Help with placement and acoustics, 2 ceiling heights

Posted: Thu Oct 15, 2009 1:03 pm

I've been doing some research on here and other places for a while now and wanted to get your guys' opinions before I move on to the planning/construction stage. I will be using this room to record not only myself, but others, so I'd like it to sound decent.

My neighbors aren't much of a problem. They don't live very close and have never mentioned anything in the past. I'm more concerned with treatment than isolation with this room.

My room is fairly odd shaped. The ceiling has 2 different heights. One on one side then one on the other, you can see it in the pictures. I am not quite sure how to handle this.

I also am wanting some input on acoustic treatment if at all possible.

Sorry about the mess, I'm in the middle of situating everything. The wood hutch in the corner and the white shelving will all be out of the room. Anyways, I'm thinking about putting the mixing desk on the wall where the TV currently is hanging. This gives the space behind me more symmetry. The drums can go directly behind me in the middle of the room.

As for acoustic treatment, I was thinking of putting bass traps in the corners behind where the drums will be, 3 panels on the wall behind the drums, 3 on the sidewall without the window, and some in the isolation room. One above the mixing station. I am not sure how to handle the wall with the window.

Thanks in advance for your help.

Posted: Fri Oct 16, 2009 7:09 pm

Some things you can consider that are supported by documents on the Internet and various other books/authors:

Your room is square and the ceiling is low. This is never a good combination. You can take some of the squareness effect out, but that low ceiling...that one is always in your face, so to speak. Constructing an overhead acoustic cloud will take away some of the early reflections. With all this in mind, if you have carpet on the floor, take it up...no questions asked.

The issue with a square room is that not only do you have one pair of walls that are parallel, creating flutter echo, but you have another pair of walls creating flutter echo at the same area in the same frequency.

If this were my room I would move all my gear, monitoring, computer, etc. to the wall marked 11'10" that has the window to your left (if facing that wall), and the odd parts of the room will be at your back.

This will give you at least a foundation to establish some symmetry which is always needed for monitoring.

Then, at the ceiling elevation change, this area would get some type of soft absorption within that corner created by the two ceiling elevations (*studio tips super chunks).

Since the window is right about center of the room, this is (due only because this is a square room) the place that you would install an acoustical treatment panel(broadband) in pursuit of a RFZ(reflection free zone)...to be matched in kind on the opposite side.

You want to look into the RFZ(reflection free zone) as it will have more importance in your room simple because it is a square room and your reflection points will match up to the center points of such a small area.

If you do choose to move the monitoring position as suggested, you will find that installing StudioTips Super Chunks in the corners of the wall you are facing will be a marked improvement.

You may also find that installing a 4 foot wide 2" 703 panel X your wall height dimension at the back center of the wall and at the front center will be very helpful, part of the RFZ package you will be looking into.

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