Basic Studio Design

Hi, In the attachments I put two drawings of a place where I would like to set up a recording studio for some Rock n Roll and Indie bands. To the studio: Dimensions: 6,55meters = 21,48 feet 3,86meters = 12,66 feet height about 2,5meters = 8,2 feet The floor is covered by floor tiles and the top is wooden with 15cm (5,9 inch) heat insulation. The walls are solid rock about 0,5m (19,68) thick. Half wood half glass (double-vacuum) door - good sound isolation from outside noises Window double glass as well. Walls are covered in lime, I will measure the reverb when the place will be empty with some improvised omnidirectional speaker. From what I calculated the proportions are near to perfect but! I would like to fit in a recording studio with a mixing deck and computer and two monitors in there, along with preamps tape recorders and some other gear. Inside I would like to fit a piano, one guitar amp, one bass amp and a corner for the drumms and drummer. So what do you people say about the layout? After I measure the reverb I would probably have to place there some "multi-fusors" maybe a manhatan-diy. Maybe half the studio floor should be covered in carpet. Would it be possible to make some good recordings with the whole band playing in such a small space? Thanks guys R.

Hi "somorastik". Please check the announcement at the top of the forum about what to do to assure getting as many responses as possible. The announcement leads to this post (click here). You seem to have missed something! :)

The floor is covered by floor tiles

Ceramic tiles? What is underneath those?

Half wood half glass (double-vacuum) door - good sound isolation from outside noises

Are you sure? What are the acoustic specifications for that door? It might be fine for normal house or office noises, but "Rock n Roll and Indie bands" are a bit different! If that glass is the typical thin double-glazing used in houses, it won't be much good at low frequencies.

I will measure the reverb when the place will be empty with some improvised omnidirectional speaker.

Omnidirectional speakers are not important for that: an omnidirectional mic is. Use full-range (20Hz - 20 kHz) speakers with flat response, and use a proper measurement mic.

From what I calculated the proportions are near to perfect

"Perfect" for what??? :) They aren't very good at all acoustically, for example. A ratio of 1 : 1.54 : 2.61 is pretty bad, not close to any known good ratio, and does not satisfy Bolt's criteria. The Bonello curve is pretty bad too, with two dips in it.

I would like to fit in a recording studio with a mixing deck and computer and two monitors in there, along with preamps tape recorders and some other gear ... a piano, one guitar amp, one bass amp and a corner for the drumms and drummer.

IT sounds like it is going to be rather crowded in there!

After I measure the reverb

It is a small room, so therefore it does not have a reverberant field, technically. It is too small to build up much of a proper statistical reverberant field. You can measure modal response and energy build up, but not true reverberant response.

I would probably have to place there some "multi-fusors" maybe a manhatan-diy.

Once again, it is a small room, and therefore most types of diffuser cannot be used successfully, for many reasons.

Maybe half the studio floor should be covered in carpet.

That would be a bad idea! Carpet has random and selective acoustical properties that are probably unknown, and almost certainly do not match what you need for that room. Far better to actually calculate and measure the room response, the install proper absorptive or tuned acoustic treatment, as needed. Of course there are some basic treatments that you can include in your design already, since they are obviously necessary for that room, such as a lot of large bass traps in the corners, and thick absorption on your first reflection points. But diffusion is not what you need for a small room like that. - Stuart -

Hi, thanks for reply let me specificate what I know, sorry for not reading the top of the forume I posted in a haste. I will use only metric dimensions now. -ceramic tiles 1,5cm thick, underneath 10cm concrete. -the windows are set, I cant do much about that, Im a student and I try to do what I can with what I have. As I said double glass with vacuum inside, something like plastic windows used in houses Maybe I can tae advantage of the low frequencies absorbtion, you can imagine the dimesions of the glass from the drawings I posted. -sorry I calculated this only quick about a year ago :-) Sorry Im not perfect. I imagine maybe I can adjust the proportions using plaster board (I cant do bigger building changes) and it will devide the studio into a recording room and a mixing studio. -maybe I can add reverb after the recording is done to cancel out the imperfections of the recording room. I dont know if this is the proper way to do that. -One thing I forgot to mension, the lime on the walls is very structured maybe even 2cm peaks can be found there, I dont know if you can imagine that, its a type of plaster. And the last thing I would mention is my position in this whole process. Im a student and its my fathers room, in fact it is an old piggery (a good name for a recording studio :-) ). Its pretty damn cold in there even during the summer, so that might be an advantage. As I mentiond I cant be building some extra walls in there. I want it to be as much as diy as I can, I can build a bass trap and so on, some other acustical treatment I can buy. Why I posted is, to ask if it even has a potential as a recording studio? I realy want it to be since I live in a flat and cant do no good recording in there. I dont have any acoustical measurments yet, nor responses for the used materials. I only tried to clap in that room, there was some furniture and I thought I heard a reverb so I thought ok! The walls are pretty damn thick I can tell you, I was crushing the hole for the window in the back. Sorry for the little data I provided, but thats all I have. So what would you recomend? Thanks again for responding

