Dog + Bear Studio build

[Soundman2020]

... any nice beaches around where you live? I need a vacation, that's for sure! I'm starting to lok forward to this, so pleas do slow down a bit on that build!!!!


- Stuart -

[stevev]

.. any nice beaches around where you live?

unfortunately no Stuart we're up in the hills which also means the odd fall of snow in the winter

flooring.jpg

I finally made a decision on flooring and went for the strandwoven bamboo. 14mm thick and 14 coats/layers of polyurethane and other protective coats. Goes down on a 2mm underlay with vapour barrier attached.

I won't be getting a chance to put it down for at least a couple of weeks, but i'll post up some pics once it's down.

[Soundman2020]

we're up in the hills which also means the odd fall of snow in the winter

Oh cool! Then I can stay for winter, and learn to ski! I always wanted to learn to ski....

By the way, that flooring looks REALLY nice! I reckon your place is going to be somewhat amazing...

- Stuart -

[stevev]

Thanks Stuart I know I've said it a few times in my thread, but the advice from this forum has been what has really made my build what it is. (and maybe 1200 hr's manual labour)

As a bit of a side note, a young friend of mine who is studying film production came over on the weekend to do some film overdubs with his actors. Nice guys, fun session. But the real grin for me was when the rest of his crew turned up (around 9 or 10, 20 year olds) and they wanted to hear the isolation between the rooms. I'm in the live room pounding away at my drum kit and they're in the control room all smiling as they could only hear a teeny bit of kick! Great moment

[John Sayers]

that's because you play wimpy drums

[stevev]

that's because you play wimpy drums

yeah, I tried being a hard-core drummer John, but I couldn't stand dribbling out of 'both sides' of my mouth

...and cue the 'drummer' jokes

[neilstar]

i just read through yr thread steve, wow, what a great looking studio yr building, well done, i will keep watching for more updates, plenty of cash and hard work gone into that, wish i had that sorta cash to throw at it, but i think im gonna slow down, and try to do it better the first time, so i hope you dont mind me continually asking dumb questions, the information i have been recieving from this forum regarding building a soundproof room is invaluable, thank you

cheers Neil

[stevev]

cheers Neil

wish i had that sorta cash to throw at it

Well, technically I don't, the bank does though

i think im gonna slow down, and try to do it better the first time

excellent idea mate. There were a few points in my build where I changed my thinking or my plan because of advice given to me here. Sometimes it'll sound like people are being picky or pedantic, but they've got your best intrest in mind and want you to end up with the best building you can afford.

And there's no dumb questions, because if you already knew everything about building a studio then you wouldn't be here like the rest of us

[stevev]

floor 1.jpg

floor 2.jpg

floor 3.jpg

After a monster job away from home for the last six weeks, I've finally managed to get back in the studio for some build time. Control room floor went in today and I've got to say I'm really impressed with this product

Very easy to put down and at 14mm thick it's got a great feel to it when walking on it. I thought there might be a bit of a 'floating feel' but it feels like a genuine nailed down timber floor. Cutting in was tricky as there's obviously a lot of angled walls being a studio.

There's still a bit of finishing to do with the skirting boards but I should get on to that tomorrow, which will mean the control room is pretty much done apart from furmiture. I've got a local furniture maker getting together a quote to build a classy rack for the outboard gear and with any luck I'll be able to get him to sort out a desk top as well now that I know which console I'm going with (Midas VeniceF24)

[Soundman2020]

That looks pretty darn nice! Good workmanship all around.

REW?

- Stuart -

[stevev]

I should get a chance to run REW later today and see if the final finishes in the room have made much difference. Maybe it's just psychological, but the room did actually seem a little brighter with the highly reflective floor instead of the concrete. I'll post up the REW data when I'm done.

[John Sayers]

floor looks great Steve.

[stevev]

Thanks John

I've been busy building desks and installing consoles, but should get a chance to run REW for some final results tomorrow.

I've also got a couple of Spacedec swing arms for my PC monitors on order. Hopefully i'll be able to mount them in a way that means I can get them nice and upright for editing/tracking, but swing them down and out of the way for mixing. There seems to be enough adjusment in the units by looking at the tech specs, but there's nothing like having the physical unit on site to see exactly how it looks!

[stevev]

desk and console.jpg

Finally built myself a desk and got the console in and installed. I think the swing arms for the computer monitors are waiting for me at the post office so I'll see what I can come up with once I have a look at them.

I also did some REW measurments for the control room, which at first had me pretty alarmed as it was showing huge modes at 50, 100, 200, 300 etc etc. After a bit of trouble shooting I found that my SPL meter is adding a lot of noise to the signal. Running a spectrum analyzer over the signal from the meter confirmed this so it looks like it's back to Galaxy for a warranty claim

I then pulled out a U89 to double check and these are the results. I'm not sure how the 89 compares to the Galaxy SPL meter in terms of flat response, but it's probably the most accurate mic i've got in the locker.

stereo.jpg

right.jpg

left.jpg

Here's the dropbox link if anyone wants to take a more in depth look at the results:
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/416 ... ments.mdat

Still waiting on a quote from a furniture maker to construct a timber rack unit, but if he doesn't get back to me soon I'll just have to put one together myself. In my spare time....which is non-existant

[Soundman2020]

it was showing huge modes at 50, 100, 200, 300

Hmmm.... And you live in Australia, where power is 50 Hz.... I'm thinking "Mains Hum".... Did you use a properly wired cable for that? Everything correctly grounded?

Just checking, but did you have the U89 on omni for those tests?

OK, looking at the REW data, there are several puzzling things there: First, either you didn't do the calibration correctly against a sound level meter, or your room and system are amazingly, astoundingly quiet! According to your graphs, you did those tests at about 55 dB, meaning your RT-60 measurements went down to -5 dB I'd re-check the calibration of REW against an accurate SLM. You should do the tests with each individual speaker giving you around 80 dB on both the REW meter and your SLM, so both together should give you about 86 dB.

Next, the readings from Left and Right speakers are very, very different. Almost like it was two physically different speakers. There's a difference of around 4 to 15 dB at all points across the spectrum, with L being higher in some places but R in others: Perhaps something changed in the room between doing the L and R readings? Maybe you yourself were in a different place, or you moved the sofa, desk etc.? Another curiosity: summing the L and R SPL curves does not match the "Stereo" curve. Or rather, it does match in the low end, up to about 2 kHz, but above that it just goes wild. I would try to figure out why the two are so different. The L and R curves should be at practically the same level, showing more or less the same thing (except for minor variations due to asymmetry in the room), and the reading with both speakers on should be consistently about 5 or 6 dB louder across the board.

Next, it looks like you overdid the baffle step compensation. On all the graphs, there's a consistent drop of about 4 dB below 120 Hz. How do you have the controls set on the rear of your speakers? Are you using a sub? Are you using anything else that could be shaping the frequency response, such as a graphic equalizer, or a crossover?

The good news is that the room seems to be behaving very nicely!

- Stuart -