Help designing a studio in a 2 car garage

Hello, I am new to these forums and am hoping I will get the help I am searching for. :) I am seeking help building a studio in my garage. The room is 24'x24'x8'. Right now all of the existing walls are plywood. The ceiling is plywood with an inch of foam board insulation, and the floor is cement. There are two garage doors on one wall and two windows on another. ( I plan on covering the windows) The studio will be used for a 3 piece rock band, playing material similar to Zeppelin, Hendrix, and all of the other 60's/70's psychedelic rock bands. I am trying to do this as close to the way studios were in the 60's. I am looking for help on what design methods were used in the 60's. Were bass traps used? or unparalled walls, etc. Also, I am on a very tight budget, with only $3-$5 thousand to work with. I know it won't be anything professional but I am trying to get the best for my money. Any help and suggestions are appreciated. :)

So this is just a rehearsal room? No control room? In other words, you'll just be playing in there, not recording/mixing/mastering? Regarding your quest for 60's style acoustics: There's a reason why studios are not built that way anymore: they cost a fortune to build, and still didn't sound very good! They were also pretty large: yours isn't. Over the last 50 years, the science of acoustics has advanced quite a bit, and the way sound moves, behaves and interacts with objects and surfaces is much better understood. If you are planning to record in there, with a small space like yours it might be better to go for a more balanced, neutral sound, based on modern acoustics, then get the "honky-dull" sound through mixing, using reverb plugins that emulate that type of room.

The room is 24'x24'x8'.

:shock: Bad, bad, bad idea! All three dimensions are multiples of 8, and two of them are identical! That is already guaranteed to give you a very problematic modal response, which it will be impossible to fix on your budget. I'd suggest that you will want to build an extra wall in there somewhere, to fix that ratio. - Stuart -

No we will be recording/mixing/mastering in the room. We've been to several studios using iso's for the guitars and vocals and have not been happy with the results. The first album we produced, we had done ourselves, and recorded all instruments at the same time, sectioning off with gobos but not much more. Obviously there was some bleeding, but the results were much better. Also, we have been to a studio that did the same thing and the results were perfect! But since the three of us will be recording at the same time, we thought it would be easier to have the recording gear in the room with us. After remeasuring, the exact measurements are 279"x285"x78", I'm not sure if that makes a difference, or if it will once insulation and drywall are added. Bare with me, I'm new to this. :P

We've been to several studios using iso's for the guitars and vocals and have not been happy with the results.

Ahhhh! So you are not trying to reproduce the lousy 60's sound: you just don't like the sound of small vocal / iso booths! (Neither do I). That's a rather different matter. All small rooms sound bad: the smaller they are, the worse they sound, and the more treatment they need to make them more acceptable. Tiny booths are the worst of all, and no amount of treatment can make them sound good, so the other alternative is to make them sound dead, they try to add some life in the mix. Success on that front is illusive, ... :) So your quest is not really to build a bad-sounding 60's room, but rather to not get a "tiny booth" sound. Things are looking up! ITU and EBU recommendations for critical listening rooms are a MINIMUM room volume of about 1500 cubic feet, and live rooms of at least double that. You guys are fine on that front, but you have a different and serious problem: low ceiling. The studios of yester-year did not have 8 foot ceilings! More like 15, 20, 30, even 40 foot. You can't get good sound with a low ceiling, as the early reflections come back too fast at too high a level. That "airy" sound you are looking for is "airy" because of, well, air! Not just to the sides, but also above. There just isn't much "air" between the instrument/mic/your head and an 8 foot ceiling. There are some things you can do to the room to mitigate that to a certain extent, but you are not going to get the sound you are looking for in a room with a low ceiling. So if you really do want that open, airy sound, then you should look for a place with a much higher ceiling.

Also, we have been to a studio that did the same thing and the results were perfect!

And I'm betting that the studio in question did not have an 8 foot ceiling....

But since the three of us will be recording at the same time, we thought it would be easier to have the recording gear in the room with us.

