Challenge Time : Oddly shaped bedroom into a Studio

Ok, so I want to do this thing up right. I need some help setting up my home studio and I hope to give enough info for you wonderful people to help me out. I'd like to do this as cheap as possible since I am not only a struggling musician, but I am also a broke college student. I go to a private art school so I am extra broke. What little money I have to put towards my hobby is going into this studio. I was thinking 703 for sound absorbtion. Suggestions for things to do now on a budget and then things to add later when I have more money would be awesome! I can't really change the shape of the room as far as construction or anything, but I can throw up blankets as walls maybe? I'll do this little thing in 3.25 parts... The Room, what I plan to do, and what I got. THE ROOM Ok, so the room is actually my bed room and the bed will have to stay. It is above the garage and there is also a small part of the attic above it. It is a very oddly shappen room. It is for the most part L shapped with an extension for the entrance. The Room has 8 foot ceilings. Below you can see an overhead diagram with dimensions and a few photos of the room. In the photos you can see where I have things in my room, but I am more than willing to completely rearrange the room to accomidate the recording studio. Also attached to the room are a closet (maybe emptying that out and making a vocal booth) and then my bathroom. Their dimensions and diagrams are below too. One thing not seen in the diagram are the slants at the top of two of the walls. The one on the 180.5" wall which is the one with the closet door on it has a slant with legs of 25"x25" and that slant starts 64" away from the corner where the closet door is and extends the rest of the wall which makes the slant 116.5". The wall opposite of that which is the 87.5" wall has a slant that has legs of 12"x12". You can see pictures of all this below. THE CLOSET (I hope this can work as vocal booth) The closet also has an 8 foot ceiling. It is 55.5" by 64" for the dimensions. This closet has two shelves in it. One is on the wall to the right as you walk in and is 48" off the ground. It extends from the corner 46" and sticks out form the wall 11". The other is 68.5" off the ground and it extends the full length of the wall that is right in front of you as you walk in. That makes it 64" and it sticks out from the wall 18". The higher shelf is covered in blankets and the lower shelf just has random stuff on it that I can throw somewhere else. If you look in the picture of the closet there is a small door below the lower shelf. This door is made of plywood and is just storage. The storage isn't air conditioned or insulated very well, so I'll prob need to throw something on that. Regardless we need to be able to open it. WHAT I PLAN TO DO I would like to be able to record vox, acoustic and electric guitar, bass, and drums. This section was shorter than I thought it would be. haha! Its the .25 of a part. WHAT I GOT Currently I am running a PC with Cubase and Dual Monitors. I am running all of my stuff into a behringer MX 2642A mixer and then out of that into my M-Audio Delta 44 which goes into Cubase. I have an M-Audio DMP3 Preamp as well. For Mics right now I have a Studio Projects C1. This month I will also be adding these things to my studio: Studio Projects C4's, AKG D112, M-Audio BX5's or Behringer Truth's (gotta hear the behringer's before I decide), and an SM57. Oh, I also have a cheap Yamaha keyboard that I use as a MIDI controller. Ok, so any help or suggestions you all have would be so much help to me. I really don't know too much and I want to do the best job I can for now. I am willing to rearrange the room. So if you have good ideas about where to move the bed, desk, etc please do tell. I could put up a blanket or several blankets as a way to separate the smaller break off from the room where my desk is now from the bigger area of the room that currently has my bed in it. I will be taking everything out of the closet unless you recommend that I leave the blankets up top of the shelf for absorption. There are lots of blankets as you can see. Below are the photos with descriptions of their location. Please let me know if you have any questions. Did I give enough info? THANKS SO MUCH IN ADVANCE GUYS! DIAGRAMS - not to scale! Diagram with furniture placed - http://caseybritt.com/soundtreat/diagramw.gif Diagram without furniture placed - http://caseybritt.com/soundtreat/diagramwo.gif PHOTOS ROOM Through entrance door looking at double window - http://caseybritt.com/soundtreat/room01.jpg Turn to right look at corner of room with Desk - http://caseybritt.com/soundtreat/room02.jpg (that table blocking most of the desk will be gone) Closer view of corner with desk and bookshelf - http://caseybritt.com/soundtreat/room03.jpg Looking at closet door from desk area - http://caseybritt.com/soundtreat/room04.jpg Looking at the 12"x12" slant - http://caseybritt.com/soundtreat/room05.jpg In front of TV looking at corner with bathroom door and closet door - http://caseybritt.com/soundtreat/room06.jpg Looking at 25"x25" slant over bed - http://caseybritt.com/soundtreat/room07.jpg CLOSET Corner opposite door, both shelves seen - http://caseybritt.com/soundtreat/room08.jpg Looking down on lower shelf and small plywood door - http://caseybritt.com/soundtreat/room09.jpg All those blankets on the top shelf - http://caseybritt.com/soundtreat/room10.jpg Showing the end of the lower shelf above plywood door - http://caseybritt.com/soundtreat/room11.jpg Thanks, Casey PS - the room's a little messy so please forgive me. I just moved home from college and haven't finished putting everything away. But as you can see I am ready to get crackin on this studio thing.

