Old Church, Double control room layout

bassman · Post by **bassman** » Wed Oct 15, 2003 4:08 pm

This comes from another thread in the construction forum. It seems more like a design at this point since I'm only considering the space and do not own it yet.

Here goes:
I want to create a studio with two control rooms, one big one for me and another smaller (less expensive) one for people to rent or lease out so that my big tracking room gets more use. I mostly mix at this point but when I track its always an issue since my space is limited currently. Plus, we just had our second child and I need to get my ass outta the attic so we can have our master bedroom and the kids each get a room. Time to go...

Each control room needs a dedicated Iso booth for overdubs in case the main room is being used by the other control room. So each ISO must have direct line of sight with one control room and should be of reasonable size for vocals, amps, maybe even a kit or piano. The large room I want to be variable in acoustic nature. I want to be able to do foley work in there and turn around and get massive drums or even a string section, choir, what have you. I would even like to be able to screen films and possibly mix larger film work in this room.

I would like to have one area with really dead acoustics and effective bass trapping for bass amps and other things. I'd like to be able to track many musicians in the room and use the bleed but be able to control it well. OK, do I want it all or what?

I've made a rough layout of the second floor of a building I looked at earlier this week. Its an old church and has the height, a freight elevator and a nice location (walking distance from the house).

I am attaching the layout and hopefully a shot of the outside to give you an idea of the height of this place. Its not pretty but it could work I think.

-bassman

bassman · Post by **bassman** » Wed Oct 15, 2003 4:10 pm

Here's the pic...

DDev · Post by **DDev** » Thu Oct 16, 2003 4:36 am

Looks like a building with potential. My only concern would be how to isolate it from the ground floor (both for your recordings and how much noise will flow down to the first floor).

Also, are any of the interior walls load bearing or can they be relocated to suit whatever floorplan you come up with?

What size control rooms are you envisioning? Do you need to have a surround setup or just stereo monitoring? How about approximate sizes of the iso booths? Your space will shrink rapidly as you begin adding all these in.

Darryl.....

bassman · Post by **bassman** » Thu Oct 16, 2003 5:11 am

All partitions are movable. The only fixtures are the freight elevator and the bathroom area plumbing. I could probably move the bathroom but would like to avoid the expense plus the area to the upper right of it could be a lounge/kitchen.

One control room should be healty and surround capable. The second should be smaller and primarily stereo. With the height available, most of the heavy bass trapping would be in the ceiling I assume allowing for a little more floor space. I want low end accuracy! The larger control room needs to accomodate a keyboard programming area (behind the mix pos) and a producer/artist area behind that. Don't know if it is feasible but I would like to have a common machine room for the place as well. All DAW, no tape decks to worry about. I was thinking about a double, corner control room layout but haven't mastered enough of SmartDraw to sketch it out yet.

Both booths should be large enough to accomodate drums or piano but optimized for vocals. 100-150sq ft or so. The large room should have some symetry in the dead area for film screening purposes.

Whew, I know that all of this might not be possible but I must at least explore the possibilities. I want to do a lot of DIY but will pay to have proper framing and structural integrity/safety. I'm looking at the imossible budget of $25K for the build.

-bassman, I want it all!

DDev · Post by **DDev** » Sat Oct 18, 2003 7:37 am

I don't yet have a copy of SmartDraw to do anything with (besides I'm not much of an artist), but I was thinking that Michael Jones control room layout would be a good place to start for your main control room (see link below). His studio is 30'x40', so if you use that as a reference you should get the idea of how to lay it into your space. My thoughts are that I would put that control room in the lower left corner of your drawing in the large open area, and make the adjacent area your tracking room. I would use the space on the top end for the smaller control room and booth, with the area around the elevator and stairs left as a lounge/entry area.

Anyway, I'm not really an expert at this but an avid student. Good luck with it.

http://www.johnlsayers.com/Studio/Mainp ... rriage.htm

Darryl.....

Post by **John Sayers** » Sat Oct 18, 2003 8:00 am

Bassman - the main obstacle I see your request for having two control rooms accessing the one studio. YOu would need to have a very high STC between rooms for that system to work - check out Galaxy Studios where they achieved an STC of 100db http://www.galaxy.be/history.htm

I doubt you'd be able to achieve that kind of STC with your 25K budget.

Otherwise it looks like a cool building for a studio - good lift access for gear loading, nice open space without poles etc. for the studio. Why not make the office area at the top of your plan the 'B' studio??

cheers
JOhn

bassman · Post by **bassman** » Sat Oct 18, 2003 1:08 pm

I should be a little clearer. The whole space is available. The walls in the layout just indicate what is there now. I can't move the elevator and the bathroom would be a pain to move but otherwise, its all open. I'll work on a couple ideas and post a layout soon.

John, one idea I had was to have the booths separate each control room from the main room as a buffer for STC. that would make four sliding doors and a 6'+ airspace between. Would that provide enough STC? I have seen and marvelled at Galaxy before. what an amazing place!

I have a K's Choice CD and always wondered why it sounded sooo good until I saw that studio. Talk about a brick sh** house! I'd love to do some work there. Have you ever been to Masterfonics tracking room in Nashville? http://www.emeraldsound.com/studios/stuj.shtml[/url]

I've been able to hear some of my work in that playback system. Hidley/Kinoshta 20hz! All the way down...

I'll post back as soon as I get the hang of this SmartDraw thing. They need an OSX version so I can diddle on my laptop.

-bassman

knightfly · Post by **knightfly** » Sat Oct 18, 2003 5:00 pm

"They need an OSX version " - they've GOT one - it's called "Virtual PC" - my son's a graphic artist, runs all kinds of PC stuff on his power book, g4's, etc - MicroSlop got so nervous they bought Connectix, so I'm not sure what the availability is now.

Here's the deal so far -

http://www.connectix.com

Just a thought... Steve

jdean · Post by **jdean** » Sun Oct 19, 2003 1:29 am

horribly crude and not to scale but;
are either of these close to what you want?

jdean · Post by **jdean** » Sun Oct 19, 2003 1:31 am

option 2.

Post by **John Sayers** » Mon Oct 20, 2003 1:26 pm

I like option 2 as it uses the spaces really well and the access to stairs, toilets etc is fine. My only concern is what if control B want's access to the tracking room to record an acoustic set and control 'A' is mixing heavy metal

Surely that booth for control B should be enough - if they want more space they should book studio A ??

cheers
john

bassman · Post by **bassman** » Wed Oct 22, 2003 2:18 pm

Thanks there jdean, I like the second option better as well and keeps sight lines good for using the B control as a possible third iso.

Thanks for all the input. We'll see if the space will be mine. I need to go take a look at an old movie theater!

Could be cooler...

John, I agree about isolation in extreme cases but the A room is my personal space and I don't mix too loud. The B room is there just to keep the tracking space profitable as I mostly mix. Plus, I can just kick 'em out or re-book if there is an issue. Hell, I'd own the place!

-ashley