Studio Design - Very Small workspace

Hello!! I came across this forum by accident a couple of months ago, and have been reading and researching every since. I was one of those guy who thought I had a studio as long as I had my protools rig and monitors. (sadly a couple of album has been leased with my mixing in this environment, cant wait to see what I can do in a ideal environment). After heavy reaching I have finally decided to pull the trigger and start a studio build in a room built in the garage. (the room was built before we got the house). I am terrible at Sketch 3D so I have a drawing I drew up to scale 1" = 2' I purchased all the insulation (r13) and studs and quite sound drywall already, however if you guys think the design just wont work, I can return it since I havent used it yet. My budget it open, however if there are two way of things things I will take the lease expensive route. Thanks!

What is it that you want from this room? Are you trying to construct a control room AND a tracking room? Do you have idea for an isolation booth/room? What are the measurements of the existing structure? Are you wanting to construct a "room in a room" type environment or do you only concern yourself with interior acoustic treatments?

What is it that you want from this room? Controll room and live room for my drums and vocals. I have no problem moving the drums to make room when it's time to record vocals. I am trying to build a room within a room. The original room size is: 13' L x 11'6" W 8' H Thanks for taking the time to reply!

And I should add: Another purpose for the studio is some type of sound isolation from the house, which is right on the other side of the open door in the drawing. (that way I can track with keeping the peace with the wife). I wish I was half way decent with sketch 3D to give you guys a better idea of what I'm talking about.

"13' L x 11'6" W 8' H" You would be in a better position if you simply used all the available space rather than trying to cut it up into smaller portions.

That's what I was affraid of. Do you reckon I can get away with a 4 x 5 vocal room? Or am I setting myself up for a boxy sound in a booth of that size. Again thanks for your reply!

For a room this size, you can use the entire space as a control room and get a good voice sound with proper treatments.

Thanks for reply, after soaking in your advice I redesigned the control room. I am going to mix the Control room and the Live room together Once again I am very very terrible with Sketch 3D so the attachment is a drawing drawn to scale: 1" = 2' (This build out is based on a room built in a garage, Frame anchored to cement slab) And to make sure I have read and absorbed everything, this is how I build my 2 leaf wall: I have an existing wall - Drywall > Framing > Insulation > Drywall *Knock down outter Drywall on existing wall so its - Drywall(x2) > Framing > Insulation > *New Framing > Insulation > Drywall(x2) ? R13 should be ok? Sorry again for the terrible drawing, but at least its to scale! HAHA

I would really, really suggest that you spend some time figuring out SketchUp, using some of the on-line tutorials! It will make your life a whole bunch easier. I'm not understanding the design concept of your room: I cant figure out the purpose of the strange angled wall sections when, or the other things that might be doors or windows or something else. I also don't see the "room-in-a-room" concept that you said you were going to use: there doesn't seem to be any decoupling going on there (no MSM). There are no details of the existing structure (except that the floor is concrete and the stud frame is anchored to it).

*Knock down outter Drywall on existing wall so its - Drywall(x2) > Framing > Insulation > *New Framing > Insulation > Drywall(x2) ?

Yup, that's the general idea, but I'm not seeing it on your sketches! Anyway, you need at least 4 inches of air gap between the two sets of drywall. If you leave a 1" gap between the frames, then you will have about 8" of air gap, so that's fine (unless you are planning to build the new wall inside out?)

Another purpose for the studio is some type of sound isolation from the house, which is right on the other side of the open door in the drawing. (that way I can track with keeping the peace with the wife).

What are you design specs for isolation? What are your goals? In other words, what numbers did you measure in your initial testing, and how much isolation do you actually need? You need to be crystal clear on those numbers in order to design your wall properly. If not, then you are either wasting money by over-building the room, or you are going to be sadly disappointed when you don't get anything near what you are hoping for. - Stuart -

A few things that may help... For a room this small, you need the treatments, and overall it is in an attempt to be a mixing environment, so you should be with the tried and true for these areas.

Ok I finally got the hang of SketchUp!!! Build on concrete slab. Room As is: Once you open the door to the studio, there is a 5" step down into the studio. And a window which I plan to cover up(not an issue, no one can see this window, not even neighbors) The celling to the room slopes down to 6'1" staring at the 6'10" mark from the back wall. The Red walls are walls I plan to build (two leaf room within a room) Soffit my KRK Rokit Powered 8 Generation 2, I think I have the correct angle needed? Does this design look doable? Thanks for your patience with me everyone. Edit: I included the sketch up files IdealsStudio = Room as is IdealsStudiodesign = Room I hope to build

Ok I finally got the hang of SketchUp!!!

Great!!!! That's MUCH better! Now we can really see what is going on. What is the purpose of the strange angled wall at the right rear of the room (opposite the door)? Is there something on that wall that forces you to angle the wall like that?

The Red walls are walls I plan to build (two leaf room within a room)

You seem to be confusing your soffit walls with your inner-leaf walls: they are two different things. First you have your inner-leaf, and then you have your soffits. - Stuart -

Soundman2020 wrote:

What is the purpose of the strange angled wall at the right rear of the room (opposite the door)? Is there something on that wall that forces you to angle the wall like that?

I was trying my best to design the room after John's design here: http://www.johnlsayers.com/phpBB2/viewt ... f=1&t=5457

Soundman2020 wrote:

You seem to be confusing your soffit walls with your inner-leaf walls: they are two different things. First you have your inner-leaf, and then you have your soffits.

I was referring to Johns build again here, it seemed like the soffit was built right into that inner - leaf wall with a layer of insulation between the two...maybe my eyes are deceiving me when I look at that sketch file.

