John Sayers' Recording Studio Design Forum Archive

Hello all, this studio design is a second revision, after incorporating the SAE Corner Control Room plan into my original (it offered better control room site lines and visual communication for the musicians). The hallway that wraps around the individual rooms (which is a single layer of sheet rock with minimal insulation with 2"x4" studs on 16" centers, for aesthetics only) is bordered by sand filled cinder blocks, the main construction material for the studio exo-skeleton.

I have lots of questions, that will surely lead to only questions in return so I see no point in not cutting to the chase.

-First, I am planning on building the control room and studio A first, then finish over a period of less than one year, as to remain oporational for the entire period of construction.

-Secondly, I need to know if my isolation techniques will be addiquit. I plan to have the walls of the individual rooms be 2"x4" studs on 16" centers. Then a layer of sheet rock, either a layer of MDF or thick insulation(which ever will do me better), with another layer of sheet rock on top. I plan to float the floors, but am not quite sure if I should use a strip of neoprene the lenght of the floorboards or just at specified points along the beams.

-Lastly, the goal for this studio is to be completely modular (simply meaning, if I were to move to Arizona and wanted to take my studio, I could encase each room in a thick case and load them all onto the back of a semi-truck and then place them back into another identical studio exo-skeleton).

Any suggestions, criticisms, or comments are always welcomed. As a last note, I did draft this in MS Paint, so it is not exactly to scale, but it is pretty close.

When you get time, you should go to the REFERENCE section and read at least the first two or three links there; it will help you understand about best use of materials in sound proofing, so you won't want to put mass-air-mass-air-mass walls together - Also, decent isolation requires heavy, IMMOVABLE amounts of mass so you need to decide whether portability is more important than isolation.

I'm getting too far gone to do much more right now, be sure to read/re-read those links and I'll "arnold" manana... Steve

In talking with some of my builder buddies, I to came to the conclusion that building for portability was not well thought out and scrapped the idea, thanks for input. I'm still not sure what you're talking about with putting the walls together? I will go and reread the reference section again and away any other suggestions. Thanks a ton!

"The hallway that wraps around the individual rooms (which is a single layer of sheet rock with minimal insulation with 2"x4" studs on 16" centers, for aesthetics only) is bordered by sand filled cinder blocks, the main construction material for the studio exo-skeleton."

This 5' space all around looks to me like a drastic waste of otherwise usable space, considering it's already within the containment area - is there a reason for it I'm not seeing? Where do you get into this space from the outside, and why is it necessary all the way around?

The REFERENCE links will clear up floor floating a bit, as well as mass-air-mass isolation - then I can hopefully answer your remaining questions on actual implementation of the concepts for your case... Steve

Steve, I hope this new floor plan helps. And to add to the lists of questions I'm sure to ask before this building is done, the light green areas of the plan are up in the air as far a flooring goes. I think carpet in the control room would be okay, as well as in the vocal booth and the amp iso booths, but in the live room I don't know if the wood floor should continue or if it should be carpet? I have tossed around the idea of having custom cut carpet pieces with non skid bottoms made to place in those spots to change the acoustics of the room, but I am not sure how effective the carpet will even be installed, let alone just laid out like an area rug. Finally, the far left wall of Studio B, I really think I want to build three gobos all with one slat wall sides, the center (widest of the bunch) with a rock wall side, and the remaining two having a hinged variable panel absorber, with the closed serving as a high and low absorber and the open acting as a low absorber with high diffusion. And, does anyone think there is enough room in the upper right corner of studio B has enough depth to function as a slat wall with a small bass trap behind it? Thanks a ton for all the time and information, I hope everyone has the best of weeks!

My own personal preferences - no carpet that isn't portable, period. Only exception (for me) is high traffic areas, hallways, NON-acoustic places.

Gobos - ROCK face??!? WTF kind of wheels are you planning for this, or are you actually referring to wall-mounted stuff?

If you can re-post your actual questions, spaced for readability, it will help me wade through all the posts more quickly so I might have time to work on the video editing station I've been trying to finish (or start, for that matter ) for a couple of weeks; thanks... Steve

Sorry Steve, I read the post about spacing questions right after I posted those questions. I haven't quite worked out all the details, I'm still in the planning stage of all this. And thanks for the flooring suggestions. I am contacting John at this very moment about getting my design professionally done. So thanks for all the help, and I hope that you get that edit desk started sometime soon, ha, ha!!