Well, that's fine for tracking, but mixing successfully is a very different animal! Mixing requires some very specific room parameters, including: perfect room symmetry, no major modal issues, reflection free zone around the mix position, perfect speaker geometry, absolutely neutral frequency response, time domain response (RT-60) according to ITU recommendations, control of first reflections such that no reflections get back to the mix position in less than 15ms and at a level of less than 15 dB below the direct sound, etc. All of that can, indeed, be done in a garage (even one with an 8 foot ceiling), but it requires careful design and careful construction. If you build the room well for mixing, it will also have reasonably good acoustics for tracking, except of course for the ceiling height. You might want to think along that direction: Design it to be a great control room, and it will be a reasonable live room automatically. On the other hand, if you design it to be a lousy live room (your current plan), then it will be an even worse control room! :)

And would it be better to make the room, say 20x24 rather than 24x24?

There are dozens of good ratios, and thousands of bad ratios. 20x24x8 is better than 24x24x8, yes, but still not good. 17'6" x 23'3" x 8' is even better, but still not great, due to the low ceiling height. It fails one of the three key critical BBC tests for rooms usable as a studio.

No we will be recording/mixing/mastering in the room.

Mastering too? That is yet another ball game! Everything you need for a mixing control room you also need for mastering, but with far higher precision. And for successful mastering, you really need a large room with a ceiling higher than 8 feet. Having said all that, if this space is all you have, then it can be made to work out, but understanding the limitations. I'd suggest that you should think along the lines of building it as a mixing room that can also be used to track, rather than as a tracking room that can also be used to mix. - Stuart -

Thank you very much for your advice. All I need to figure out now is how to go about making it a control room suitable for tracking too. :P As I said, I am pretty new to recording, as far as designing a room. We may be getting a room at an old church, renovated into another business. On the plus our rent will be free! :) and the room might be as big as 4,000 square feet with a ceiling as high as 30 ft. However time is of the essence, so for now we are continuing to plan on our Home studio, rather than relying on that.

All I need to figure out now is how to go about making it a control room suitable for tracking too. :P As I said, I am pretty new to recording, as far as designing a room.

