Recording room construction

[Sage97]

I will soon build a house and thought I'd do something like this to indulge this hobby. It's most probably overkill since no one else but my immediate family and the AGF will ever hear my recordings. Nevertheless, I'd like to have my own quiet space. It will be the tracking and mixing room but will not function as a bedroom or anything else. It will also be on the second floor so will have to do something similar to the floor.

Is this close to the target or is it way off? Any other items I need to consider? Green glue?

Thanks in advance.

[Mischief]

First let me say it's easy to get carried away so first decide what you really require. Next soundproofing is a bit of a misnomer. It's more about sound isolation and attenuation. These are addressed differently.

That's not a bad start but using a second channel to float the second layer of drywall off the first would be a lot better for minimal extra cost.

If your starting from scratch the first thing I would do is plan the best dimensions acoustically. Typically bedroom and standard room size and shape works directly against you. A bit of planning here can put you miles ahead, but more often then not you may have to just work with a spare room you have.

Next remember fundamentally sound is energy and bass carries a lot of energy. You cannot destroy energy so really dealing with sound is more about controlling the sound energy and converting it.

To convert as much bass energy into heat by transferring the bass energy into controlled wall vibrations that do not transfer requires mass and isolation. The technique in the video using channel helps to isolate and double drywall provides mass. Better yet would be two layers of extra thick drywall each isolated with channel or packers. Taken further double walls work extremely well. In fact the best techniques are essentially a floating room within a room. That provides the isolation and heavy mass transfers the heavy bass vibrations into heat. Attenuating the sound in the room is best done dimensionally and then with absorbing material (which again is actually transferring the energy) double a wall as your library. Have some soft furniture in it, some strategic carpets on that isolated heavy floating floor. Moveable acoustic panels work well to. Irregular shapes on the walls like wood slating etc can work well. Eggshell foam etc mostly just look the part. Foam will only address some higher reflections. Heavy blankets on tracks would work better.
Corners are known to collect unwanted bass so shape or bass traps in the corners are useful.

A lot of this can be done on a budget if you are creative and thrifty. Your best bet though is a room from scratch in a larger space. You can address many issues by design instead of having to throw money at it later trying to overcome a design issue.

I'm sure other more knowledgeable ones will chime in. But I hope this helps.


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[Mr. Jelly]

The room I use just happens to have an angled ceiling. It has carpeting and I have put up sound foam and defusers in a type of random way. So this was not done scientificly. I don't run guitar amps or drums in a live situation in this room. I just recorded some acoustic guitar and added a touch of reverb to it. It sounds as good as any acoustic guitar recording I've heard. It does quit well for recording / mixing. Some years ago I used to run Acid and used guitar modlers. Recording is a whole different world than guitar. There came a point that I decided to back away as I really just wanted to play guitar and not spend all my energy learning how to be a recording engineer.

[Sage97]

Thanks guys. I'm not shooting for a pro sounding recording room, I just want a home recording area that's a step or two up from a regular bedroom

Mischief,
I'm building from scratch so I'll have a bit more freedom. I'll double check the dimensions of the room but its not a square and I think there is one angled wall/ceiling corner. I like your suggestion of an extra channel between the two drywalls. I do plan on carpet and putting a leather loveseat. I've seen DIY panels on here that I can put together depending on how things turn out.

Mr. Jelly,
This would also be mainly for acoustic guitar and vocal recording. I've sold most of my electric gear except for one PRS and a few amps and pedals.

Thanks again folks.

[gfsark]

I'm working on a similar project. Here's one of the most useful sites I've found: John Sayers' Recording Studio Design Forum
http://www.johnlsayers.com/phpBB2/index.php

There are some great summary articles on acoustic treatment/sound isolation, so you can get a sense of the design principals. They will also provide advice if you provide sketchup drawings of your project and details regarding construction type and budgets.

It's easy to fool yourself into thinking that a particular treatment is beneficial when it's not. For example, by doubling up the thickness of the drywall, you are changing the resonant frequency of the walls, but will that change improve the acoustics? The rug on the floor, is that beneficial? Most recording studios have wood floors.

[Sage97]

Originally Posted by gfsark

I'm working on a similar project. Here's one of the most useful sites I've found: John Sayers' Recording Studio Design Forum
http://www.johnlsayers.com/phpBB2/index.php

There are some great summary articles on acoustic treatment/sound isolation, so you can get a sense of the design principals. They will also provide advice if you provide sketchup drawings of your project and details regarding construction type and budgets.

