Warehouse Recordings

[Volmar]

I've rented two floors in a massive warehouse in Tórshavn the capital of the Faroe Islands for four weeks of recording and sound experiments. I am going to record with my Mac/PT/Lynx rig + API, Urei, Distressors etc. outboard + Coles ribbon & Wunder CM7 mics.

I am however thinking if any of the equipment (especially the Wunder) will be damaged as it's cold in the building, ranging from 0 to 10 degrees Celsius, and what about humidity? I saw there was a small pool of water on the concrete floor in one end of the building although most of the huge space looks completely dry. I have next to no knowledge on this subject, so it would be great, if someone could enlighten me.

Thanks,

[lalune]

I don't think that the temperature will be a problem, but be careful with humidity.
Never move your equipment from a cold to a warm environment as you can get condensation.
The way to do it is to put your gear in a box or bag or whatever in the cold place, move it, and give it time to warm up in the warm place before you open the box or bag or whatever.

Just curious, what kind of experiments will you be doing for four weeks in a cold warehouse on the Faroe Islands?

[boojum]

Pipes?

[Volmar]

Thanks!

I'm recording ORKA's new album. We're planning on experimenting with building instruments while recording the new album. ORKA on MySpace Music - Free Streaming MP3s, Pictures & Music Videos

[jeremyglover]

awesome sounds great! let us know how you get on.
as stated above i would bag the mics at the end of the session.
cheers, jeremy

[surflounge]

Originally Posted by Volmar

I am however thinking if any of the equipment (especially the Wunder) will be damaged

yes, guaranteed it will never be in the same working condition after exposure you describe

[Volmar]

Hey, thanks all. I will send some updates and links as soon we have something interesting happening.

But I'm getting two different opinions now... Could you please clarify, Surflounge? Why will they not be in the same working condition?

[surflounge]

cold + wet = destruction for gear

what do you think? it's NOT gonna hurt it?
plus, you'll be surrounded by salt water.
doesn't seem like the best environment for gear preservation.

[Remoteness]

You should consider building a control room within the warehouse and install the proper environment control.
You can rent portable dehumidifiers, air conditioners, heaters or all in one units to balance the temperature and humidity levels.

Furthermore, after the sessions are done, take everything apart and examine, wipe and clean every piece of gear that was involved in this project.

[LX3]

Funny you should bring this up.

I was recording drums a couple of nights ago in an unheated factory, just as we were going through a patch of particularly cold weather. There was heating, but it was too noisy to run while recording, and it was such a huge space that it would have taken an hour or more to get the temperature up at all.

Great sounding place, the gear was all pretty happy. The problem was that as a player, after a few hours I was way too cold to carry on.

It caught me out (because I've recorded in this location pretty succesfully before... but in the summer). You forget how important the work environment is until you have to deal with a bad one.

So I'd say that equally important as the gear and room is the vibe of the place, especially when you're producing other artists (which thankfully I wasn't the other night). I've seen sessions go downhill very rapidly when perfomers aren't comfortable. Being cold might be tolerable for an hour, then it starts to get annoying, then eventually unbearable. It's better if recording is a pleasure, not a battle for survival

That's the great thing about real recording studios - it's a controlled environment, where (hopefully) you don't have to worry about things like being too hot or cold, unexpectedly weird acoustics, external noise (e.g. traffic, neighbours, kids throwing stones at the building!), irritating control room ergonomics, security, etc. All the obstacles that can ruin a session are already dealt with, and you just get on with the music.

Not that you can't make unusual recording spaces work, but with studio rates the way they are, the economics have changed.... at least for short recording sessions.

I also agree that extended time in cold damp environments is really bad for studio gear. It breaks my heart when I find great secondhand kit that's obviously spent the last couple of years in someone's damp garage or basement. Thanks to our small houses in London, the secondhand market is littered with that stuff.

Options? Maybe bring in some heating, partition off part of the warehouse so you don't have to heat the entire thing, build a temporary "room within a room" for the control room, wait until the spring, find somewhere else?

[ohmoka]

Originally Posted by LX3

Funny you should bring this up.

I was recording drums a couple of nights ago in an unheated factory, just as we were going through a patch of particularly cold weather. There was heating, but it was too noisy to run while recording, and it was such a huge space that it would have taken an hour or more to get the temperature up at all.

Originally Posted by LX3

Options? Maybe bring in some heating, partition off part of the warehouse so you don't have to heat the entire thing, build a temporary "room within a room" for the control room, wait until the spring, find somewhere else?

Me too!

I did a piano session last week and had the same worries.
It was a church pretty close to a road so in order to avoid street noises we did 3 night sessions starting at 10pm and finishing by 3am' ish.

The heating system of the church makes quite a lot of noise -no chance to leave on during the sessions- and the temperature drops pretty quick after it is switched off-. I was very worried about the tuning of the piano as we were not going to have stand by tuner... he was only booked before starting each session.

I hired some electrical (and completely silents) heaters from HSS (All over the UK) to keep the temperature warm and STABLE around the piano -and the pianist of course!.
The changes of the temperature will bring the problems.

The piano tuner told me that more important than the temperature is the humidity... A few degrees does not represent a big deal (depending on the piano) but high humidity places can definitely be a problem.... the piano can react unpredictable... as he said.

The recording went very well mostly because the piano we brought was AMAZING! The temperature definitely changed and by the end of the session (3am ish) I could say it dropped +/- 5 or 6 degrees than when we started (even having two heaters by the piano) (See photo) . As I mentioned the piano was really good and keep the tuning during the recording. When the piano tuner came back the following day for the next session (both times) he said that it was pretty much in tune, It just required little adjustments.

If I have the same situation in the future I will use more heaters trying to cover all around the area that needs to be warm and not only one side as I did..thumbsup

[Volmar]

This took a while Thanks for all your help! It all went well, equipment still intact. We measured the humidity, which wasn't a problem and most gear can handle low temperatures. We did however keep all gear running at all times in order to prevent condensation.

Here are some links to what we did:

ORKA recording the album ÓRÓ at the Salt Warehouse by the Ports of Tórshavn - YouTube

ORKA - Rúmdardrongurin [Official Video] - YouTube

ORKA - Tað vakrasta [Official Video] - YouTube

Thanks!

[Rolo 46]

I record in cold stone Saxon Churches with RF SDCs
The gear is not a problem , the people are.

[David Spearritt]

Originally Posted by Rolo 46

I record in cold stone Saxon Churches with RF SDCs
The gear is not a problem , the people are.

So true.