No problem! That's what this forum is here for! If everyone was an expert, this forum wouldn't even exist! The issue with acoustic design is that it isn't intuitive: sound does not behave the way most people think it should. It takes a while to "unlearn" everything you think you know about sound, then to re-learn the actual truth (which is sometimes surprising). Unlike most other places on the internet, this forum is based only on solid acoustic science, not guesses, myths and rumors. So you won't find any recommendations for egg crates on the walls or carpet on the floor here! What you will find is advice based on physics, materials and techniques that have been tested in independent laboratories and proven in real-world professional studios, but adapted to home studios as much as possible. You also won't find marketing hype from manufacturers trying to hawk a product, even though there are some manufacturers who post here regularly: they are welcome precisely because they DON'T hype their products here, and instead share their knowledge, experience and research. So if you are looking for a place where you can learn how to design your studio properly, you found it: John is one of the leading studio designers on the planet, and has built some pretty amazing studios (look around the forum for details!). He makes a living out of designing world-class studios for people with enough money to pay for that service, but he also shares his knowledge for free on the forum for the rest of us! Anyway, in your quest to learn how to design your place right, I'd suggest that you start out by reading two books on the subject. First, the Bible (not THE Bible(although reading that is highly recommended too), but rather "Master Handbook of Acoustics" by F. Alton Everest. That is considered to be the bible of acoustics, and takes you from basic concepts to everything you need to know to get started. The second book is "Home Recording Studio: Build it Like the Pros" by Rod Gervais. That's more of a practical "nuts and bolts" guide of how to actually put the bits together coherently, what materials to use, etc. Between those two books, you'll have a great basis to get started on learning how to design your studio. Then, with the help of the folks on this forum yo can refine the design to meet your needs and your budget, and once the design is complete, THEN you can start building. Way too many people make the mistake if starting to build before the design is complete, and before they even understand the concepts. Then they come here looking for solutions when it is already too late, and they get all upset when we tell them why what they did wont work, and which parts they have to knock down and re-build in order to get it right. Fortunately, you didn't make that mistake! You didn't build anything yet, and are just starting out with basic design questions. Great! What I'd suggest you do is to buy and read both of those books (try Amazon), then learn SketchUp (which is the design program that we all use here, and is FREE (!) from Google), and create a basic accurate model of your existing room, showing the correct dimensions and the positions of all of the doors, windows, and other things that could cause problems, and add in your first attempt at designing your studio, and post the SketchUp file here, for us to take a look at. Based on that we can give you advice on how to improve it, problems and solution, possible pitfalls, etc. In the meantime, while you are learning all this stuff (it takes a while!) you should also do some tests in that room and get some actual readings (with a sound level meter) of how loud you guys are when you play, how loud the ambient level is when you are not playing, and how quite things need to be to avoid getting arrested for disturbing the peace! In other words, call your local municipality and get a copy of the regulations on noise, to find out what the legal limits are. Subtract "A" from "B" and you get the basic number that defines your build: how much isolation you need. Based on that number you can look at the standard reference documents to find a construction method that will achieve that level of isolation, using materials and techniques that are within your budget. Based on that, you'll have an idea of the final interior dimensions that can be attained for your room (the isolation takes up space): With those dimensions in mind, you can find a good room ratio that fits your situation. With that ratio in mind, you can then start the basic layout, using the normal criteria for positioning your speakers and mix position (the critical starting point for any studio design): Then things will kind of fall into place: the initial round of treatment will suggest itself. Then, and only then, can you go out and by hammer, nails, 2x4s and drywall, and actually start building. Once the basic structure is in place, with the inner-leaf complete, then you can do a real acoustic analysis of the room, using REW (which you get for FREE from Home Theater Shack), and based on that we can help you figure out the next round of treatment. It's a long process, but that's the way to do it right, and it will get you the best possible studio for your space. There are many tricks and techniques that you can learn along the way to maximize performance and minimize the problems associated with your small space. So that would be my plan of attack. - Stuart -

Thank you very much Steearr. :) I plan on reading both, however, would one be more important to read than the other? As I said, time is of the essence, and we are trying to build it ASAP. It probably won't happen as soon as we would like though. :P

Rod's book is more practical, more design oriented. Everest's book is more theoretical. They are both important. Hard to say which one is more useful! - Stuart -

Okay thank you. Were hoping to have it done done by January, which isn't much time, I know. However, we only plan on using the studio for a few years, which is why I said I know it won't be professional and am just looking to get the best for our budget.

Well, please don't take this the wrong way, but I think that a January deadline is very unrealistic. Just doing the design itself will probably take a month, without even considering learning how to do it first, or then actually building it afterwards! It takes months to learn this stuff, even with full-time study. There are just so many things that you need to consider, and getting any one of them wrong can damage or destroy either the isolation or the acoustics, or both. I'd really suggest that you might want to reconsider your time-line, or if you really have to have it done by January, then hire someone to do the design for you, so you can just concentrate on the actual building. You are going to put a lot of money into the build itself, obviously, so even if it doesn't need to be top rate professional, it still makes sense to get the design right. It would be sad to invest all that money, time and effort in materials and labor, then end up with something that doesn't work at all. And that really is the most likely outcome if you rush without understanding. Building a studio is nothing at all like building or renovating a normal house or office: many things have to be done different, or it just won't work, plain and simple. I really reckon you should re-think your timing! - Stuart -

Thanks for the advice. I know we really should wait. The only problem is we would like to have our next album out by the end of april, to kick off our summer schedule and while we still have time. (we don't play out much during the winter) I will talk it over with my brothers, who are my other band mates, but I'm sure they won't wanna wait. http://mysteryfyre.com/ - take a listen if you have the time! :) keep in mind most of the material on here was from 2008/2009 and we have grown immensly.