John Sayers' Recording Studio Design Forum Archive

Hi All,
I just found this wonderful site. I am a cellist who is is beginning a series of multitrack project in my home studio and would appreciate anyone thought on acoustic changes that I might make in my recording space. I know almost nothing about acoustics but have noticed that in the studio designs on this forum there are not a lot of right angles.

I spend a great deal of time practicing and teaching in this space and haven’t noticed any issues but I am wondering if making some alterations to the room would make the sound that I am getting in recordings better.

As I am renting, any alterations that I make need to not involve major construction/destruction.

I downloaded SmartDraw to give you a view of the room.
A few details not visible on the layout.

1. The two items against the west wall are 6' high CD racks (full)
2. The items in the north/east and south/east corners are old iron heaters.
3. the area in which the walls meet the ceiling is curved rather than the traditional right angles.
4. I currently have a large area rug down as it seems a bit too live without it and it saves the wood floor from cellists endpins. It fills about 1/3 of the room.

What other info would you like?
Thanks for any knowledge/advice you care to share.

Derek

Greetings and welcome! That's a pretty nice space you have there. There are a couple things I can think of that would make it sound even better.

Hrm... looking at the layout of that space, I'm having trouble deciding if there's a good spot to put the mixing desk and listening position. You want the room to be as symmetrical around your speakers as you can get it, or the stereo image will be wierd. It'd be all right against that right wall, especially if you treated the wall on the left end of the plan to absorb as much as you could. John's Wall Units page has some ideas on what to do there.

As far as the walls go, having them paralell is going to create some flutter echoes for you if you perform between them, so if you could record sitting in a spot that isn't between 2 parallel, reflective walls, it'd be best. Somewhere near that angled wall in the bottom left would work.

Hope this helps.

Kase
www.minemusic.net

...perform between them, so if you could record sitting in a spot that isn't between 2 parallel, reflective walls, it'd be best. Somewhere near that angled wall in the bottom left would work.

Thanks! Do you think I should perform facing my current desk placement? BTW my desk is now in that spot because I put the CPU in the closet and the extensio cables for the keyboard/monitor/mouse only go so far. Would it be a bad spot to stick my monitors in the corner edges of the desk area?

Also, the room entrance at the bottom left is covered by a heavy curtain.

Thanks again & I'll check out John's wall unit page as you suggest.

-Derek

Derek,

> I am a cellist who is is beginning a series of multitrack project <

Cool, so am I, and I record myself in my home studio all the time.

One problem when recording acoustic instruments in a small room is all of the walls are very close to you and also to the microphones. This can create comb filtering (basically a rippled frequency response) and short echoes, which together make recordings sound like they're done in a small room.

I think you'll do well to apply absorption to the one wall you're closest to while recording the cello. Also, I appreciate that you want to protect the floor, but you'll get a more natural sound if the floor under the cello is reflective. I have a very small piece of carpet on my hardwood floor. Basically it's just a strip large enough to hold the chair and catch the end pin. However, doing this means you need additional absorption on the ceiling over the area where you record. Otherwise you'll get repetitive echoes between the floor and ceiling.

--Ethan