Hows my room for mixing?

[akjl4]

Ok my room is 16x24 and my monitors are about 3 feet apart and about 3.5 feet away from one of the 16 foot walls. my room has no sheetrock just r19 insulation covered with visqueen same with ceiling only insulation there to.

my monitors are event studio precision 6s, so not very bass heavy.

Is this room less than Ideal for mixing or do you think it would be okay for mixing some electronic tracks?

[Cryonic_Sound]

Originally Posted by akjl4

Ok my room is 16x24 and my monitors are about 3 feet apart and about 3.5 feet away from one of the 16 foot walls. my room has no sheetrock just r19 insulation covered with visqueen same with ceiling only insulation there to.

my monitors are event studio precision 6s, so not very bass heavy.

Is this room less than Ideal for mixing or do you think it would be okay for mixing some electronic tracks?

Yes/No/Maybe? There are so many factors you've left out, the least of which being ceiling height that I can't give a specific answer. On top of it all, many of us have different standards for what would qualify as "ideal" and "less than ideal." Honestly, if you know what your room is doing and what your monitors are doing, you probably can mix in it. I'd only worry if there were some odd acoustical quirks going on (annoying reflections, and whatnot.) Of course, your mileage may vary.

[Glenn Kuras]

Is your mix spot (where you sit) about 9 feet from the 16 foot wall? Do you feel as you are having a problem? Do you have any bass trapping at all? If the room has 8 foot ceiling then no it is not ideal, but if treated properly then you can make it work.

Glenn

[jwl]

You should definitely be able to make this work. If you have insulation facing in to the room, that's a good start for taming reflections.

I'd put the listening position 38% of the way back from the wall, in the center, ie, 9.12 feet back from the wall. Then put the speakers in an equilateral triangle from your ears.

Treat the side walls and ceiling with absorption to create a RFZ, sounds like you're already on this with the insulation facing in the room.

Then add bass trapping in whatever form you wish.

These simple ideas will get you 95% of the way to great sound in most rooms.

[DontLetMeDrown]

There is only one way to find out.

[Slaytex]

Being multiples of 8, I'd say it's not ideal. You don't want your room to be able to divide into itself evenly or you will get major nulls. You could make it work with A LOT of traps though.

[strat+ac30]

Almost any room is ideal given an unlimited budget. Almost every room is usable with some treatment, even on a relatively low budget. The real question: is there an alternative room? If there's an A option and B option, then we can take all of the acoustics/geometry/etc into consideration.

If your B option is "not making music", then using that room is the best solution available.

[akjl4]

my ceiling is 8.5 feet high ,and right now I sitting about six feet from the wall.
I wondering if I shoud build some monitor stands so I can have them farther apart to create a better stereo image. Right now they are about 3 feet apart, on the edge of my desk.

How many bass traps should I put in my room ideally, and should that be my biggest help towards better acoustics?

[Glenn Kuras]

I would think starting with 8 to 10 bass traps would get you pretty far in a room that size. Maybe more, but you would need to get them in the room and see. Besides bass traps straddling corners I would also look at panels on the early reflection points on the right/left wall and for the ceiling. For the back of the room with it being 24 feet long you could either go with diffusion or absorption.

Glenn

[Ethan Winer]

Originally Posted by akjl4

How many bass traps should I put in my room ideally, and should that be my biggest help towards better acoustics?

Ideally? In a room that large the ideal would be 20 or more. But even 8 will make a very real improvement. It's impossible to make any room that size perfectly flat, and with no bass ringing. So the more traps you add, the closer you'll get.

I have 42 bass traps and panels in my living room which is about the same size as your room. There's a video on the RealTraps site showing a "tour" of my living room, and it explains how I treated the room and why. It's second in the list on our Videos page:

RealTraps - Videos

--Ethan

[akjl4]

I was wrong about my ceiling height it is actually 9.5 feet high because the floor joists are still exposed, so I measure to the bottom not the top where the floor is. And the joists are packed with fluffy insulation.

So I pulled out a tape and my room is actually 14.5 feet by 24 feet and a ceilong of 9.5 feet. 3 of the 4 walls are packed with six inches of fluffy insulation for the top 6.5 feet. The bottom 3 feet of those 3 walls are quadlock insulation which is styrofoam. The remaining wall is sheet rocked top to bottom and is one of the 24 foot walls. The ceiling is packed with six inches of fluffy insulation as well and covered with plastic walls have 6mil plastic as well and the floor is made of concrete with an area rug in the miidle covering about 1/2 the space.

what traps do you guys think I should be using, based on my room conditions.

