Small Basement Overdub Studio

Hi all! I'm a composer (no engineer) for film and games. To up the overall production value of my music, I'd like to build a small overdub studio into the basement of my house - unfortunately the columns the house is resting on make it hard to get the necessary rooms to "fit", or so it seems to me. I came up with two layouts, but I'm still unsure if they would work. Could you guys please take a look at them and tell me what you think? The current, unfinished, room height is 7'7". Thanks for your help! best, Mike

I reckon your second option makes more sense, but you have the walls angled the wrong way! The room should be narrower at the front, where the speakers are, and wider at the back. That one also looks to be rather square-ish: You should check that, and make sure your ratio is good. Square rooms are bad news. - Stuart -

Thank you! I'll change the design!

Hi! I rearranged the layout - would this make more sense? (my apologies for the noob mistake with the room angles! :oops: )

Much better! What are the dimensions of the control room like that? - Stuart -

Here they are :) The (unfinished) room height is 7'7".

? Question? Where is the door located from the control room? Also ... it looks as if windows are located near the corners of your CR ... if so, this could cause issues when considering room treatment [i.e. corner traps].

Hi! The CR has two doors: One is located on the lower right, for access to the staircase as well as on the upper right, for access to the live room. There is one window on the left, the other opening in the wall on the lower left is in fact an access door to the main water shutoff valve of the house. You are right - installing corner traps on the right side of the CR (front and back) will be tricky, if not impossible. (Any ideas?)

n_Gazer wrote:

Hi! The CR has two doors: One is located on the lower right, for access to the staircase as well as on the upper right, for access to the live room. There is one window on the left, the other opening in the wall on the lower left is in fact an access door to the main water shutoff valve of the house. You are right - installing corner traps on the right side of the CR (front and back) will be tricky, if not impossible. (Any ideas?)

More info is still needed, I think, as to things like: Monitors. Are you planning to soffit mount, or free stand and stands? A 2nd concern, and this will be better handled by 'SoundMan' ... looking at the control room floor plan. You have the side walls 'splayed' ... are you planning an 'inside out' design ? Also ... although the splayed walls show a 12' width at the front, I notice that the overall width/length dimension are nearly square [~14' x 2-6"] ... I don't know if that would be a concern, but I raise the question just to bring attention. As to corners being occupied with things like doors, windows ... we have learned that these 'corners' are precious areas that are prime candidates for bass trapping ... and something that would be a priority to utilize. They are not the only corners available, but they do offer the maximum number of hard surfaces joined. I am only a student here, trying to help identify potential issues ... especially during the design phase [this is the time to address them ... there will be others to follow more than likely :) But that is the fun and challenge, designing within the pre-existing framework and your goal. Maybe posting actual pictures of the space ... sometimes helps the designers offer ideas, or better understand the circumstance to better maximize what you want to achieve. As a reminder [that I also faced] ... wanting to get the final plan laid out so that you know what your dealing with AND to get SOMETHING going so that at least it LOOKS like your making progress!!! You may already have the best design possible ... but, try to maintain calm/patients because THIS is THE most critical part of the entire effort. There are many aspect to plan out ... things like HVAC, lighting, air x-change ... The Staff here can be so helpful ... and the build can be quite frustrating/ difficult .... and downright overwhelming [at times] ... so, take your time ... post up different floor plans and get this important step as well thought out as possible. Look forward to watching and learning :) Sincerely.

Thanks so much for your advice! :) To answer your question: I'm planning on utilizing this desk: http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/MCDesk , so the speakers would be sitting on the desk itself, rather than on stands. Also, yes, I'm trying to do an 'inside out' design - at least for the CR and the Vocal booth. I'm not sure what the bigger problem would be in terms of CR dimensions - narrow width or almost-square dimensions. In the first render the CR is located on the right, making it much more narrow (~8'), and a little deeper (~17') than it's current incarnation on the left. Just from a "feel-good" perspective, I'd shy away from that solution, as it would create a narrow, windowless box in which I have to spend most of my time. Moving the CR out of the lower half of the basement would make it very hard (I think) to create a tracking room big enough to record ensembles larger than 4 musicians, which I'll have to do more often than not (section strings, brass etc.). To give you an idea what I'm up against, I attached a render of the current state of the basement. I apologize for not including the HVAC system in the previous renders - I thought it would be a good idea to leave it out for better visibility. The latest studio design would incorporate moving the HVAC ducts to the space between the upper wall and the upper beam, so the ceiling height would drop a good foot there. To cut the costs down a little, I'm planning on only sheetrocking the ceiling of the CR and the Vocal booth; the bathroom and the live room would have simple acoustic tile ceilings. Do you think, this would provide enough isolation (i.e. making only the CR and the booth separate "boxes")? Thanks again! Your advice is much appreciated! :)

so the speakers would be sitting on the desk itself, rather than on stands.

There are several problems with speakers sitting on the desk. The big one is vibration: The vibration of the speaker cabinets will be transmitted into the desk itself, causing the desk to vibrate and act as a speaker. That muddies up the sound terribly. Second is reflections. With the speakers sitting directly on a surface, there will be reflections from that surface bouncing around the room at strange angles. Third is height: The speakers should be positioned with the acoustic axis 1.2 m (about 47-1/4") above the floor, which is ear height for most people when seated. It's unlikely that your desk and speakers will work out to the correct height. Fourth is position: It isn't very likely that the desk will just happen to have a place to put the speakers in the correct location for your room, but you have no choice with a desk. If it turns out that the correct location is a few inches behind the rear edge of the desk, or a few inches off to one side, well that's unfortunate: you are stuck with putting the speakers in the wrong place. For those reasons (and others) stands are a better option, in general.

I'm not sure what the bigger problem would be in terms of CR dimensions - narrow width or almost-square dimensions.

Personally, I would avoid the almost square dimensions, even if it meant making the room a bit narrower. Of course, if it makes the room so narrow that you cannot get the speakers far enough apart, or that it causes some other issue with the speaker geometry, then that would make it a tough call!

To cut the costs down a little, I'm planning on only sheetrocking the ceiling of the CR and the Vocal booth; the bathroom and the live room would have simple acoustic tile ceilings. Do you think, this would provide enough isolation (i.e. making only the CR and the booth separate "boxes")?

No, that wouldn't give you much isolation at all. Acoustic ceiling tiles provide very little isolation at all (that isn't what they are meant for). Isolating a room is kind of like building an aquarium: Unless you put glass on all sides of the aquarium, it will not hold water. Unless you seal it totally watertight, it will not hold water. Even a tiny hole means that water will leak out. It's the same with a studio. It's just like an aquarium (except upside down): unless you treat all 5 sides to the same level, and seal them all airtight, it will not "hold sound". Even a tiny gap somewhere is enough to compromise the isolation. Just like water will always take the easiest path out, so will sound. If you isolate 4 sides really well but didn't do the ceiling, well then you wasted a lot of money on doing the walls! That would be like building your aquarium with glass on four sides, but putting only cardboard on the bottom, instead of glass. Obviously, that won't work. Neither will only isolating some sides of the room. And just like water leaking out of an aquarium will splash around all over the place, so will sound leaking out of your room. Once the sound is out, then it is out and free to go wherever it can. Sometimes people think that "I don't need to isolate the north wall, because that's just the kitchen there, and I don't mind if the sound gets to the kitchen". The problem is, if the sound gets out through the north wall, it will be audible to the south, east, west, and up, not just in the kitchen! So if you want to isolate, you have no choice: you have to do all sides of the room to the same level. And that includes doors, windows, HVAC and electrical. - Stuart -