small project studio in Belgium - design advice needed

hello everybody, my name is Kurt, I live in Belgium and plan to build a small project studio. at this moment I have a mobile setup: I record band demos in rehearsal rooms, livingrooms, bedrooms, garages, ...I mix at home mainly on headphones since I haven't got a decent room with proper acoustics. in January our constructor will start the renovation of an old house we've bought and there will be a new garage to be built which is not connected to the house. Part of the garage will be my "playing ground". I've included a picture of our architect's plan, haven't got a scanner at this moment so sorry for the lousy quality. the design of the studio is not fixed yet meaning that the double door can move and that the separation between tracking and mix area can change. there's also a window but that can also move or eventually be left out. the dimensions of the room are approximately w=3.30m, l=5.80m, and for the height there is a special thing to be taken into account: the roof is slightly sloping from 2.60m at the outside to 3.40m at its maximum on the dotted line which runs across diagonally over the studio (hope this is clear). the complete garage/studio is built on a concrete slab and will be made of concrete cell blocks. so a few questions regarding design, there will be a lot more questions once I start construction. my goal is to: - have a decent mixing room with good acoustics - have the possibility to record vocals, acoustic and (loud) electric guitars. if possible it would be nice to be able to record drums (I know it's a very small space and I won't get great drum sounds but just to have the opportunity would be nice). - make it as soundproof as possible, closest neighbour houses are approximately 15m away, my own house is approximately 5m away. - it would be nice to keep the window to have daylight in the studio. - have good ventilation, there is no heating but I plan to have electric radiators or something. my questions are: - should I go for a 1 room studio or build a separate booth for vox, drums, guitars? - could any of the sketchup wizards over here share some ideas on a good design to get the best results as to isolation and acoustics. - since I haven't got a room for the band to chill out (only have a toilet) do you think it would be better to concentrate on the mix thing and continue to do mobile recordings with the occasional overdubs (like vocals and guitars) at my place. I can't accomodate a full band but 1 or 2 persons in such a small room should be ok). - I have seen the speakers being soffit mounted in small rooms, but is this really necessary? at the moment I own a pair of Yamaha HS-50 monitors, but I will probably upgrade in the future so soffit mounting is not such a good idea I guess since my next pair of monitors will probably be bigger. I hope I have everything covered, it's a lot of info so thanks a lot already if you've made it till here ;-) Finally: my budget for the build (isolation and acoustics) is about 6000 dollars. I will try to do the entire construction by myself with the help of my brother who is a carpenter. I bought Rod Gervais book but since English is not my mother tongue I find it very difficult to understand all technical terms and the building material is also very different in Europe. so thanks a lot for reading and hope to get some useful tips. greetings from Belgium! Kurt

no suggestions?

maybe like this - move the bathroom ;) cheers john

hey John, thanks for looking into this. your plan would be the easiest way to get a symmetrical control room but I'm afraid the bathroom has to stay there. as you can see on the plan there is a large double door at the back of the garage to give direct passage to the garden which would be impossible if we change the position of the bathroom. the only other option would be to move the bathroom to the front of the garage and make a smaller booth. but let's assume we keep the bathroom in its place. would it be a good idea to make a 1-room studio, I've been thinking about this lately and the idea pleases me because wouldn't that make the construction a lot easier and cheaper and I can still build gobos and screens to place around drums, amps and vocalists. but I have no idea how to fit that in that space taking into account room ratios (??) and avoiding straight walls. another thing that worries me is the sloping ceiling, how can I get symmetry in the control room with a sloping ceiling. and will my budget be big enough? Another solution would always be to just make a good sounding mix room and forget about recording drums in there but it would be so convenient to be able to track overdubs like vox and guitars.

How about this then. cheers john

and how about this for a 1 room solution? would this be a good idea as to acoustics? my main goal is to have a good mixing room, so I think the bigger the better. it's still symmetrical this way.

Yes - that's the one room option. cheers john

I couldn't quite read those plans, so I don't know what size your space is... But I would rather have a big control room with a small 50 square foot vocal booth... That's if I was building it for a mix room. If you are mainly tracking, then I'd make a really small control room..> With a bigger tracking room.

hey thanks for the reply. as I stated in my initial post: the dimensions of the room are approximately w=3.30m, l=5.80m, and for the height there is a special thing to be taken into account: the roof is slightly sloping from 2.60m at the outside to 3.40m at its maximum on the dotted line which runs across diagonally over the studio (hope this is clear). at this moment I have a mobile setup and do a lot of on location recording. I intend to keep the tracking at my studio to a minimum and my main goal is to have a nice mixroom with the possibilty of overdubbing vocals and guitars and possibly a drumkit. since I have to move my rig often I don't want everything to be too fixed.

Hellokelidokeli all! First: Happy 2008! Secondly: I think you've made the drums and sofa in your one room drawing a bit undersized. Like this you can easily tuck away two drumkits plus the sofa in yer car... If the drum overdubs are just something that could occasionally happen, I would go for one big room that sounds good. Vox, guitars etc can all easily be done in the control room with no problems (track with headphones). Greetings, The Niz (also from Belgium) www.basicidea.be