the studio of your dreams - elaborate

[gae_layahoo.it]

i am currently in the (long and difficult) process of choosing a new location for my studio,so i thought i might hop to my favourite forum and ask the people in there..."what does the studio of you dreams look like?" location? how big? how many rooms? whatever,describe it as precisely as possible. grazie grazie grazie ;)

[Lee Flier]

Hmmm... well, this might sound like a lame answer, but the studio of your dreams should be the place where you feel you can make your musical dreams come true. A studio is a space for dreams to happen. If you don't keep that in the front of your mind, it doesn't matter how much you pay attention to the technical details, room specs and all that sort of thing, it won't be happening. It has to be a place where musicians can feel creative, relaxed, playful, excited, and just generally get lost in the moment without thinking about the process. I say this because I know a lot of the folks here are going to give you pragmatic advice which I'm sure will be great, but a lot of people ignore the "vibe" element in the process of building a technically perfect studio. Personally, I went for a space that's less than technically perfect by a long shot, but does a lot to foster creativity, and as such, it IS the studio of my dreams, despite the fact that just about any commercial studio would have more bells and whistles. --Lee

[strat0124]

Lee do your feet even touch the ground???? :) Cause you damn sure nailed it. I built my home studio in my garage, and yes, it is the studio of my dreams, simple as it is.

[Dylan]

My only wish would be to have a cordless studio. Oh, how nice that would be to not have to deal with a rats nest of cables... :freak:

[Curious_G]

carne_de_res, My dream studio would be anywhere in Italy (but maybe I'd like Roma best, just around the corner from Piazza della Rotonda)! You live in a wonderful place, anything you choose will be fine. If I were there I'd flirt with beautiful Italian women and drink Stravecchio all day (well, anytime I was not recording). In reality my studio is just outside Philadelphia, but if I work hard I can visit Italy every once in a while. Ciao! prego prego prego :wave:

[KenElevenShadows]

I like Lee's advice, and this: "My only wish would be to have a cordless studio. Oh, how nice that would be to not have to deal with a rats nest of cables... " So, my dream studio would be on the far wing of my house in Big Sur or some other really nice place that I'd want to live, up on a hill overlooking the ocean, surrounded by trees. It would be soundproof, and far enough away from the part of the house that we live in that the noise wouldn't bother anyone. The control room and the studio would have large thick glass windows overlooking the ocean. The studio would be decorated with really cool, beautiful-looking Asian art, tapestries, silk tapestries, Buddhas (some of which would be interesting pink and purple glass Buddhas that are lit from within and glow beautifully), a lava lamp (because every studio has to have a lava lamp), incense burners, and the whole bit. It would be really comfortable -- a room that you would want to hang out in even when you weren't recording. The rack of stuff would not be too large, and would have mic preamps with glowing tubes in it, and a couple of tube mics, because things with glowing tubes in them are cool. Analog studio, but also with a digital studio on a computer as well, because what analog does, it does far better than digital, and what digital does, it does far better than analog. My record and CD collection would be on shelves somewhere in the room, or perhaps in an adjoining room that it opens up into. Somewhere around the studio would be a luxurious massage lounger, for taking breaks from long hours of tracking or mixing. The last three paragraphs already describes my studio perfectly, and I already love being there. It's part of my home. So now, it's only moving the location to a nice house in Big Sur or similar place and getting the whole thing wireless that's left!

[JES]

Easy: Small, powerful gear. No cables (*love* that suggestion!). Lots of psychocosmetics. Big rooms with lots of wood. Comfortable furniture. And full of interesting musicians. --JES

[not coaster MODERATOR]

In a large, midieval craggy castle perched on a verticle cliff high above the cold black thunderous ocean below. Lonely foggy swampy moore leading up to drawbridge and moat. Large Frankenstein switches to power up the gear and mysterious screaming sounds from the old graveyard across the field. A blazing stone fireplace to warm the bones punctuated by the tolling of the old grandfather clock as the icy rain beats down past the open tower window. And alas the beating heart just under those floorboards Mad, mad?? "i am not mad" i would say. It is they who are mad........

[halljams]

[quote]Originally posted by JES: [b]Easy: Small, powerful gear. No cables (*love* that suggestion!). Lots of psychocosmetics. Big rooms with lots of wood. Comfortable furniture. And full of interesting musicians. --JES[/b][/quote]Yeah.

[Philip OKeefe]