I was trying my best to design the room after John's design here:

What you see on the right rear of John's design isn't a wall! It's a bass trap. It is just cloth stretched over a frame with insulation behind. In fact, everything on the right side of that room is treatment, not isolation. There is no inner-leaf there. What you see at the front (for the soffits) is different on the left and on the right for the same reason: the left wall is an isolation wall to the LR, but the right wall is just a treatment wall, so therefore that MDF panel needs to be there to seal off the soffit space.

I was referring to Johns build again here, it seemed like the soffit was built right into that inner - leaf wall with a layer of insulation between the two...maybe my eyes are deceiving me when I look at that sketch file.

That isn't an inner leaf wall! That's the soffit panels. There are no inner-leaf front, side or rear walls on that design, probably because extreme isolation was not a major design goal, or because there was already enough isolation with the existing structure (or maybe there just wasn't enough room for it). The only MSM wall in that design is the divider between on the left of the CR, between the CR and LR. If you look at the layers window, the "thing with the speakers mounted in it" is called "speaker front", not "inner leaf". Practically all of that design is treatment, not isolation, except for the LR-CR divider wall, which is both isolation and treatment at the same time (since both leaves are built inside-out). You can't mount speakers directly into the inner-leaf wall, for many reasons: the soffit panels have to be separate from the inner leaf. So in your case, you first need to design your inner-leaf isolation walls around the room, and those can just be parallel to the existing outer-leaf walls. The inner leaf ceiling can also run parallel to the outer leaf ceiling. Then you can add treatment to the interior of the room, as needed, and you can also add your soffits at the front. If you want you can splay the inner-leaf walls and tilt the ceiling, such as for example if you were planning on an RFZ design and wanted to use the inner leaf as part of that, or if you just felt like doing that to deal with flutter echo. But if those concepts are not part of you design goals, then just run your inner-leaf parallel to the outer leaf. So I'd suggest that you re-do your design to first get the isolation correct, then add the soffits at the front (taking into the correct geometry for the speakers and listening position), then add the treatment, such as bass traps, first reflection points, slot walls, etc. - Stuart -

Thanks Stuart!!

Thanks Stuart!! Here is the design that I came up with, with the help of dynamike: viewtopic.php?f=2&t=8205 and: http://johnlsayers.com/Studio/Mainpage/ ... ctions.htm I am going to start knocking out the inner walls to get ready for two-leaf build...that is unless you see something wrong with this design (now I know the vocal booth is awfully small but I think it will work out just fine) Thanks again for your help!

Can you upload your SKP file please? - Stuart -

Soundman2020 wrote:

Can you upload your SKP file please? - Stuart -

Sure! Its attached

I started the demo! Carpet and inner drywalls are gone! Do you think I should go forward with this design? This way I can start my framing, the wife is ALREADY on me for the "mess" I'm making... Haha

I'm thinking that you really don't have enough room to fit a booth in there. The space is very small to start with, and adding a booth just reduces it too much, in my opinion. I'd go with a single-room design, where you record in the CR itself. If you have quite equipment, or can put your noisy equipment some place where the noise doesn't get into the room, that that's a good option. You can do the booth if you want, but I don't recommend it.

I am going to start knocking out the inner walls to get ready for two-leaf build...

Yup, you sure can do that! You need to do it anyway, regardless of whether you go with a booth or not, and regardless of the interior design, so go for it! It will be good to see what surprises are hidden in your walls, as well.... But be careful with the demo! Walls have electrical wiring, plumbing and other things in them. You don't want to start a flood, or electrocute yourself (or cut off your phone, cable TV, etc.... :) ) - Stuart -

Soundman2020 wrote:

(or cut off your phone, cable TV, etc.... :) )

not that you'll have time for those things anyways... :mrgreen:

"I am going to start knocking out the inner walls to get ready for two-leaf build." See, your design isn't ready and your education isn't up to par. In a room this small...just make it a one room area...do not inhibit the ability of the sound to bloom by building a waste of space that people call a vocal booth. It is too small...currently is TOO square and will most likely be able to divide into the height...but who can tell since you haven't produced enough information to really see this through. Well, except for "knocking the walls down" :) This is another error. You do not knock walls down....assuming you are talking about extracting interior sheathing/drywall. Since if you were actually knocking the framing members down I would have to say, you are on your own and nobody here has every heard of you :) If you are going to attempt to develop a mass/spring/mass assembly....and you are working with your hard earned money AND using your own resources, let me ask you to slow down, for more than the obvious reasons. Like, I could tell you, to take your time and cut the sheetrock out of the existing framing bays to be able to reinstall it in to the exterior frame for added mass....but since you are already out on a limb and think you have this under control...you already threw away the time AND the cost to mass up the exterior perimeter....and you got Mama upset...that is almost a strike-out brother. Then let us consider other things...like who knows what this property is constructed of but you? You did not share that with us, the details we use to help, but you have to be detailed...this ain't no circus act. So we move on to the ALLWAYS, inevitable part of a build where the poster did not even know that the ceiling was part of the dynamic. Guess what...it is, and I'm thinking this is your first time even looking up and saying "what have I done". We tell 'em to go slow...we beg some to go slow, but NOOOOOO...five weeks of reading is all I need, I'm gonna bust these walls out...'cause that is what I want to do...rather than do a build and develop a thread that can be USEFUL, you guys race on into the night, expecting change, and getting exactly that, but you could get a better return on your time and money...if you would just take the time to realize...you do not know what you are up against. At least, that's my thinking on it...