How much to build a decent studio?

Posted: Wed Aug 06, 2008 6:07 am

Keep in mind Spitfire used words like "little", "just the basics", and "not outrageous" to describe what he wanted to do.

Posted: Wed Aug 06, 2008 6:46 am

MarkG wrote:

Keep in mind Spitfire used words like "little", "just the basics", and "not outrageous" to describe what he wanted to do.

Uh huh.... that's what I said, too! Confused

Posted: Wed Aug 06, 2008 6:43 pm

...to your wife?

Posted: Wed Aug 06, 2008 7:32 pm

Codemonkey wrote:

...to your wife?

I concluded long ago that Max was married to a Saint...a really crazy Saint.

Posted: Thu Aug 07, 2008 1:10 am

I could easily drop 100k on a studio if I had 100k... an api 1608 would get you halfway there haha

Posted: Thu Aug 07, 2008 3:49 am

Oh Bob... That was good... really good! (Like your wife ain't a saint, either?!?)

Seriously though... Crank alludes to an excellent, although scary, point that I was also making...

However much money you have... a studio can take every dime you have... and THEN some.

You have to be aware of GAS, and combat it. A second cousin to GAS is the hope and dream of owning a decent room... which either one of the above afflictions are bad enough, but to find yourself suffering from both.... oh man.

Just open your wallet and watch the money fly!

Posted: Thu Aug 07, 2008 7:20 am

MarkG wrote:

Keep in mind Spitfire used words like "little", "just the basics", and "not outrageous" to describe what he wanted to do.

The problem is that he is talking about going to school for this. So I'd assume he wants to make a living at it somewhere down the line. A $20K studio puts you in competition with every kid with rich parents and every middle age guy who would rather play and record music than pay for a boat or a sports car or a mistress. It's a "don't quit your day job" kind of investment. In fact, it's a "work harder at your day job so you can fund the studio" kind of investment.

Sure there are some commercial operations that can be started with relatively low overhead - a mobile unit for one. But there is no way I know of to get real sound isolation in that price range. So any low cost operation has to view itself as a niche operation. To offer a full range of services at professional quality you have to start with a budget close to what Max is talking about. Anyone thinking about starting a pro studio should look at the the Saga thread. Max has a lot of sweat equity, and he isn't building the Taj Mahal. But it's still costing a pretty penny. If you are talking about a real pro studio offering a wide range of services, I'd describe his as a very nice "little" studio that's "not outrageous."

Posted: Thu Aug 07, 2008 8:18 am

I totally agree that to have a Pro-grade studio that would qualify as decent, one would need to plan on 50-60K to start.

I interpreted spitfires needs as a living room "practice" studio, and that he would be working in an established studio to start off with for his income.

We seem to be entering a stage where the room is becoming more important than the gear. So, a discussion about budget without including the building is probably not productive.

I would consider my setup as modest-entry level. But when you put the gear in my new room, I am now over 50K. And that is with doing most of the labor myself.

Posted: Thu Aug 07, 2008 9:02 am

MadMax wrote:

hmmmm... 10k? 20k? I wish......

I'm somewhere around $75k for the upfit and just over $120k in gear....

I musta' did sumpin' wrong........ <sigh>

I would say you only did something wrong if you can't hear the difference between your recordings and those of an amatuer with 5K in gear.

Posted: Sun Aug 17, 2008 6:36 pm

i am new here....and first off...i have never been part of a forum where people are so mean...thread after thread i read is full of people insulting others questions and responses...without giving a hint of advie themselves....

wow....

and im not talking about everyone...there are some helpful responses here

i cant even believe no one asked the poor school boy what he wants to do with his studio???!!!!!!

what type of music do you want to make?
what do you want to record?
do you want to be a commercial studio renting by the hour...
or take on a more producer role working closely with artists?
do you plan on recording live bands?....electronic music??
singer songwriter acoustic music???

you need to know exactly what you want to do before we can tell you what you need

Posted: Sun Aug 17, 2008 7:05 pm

I haven't seen anyone throwing insults in this thread and I'm pretty sure it has been established what the op plans on doing with his studio. It's tough not to be somewhat cynical when this is supposed to be a "pro" audio forum and people ask questions about how they can connect their Behr....... mixer to their "hi end" SoundBasher card.

