Live room survey

WiseMindsRecordingStudios · Mon Jan 16, 2006 4:34 pm

I am about to "treat" my live room. I mainly plan to record drums in this room but occasionally I will be recording guitars and drums together as in a "live" band scenario.

The drums are on a 6"h x 8'w x 6'd riser that will be carpeted. (see pic for layout) The room will be hardwood floors, walls painted drywall, ceiling "popcorned".

I am planning on suspending a cloud of 2" - 4" rigid fiberglass above the entire riser.

I originally was going to build bass traps in each of the 4 corners of the room. Now I am not so sure. The room is quite rectangular as you can see. Should I diffuse? Trap? Both?

What whould you do? I am interested in hearing your proposals and why. Thanks in advance.

WiseMindsRecordingStudios · Mon Jan 16, 2006 4:37 pm

Just a side note, the black curtains you see in the mock-up are still planned for the room. I guess I should mention that I am looking for a slightly live room but not the cement box it is now. And the root of my question is, are bass traps needed in this room?

knightfly · Post by **knightfly** » Tue Jan 17, 2006 4:37 pm

If it's drywall, yup; if it's concrete, double-yup

You may wanna replace one of the corner traps with a longer, slat resonator centered at around 300 hZ; that's the prime modal frequency for kick drums in the 22-24" range... Steve

WiseMindsRecordingStudios · Tue Jan 17, 2006 6:03 pm

Steve, thanks for the get back. I have another question. I used the RT60 calc that John posted in another thread. After entering all of my info into the calc.. Here are my figures:

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Before treatment

125hz - .35secs
250hz - .88secs
500hz - 1.48secs
 1khz - 1.93secs
 2khz - 1.32secs
 4khz - 1.05secs

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After hanging 6x8 cloud, 6x8 carpeted drum riser, 8'x18' heavy curtains on back wall. (no bass traps)

125hz - .35secs
250hz - .47secs
500hz - .44secs
 1khz - .38secs
 2khz - .36secs
 4khz - .35secs

To me...this seems pretty flat and in the range I am looking for. Am I right in guessing if I get these #'s to near zero then the room will be dead? What are your thoughts?

knightfly · Post by **knightfly** » Tue Jan 17, 2006 6:08 pm

Right; that's about as low as you'd want for a live room, anywhere from .4 to .7 depending on if you're recording classical instruments, or higher RT if it's a LARGER room. But for that size, looks like you're golden... Steve

len-morgan · Post by **len-morgan** » Tue Jan 17, 2006 11:20 pm

Are you really going to point the Bass drum right at the door between the LR and CR? It seems to me that you'd want to rotate the whole set a bit so you playing directly perpendicular to that wall. Especially THAT wall.

len

WiseMindsRecordingStudios · Wed Jan 18, 2006 2:10 am

len-morgan wrote:Are you really going to point the Bass drum right at the door between the LR and CR? It seems to me that you'd want to rotate the whole set a bit so you playing directly perpendicular to that wall. Especially THAT wall.

len

Good point Len. I do have a plexi deflector and the door will be treated with fabric and fiber, but that will be closely observed when the room is completed.

Also, I should note that the door is actually more off center than it looks in the sketch-up. The door is more perpendicular to the ride cymbal.

As far as the wall goes...yes the wall... I may have to put some sort of diffuser on that wall, maybe a curved panel.. what step am I on?!?