John Sayers' Recording Studio Design Forum Archive

I'm a member of a local hard rock band called Hells Fire, the lead guitarist is having his garage rebuilt as a recording studio, and luckily, the garage backs on to his laundry room, that has a perfect, large, open closet, that can be used as the control room, he is having the garage and the laundry room as one unit, and the control room angular to the studio, so that the controller (me), can see all round the studio, the control room entrance will be outside the studio, all outlets in the control room and the studio area are about 4' above the floor, and use GFI's, the amps, cabinets, mics and everything else in the studio area have been drawn out for placement.

The problem we'll be having is where to situate all the audio cables going to the control room, and all the power cables feeding the GFI's, should the power cables go along trenches in the floor, or along the ceiling and down the walls?

How do all the audio cables (balanced and unbalanced) go to the control room?

for Direct board connections, would it be a good idea to have wall mount 1/4 and XLR sockets in the studio, placed at areas for the lead guitarist, bass, keyboards, etc etc, with conduit running along the walls to the control room, so that the guitarists, and bass player and keyboardists or anyone else, can just plug into wall sockets? But the mics are hardwired direct to the control room.

This is the first time we'll be setting up a studio.

If we can't do it ourselves, can someone give me a rough idea on how much a professional person would charge to come in, connect and setup the equipment, and set up the acoustics ready for recording?

can you post a room diagram?

Hi Usalabs, and welcome!

for Direct board connections, would it be a good idea to have wall mount 1/4 and XLR sockets in the studio, placed at areas for the lead guitarist, bass, keyboards, etc etc, with conduit running along the walls to the control room, so that the guitarists, and bass player and keyboardists or anyone else, can just plug into wall sockets?

That's the normal way of doing it, yes. HOWEVER: I think you guys are a LONG way away from thinking about how to wire the studio! There are many much more important issues than wiring, which you should be thinking about and planning very carefully first.

Such as, for example:
How loud are you?
How much isolation ("soundproofing") do you need?
Are the dimensions, shapes and sizes of the rooms suitable for the purpose? In other words, are the ratios correct, are the walls and ceiling angled correctly?
Is the geometry designed correctly? (layout of speakers, mix position, treatment, etc.)
Is the treatment designed correctly? (position / size / orientation / tuning of bass traps, absorbers, diffusers {if any}, etc.)
Will the design give you the correct RT-60 and response curve?
How will you handle the issue of HVAC (heating, ventilation, air-conditioning)?

And many other similar questions.

This is the first time we'll be setting up a studio.

Great! Then you have come to the right place here on John's forum! That's what this place is all about: solid, sound, scientific advice on how to design and build your studio. No hype, none of the common myths, legends and snake-oil that you see all over the internet: just the absolute raw truth, based on real principles of acoustics and physics.

Our first advice to most folks in your situation is the advice that nobody wants to hear. It is simply this: STOP! In other words, don't do anything yet. If you are serious about building a good studio that actually works, then stop what you are doing right now, take the time to learn about the basics of acoustics and studio design, then plan everything carefully, designed down to the last fine detail, before you even lift a hammer or soldering iron.

Or you can carry on, rushing into it, spending lots of money on building an acoustic flop that is unusable as a studio. Sadly, that is what quite a few folks do. They don't want to hear about how stupid it is to rush in, spend a weekend gluing carpet on the walls and nailing egg-crates to the ceiling, then calling it a "studio". So they leave and do that anyway, then spend the rest of their lives wondering why all their recordings sound like crap, and why they can't sell a single CD, or even give them away!

Way too many folks aren't really prepared to do what it takes, so they never have a usable studio. I sincerely hope that you are not one of them!

So if you are prepared to take our first advice, then stop, learn, and the experts here will be more than happy to help you figure it out. That's what we are here for!

If we can't do it ourselves, can someone give me a rough idea on how much a professional person would charge to come in, connect and setup the equipment, and set up the acoustics ready for recording?

You are on the right track with your thinking! But you can't "connect up and treat" the place until you first design and build it.

You have two options here: You can do it for free if you are prepared to put in the time and effort for a few months to learn the basics of acoustics and construction, or you can pay someone to do the design for you. If you want to do it yourself you'll need to buy a couple of books (we'll tell you which ones) and spend time reading them, and also reading over this forum, until you are familiar with the basic concepts, and understand why your speakers should be soffit mounted at 1.2m with the acoustic axes intersecting 20cm behind your head at an angle of 60° and 38% of the room depth, and why superchunks should be in the corners not in the middle, and why most diffusers don't work in small rooms, and why you need a cloud, why a room ratio of 1:2:4 is a terrible idea, and all the other things that are so important to getting it right. That will probably take you a couple of months, then you'll be in a position to design your studio. Or if you don't think you can handle that (or don't want to), then you can pay someone who already knows all of that stuff, and they can do it for you.

If you choose to pay someone, then start by sending e-mail or PM John himself, and he'll quote you for doing your design.

Or if you want to do it yourself, then please start by posting a detailed description of the space that you have (with a diagram and accurate dimensions), what your goals are, what your budget is, etc.


- Stuart -

Bill Pillmore wrote:can you post a room diagram?

I'll be going to the garage later tomorrow, I'll do some measuring and create a floor plan of the garage, equipment positioning and the proposed control room area, I'll alao take digital photos around the areas, and post the diagram and photo here.

Reply to Soundman2020:......

Thanks for the welcome.

When I post the floor plan and photos, maybe I could get some help on specific measurements for studio equipment placement, and the positioning and measurements for the control room equipment, I'll also post all the equipment models that we'll be using.

EDIT.......

As I can't upload images here, I have set up my own home server to show the images at:-
Studio Images

Soundman2020 wrote:They don't want to hear about how stupid it is to rush in, spend a weekend gluing carpet on the walls and nailing egg-crates to the ceiling, then calling it a "studio".

We're definitely NOT using "egg-crates" LOL, but we do have the right materials, such as the sound proofing.

The walls and ceiling will be using a thermal insulation, between the inner and outer walls.

As for the HVAC, we are using a slow air flow system to reduce air rumble and hiss, the HVAC system is a single unit, the heating system (hopefully) will be using a hot oil system in a radiator type design embedded under the floor, under the radiator the "well" would have a reflective surface to direct the thermostatically controlled heat upward,,, this layout would also help to prevent changes is acoustics, because I found, by placing any extra equipment in any area where sound is traveling, would dramatically change the acoustics.