[quote]Originally posted by Lee Flier: [b]...the studio of your dreams should be the place where you feel you can make your musical dreams come true. A studio is a space for dreams to happen. If you don't keep that in the front of your mind, it doesn't matter how much you pay attention to the technical details, room specs and all that sort of thing, it won't be happening. It has to be a place where musicians can feel creative, relaxed, playful, excited, and just generally get lost in the moment without thinking about the process. --Lee[/b][/quote]As usual, Ms Flier hits it out of the ballpark. ;) I really have to agree with this. You can have the most acoustically "perfect" room (no such thing exists, but work with me here...), the most top flight gear, and be the greatest (technical) engineer in the world, but IMO, you're still short on the things you need to make a great record. First of all, you have GOT to start with great songs and great, creative musicians. And if the "vibe" isn't there, if they don't feel comfortable, how are they going to be creative? We used to be in a commercial building. I think the best thing that ever happened to our studio is when our lease expired four years ago and we were forced to move. I decided I was not going to get into a situation where someone could force us to relocate at the end of a lease, or increase our costs whenever a lease was due to be renewed. I was tired of driving from Lake Arrowhead all the way down the mountain to get to sessions (30 minutes minimum - even in a Miata). So we got a house on a third of acre with a large concrete block barn that we spent 6 months converting into the studio of OUR dreams. It's SOOOO nice to be able to get up at 0400 with a song idea, walk 100 feet out into my back yard, open the door, disarm all the alarms and flip a few switches and get right to work. Having it CLOSE is very nice. And because it's close, I can keep an eye on it, which helps me sleep well at night. We've got clean fields of fire and we're all sighted in - I'm only partially joking... we're a [i]hard target[/i]. Security is very important, and having things where you can keep a constant eye on them is another advantage of having something at home. I was kind of suprised with the direction this thread headed in. I personally was expecting everyone to be describing more futuristic stuff (direct brain to computer communication, holographic 3D interfaces, etc.) but I can see that was not what carne_de_res was looking for. I think Dillweed's cordless studio came closest to that futuristic idea. I'd certainly love to see THAT! A couple of pratical thoughts - Yes, make the interior comfortable, inviting and "vibey", but pay at least SOME attention to getting the acoustics at least "workable". There's noting worse than spending a bunch of money on construction only to realize your acoustics suck, so get them right to begin with. And speaking of acoustics, you want to give some consideration to isolation... you don't want the neighbors calling the police every time you fire the studio up and get cranking - nothing "busts" the vibe faster than a visit from the boys and girls in Blue. :eek: Besides, you don't want to hear whatever your neightbors have going on (lawnmower, industrial machine shop, whatever) come crashing into your mics in the middle of the "take of a lifetime" - that's another sure fire vibe buster. Good electrical is important, as is good environmental conditioning. That means heating and good air conditioning / filtering. It's pretty hard to be creative and comfortable when you're sweltering or freezing. The size, layout and amount of rooms is pretty much going to depend on what you want to do and what your budget and preferred working methods are. For example, while I'd love to have a room the size of Abbey Road Studio 1, it's just not pratical for me - I don't do enough full orchestra dates to warrant that. ;) 1,200 sq ft is a good working size for my needs, although a little tight in some respects. Fortunately, I do have plenty of room to expand if I should ever feel that is warranted. I did want seperate tracking and control rooms, and a couple of Iso booths though. Others would be better served with a "all in one room" approach, which can make things easier for someone who is using the studio primarily for their own projects and has to simultaneously work all the gear and perform... Since I DO record here from time to time, I added a few features to make it easier for me to do so while also operating the gear... my favorite being tie lines into the iso booths and main studio from the control room so I can play guitar from the control room while having the amp cabinets mic'ed up in other rooms. A large, well designed control room was important to me, because I spend a LOT of time in there. Ours is about 17' X 19'. We painted it a rich forrest green and used natural wood accents. The idea was to give it a mountain / forrest vibe. It's very nice, but in retrospect, it tends to be somewhat dark - so lighting is important. Actually, lighting is ALWAYS important. I'll leave the gear up to you. If you want to know what I'm using, a fairly current list is on the website. Best of luck with your new studio!

[Mark V]

I wouldn't mind checking out Peter Gabriels studio,I was reading somewhere that the main recording room has a partial glass floor with a stream running underneath...

[not coaster MODERATOR]

I've built my dream studio. [img]http://electron.mvp.net/motrash/highlife.jpg[/img]

[big K]

I whould need two things in my dream studio, 1) lots of plants, they add lots of freash air to the studio and look nice. .. imagine still in a nice garden, that nice feash smell of green grass and plants, player your heart out on you insterment of choise, of just singing it out. Like inthe shower only dry.... the other thing i would need is a window to the out side, it is greeat to see the sun, and even more fun when you are mix in a big rain storm or something... it changes your mood and the way you mix/ produce...ect. well just my thoughs.. cheers. KEvin Nemrava- stil looking for a summer job.

[gae_layahoo.it]

thank you all.keep 'em coming! :D one more question: mansion or warehouse...which would be better for you?

[Philip OKeefe]

Mansion.

[Curious_G]

[quote]Originally posted by carne_de_res: [b]thank you all.keep 'em coming! :D one more question: mansion or warehouse...which would be better for you?[/b][/quote]Villa!.. or maybe Temple! (small 15th century chapel?) :) and I work in a basement...

[Emperator]

God's mansion. Old wooden church with the tall steeple ceiling. :D

[freddynl]

There's only one dream studio; Let me play all my instruments and let a ROBOT take care of all the technical recording stuff.... :D

[offramp]

I go back and forth with the mansion/warehouse issue. lately, it'd be mansion; this is due to the fact that I can't seem to find the ability to pull Sting's "All This Time" DVD out of my laptop. I just keep watching it, and drooling, drooling over the fact that he's got a seperate building just a few paces away that used to be the olive pressing building of the villa, big enough for everyone in the band AND his mobile studio AND a camera crew. That building has a vibe, a vibe from being a place where commodities like olive oil and wine were created, well-weathered interior, ceiling beams, a spiritually warm place. As for gear...well, dunno. As much as it'd be opium to have an SSL, sometimes I think I'd prefer the Neotek series IIIC that I cut my teeth on back in the mid-80's. Ideally, I'd like to have both full digital and a coupla big honkin' Studer MKIV's in there. Cordless would be nice, I suppose, but I think we've got enough RF in the atmosphere as it is, and I kinda like having cables going here and there every now and then...makes it feel like something's happening. Second choice of location would be maybe an old movie house. We've got a few places here in Denver that I'd like to have...large, open buildings with these gorgeous, arched wooden ceilings. They were machine shops and garages back in the early part of the last century. Sometimes, I vascillate between having a place with a lot of natural light, or someplace that's really sequestered, and you feel like you've stepped into a hidden world.