to big, tweaking it some more yet.

Not sure what else I can do to this drawing to shrink the file size. It's still at 665kb. The frames are build, outer walls and inside walls are done, not to sure on the angled wall parts. I guess I just need to quit asking questions and actually go buy the book huh... :roll: I want to thank you guys for the help so far. I'm sure I messed up on the first post somehow and really appreciate the help I've gotten.

the angled walls inside the booth and live room are simply frames which hold the absorption and/or are broadband slot resonator units. you may find some space for a poly or two. one challenge is the control room since it's fairly small. having two back to back doors could be tough. it might make sense to extend the hallway all the way to the control room and make it an air lock and make the far CR door simply a small window into the live room.

If the angled walls are frames, wouldn't that make a triple leaf effect? Or am I over thinking that part? Just decouple the angled walls? I like your idea about the CR mods, makes more sense that way. Thanks again.