It's easy to fool yourself into thinking that a particular treatment is beneficial when it's not. For example, by doubling up the thickness of the drywall, you are changing the resonant frequency of the walls, but will that change improve the acoustics? The rug on the floor, is that beneficial? Most recording studios have wood floors.

Awesome! I'll check this out and study. You're right. I certainly don't want to do extra things that don't generate the results I need.
Thank you gfsark.

[Halcyon/Tinker]

Soundproofing seems overkill for your stated ambition.

I'd instead focus on room treatment. If you're willing to indulge yourself, you can make beautiful, gorgeous absorbers and bass traps yourself that can be as much art as function.

Do some reasearch on it. Lots of good info out there. I also strongly recommend a back wall diffuser tuned to the actual room.

And ceiling clouds and bass traps make an epic difference.

In my little room, the side walls are convertible from absorption to reflection. When doing drums and acoustic instruments I put up the reflectors, when doing vocals mixing, I put up the absorbers.

If it has a window, make a plug for it..

Put bass traps, good ones, in every corner.

I'd suggest a throw rug that you can roll up when recording guitar, and lay down when listening to tunes, mixing, or recording vox...

And in mine, one caveat of the couch was that it had to fit through the door with little effort to make room for musicians and my drum set...

[Sage97]

Originally Posted by Halcyon/Tinker

Soundproofing seems overkill for your stated ambition.

I'd instead focus on room treatment. If you're willing to indulge yourself, you can make beautiful, gorgeous absorbers and bass traps yourself that can be as much art as function.

Do some reasearch on it. Lots of good info out there. I also strongly recommend a back wall diffuser tuned to the actual room.

And ceiling clouds and bass traps make an epic difference.

In my little room, the side walls are convertible from absorption to reflection. When doing drums and acoustic instruments I put up the reflectors, when doing vocals mixing, I put up the absorbers.

If it has a window, make a plug for it..

Put bass traps, good ones, in every corner.

I'd suggest a throw rug that you can roll up when recording guitar, and lay down when listening to tunes, mixing, or recording vox...

And in mine, one caveat of the couch was that it had to fit through the door with little effort to make room for musicians and my drum set...

Thank you sir. This sounds like a less expensive plan which I am all for.

[Halcyon/Tinker]

I found most of my info from this guy...http://ethanwiner.com/acoustics.html

I set my room up as a listening room, then added the interchangeable side wall diffusors to give it a brighter sound when recording drums and acoustic guitars.

http://www.studiopeople.com/img/proj.../pd_image2.jpg


I used http://www.roomeqwizard.com/ to test the room to know what the problem area were and to treat the room accordingly...

And this tohttp://www.subwoofer-builder.com/qrdude.htm to calculate the diffuser dimensions to build one of these...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Llsvfc2Pbcw

[Halcyon/Tinker]

Also, spend the time to do the math right...

[Earl49]

That video was cringe worthy to watch.

Insulation is insulation, period. There is no advantage to Roxsul versus other brands of mineral wool, or fiberglass batts, or shredded cellulose, etc. Despite what the insulation manufacturers want you to believe, I see the same STC test results regardless of the insulation for a given wall type.

Resilient channels are irrelevant on the double-stud or furred out wall shown in the video. They accomplish nothing acoustically. There is already a separation or disconnect from the underlying structural wall, which is what the resilient channels are intended to accomplish. He made it a point to hit the channels between wall studs (good) but what about the edges of the sheet rock? I’m sure that the layers are sitting rigidly on the floor and touch rigidly around the edges. So the wall sheet rock is fully constrained around the edges, and is no longer free-floating as intended. With 33 years in the acoustical engineering business and nearly 2300 projects (including many studios) I can count on one hand the times I’ve seen professional builders install resilient channels correctly – and I don’t even need all my fingers either.

Never – repeat NEVER – put a resilient channel between two layers of anything – sheet rock, plywood, OSB. It just doesn’t work because it is impossible to NOT hit the underlying layer (and for other reasons).

Sage97, I will be offline for the next ten days. If you want to buy a couple of hours of my time when I get back in the office on DEC 05, I would be happy to help you out with accurate advice based on experience and lots of field testing, plus an assessment of your real needs. To be candid, you are getting ready to waste considerable money and to fall prey to the acoustical mythology and “myth-information” out there on the interweb. I don’t need the work, but hate to see people going down the wrong road…. spending $$$$ and not accomplishing what they intended.

[Sage97]

Wow Earl. I definitely do not want to waste $$$.