Decisions creating/acoustically treating my studio

[strawdps]

Here's my situation ... I am working on acoustically treating a room in my house for my studio. My roommate suggested that I use my “shed” in the back yard. I had never thought of it but I did some measurements and it is almost the size of the room that I was working on in my house. The room in my house has hardwood floors and is 10 ft. by 13 ft. and has a vaulted ceiling from one side of the room (8 ft.) to the other side (11 ft.) and a ceiling fan. The walls are regular drywall like any 1990’s built home. The “shed” in the backyard is 7 ft. by 11 ft. and has a ceiling that starts at 7 feet at both sides and meets in the middle at 8 feet. The floor is concrete and the walls seem to be drywall but are probably not properly insulated (not sure though). I know I’m going to have to take out the cabinets in the shed if I go that route. It would be nice to have my (“high quality” project studio) to be independent of the house so I could have roommates and not pay my mortgage all by myself. I like to work late and it is hard with roommates. This room would be used for tracking vocals, electric/acoustic guitars and for mixing. (I will send out to master)

Is the “shed” in the backyard too small for what I need?? Will it be feasible to turn it into a “nice” sounding room?? Can anybody help me with good locations for the bass traps (and other acoustical foam) in either room??

I am fully aware how important the acoustical treatment of a room is to recording/mixing and want to do this as right as I can afford
I’m attaching pics of both rooms … the first 3 pics are inside and the rest are of the outside shed.

Thanks guys … I love this site!!

[Ethan Winer]

Originally Posted by strawdps

Can anybody help me with good locations for the bass traps (and other acoustical foam) in either room??

Room treatment is a deep subject, and a complete answer requires far more than will fit into a single reply here. So here's the short version which will get you 99 percent of the way there. All rooms need:

* Broadband (not tuned) bass traps straddling as many corners as you can manage, including the wall-ceiling corners. More bass traps on the rear wall behind helps even further. You simply cannot have too much bass trapping. Real bass trapping, that is - thin foam and thin fiberglass don't work to a low enough frequency.

* Mid/high frequency absorption at the first reflection points on the side walls and ceiling.

* Some additional amount of mid/high absorption and/or diffusion on any large areas of bare parallel surfaces, such as opposing walls or the ceiling if the floor is reflective. Diffusion on the rear wall behind you is also useful in larger rooms.

For the complete story see my Acoustics FAQ.

There's a lot of additional non-sales technical information on my company's web site - articles, videos, test tones and other downloads, and much more.

--Ethan

[strawdps]

Thanks Ethan for your postthumbsup Your posts are always very informative!!
I will check out those links ...
Do you think the "shed" in the backyard is big enough (7 ft. by 11 ft. and is 7ft. tall) to convert into a studio or should I just use a room in my house? If I use the "shed" I plan on putting in hardwood floors.
In your professional opinion do you think I can turn the "shed" into a good sounding room after treating using bass traps and high/mid frequency absorption?

[Ethan Winer]

A shed that's only 7 by 7 by 11 is very small and square. If you have a large room in your house, use that instead.

--Ethan

[strawdps]

With loads of bass traps/diffusers is an area that small, (7 ft. by 11 ft. and 7 ft. tall) able to be a good room for tracking/mixing?

I know it is always better to have a big "alive" sounding room but can a room that size be a good sounding room with proper treatment?

I don't want it to sound "boxy" ... I would really like to use that shed if possible because I would have more privacy ...

[avare]

Originally Posted by strawdps

I know it is always better to have a big "alive" sounding room but can a room that size be a good sounding room with proper treatment?

No. It is an exercise in making the unsuitable tolerable.

Andre

[Weasel9992]

Originally Posted by avare

No. It is an exercise in making the unsuitable tolerable.

Andre

Brilliant. Exactly right.

If you can use the other room, you should. By the time you get done treating a room that small you won't have any room to record anything in it. My own control room is 13'x17' and it's *just* big enough to mix in and record overdubs.

Frank

[strawdps]

Originally Posted by Weasel9992

By the time you get done treating a room that small you won't have any room to record anything in it. My own control room is 13'x17' and it's *just* big enough to mix in and record overdubs.

I hear ya and thanks for the advice ... it sucks because I realize now I have to live alone and that's a thousand bucks difference a month. I know it would have been a bit cramped in the 7ft. by 11ft. room ... I was thinking that it was possible to treat that room with tons of bass traps and diffusors and make it sound good. The big living room with the hardwood floors is a good sounding room so I guess that is the way it has to go ...

Are you guys saying that a room that small (7ft. by 11ft.) cannot sound good even with really good treatment or are you saying that a room that size cannot fit all of the equipment necessary to record along with the bass traps, etc.??

