Midi Composing/Mixing Room - New, Rectangular but Small!

Hello all, I'm moving my mixing/composing room into a small space in a newly renovated basement. This is in a stand alone-house, and will be used solely for composing, playback and mixing. Any "recording" will be via midi. So, I'm not at all worried about isolation. I generally mix around the 85 dB level. I'm looking to tune this small space as well as possible in order to produce reliable mixes. Most of my work is in the dance and ballet arena, usually featuring very cinematic textures - big drums and percussion, low and evolving swells, etc. Translation from my mixing desk to large auditoriums is already a concern, and probably even more so given the size of this room. When budget allows, I'll mix elsewhere, but that won't always be the case. Specs on the room (sorry for the very crude layout): a) Rectangular: long wall, 12.5 feet, short wall, 8.33. Two walls have bi-fold closet doors, and the entrance door is actually a 4 foot french (glass panes) door. These are all noted on the attached layout. b) Ceiling is a newly hung armstrong acoustical ceiling. Height from floor to ceiling is 88.5". Above the drop ceiling the joists are all filled with 5.5" insulation. c) The walls are all 3/8 sheetrock screwed to standard 2x4s. The long, uninterupted wall has the concrete foundation about 6" behind it. The other long wall has 2 feet of open space with the oil furnace tank behind it before hitting the foundation. d) Laminate wood floor In reading various articles and books and many posts on this site, I realize the best orientation is always the long axis. However, because both of the short walls have doors, there is no realistic way to position my monitors against those walls (at least I don't think so). So, if you refer to the photo, you'll see I've simply moved in the equipment in what I think would be the orientation that I'll need to try (and it will be a struggle) to optimize for. A few other notes: a) The desk in the photo is not necessarily final, nor are the home-made monitor stands. b) The monitors are DyneAudio BM5A, and they are resting on 2 3/4" Prime Acoustic Stabilizers. c) I have access to eight 4' wide x 1.5' tall Auralex diffusors, which could be cut, hung, anything needed if they'll help. d) Budget - at this point I think all I'm really looking at are diffusors, absorbers, maybe somekind of cloud set up... but let's say $1,500 for these items? Beyond the general "what would you recommend?" my specific questions would be: 1. If I center myself facing the long wall (as I've done in the pic), I assume my monitors go against that wall as tightly as possilbe. Should I treat that wall with anything else? 2. At what measurement/percentage of room-width total should I aim to place my "ears"? Basically, how far back from that wall should I sit? 3. Recommendation on treating the backwall and back wall corners -already knowing the short axis is probably going to kill me a bit. 4. Anything for the ceiling directly above my workstation? Thanks in advance for any assistance.

Was hoping anyone had a chance to review/comment yet? Thanks very much!

The size of the room is not ideal obviously, but orienting along the long wall as you've done is probably the worst case - you'll be sitting far to close to the wall behind you. As I see it, access to the sliding door closet is already cut off the way you have it now so I assume access is not critical. In this case I would orient to the closet wall so you're firing down the length of the room which is much better. If you have the desk and speakerstands on wheels or coasters they can be moved out of the way temporarily when you need to get to the closet.

As I've been starting to work in the room a bit I've too realized that I have to orient the long way. That being the case - any recommendations on what and where for bass traps, absorbers, clouds, etc?

Since your recording process is midi based, the main concern is listening i.e. not acoustic recording, plus considering the rooms physical size and constraints, I think your best and certainly cheapest solution initially would be to get some heavy drapes up front and back - I'm talking cinema curtain type material if possible. Make or buy some broadband absorbers for your 1st reflection points (sides, ceiling) - not just acoustic foam and ensure these are mounted with standoffs to ensure their efficiency. That's where I would start with that particular room. You might want to download a copy of REW (Room EQ Wizard, free) in order to monitor the effect your treatments are having as you progress, also to highlight any particular issues. Remember too that symmetry is king and that positioning will have a major role i.e. where you sit, placement of speakers in proximity to the walls as well as to you, angle of speakers, etc. etc. Play with it!

Thanks Brian- I hadn't even thought of the heavy curtain route- it certainly sounds good for both $$ and aesthetic reasons - I'll give that a try. In other forums and books I've read that you never want your ears to be dead-center in any axis-which confuses me. I understand that front-to-back, ~38% is more ideal, and from top to bottom it's not a worry in this room anyway. But laterally - wouldn't I want to be lined up equi-distant from both side walls? Thanks again for your replies, I appreciate the help.

In other forums and books I've read that you never want your ears to be dead-center in any axis-which confuses me. I understand that front-to-back, ~38% is more ideal, and from top to bottom it's not a worry in this room anyway. But laterally - wouldn't I want to be lined up equi-distant from both side walls?

As Meatloaf used to sing many years ago: "Two out of three ain't bad". :) In other words, as long as your head is not centered front-to-back and not centered floor-to-ceiling, then the slight remaining issues from being centered side-to-side are massively outweighed by the major advantages of symmetry. The 38% "rule" is mostly about modal behavior anyway, and if the room is suitably treated to keep the modes well damped, then it isn't really so life-and-death at all. If the modes are not easily triggered, and well damped with treatment, then they won't be much of an issue at 38% or anywhere else, within reason. Besides, this isn't a "rule" at all: It's just a theoretically good place to have your head, and should be taken only as a guideline, a starting point for experimenting. I promise that you will not be arrested by the 38% Police if you don't have your ears exactly pegged to that precise spot! :) And if you think about it, for typically sized home recording studios, just leaning back in your chair or stretching forward to adjust something on the console is going to move your head several percentage points anyway... Long story short: tweaking your chair to get the "perfect" 38.00000% location is just like tweaking the room dimensions to the last fraction of a millimeter for the "perfect" ratio for your room: there is no such thing as "perfect" in both cases (despite the mantras you might see chanted almost religiously on some audiophile, home studio, and home theater forums, about "golden" ratios and complex mathematics for finding perfect seating positions!). No such animal exists. There are only "pretty good" ratios and "not-so-good" ones. As long as you are fairly close to a good ratio and very roughly around 38%, you'll be fine. In fact, as long as you are not too close to a bad ratio, and not too close to the 25% or 50% positions, you'll be fine. - Stuart -

Thanks Stuart - that clarifies things, and certainly makes me feel better about being exactly in a sweet spot all the time. This room is so small, if I raise my eyebrows I may be out of alignment. :D I'll post back with my progress after I take on some of the recommendations. Thank you both again.