Treating and 11' x 11' x 9' box of death

[mousdrvr]

Is there anything that can be done? I'd really appreciate any thoughts.

[Jackpine]

Ummmm..... an expansion???

[mousdrvr]

Ummmm..... an expansion???

Ok I'll put you down for "I'm Fucked" :lol:

[magicchord]

Dude...

At my last house I had to use an 8X8X8-foot room in the garage as my studio.

Forget sound issues for a moment; that space was just too small to get anything done in. Yours is almost as bad and I think you should seek another solution.

Just sayin'.

[dikledoux]

If you don't have a choice about this being the space you have, then treatment will make it workable. Not nice, but workable.

What I'd do if it was me:
eliminate parallel walls with the use of furring strips as a second set of studs to offset two opposite walls. Or you might just do ONE wall more drastically angled and then nothing in the room will be square. But you'll screw up the symmetry and maybe have to deal with that at your mix position. It'll give you a chance to add some mass to those walls though, so pick the ones that are most likely to give you noise problems. And break up the ceiling in a space or two with a diffusor of some kind which brings me to...

Diffusion - depending on your furnishings in the room, you may be able to make this happen almost by accident.

Absorption - by means of the materials/furnishing in the room and them most importantly by bass trapping. Low end wierdness is going to eat you alive in this room otherwise.

Lose the corners - maybe build bass traps into them and cover two bases at once.

dik

[mousdrvr]

My Brothers,

Thanks for the responses. I really do hear you guys. owning 4000 sq' in Austin translates to renting a fucking outhouse on a vacant lot up here in Palo Alto. I know this will never sound great. I was kind of waiting till we bought another house to set things up. But our location is too good for us. It will be a few years yet before we can buy what we want up here and that means we might as well stay put, besides the mous mate is still considering LA for our final landing site and She IS the boss :D

The place we're at now is a 30's vintage tear down. It's kinda cute but it's literally falling apart. We are trying to get our landlord to sell us the lot so we can build what we want but I'm not sure that's going to happen. However, he truly does not care what we do to the place so Dik's suggestions are not beyond reason. But Mr Big has plans to sell this lot and the adjoining one and build yet another apartment complex. We have reason to know that getting the appropriate permits will be very difficult for him, still I don't want to do a bunch of "down to the studs" work when this thing has a bulldozer with it's name own it. Now if he sells it to us ........... Booya!

Anyway, all I'm trying to do here is get a place where I can track a decent vocal and maybe mic an ac. I just bought a M88 cause this place is too noisy an fucked to use my U-195. Again I'm not expecting miracles but I'd like to get something wherein I can track vox and listen to a set of nearfields without tearing out my hair. It's just been too long since I've done anything but practice or play the odd gig and I've just GOT to get to making some shit again or I'm going to go mad....uh madder than I already am :lol:

More than y'all needed to know I'm sure but that's the context.

Thanks again for the replies, I feel the love.



-mous

[vocalnick]

Similar boat here, and although I don't speak feet, I believe my dimensions here are about the same.

We're renting, and the landlord most definitely does care what we do with the place... not to mention I'm leery of doing too much work on something I don't own. My grandparents had a couple of rental properties sold out from underneath them after making thousands of $$ worth of improvements. There's probably a connection there if you care to look. :P

I'll be keeping an eye on this topic for (cheap!) suggestions too. For now, I'm still using the room to compose & record - just not as well as I might. I don't really miss working in TV, but at least a quiet room and a decent pair of monitors were generally only a few steps away there.

[M.Brane]

Bass trap it to death, and try to make the rear wall/ceiling as invisible as possible. 'Bout all you can do I'm afraid. Try not to kill too much top-end in the process.

The sweet spot is gonna be real tight. Consider bolting your chair to the floor, and using head restraints once you find it.

[lebouche]

My live rooms 10x10x6...
Thinking bout moving evreything to another site as well but its so much grief...if I could knock my booth down and soundproof the whole thing inc control room I could get more band work.
Too small to record bands in....to expensive to soundproof the whole area if I expand it.
Good luck to you...I'm sure you'll get by.:Razz:

[slabrock]

The sweet spot is gonna be real tight. Consider bolting your chair to the floor, and using head restraints once you find it.

Don't abandon your hope.

It's never gonna be very good, but it can definitely be good enough to track, and do some small money mixing too. No big bucks, no mastering. Nearfields, yes. Genelec 8020's or Yamaha NS10's, why not? No subwoofer, though, the space's too small i'd say.

Find out, if there is available space between the present ceiling and the roof. Maybe you can build a new, higher ceiling and treat some of it.

Tilt two walls slightly so that you face the narrow end of the room while mixing. Treat that end heavily, both side walls and the end wall, and remember that compressed fibre wool adds space.

