Hi

Here is a 3d sketch of my small studio room. The dimensions are:

Metric
Length - 2.3 m
Width (varies) - 1.7m to 1.8m (not parallel)
Height (varies) - 3.1m to 2.7 m
Feet
Length - 7.55 ft
Width (varies) - 5.9 to 5.78 ft (not parallel)
Height (varies) - 10.17 to 8.86 ft

-All the walls are double layer brick
- I installed 2 firedoors with a gap of about an air gap of 4 inches.

The roof is a tiled roof (like 30 mm brick). There is a gap of about 300 mm (12 in) between the tiles and the ceiling (gypsum). Keeping the ceiling up there is 4x 300 deep wood beams space along the lenght of the room.



The aim of the studio:

-Record harmonica (mouth organ and voice) in the corner. (dead corner)
-Record keyboard and guitar on a track by track basis looking at the speakers with my back to the door.

Equipment:
- Laptop which i will enclose in a box for soundproofing
- Presonus Firebox Mixer (2xMic inputs)
- 2 monitors which I don't have yet

Local guys said I could do the following:

Auralex Sonapads (1.2x0.5m) space as shown in the sketch.
Curtains on the side as the foam is very expensive
Basstrap in the corner as shown

Question:

The auralex products is very expensive and I would rather go for the fibreglass panels which I read a lot about in the FAQ section. But I have to start somewhere. Could someone please show me how he would lay out the room with fibreglass panels as a starting point. As well as creating area in the corner for voice and harmonica recording.

I can lay bricks ontop of the ceiling with some strenghening below for soundproofing or should I use maybe a double layer of fibreglass between the ceiling and tiles and hou effective will this be ?

Best Regards

Francois de Villiers

Francois,

> Could someone please show me how he would lay out the room with fibreglass panels as a starting point. <

The drawing below shows the general idea. The panels marked "1" and "2" are bass traps, and those marked "3" are mid/high frequency absorbers. Your room is shaped differently, but the basic goal is identical.

--Ethan

Hi Ethan

Thanks for the quick response. Roughly what surface covering in percentage should I be looking at. Or how big should 3 be more or less taken my dimensions in account . Can I still make one corner totally dead as shown in my sketch for harmonica and voice recording ?

Best Regards

On the "1" and "2" bass traps, which are deep-bass and which are high-bass? sorry if this is a stupid question too.

Francois,

> Roughly what surface covering in percentage should I be looking at. <

Somewhere between 30 and 50 percent, including carpet and any plush furniture. But this is a very rough guideline. At some point you have to trust your ears to know when you've done enough.

--Ethan

> On the "1" and "2" bass traps, which are deep-bass and which are high-bass? <

Neither. That drawing shows how to place bass traps made of rigid fiberglass. This is very different from the system of wood panel bass traps.

--Ethan

Ethan

Thanks. Will show the frequency response as soon as I am finished with the layout.

Ethan,
What would you recommend for a room about 11x11 that I will be recording acoustic guitar and vocals is??
I am going to make mineral wool bass traps and maybe a few mid/high absorbers next week.
Can you show me where it would be best to put them in a room of these dimensions.
I don't want it too dead but I want it to sound balanced and nice for recording acoustic guitars.
The ceilings are 8 ft. and the walls are drywall.

3Dfan-

Ethan may say otherwise regarding this but my understanding is that a room as small as ours (mine is 10x12) requires as much corner bass trapping, per the image above, as we can tolerate fabricating and mounting. As for mid to high absorbers the room size requires a generous amount between parallel surfaces because of the inherent small and boxy sound it produces. I would imagine that your best bet for ambience is dead room and a decent plug-in or outboard reverb.

That doesn't really work. WHen you make a room dead it is worthless for recording acoustic guitar in. What happens is the foam absorbs all of the high end harmonics and gives you a bass heavy mix. Then it is impossible to eq out enough bass to get a good mix. You can not replace the high end harmonics that are lost with a plugin. I have tried this and it DOES NOT WORK. I have heard from a few other people the same thing you suggested but I found out by experience that it is a bad idea.
My theory is that it is better to have the best DIY bass traps you can build to rid the room of the excess bass and then use diffusion on the parallel walls. The idea is to give the illusion of a larger room by trying to neutralize the inherent problems of small rooms.
I personally think this is best done with a combo of bass absorption and mid and high diffusion.
Ethan, I'm interested to know what you'd recommend for an 11x11 room.

Keep in mind that most of my understanding of this is in theory only so...

If you can successfully implement diffusion, more power to you. It just seems to me that if high-end harmonics are generated by the instrument itself, are they not captured by the signal chain? Do bass traps not control the "excess bass" effect of deadening the walls?

Perhaps Ethan could iron this out for me as I am not so sure now. I'm just thinking that while a great sound can be achieved with reflective/diffusive surfaces, this requires a minimum distance between them.

It will be good to dialogue on this as the bass trapping phase on my room is almost done and the rest of the wallspace still needs to be addressed.

Guys,

> I personally think this is best done with a combo of bass absorption and mid and high diffusion. <

Diffusion does make a room seem larger, but it helps less in a room like yours that's really tiny to begin with. Or maybe it helps more!

If you want to experiment with diffusion, you should consider the "better" types like QRDs and skylines. The site http://www.mhsoft.nl has some great plans.

> Ethan, I'm interested to know what you'd recommend for an 11x11 room. <

I recommend as much corner trapping as possible as shown in the drawing above. As Tim explained.

--Ethan

Thanks for your input Ethan and by the way, I'm glad to see you obviously love your cat. Cat's are GREAT!!