new place / new (home) studio / any suggestions

Hi, I'm about to move to a new place. It will undergo some reconstruction so I decided to build there a small studio-like room. I can't make room in the room and I'll have to use the same room for non-audio work, storing cloth etc. Most of the audio-work I do is "electronic" music and some postproduction. I don't need to record too much, so I'm OK with only one room. The room is 4.5m x 4.7m x 2,7m... almost square, but there is large opening on the right and it is pretty unsymetrical with the window ont the left side. I'll close the opening with some sort of light door. I expect, it lets the bass through (so the modes are different than in square room) and it "correct" the imaging a bit. Am I wrong here? I'd like to have hard wood floor and absorbtive ceiling. I found some knauf perforated panel ceiling with good absorbtion from 125 to 2000-3000HZ. I'd like to place it above the speakers, leaving rear half of the ceiling just normal gypsum. Bookcase placed in the rear and front should somehow diffuse the first reflections. Could it work? Or it is better to put some rockwool to one side? I'm sure to put a panel absorbers to the front corners, but I have to put wardrobes to the rear corners, maybe it could absorb some bass. Or is it very important to have a "correct" trap here? And what about the side walls? Rockwool panels? foam? I'm slightly nervous to have a upright piano on the right side because it is pretty reflective, I didn't find a better place for it up to now, could it be a problem? Thanks for your comments, the pictures shows a sketch of the place... no design for now ;-) Matous

...is it bad to have speakers close to wall? I have it that way now and think it causes major bass problems, so I wanted to have it pretty far at the new place. However I see many studios/designs with speakers near the wall. Confused... Soffits are no way, because this place is mid-temporary ;-(.

I think you need more emphasis on low-mid to high absorption in that room - the area infront of the desk where you have panel absorbers should be high frequency absorption. The rear wall also should be dead in a room that small. cheers john

like putting a rockwool on the whole front wall? How near can I go with the monitors not to have bad bass response? thanks alot Matous

matucha wrote:

like putting a rockwool on the whole front wall?

Yup - in small room it's best to deaden the whole room down. Rockwool is going to work down to the low- mids as well as treat the highs. To put brightness back why not add some slots in the front?? cheers john

thanks, I have to rethink whole room now ;-), I'll be back soon with a new picture...

matucha wrote:

...is it bad to have speakers close to wall? I have it that way now and think it causes major bass problems, so I wanted to have it pretty far at the new place. However I see many studios/designs with speakers near the wall. Confused... Soffits are no way, because this place is mid-temporary ;-(.

Yeah, unless you can flush mount it's almost always best to move the speakers away from the walls. You don't necessarily have to use the traditional in-wall soffit arrangement though. You can get the same results by building yourself some floor standing partitions to mount the monitors in. Btw, cool 3-D renderings. I felt a tinge of vertigo when I first looked at them.:) Thomas

Btw, cool 3-D renderings. I felt a tinge of vertigo when I first looked at them.

me too :) what program did you use to draw them? cheers john

3DStudio MAX5 and 3DS VIZ4 (it is almost the same). I have basic plans in AutoCAD. Nice thing about 3DS MAX R5 is it has Radiozity and can simulate how the light distribute as it bounces off the room surfaces. It is very similar to the acoustics (not at the low freq), still thinking about to use it somehow for acoustics ;-). barefoot> are there any plans of free standing speaker mounting? or a pictures? I'll have to fight the space, because I have to get the speakers far from the front wall and the listening position somewhere else than to the centre of the room ;-( soon the new (and nicer) pictures

Basically all we're talking about is a framed panel with a hole cut in it to mount the speaker - maybe a shelf to mount the speaker on and some sort of legs if you can't find a way secure it. Something like a 4'x8' sheet of plywood framed with 2"x4"s would work. You could go smaller, but then you should mount it as close to the front wall as possible - not much more than the depth of the speaker. The attached picture is a basic schematic view from the back. Thomas

Thanks, it looks interesting... will try to think about implementing it. As I understand, this makes high and mid freq with less comb filtering, because of no reflection from backwall. But the bass go through as it is nothing there. I have another set of pictures. A bit different design. Do you think the lowmid absorbtion is enough now? Is bad to put a piano this way (back facing rockwool etc., in a niche)?

some views

I just have to ask... What software are you using to draw that space.... its awesome!

cool model

Matous, Here I've shown half of the sort of implementation I would recommend specifically for your room, if you want to try flush mounting. In this case you could forget the legs and secure the partitions to the bookshelves with clamps, brackets, or even hinges so they can swing open for rear access. The low-midbass absorbers in the corners could then be replaced with larger deep bass absorbers. You just need to leave a little room for the sound to travel around the partitions. This arrangement will help break up longitudinal standing wave modes as well. Thomas

looks like it could work ;-) thanks again.

I was very busy in last days, all I did is this AutoCad drawing... a bit more precise than the initial 3d sketch. I left soffit mounting behind (sorry), because of easier moving out (this place is temporary ~2 years). Do you see any mistakes? Do you thing the room will sound unbalanced? Whad do you miss... thnx Matous

BTW: I spent some time with moving speakers/listening position around to place it where no important mode null exists... is it worth? or the reality is different, since the mode's nulls are pretty close one to another?

3DStudio MAX5....... It seems to be a GREAT program. 8)

yep... Autocad is much more plain technical, isn't it ;-)?

no reponses? ;-) it looks like my plans are perfect ;-) Now the question is, what monitors? I'm counting with ADAM S3As, but one friend suggested it is TOO BIG for a room like this, what do you think. The lowest mode is ~36Hz and S3As have (i think -3dB point) at 32Hz. This looks ok to me. And what about the distance from speakers? Is 1.2m OK, or it is too close? thanks

I did some raytracing and I found a way how to prevent the first order side reflection to cross the sweetspot. Only the window reflection looks "bad". Do anyone have solution to this? Some kind of curtain?

here is front and rear... hopefully, letting the sound to go to fabric covered rockwool will help to get rid off it.

ceiling and table reflections. Table looks safe to me... I'll try to make angled hanged plane to send the ceiling reflection further back and so the only thing that bugs me now is the piano reflection. Looks like I'll end with having always something on the piano to kill it ;-). Any ideals?