[GYMusic]

The problem with this scenario is you could have the ultimate mix spot or mix room or whatever... and still crank out horrible mixes. And the opposite is also possible... to turn out great mixes in a horrible room. IMO, the only way you're going to get any sort of forward moving advice is to post up one of your mixes done in this room.

[Glenn Kuras]

Originally Posted by akjl4

I

what traps do you guys think I should be using, based on my room conditions.

For bass trapping I would go with broadband bass traps. Seeing as you have a bunch of r19 in the room, which will absorb a ton of high end I would go with something that has a limp membrane to the front that will reflect some of the high end.

Glenn

[Ethan Winer]

Originally Posted by akjl4

what traps do you guys think I should be using, based on my room conditions.

How much money do you have?

Glenn and I are both in the business of selling bass traps, so maybe start at both of our web sites.

--Ethan

[LaLaFaV]

To Ethan, Glenn & other acoustics experts...
Since it makes sense to have your monitors "firing" the long direction of the room:
Do you think he should be putting drywall on the other 24' long wall to be symmetrical? Then, put acoustic treatments on top of the drywall? It seems weird to leave a wall on one side without drywall because of left to right balance issues.

[Ethan Winer]

Originally Posted by LaLaFaV

Do you think he should be putting drywall on the other 24' long wall to be symmetrical?

Maybe. Left-right symmetry is important, especially in the front of the room between your ears and the loudspeakers. But if one wall is totally absorbent (bare fiberglass), and the other side has absorption over all reflection areas, then acoustically the room will be mostly symmetrical. At least over the range of frequencies the left and right reflections are absorbed equally.

--Ethan

[akjl4]

So looking straight forward at my monitors the 16 foot wall in front of them is fiberglass, the 16 foot wall in back of me is fiberglass, I turn my head right, that 24 foot wall is sheet rocked and I turn my head to the left that 24 foot wall is fiberglass.

This is a fairly symmetrical room that would benefit from some bass traps?

[peeder]

Somewhere along the way getcherself some decent monitors and learn how to isolate and place them.

3 feet apart is probably too close in such a room. Give yourself and them some space.

Oh and I would be tempted in your case to put the sheetrocked wall behind me and treat the reflection points on the two equal sidewalls. Even though usually I would want to have the long dimension be the listening axis. I just think that will be left-right asymmetrical unless you sheetrock the other side.

It's gonna cost some do-re-mi to get traps shipped to Alaska no? I'd look into DIY if you can find Owens Corning 703 in dogsled distance.

[akjl4]

Originally Posted by peeder

Oh and I would be tempted in your case to put the sheetrocked wall behind me and treat the reflection points on the two equal sidewalls. Even though usually I would want to have the long dimension be the listening axis. I just think that will be left-right asymmetrical unless you sheetrock the other side.

It's gonna cost some do-re-mi to get traps shipped to Alaska no? I'd look into DIY if you can find Owens Corning 703 in dogsled distance.

So were exactly would the reflexion points be if I put the sheet rock behind me?


And I think I should be able to pick up some owen cornering if, I feed my dogs a hardy meal.

[peeder]

Originally Posted by akjl4

So were exactly would the reflexion points be if I put the sheet rock behind me?

The reflection points are, if you sit at the mix position, and have an assistant run a mirror flat upon the wall's surface, anywhere you can see the tweeters directly. Those points need to be treated with absorption or diffusion...the closer they are the more likely absorption will be better. Diffusion is just a means of taking away the direct reflection "glint" from the tweeters.

Think about your speakers as floodlights and your walls as mirrors. You're trying to watch a movie.

[Glenn Kuras]

Originally Posted by peeder

The reflection points are, if you sit at the mix position, and have an assistant run a mirror flat upon the wall's surface, anywhere you can see the tweeters directly. Those points need to be treated with absorption or diffusion...the closer they are the more likely absorption will be better. Diffusion is just a means of taking away the direct reflection "glint" from the tweeters.

Think about your speakers as floodlights and your walls as mirrors. You're trying to watch a movie.

Peeder has given you the right answer, but I would not recommend diffusion at all in the early reflections. You are just to close to the side walls for it. Now if you are talking about the back wall or side wall behind you, then YES that would work.

Glenn

[Ethan Winer]

Originally Posted by akjl4

This is a fairly symmetrical room that would benefit from some bass traps?

All rooms need as many bass traps as possible.

Also, see this:

RealTraps - How To Set Up a Room

--Ethan