Add bass traps in the corners behind you, or buy the biggest and heaviest vintage sofa you can get. Hang a panel resonator on the rear wall, and remember there's going to be a bass boost on the back of the room anyway. Don't treat the side walls behind you too heavily, or you make the room dead.

Check the exact area in the side walls, where the sound reflects to your ears, and build some diffusors there.

Actually, i have a similar space, and situation, in that i want to build a control room in my outhouse/garage so that i don't need to go to a proper studio every time i need to do something like edit or clean tracks. I have a very good deal with a studio that's just a 10 minutes drive away from my home, but sometimes that's too far. I still prefer to track there instead of tracking at home, even if i'm just demoing the guitars and vocals. My home recording days are over
:lol:

Peace,

Slabrock

[Brendo]

That room's about the size of my bedroom...

[bunnerabb]

I'm not sure what you're using, but I slapped this together.

Standard diffusion / absorption model for a project studio.

http://www.picvault.info/images/537028152_malice.jpg

[otek]

If all you need is a room to record guitars and vocals, I've seen similar dimensions on well constructed voiceover booths.

Your real problems will likely be in the low end - the "bomb shelter" style "wummmmm's" will require bass traps and extensive correction.

[Mixerpuppet]

Layer the 1" 703 on the ceiling to tweak the "acoustic height", bass traps and foam products as required to balance the rooms overall response. Bunnerabb has a nice floor plan for rough placement... 2" 705 on the side walls closest to your monitors and mix position and 2" 703 on the backwall directly behind the mix position...

Cheaper to build yourself by a long shot. Waaay cheaper

Keep your mix position away from the center of the room first and foremost...

[Ethan Winer]

Bass trap it to death, and try to make the rear wall/ceiling as invisible as possible.

I agree. If there's a chance to use a better room, that's of course preferable. But if this is what you have, bass traps will go a very long way toward making it workable. And the rear wall advice is good too. The wall behind you creates the worst peaks and nulls, so broadband absorption or bass traps is the best solution there. At least two of them directly behind your head spaced a few inches off the wall will help a lot, and four will help even more. This is in addition to treating as many corners as you can manage.

--Ethan

[mousdrvr]

Guys Thanks for all the replies.

I found these guys online http://www.atsacoustics.com/
will they be any good? I'm leary cause they don't seem to mention the incredible importance of bass trapping.
However the price seems reasonable and the shit looks half way attractive.

I don't have problem doing DIY stuff, but I sure the hell ain't Bubba. I gave away or sold all my tools when we moved back to CA from Austin and my house framing days are way in the rearview mirror. Still if this is a matter of getting some fiber glass insolation, packing it in several simple plywood frames and wrapping that in colored burlap, I think I could deal.

So, if I DIY is the way to go, as many of you have indicated in the poll, what's the best way to do it?

Oh I should mention that what with an actual desk, some of those genelec nearfields, and a few channels of decent AD,
My budget is only around $500


Again thanks for the replies and genuine support. This place is the best.



-mous

[mousdrvr]

I agree. If there's a chance to use a better room, that's of course preferable. But if this is what you have, bass traps will go a very long way toward making it workable. And the rear wall advice is good too. The wall behind you creates the worst peaks and nulls, so broadband absorption or bass traps is the best solution there. At least two of them directly behind your head spaced a few inches off the wall will help a lot, and four will help even more. This is in addition to treating as many corners as you can manage.

--Ethan

Ethan, Thank you

Yeah I saw your videos! and you guys would be my first choice for sure. But I'm not sure if I can afford enough of your traps to do the job. Still if only 2 or three would start to make a difference It might be a good way to go.


-mous

[dikledoux]

MousD,

Ethan is too classy a guy to publicly diss the people at the link you gave, and there's some value as far as absorption at mid and upper frequencies with those panels. But they aren't bass traps. You may have seen this DIY info:
From Ethan's site (http://www.ethanwiner.com/acoustics.html)

and if you check with someone like a local insulation contractor/supply house you can get the OwensCorning stuff and materials to do the DIY work pretty effectively for your budget. Between the rigid insulation and the covering material of your choice (and maybe some simple carpentry) you can fix a LOT.

dik

[mousdrvr]

MousD,

Ethan is too classy a guy to publicly diss the people at the link you gave, and there's some value as far as absorption at mid and upper frequencies with those panels. But they aren't bass traps. You may have seen this DIY info:
From Ethan's site (http://www.ethanwiner.com/acoustics.html)

and if you check with someone like a local insulation contractor/supply house you can get the OwensCorning stuff and materials to do the DIY work pretty effectively for your budget. Between the rigid insulation and the covering material of your choice (and maybe some simple carpentry) you can fix a LOT.

dik


Perfect!

Thanks Dik and Ethan


Mousd