live room - help heeded

[dali]

Hi.

I'm building a studio live room for recording drums, small choirs, small string ensembles etc. I need a room with nice acoustics. Not a dry room. I have already built shaped walls with fiberglass as you can see on picture. So at the moment room is great regarding insulation but totally dry without any acoustics, which of course is not good when trying to capture the room ambience.

So the question is. What to put on the walls (in front of fiberglass) to get nice room ambience?

Wooden pannels seems very nice and cheap solution, but I don't know about the sound.

I don't have any experiences regarding a construction of live acoustic room, therefore any help would be more than welcome.

Thank you

Best regards,
Dali

[Ethan Winer]

dali,

> What to put on the walls (in front of fiberglass) to get nice room ambience? <

My best suggestion is to read through the various threads here and in the Studio Design section, and look for photos showing how other rooms were treated.

--Ethan

[dali]

Hi Ethan!

Thank you very much for your reply!

I read various threads regarding this issue, but have found no real ideas for my room. If not a problem I would vary much like to ask you few basic questions about acoustics, just to be sure I'm on the right way. I saw your video tutorials. Amazing!!!

1. Room shape, walls placement
From viewing other studio rooms, I came to a conclusion that no wall should be parallel to another becaouse of sound bounce. Therfore I shaped my room the way you see on the picture. Was changing rectangle room shape a good step or unnecesary work?

2. How to proceed
I isoleted the room, preventing the sound to go outside. I suceeded 100%. No sound is leaking, my neighbors are happy. Now I need to take care of the acoustics inside. At the moment the room is totaly dry since the fiberglass is all around.

I need to start somewhere, hopefully not spending to much money and time because of my mistakes done during process. So what is the most sensible way to proceed? I suppose I could install wood panels all over the place. Then I suppose room will be WET as hell. From there I could go and install traps or simply remove some pannels, since fiberglass is already behind it.

3. Traps, absorbers
Like mentioned above. Is it better to make standalone traps or just remove some panels, since fibreglass is already behind it.

4. Stage curtains on every wall
I was thinking about instaling a masive heavy stage curtains on all walls. So whenever I need WET room I can remove curtains to the corners, when I need a DRY room I drag curtains over all walls and any combination in between. What do you think about the idea?

5. Drum cloud
I was reading about a drum cloud. It seems very nice idea. Would it work, not to install wood panels above drumkit, (let's say 3x2 meters). Just leave fiberglass and cover it with a cotton?

By the way. I have ETF and measurement microphone.

Thank you very much

Br,
Dali

[Ethan Winer]

Dali,

> Was changing rectangle room shape a good step or unnecesary work? <

That's useful, but covering all the walls as you did with fiberglass accomplishes much of the same thing. The goal is to avoid flutter echo - that "boing" sound you get when you clap your hands - and either works. So now that you have the angles, you can cover portions of the walls with painted cardboard or thin plastic to get back some ambience. And the angles will still prevent flutter echo. So all in all you did the right thing.

> I was thinking about instaling a masive heavy stage curtains on all walls. <

Again, putting cardboard or thin plastic on some parts of the walls is easier, though maybe it won't look as nice as curtains.

> I was reading about a drum cloud. <

Yes, it's useful to have absorption over a drum set.

--Ethan

[dali]

Thank you very much for your answer!

By the way. Do you sell realtraps in Europe?

covering all the walls as you did with fiberglass accomplishes much of the same thing

Fiberglass all over is for isolation to outside. I didn't want the sound to hit the concreete, transmiting it all over the building. The idea is to cover fiberglass with wood panels which are varnish, so assuming it will work as plastic, like you suggested.

So the way I see it. Now I have 100% DRY room. When installing wood pannels I will have 100% WET room, hopefuly with nice echo, because of wall angles. If room will be too WET I'll need to find a way to absorb it either with traps or curtains.

Again, putting cardboard or thin plastic on some parts of the walls is easier, though maybe it won't look as nice as curtains.

On some parts? So maybe leave out corners and drum cloud (cover fibergalss with only a cotton) would eliminate need for aditional traps, right?

Curtains give me a possibility to adjust WET to DRY room like for an expamle: When curtains are fully stretched all over the wals the room is DRY. If gathered up in corners room will be WET and still I keep the room corners absorbed by curtains. And I have posibillity to stretch the curtains from 10% to 100% of the wall space having many posible variations.

What do you think of this idea?

Thank you very much!

Br,
Dali

[Ethan Winer]

Dali,

> Do you sell realtraps in Europe? <

Yes, we ship all over the world all the time.

> Fiberglass all over is for isolation to outside. I didn't want the sound to hit the concreete, transmiting it all over the building. <

Unfortunately, that doesn't work very well. Sound isolation requires dense rigid walls, and fiberglass is neither dense nor rigid.

> The idea is to cover fiberglass with wood panels <

But that's the same as not having fiberglass at all. You won't get much isolation, and you won't get a reduction in room echoes either.

> Curtains give me a possibility to adjust WET to DRY room like for an expamle: When curtains are fully stretched all over the wals the room is DRY. If gathered up in corners room will be WET <

Curtains absorb only higher frequencies, but that's not what you want. For a room that size I'd just make it as neutral sounding as possible, and definitely not too live sounding (wet). Small room ambience is not usually good sounding. You can always add reverb and ambience electronically while mixing.

--Ethan

[dali]

Hi Ethan.

Thank you for your valuable answer!

Unfortunately, that doesn't work very well. Sound isolation requires dense rigid walls, and fiberglass is neither dense nor rigid.

It looks like Dali didn't do his homework again! Damn, I'm so angry on myself. So, instaling fiberglass for sound isolation was no good and a total waste of money. Should I remove it or leave it in? I also covered walls with Selitac PS. It's Parquet Insulating Underlay with 20db sound isolation. I thought it will do a good thing.

http://www.selit.de/eng/products/tritts ... b=1&flash=

Wood Panels, I plan to instal on top of it, are more dense and rigid. Maybe it will isolate sound a bit more.

I'm in a bit uncertain regarding situation now. Maybe it's still not too late to go a step back and change it. How would you approach with sound isolation and absorption in my room?

Thank you

Best Regards,
Dali