[Weasel9992]

Originally Posted by strawdps

I hear ya and thanks for the advice ... it sucks because I realize now I have to live alone and that's a thousand bucks difference a month. I know it would have been a bit cramped in the 7ft. by 11ft. room ... I was thinking that it was possible to treat that room with tons of bass traps and diffusors and make it sound good. The big living room with the hardwood floors is a good sounding room so I guess that is the way it has to go ...

Dude...now that's dedication.

Originally Posted by strawdps

Are you guys saying that a room that small (7ft. by 11ft.) cannot sound good even with really good treatment or are you saying that a room that size cannot fit all of the equipment necessary to record along with the bass traps, etc.??

I'm saying the latter...by the time you get the space adequately treated, you'd be able to get some gear in there...enough to mix with...but there wouldn't be nearly enough room to track anything. If *all* your going to do is mix in there, you could probably make that work. You could always track off-site somewhere, or in the house when the roomies aren't at home.

I'd hate to see you shell out another $1,000 a month...any way to make it work while still keeping some room mates?

Frank

[strawdps]

Originally Posted by Weasel9992

I'd hate to see you shell out another $1,000 a month...any way to make it work while still keeping some room mates?

Yeah ... it will be nice to live alone for a bit anyway though

If I post a sketch of my big room in my house could you guys estimate how many bass traps / other treatments I should buy and the locations of of the treatments in the room? That would help to plan my budget bigtime!!

[Weasel9992]

Originally Posted by strawdps

Yeah ... it will be nice to live alone for a bit anyway though

If I post a sketch of my big room in my house could you guys estimate how many bass traps / other treatments I should buy and the locations of of the treatments in the room? That would help to plan my budget bigtime!!

Sure. Post it!

Frank

[strawdps]

Thanks ... I'll do it after work These first graders are a handful

[strawdps]

Here are the drawings of my rooms ... any feedback or advice on the locations, type of treatments and how many of the treatments are greatly appreciated. I think my money is best spent on good treatment now

The big room (room C) is my living room and it connects to my kitchen, I think it sounds good now but I think it could sound even better. It has hardwood floors.

Room A is the shed in my backyard ... still thinking about treating it and turning it into a mixing room because it gets me out of the house ... any thoughts on turning this into an acoustically sound room for mixing and tracking vox, acoustic and electric guitars ... I know it's small and I'll be cramped but I'll make due for a good sounding room ...

I think that I will only do one room now ... the big room or the shed ...


Thanks

[Weasel9992]

You could use the living room for mixing and tracking if you wanted to...it's big enough. The kitchen is going to have limited usefulness because of the size and composition I think. Set up in the living room facing the kitchen, then treat all the available corners floor to ceiling with bass trapping. Get the front and back wall with bass trapping too. The first reflection points can be treated with 2" panels, but 4" panels would be better.

Alternately you could track in the living room and mix in the shed, but I think the shed may be too small for use as anything but an "iso" booth, and even then it would require a good bit of treatment. If you can only deal with one room thoroughly, then I'd do a live end/dead end thing in the living room and leave it at that for now.

Frank

[strawdps]

Originally Posted by Weasel9992

Set up in the living room facing the kitchen
Frank

Is that with the audio facing the kitchen or me facing the kitchen? Thanks for the advice ... I'm gonna get my money together

[Weasel9992]

Originally Posted by strawdps

Is that with the audio facing the kitchen or me facing the kitchen? Thanks for the advice ... I'm gonna get my money together

...with YOU facing the kitchen.

Frank

[Brenton]

Since its your house why don't you put in a bigger shed and then you can have a good size studio and rent out some rooms. I was lucky enough to have a big shed which I turned into a studio and I gotta say its great having the studio and house separate.

I know the answer is probably money but if your going to stay there it might be worth it.

[andrebrito]

The problem with such small rooms is that in order to correct the modal behaviour (room modes) you end up with using too much absorption and the room that is by nature dry, ends up completely unsuitable for tracking. And in such small room the lowest modal frequencies are quite difficult to solve

[strawdps]

Originally Posted by Brenton

Since its your house why don't you put in a bigger shed and then you can have a good size studio and rent out some rooms. I was lucky enough to have a big shed which I turned into a studio and I gotta say its great having the studio and house separate.
I know the answer is probably money but if your going to stay there it might be worth it.

Money is part of it ... I asked around about building another shed from scratch and it was looking to be 20,000 dollars!!! Is there a cheaper way to do this and have a nice size studio in the backyard??

[Brenton]

I live on the other side of the world so I can't really help you with the cost of sheds. Although a guy I work with here just did a good sized one for around half that amount with slab and thats in oz dollars. Good luck with it.

Maybe you could extend your existing shed.