Garden Studio Set Up - quick help required!

Customising, building or repairing your own gear? Need help with acoustic treatment or soundproofing? Ask away…

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Re: Garden Studio Set Up - quick help required!

Post by MOF »

You can never have too much bass trapping

Well if it’s filled the room then maybe you’ve got too much. :lol:
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Re: Garden Studio Set Up - quick help required!

Post by RichardT »

I think it’s important to experiment with your acoustic treatment - trying out different positions for the traps until you get the best sound you can. And, as Drew says, start with a few traps in the key locations and add more as time goes by. You’ll need quite a lot to get good results and reasonable control of the bass frequencies.
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Re: Garden Studio Set Up - quick help required!

Post by damonbrockmusic »

Thanks all. Great help.

I’ve a plan now for panels etc.

Anyone have any advice regarding the LVT flooring by any chance?
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Re: Garden Studio Set Up - quick help required!

Post by damonbrockmusic »

damonbrockmusic wrote:Thanks all. Great help.

I’ve a plan now for panels etc.

Anyone have any advice regarding the LVT flooring by any chance?

Apologies for the chase, but if anyone has any knowledge or advice regarding flooring, please drop me a note here asap as I need to confirm v soon

Thanks!
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Re: Garden Studio Set Up - quick help required!

Post by damonbrockmusic »

Hi all

Me again - this time the Q is about the internal acoustics.

The building is up and soundproofing is getting done next week.

My small room set up will be desk at one end, door at the other.

I'm very nervous as the installer's plan is to install a full wall acoustic panel on one of the side walls, with 6 other panels, I believe three on the opposite side wall, one at the back behind my desk, and two on the door wall. I think all panels are absorbers. He's providing floating corner bass traps for me to try out.

I'm worried that the full wall panel will kill the resonance and deaden the sound, and the cost of remedying the wrong install would be pretty huge I think.

Any thoughts and advice would be most welcome.

I've read through Black Ghost Audio's webpage about acoustic treatment and make sense to me.

Thanks for any input
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Re: Garden Studio Set Up - quick help required!

Post by Hugh Robjohns »

I don't think this is something that can be analysed remotely. It's something you'll need to discuss with your acoustic designer to make sure the room meets your requirements and expectations.

It might help if your builders can take you to a previous similar construction so you can get a first-hand idea of what it sounds like with their proposed acoustic treatment.

You said at the start you wanted a lively room for recording acoustic instruments, which is fair enough... but that also becomes problematic if you also plan to mix tracks in the room, or you want to record instruments and voices in a neutral acoustic environment. You already have a wooden floor, I believe, which will provide some liveness, especially as you have no ceiling treatment.

Remember, it's generally much easier to make a controlled room livelier, than it is to make a live room more controlled, simply by introducing reflective surfaces (permanent or temporary) in front of the absorbing panels. Most pro studios have acoustic screens with reflective surfaces on one side and absorptive panels on the other, for example. And I've seen plenty of studios that have acoustic panels mounted on hinges so that they can be folded closed to reveal a hard reflective backing, or opened out to reveal an absorption panel... And others with vinyl roller blinds mounted above the acoustic panels which can be pulled down to introduce some extra HF reflection as desired... I'm sure you can think of many other similar possibilities of introducing some acoustic variability.
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Re: Garden Studio Set Up - quick help required!

Post by damonbrockmusic »

Hi Hugh

Thanks for getting back so quick.

Yes, I was thinking that if it's not possible to change the order as we're only a few days from install, then reflective panels could be used to create the desired effect as and when I want it.

I know I'm asking for a lot from a small room, so I guess flexibility is the key.
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Re: Garden Studio Set Up - quick help required!

Post by Hugh Robjohns »

:thumbup:
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Re: Garden Studio Set Up - quick help required!

Post by damonbrockmusic »

A follow on Q I have is - will the install, as I described it 2 posts ago, as it's not symettrical, create acoustic problems?
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Re: Garden Studio Set Up - quick help required!

Post by Hugh Robjohns »

Without seeing the plans it's not possible to say.

If you're just using the room as a recording space, then no, it's unlikely that it will be problematic.

But if you plan to mix in there a lack of symmetry could result in imaging problems. The most important point is that you should have absorber panels on the mirror points. So if one of more of the isolated panels is positioned appropriately it should be okay. But if you end up with a blank wall at a mirror point it probably won't be!

So you'll need to work out where you desk is going, where the speakers are going, and where the reflection points will be... and then have a conversation with your builder.
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Re: Garden Studio Set Up - quick help required!

Post by damonbrockmusic »

:thumbup:

Thanks Hugh, that was gonna be my plan.
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Re: Garden Studio Set Up - quick help required!

Post by Sam Spoons »

I'd add that if you have a hard floor you really need some ceiling panels (see my post above) or you will have flutter echos between the floor and ceiling.
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