That being said, I am not a "pro" and have still found a mountain of good info on this forum. The kind of info that most people pay $20000 or more to get and still may not get because the class is just too big and the "school" is too interested in playing on the starry eyed dreams of their students. Don't be critical about that statement now. I've just payed off my student loan which I started 13 years ago.

I think the answers are usually as sharp as the question is appropriate and well informed.

Posted: Sun Aug 17, 2008 7:27 pm

Fella said "you want a better answer, ask a better question"!!!

Posted: Fri Aug 22, 2008 2:51 pm

Well, since you asked in the "Pro Audio Forums" your going to get answers from pro's using pro gear. Thus greatly increasing your cost.

If you know alot about computers, well atleast enough to build your own, you can do a decent home set up for personal/demo use for WAY less.

1: Build a dedicated computer. NOT your family PC, but one that you can strip down and turn off all the crappy stuff in the back ground if your using windows. I built mine using Mac OSX 10.5.1. (I cheated) Use lots of Ram, atleast 2 Ghz (I use 4)and a fast HDD.
Price... $700

2: Get a decent interface. I got the Presonus FireStudio. Comes with CuBase LE, which you can use for now, or if your really good at Torrent, you can find another software.
Found a referb one for...
$500 (You can get a FirePod or FireStudio Project for cheaper)

3: Get a decent condensor mic for Vox. This can get expensive, but for starters, you can spend about...
$100

4: Get ATLEAST 5 Shure SM57's for drums and guitars, (you should get 7 though, all depends on size of drumset) also a decent kick drum mic. Price...
$600

5: GOOD pair of headphones
$100

6: Decent set of monitors
$100

7: Stands and Cables
$200

You can spend about $2,300 and get going with a decent set up with decent quality. You won't be releasing any major records on major labels, but it will sound good enough. Mine does! Very Happy

Posted: Sat Aug 23, 2008 7:03 am

Seth kinda' makes a valid point, but one whose direction I would seriously caution about to anyone serious thinking of doing this as a professional.

While this is a nice little starter setup, it is by no means anything will attract clients to call you on a consistent basis.

I didn't say you couldn't make a decent recording, I said it wasn't on par with many people's expectations of a professional level studio.

Getting a core system such as this is severely limited in it's capability... you can't record and entire band at once and expanding it is going to be all but impossible.

But as long as you go into it knowing that you will never get much more than some basic chops from it, then by all means, go for it.

The other thing to keep in mind is that you will NEVER have enough mic's. Your mic collection is an investment that will always expand.

Don't bother with cheap cables either... you'll spend twice as much in the long run replacing cables that fall apart, become noisy or just plain break in the middle. You don't have to spend a lot of money, but you shouldn't buy the $10 specials either.

Now for the ugly part.... all of this the jumping off point for GAS. Once you get the bug, you are doomed.

Unfortunately, one of the truths that a lot of folks are avoiding, is the reality that there will be few studios that will be in existence in a few years that will hire you once you get out of school. Why? Because they are dying on the vine because of the little home studios putting out fair to decent work. They won't be able to afford you, so you'll have to build your own shop.

Now you're competing with the other home/project studios and the guys who are just hanging on with the small to medium sized room.... and to differentiate yourself from the other guys... you're gonna have to build a good sounding room.... because when you go to school, you'll actually find out how damned important the room is.

So... you look at your gear and try to sell it... it's a decent starter system... you'll find out the ugly reality that all this starter gear is worthless. You might get 10% of it's purchase price... other than your mic collection.

Posted: Sat Aug 23, 2008 8:19 am

Spunkadellic wrote:

i am new here....and first off...i have never been part of a forum where people are so mean...thread after thread i read is full of people insulting others questions and responses...without giving a hint of advie themselves....

I coulud point you to much worse fora than this one, in both regards. This one's pretty helpful compared to some.

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