Wish I could help you with the acoustic side of things...but I let those more in the know around here give you some answers, I'm still learning too! However, I do feel I need to chime in here about the Behringer Truths....don't do it! I don't know what you are monitoring on right now, but as an owner of the truths for about two years I can say they have given me nothing but problems (now including an incessant humming coming from one of the amplifier sections). Not to mention the slightly exaggerated lows/highs. Sure, the price is right and they are pretty loud--may or may not be important to you. In that size of a room, probably not. Have to say, can't go wrong with the Studio Projects stuff though...I have not heard anything I don't like yet. Sorry if this was OT, but I thought I would share my experience.

thanks for the heads up on that one man! It looks like I will be going with the BX-5's then. I understand about the not enough bass, but I will be testing the mix on various systems to make sure it sounds good before I am done. And then eventually I Will get the sub. Thanks so much. Anyone want to tackle the acoustics? Eh John? Eh Knighfly?

can anyone help me? please :: puppy dog face ::

Hey Casey - didn't notice you weren't getting response - possibly others were as aghast at the mess as I was - I finally found someone even less organized than I am :? - The first thing to do is support your local dumpster - all that clutter, empty bottles, dead pizza boxes, etc, may be the thing for college dorms but will cause problems in a room used for sound - buzzes, rattles, wierd frequency response, etc, not to mention health hazards from mold, dust, mildew... Beyond that, whatever monitors you get should NOT have larger than about 6" woofers for 2-way speakers, it leaves too much of a hole in the frequency response between woofer and tweeter - they need to be placed symmetrically in the room - if there's a wall within 2 feet of one, there should be a wall within 2 feet of the other, etc - you want PLANE symmetry, with that plane being VERTICAL and drawn equidistant between the two speakers and through the center of your head - imagine a large sheet of plywood bisecting your head and passing between your speakers - everything on one side of that piece of plywood should have a counterpart on the other side of the plywood. Blankets in the closet are the least of your worries, and will likely help absorb lower frequencies to help balance out the room response. Check around this site, you'll notice that most pix of rooms have the mixer on a desk centered between the speakers - this is because you don't want your head pulled out of the "sweet spot" when making adjustments on the mixer, or you'll either make wrong choices or have to make several changes and then put your head back centered between speakers to hear what you did - Blankets hung here and there will mainly just deaden the highs too much and cause your room sound to be too "boxy" - too much midrange - sound-wise, you'd be better off using the entire room's volume to even out response. Is your bed really that large, or could it possibly go in the alcove where your desk is shown? You only need access to one side to keep it made - that way, you could put your desk on the wall on the left side of the plan, centered on that wall - the bed would act a bit as a bass trap if it were in the alcove to your rear (as you sit at the desk) - Just a start, I'm pretty buried right now with project stuff; you can get a lot of education in this stuff at the SAE site, and the more you learn the more questions it will bring up (but they'll be informed questions) - I would concentrate on filling a dumpster with all the crap that will vibrate, trip you, or give you asthma - (not including the guitar, of course :wink: ) and then, spend some time reading the tons of useful stuff here and at the SAE site - it's all good, and any day you learn something is a GOOD day (Even at my age there are no BAD days :D ) I'll try to not let you fall through the cracks, but don't get all "frowny" if it takes a couple-three days, I work some pretty long hours and generally give up sleep to get more than a couple hours a day for this - all the study you do here and at SAE will pay off in improved understanding of this complex subject though, which will help you make better and better recordings with the gear you have available... Steve

Thanks so much Steve. I will definitely do all of the things you said. And all the clutter in my room right now is because I just moved back from college so I am in the process of getting everything unpacked and put back where it goes. My bed will fit in the alcove where my desk is, but it will stick out of there a bit. I can def get it in there though. I have had it there before and I will try moving it there this weekend. As for the mixer issue, I really don't use the mixer that much. I will only be using it for live recordings. So at that point I will probably move it over, but I do everything else digitally so the mixer serves no purpose unless I need to mic something with more than 4 mics (not the case for now), or if I am micing something live. I completely understand that you are busy, and I am happy to get just this one reply from you. Thanks so much and any help you have in the future will be taken with smiles and an open mind :) Thanks Steve! --Casey

No problem; and, if you're not using the mixer that much then you're right about placement - instead, since you're doing most things on the 'puter that's what should be centered between your speakers (try to keep the monitor as far out of the audio path as possible, though) Also, watch that you don't place speakers or your head at exact fractions of any dimension of the room, such as 1/2, 1/3, 1/4, etc - (you DO need to be centered and symmetrical left-to-right for stereo imaging, but don't put your speakers so the woofer sits at half your ceiling height, for example) Good luck with your dumpster campaign... Steve