sorry for not reading the top of the forume I posted in a haste. I will use only metric dimensions now.

Actually, that was not the problem! You can use either metric or imperial measurements: Nobody minds. That post I linked to does not even mention units of measurements! Please click on that link I gave you above, and carefully read what it says there. - Stuart -

I read through the instructions and I updated my profile. Im located in Slovakia, the studio is located in Blatnica, its a very nice place, village in nature. http://maps.google.cz/maps?hl=cs&q=blatnica&gs_sm=e&gs_upl=3148l4005l0l4194l8l6l0l0l0l0l174l708l2.4l6l0&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.,cf.osb&biw=1280&bih=675&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&tab=il The budget is about 500 dollars, as much as diy as I can (that means building my own bass traps)

Anyone willing to help? I tried to provied all the information I can. Thanks :shot:

"From what I calculated the proportions are near to perfect but!" That is good..but 500USD is not going to correct the hard surfaces you have to deal with. I would say try to set up an area that allows you to mix well, but the hard surfaces are really begging for more money...

You mead the surfaces have to be flat? So I can get more reverb? Or should I use some bass traps?

somorastik wrote:

You mead the surfaces have to be flat? So I can get more reverb? Or should I use some bass traps?

I think you should read more..study your room...figure out what it is that has the potential to be an issue. Like hard surfaces. Once you understand those then you begin to understand the basics of flutter. And small rooms that are known to have panel effect that produces bass build up in the corners. The basic corner being the horizontal corners...the most aggressive bass issues requiring wall to ceiling and floor to wall mitigation with broad band absorption, what you refer to as bass trapping. It's a marathon not a sprint:)

Well it seems Im a real newbie. What do you recomend I study? I want to find out if the place is ok for a recording studio, because I dont have any other options, and I want to record. Wouldnt you help me out just a little bit? Thanks

I just noticed that I completely missed your earlier reply! Sorry! :oops:

-ceramic tiles 1,5cm thick, underneath 10cm concrete.

Great! Excellent floor.

-the windows are set, I cant do much about that, Im a student and I try to do what I can with what I have. As I said double glass with vacuum inside,

Well, that will give you some isolation, at least, but probably not much in the low frequencies.

Maybe I can tae advantage of the low frequencies absorbtion,

Low frequency absorption, also called "bass trapping", will help as treatment for the acoustics of the room (make it sound good), but will not do anything at all to isolate ("soundproof") the room. Isolation and treatment are two very different things.

-maybe I can add reverb after the recording is done to cancel out the imperfections of the recording room. I dont know if this is the proper way to do that.

Well, you CAN add reverb, yes, but your problem is actually the opposite: the room will have it's own reverb, which you need to take out of the recordings, but unfortunately there just isn't any way of doing that. There is no such thing as a successful "un-reverb" plug in, although there have been many attempts to create one. It is just too complex to take out the room sound from a recording. That's why studios are treated so carefully, so that there is no room sound, or at least so that the room sound is pleasant.

-One thing I forgot to mension, the lime on the walls is very structured maybe even 2cm peaks can be found there, I dont know if you can imagine that, its a type of plaster.

It might cause some diffusion of very high frequencies. 2cm variations theoretically will affect frequencies above about 4 kHz, so that might be useful, to some extent.

Why I posted is, to ask if it even has a potential as a recording studio? I realy want it to be since I live in a flat and cant do no good recording in there.

Compared to a flat, it probably will be better. The size is reasonable, and you say it already has reasonable isolation, so all you need to do is treatment. I'd suggest that you test the room, using REW, then post the results here so we can see what the issues are.

Would it be possible to make some good recordings with the whole band playing in such a small space?

Probably not all at once, as you'll get too much bleed between mics, but recording one instrument at a time should work, if you have decent treatment. - Stuart -