New Large Studio

Hi All, I am in the process of building a new studio in Cape Town, South Africa. Firstly, 3 pieces of information: 1. Ceiling Height: 3.81m 2. The space is underground. 3. The pillars you see on the drawing below are not movable. (They support a $30 million property development, 11 stories high) OK, here's the pic:

Live Room: L=9.573m (measurement on the right of the room) W=7.971m H=3.81m Control Room A: L=7.971m (orientated 90 degrees to the live room) W=5.376m (measurement on the right of the room) H=3.81m The wall between the 2 is a brick wall that i would like to keep in place. The doors between the Live Room and Control Room A will be between the leftmost pillar of both rooms and the middle pillar. The window between the Live Room and Control Room A will be between the middle pillar and the rightmost pillar of both rooms. My questions are for these 2 rooms first. 1. If i follow Rod Gervais's directions, i assume that: a. I can attach a layer of drywall to the Live Room side of the wall to increase its mass. Correct? b. I will have another drywall built on the Control Room A side of the wall, following Rod's suggestion of double layer drywall, and frame stuffed with isolation. Correct? How thick should the isolation be? What should be used? OC 703 (IM475)? c. The drywall construction on the side of the Control Room A will probably be attached BETWEEN the pillars. I understand that this may well reduce isolation efficiency, however given the thickness of the pillars, will this be an issue? 2. Should i be concerned about transmission of sound ALONG the right-hand brick/concrete wall of both rooms? 3. Should i be concerned about the ceiling (concrete slab) in the way? 4. Is the placement of my doors between the 2 rooms a good idea? 5. Is the placement of my windows between the 2 rooms a good idea? 6. I intend to use Kinetic Noise Control's RIM flooring to raise the floor. Should this be done on both sides? Have any of you had experience with this product? Thank you. If there is any information i forgot to add, please let me know. I will ask questions about the left wall of the Live Room in a future post. More questions about the other rooms in future posts. HVAC is being handled and designed by an engineer with studio experience Ignore the fire escape for now.

a few questions. which control room would be used for the live room? A, B or both? what types of music do you intend to record? what are your sound isolation requirements? any trains or airports nearby? what are your ambient noise levels? what type of noise would you expect from people above your studio that might interfer with your recording process? what type of noise levels do you think they would tolerate from your studio? would it make sense to group the post production and dv edit rooms close and the live room and related CR closer? what type of CR equipment do you have? thanks!

Thanks Glenn for getting back to me. OK, answers. 1. Control Room A only 2. Any and all types of music 3. No airports or trains. Ambient Noise is very low from what i can tell. When i stand in there it seems extremely quiet. They are still doing building and renovation around us, so i haven't had a true moment's silence. 4. Very little to none i think. There's going to be a coffee shop, and then mostly offices, some of which are already operational and i cannot hear them waking around. The coffee shop is going to be a fair distance away from the studio. 5. I don't think they'll have to tolerate too much. The area had been used as storage for building rubble, so there was an enormous amount of noise going on downstairs, yet the offices upstairs seemed to be ok. I imagine that as they are businesses though, they will not tolerate any noise should it reach them. 6.1 Not quite sure this question makes sense to me. I want to have a large CR for the Live Room, and CR A is certainly it. To me they are as close together as i can get them, with the added space on the far right for ISO Booths, i have all i need in that area. 6.2 The distance between the DV edit and Post Prod rooms is about 4-5 metres, and the intention is that they are going to be used by freelance engineers, so there is no real need to integrate the 2 rooms in any way. 7. CR Equipment? In what sense? PT HD2, Focal Twin6s, Lavry converters, Distressors, FATSO, etc, the standard pro studio type stuff i think. Thanks again Glenn PS. I will be adding some pics soon.

Hi, OK, given my discussion i had with Upside Down Media today, a question. Should i get rid of the DV Edit suite, and use the full available space for the control room? i.e length would be 12.646 m We would then situate the mix position more in the middle of the length and have the window in the middle of the wall. Thanks again for all input.

i think you could keep the dv edit suite. maybe design it so it could double as an additional iso booth if needed...

Here are some pictures I took for Sui today. This picture is of the passage way that will become the lounge/reception area and you can see the post production room on the left hand side with the live room in the distance. This pic is from the Lounge looking into the Live Room. Here is pic of the Live Room looking towards the wall of the Post Production Booth. Here is a pic of the live room taken from the Control Room B corner of the Live Room looking towards the Control Room A wall. This pic is from the DV Edit Suite looking towards the Control Room A wall in front of the ISO Booths. Here is another pic of the Control Room A, but this time looking down towards the DV Edit Suite. Cheers Matt

Matt, Thanks for elaborating on some of the stuff, and posting the pics. With regards to the transmission through the ceiling slab, the slab is what has been of concern to me. I personally have not heard any sound transmission through the pillars themselves, but certainly through the slab. So false ceiling is still something i would like to know about from others. Same question still pertains to the rightmost wall as shared by the CR and the Live Room, transmission from above or from the live room, along the wall. Let me add that I wish not to move the wall between CR A and the Live Room. It is a large wall and would cost too much too move. I would appreciate other opinions, but my opinion is that the CR A and Live Room are voluminous enough to treat effectively and not have too many problems. If someone would like to tell me otherwise, please go ahead. Thanks again