Room treatment vs. drum overheads - help me spend money!

[danbronson]

I have about a grand saved up and it's going to go either to room treatment or to a pair of overheads. Eventually I'll get both, but for the time being I'm left trying to decide which to get now.

Here's where I'm at (recording mostly acoustic, rock and metal):
-My 'studio' is a large bedroom (13' X 21' with 8' ceiling), so far completely untreated with pretty bad comb filtering all over the place as well as flutter echo
-My current overheads are an omni Naiant X-S pair, not ideal, but they pick up sound (being omni, they pick up the not-so-nice qualities of my room, they have high self noise so they're not great on quieter sources like acoustics)
-I have an Audix DP5-A kit on the way, OktavaMod Mk-319, transformerless SM57 and a stock SM58 so I've got most applications covered, all this goes into Mogami gold cable, into a Presonus Firepod into my XP PC running Cubase, monitoring with an M-Audio BX8a pair

For roughly $1000, I can completely treat the room with 20 (yes, twenty) 2'X4'X6" bass traps that I'll make myself with Roxul Rockboard 60 and DIY Ready Bags. Or I can get a pair of Blue Bluebirds with shockmounts/windscreens for a little under $800. Those would not only be useful as overheads but would be great on acoustic guitars and vocals as well. I'm really impressed with what I've heard.

So what's your vote?

[davet]

Room.... great mics won't help a bad room.
DaveT

[Clarence]

It is a no brainer: a bad room is in every recording - everytime. No matter how much money you will spend on mics, the room-sound will render them - more or less - useless.

There is really no decision to make, here.


Clarence

[skatingbasser]

I'm in similar shoes to you now. The money is going into my room, easily.

[RockManDan]

yea go for the room treatment. i would suggest also trying to logistically make it happen so that you can reverse its affects(IE removing said treatment/bass traps in case you move so you can use them somewhere else). use the extra 200 bucks to get some cheap mxl's for OH until you can save for something better. cheap mics in a decent room will sound better than great mics in a horrible room full of reflective surfaces and right angles.

also, you'd be surprised how much you can stretch a little money. find some old matresses, sofa cusions, random foam, blankets, etc to strategically place around the room to break up reflections. is it as good as real treatment? hell no, but its better than nothing.

actually i change my mind. i would split the difference and go for a decent yet not huge amount of treatment, yet try to spend at least 4-500 on new mics. that would probably be your best bet, and you can use creative engineering (IE cheapness) to get your room sounding somewhere between not-horrible and decent. It will still be full of reflections, but experimentation and placement will allow you to work with them and find the sweet spot. a big empty square bedroom has no sweet spot unless you want to make a recording that sounds like an empty bedroom.

but just my thoughts. im no expert, just a long history of geurilla tactics and low budget recording.

[Clarence]

btw: don‘t overdo it with the bass traps.
Yes, the more, the merrier, but small rooms for acoustic-guitar recording will benefit from DIY diffusors, too. Put your traps in the corners (don‘t forget the ceiling/wall-corners) and google for diffusor formulas. There are good ones out there ...


Clarence

[danbronson]

Thanks for the responses. You're all right, treatment is going to make a bigger difference in the quality of my recordings. It's just so easy to be swayed by a couple of beautiful mics...

I'll do the bass traps and I've got a great idea for a couple portable DIY 2'X4' wood diffusors that I'll be able to lay horizontal like wedges or stack vertically in a corner if I want.

[mp54u]

I would fix the room first. I look at with this analogy

Analogy...

You can try and take a picture through a dirty window. The picture is still going to come out smeared and look like it was taken through a dirty window whether you take it with a $10 camera, or a $2000 dollary camera. Then after that picture is taken, you can try and use photoshop to fix it with all the fancy plugins and tools, but the picture is still not going to look the way it was SUPPOSED to look.

Now if I take the picture after cleaning the window or removing the window completely, then using a more expensive camera may make a bigger difference in the quality of the picture.

I'm sure that someone has used that Analogy before but it is the way I describe room acoustic's to my friends and the drastic effect that it has on a sound that is being recorded.

[davet]

Originally Posted by danbronson

Thanks for the responses. You're all right, treatment is going to make a bigger difference in the quality of my recordings. It's just so easy to be swayed by a couple of beautiful mics...

I'll do the bass traps and I've got a great idea for a couple portable DIY 2'X4' wood diffusors that I'll be able to lay horizontal like wedges or stack vertically in a corner if I want.

Yeah, off white bass traps just aren't as sexy as shiny new mics. But, you need traps...

[stagefright13]

I would buy $920 worth of room treatment and spend the leftover $80.00 dollars on 2 MCA SP1 mics for overheads. Then you can have your cake and eat it too! In a small room you'll need lots of bass traps. And the SP1's make a decent overhead mic. Good on alot of stuff actually.

[ScumBum]

I'd buy the mics and track drums in a different room . 8 foot ceilings is low . Ask one of your friends that has a big room or warehouse with high ceilings to track there .

[allencollins]

Originally Posted by MushroomKingdom

I'd buy the mics and track drums in a different room . 8 foot ceilings is low . Ask one of your friends that has a big room or warehouse with high ceilings to track there .

I think that's why folks have reverb units. They can do wonders to drums recorded in
not so big rooms. I have 8 foot ceilings and my drums sound HUUUUUUUUGE

If you are a purist then you may have an issue with reverb but if you use compression, gating or other fx your cheating anyway so why not go all the way?

Some Reverbs are so natural sounding, if used by professionals I bet 99% of listeners could not tell the difference between digital verb or real verb. Audio 'Engineers' included.

[stagefright13]

Yeah Allen is right. You can get fantastic sound in a smaller room with a good reverb. But you will need alot of bass traps. And a good cloud overhead.

[sethmeister]

Instead of twenty bass traps just put up floor to ceiling traps in the corners. Then use the rest of the material to put a cloud over the drums, a panel or two over your mix location, and panels at the reflection spots where you mix.

[johnwayne]

Originally Posted by sethmeister

Instead of twenty bass traps just put up floor to ceiling traps in the corners. Then use the rest of the material to put a cloud over the drums, a panel or two over your mix location, and panels at the reflection spots where you mix.

Get the Bass Traps! Bass Traps!

[A LaMere]

Both...

[danbronson]

Well, I'm going to spring for the 20 traps. Half the reason is because I mix in this room and I want it flat and tight (there's a lot of ringing right now). The other half is because I've been recording drums in here and the overheads always have phasing issues from early reflections and the kick drum always comes off as loose because of the low end ringing.

With some rooms or styles of music, you can get away with it like Radiohead has. But this is all I have to work with and so far it's pretty bad. Plus I record a lot of modern rock and metal anyway, stuff that requires a tight, low-reverb sound.