John Sayers' Recording Studio Design Forum Archive

Hello everyone, glad to be part of the board.
I noticed this site after getting some great input from John over at homerecording.com/bbs so I thought I would check out his site. I have to say so far, I have learned more than I expected thanks to John and the good people here.

I am in the beginning stages of planning my studio. A little info for you: I am having a home built starting in a few months and will build myself a studio/rehearsal space in the basement. I don’t plan on making any money from this studio <most likely>, it’s mainly for band practices <if I can start up a band> and home recording for fun. I don’t have a budget per say, but I just need good reasons to spend money on something I’m not going to get anything out of. So if there are things I am not seeing that would make great sense, please let me know.

I have posted two pictures of different directions I am going with the design. What you see is the basement of a home I am about to have built. It will have 9’ ceilings and I can use any or all of the space for the project. I am looking to have the largest rehearsal space I can muster, and fill in the gaps with other rooms. I.e. control rm, vocal or whatever. The designs you see are ones that I have came up with based on searches throughout Johns site and from what I have learned so far. If anyone has seen any obscure shaped designs or has any ideas from what I have to work with, that would be great.
Thanks so much,
SpaceBoy

No 2 - looks like the way to go. You can even have a relax lounge setup in the area at the bottom of the stairs.

cheers
John

Thanks John,

I will run with that then. I was hoping to figure out a better way to get a wider rehearsal room but I can't make it work and still keep things practical.

Thanks for the input!

SpaceBoy

What do you think about something like this?? Your input is greatly appreciated.

oh - I see - you can move the HVAC around - so this space isn't built yet??

perhaps you could look at something like this - it gives a good sized control room that is 18' deep.

cheers
john

Hey I didn't know he could move the Heating/ac:)

I thought maybe this



Best,

Dave

Thanks guys, looks great.

I was hoping to stear away from having a long and slender room to play in though.
It seems pretty clear from both of your ideas that the control room should be getting the priority over the live/rehearsal room. Right? Is the reason I would want a larger control for a much better sound quality versus a smaller one?? As you can plainly see I have no idea. I just know from prior experiance that jamming in a smaller area gets old. I will be spending most of the time in the control room though I guess.

Space

Is the reason I would want a larger control for a much better sound quality versus a smaller one

Yes:)

I'm dealing with a smaller control room, but it was really the only thing practical for my old farmhouse/basement. Knowing what I know, I am having fun pushing the envelope on this small room (11x15x6), but bigger would be a whole lot easier. Luckily I'm not concerned about sound leaking into the rest of the house, so that helps as the sound has somewhere to go.

My live room is 30 x 15 x 7, but the low ceiling and other structural issues didn't make it reasonable for building a "proper" sized control room. I've invested very little in construction costs.

If you have the space, and budget, I would get that control room nice and big. Realistically your basement will never have the ceiling height to create a <Insert famous studio here>"amazing live room." Not that you need one either, but if you really needed a large room sound, you could go to a church or something, bring some gobos, track some stuff, and bring it back home. At that point you would be very glad to have a well designed and accurate control room in which to make decisions.
Plus with John's wide sliding glass doors, maybe things wouldn't feel very confining.

Best,

Dave

Dave,

Based on your info, I am still trying to put this thing together to have the best of both worlds. As far as the basement, I will have 9' ceilings so that will help with the over sound and feel. I am pretty flexible with my budget, just don't want to go too overboard since this whole project is for hobby purposes only. I dont want to be kicking myself later either.

Please tell me if I am heading in the right direction.

Thanks,

Space

SpaceBoy,

I don't know whether you could fit the vocal booth under the stairs but here's an idea. It allows for a reasonably sized control room and live room. John? As usual John probably has something better up his sleeve.

I think you want to allow for enough bass trapping in the rear of the control room. Having a storage/Heat/AC access door behind the couch could work --plus it's a place to store cables/mic locker etc. Seems awkward IMO to have a vocal booth behind the console.

Best,

Dave

Snap some real pictures:)

Awesome, I didn't think of that. I'll plug that into what I have going.

Thanks so much for the help!!

Space

ps. I'm not going to start construction for a few months, but I'll be sure to take pix as I go!

great work Dave - hey can I take a holiday now ?? ;)

cheers
john

Great!!

Since I now have Johns blessing I will focus on the above layout. I'll try and really do it correctly and use color like Johns lovely drawings. The biggest chore now will be spending lots of time with Johns manual learning about treatments and so forth to plan out for the ideal acoustic treament!!

Thanks so much for the help Dave and John, I'm sure I'll bump into you in the construction forum!!

Space

Space,

Glad to be of any help.

John, vacation, no way man, unless your coming through Atlanta..ha ha



Dave

Ok, sorry to get back on this again.
Someone remarked about not seeing the live room from the vocal room. Just to bounce this off you guys, do you think this one would be better or worse from before?? I also tried shading some places for the bass traps you remarked about.
Thanks so much,

SpaceBoy