Home Studio Setup and Acoustics February 20, 2008
Posted by ConnorSmith in : Acoustics, Project Studio, Studio Setup , trackbackSetting up the gear in your home studio can be really fun. But, what many forget is that the actual placement of gear in your room can have a huge impact as to how well your room “sounds”. When dealing with the parallel walls and small dimensions of a typical home or project studio, even following some basic guidelines in acoustics can make a huge sonic difference. Flutter echo, room modes, and improper speaker placement are all things to avoid.
These tips will help you minimize those issues, so you can get more accurate mixes from your room.
When setting up your room, there is somewhat of an ideal spot to place yourself (if you have the liberty to do so). Try to place the listening position 38% of the longest dimension in the room (assuming it is a rectangle. That is, if your room was 10′ x 6′, you would want to sit 3.8 feet from either the front or back wall. This will help you “dodge” the nasty room modes which can ruin the low end of your spectrum.
Now, for speaker placement. Your speakers should be placed around the same height as your head is at the mix position. They should form an equilateral triangle with your head (and if you are getting really picky, the back of your head). So that means the distance from one speaker to the other should be the same distance as from your head to either speaker. If everything is in this equilateral triangle spacing, the speakers should also be at 60 degree angles towards you. If you have the space, try to keep your speakers as far away from the walls as possible. Obviously, sometimes space is limited so we have no choice. When speakers are placed too close to walls, they can start to build up low frequency energy, and cause inaccuracies in the room (especially the low end of the spectrum).
Parallel walls and small room dimensions can plague the home studio owner. However, with a small investment into some acoustical treatment, you can negate a lot of these problems. Try an Auralex Roominators kit and a pair of MoPads. Together, these cost less than $200, and can really help “flatten out” the response of your room. The roominators kit has enough panels (and glue) to treat the first reflection spots of your room (to help with flutter echo and other problems). Isolating your monitors with the MoPads will make your monitors much more accurate in the low end.
The easiest way to find your first reflection points is to find a friend and a small mirror. Sit in the mix position (with your speakers properly placed) and have your friend slowly hold the mirror against the side walls and slowly move it back and forth. When you see the reflection of your speakers in the mirror, mark the spot, because those are the points to treat with your Roominators Kit. I would start by treating the 4 walls of the room (leave the ceiling for another day).
If you’ve noticed, many of the issues I am discussing here deal with the low frequency energy that can build up in a small room. Many rooms need “bass traps”, which are specially designed acoustical panels (usually put in the corners of the room) that “trap” the low energy in the corners, thus preventing it from distorting the spectrum at the mix position. Many companies (like Auralex) sell bass traps, but it is also possible to build your own. (I opted to build my own, which I would be happy to share with everyone in another article some time).
All rooms and situations are different, so if you have a room that you need to treat, please feel free to post in the comments here, or email me with questions.
C
The Studio Files
Comments»
Great stuff, Connor. I am sure everyone would love to see some pics of your setup (when you get a chance). We’ll produce a “build a better bass trap” video episode really soon.
Cheers
DS
I have a small room, roughly 12′ by 12′ (oops, bad already, its a square). I don’t have a any room to negotiate my mix position, it is close to a wall, about 7′ from one wall, and 5′ from the other. My speakers also reside about 6 to 8 inches from the wall.
Ok, now that the ugly has been said, here’s some good:
(You’ll want to know, anytime I say foam here, I mean the 2″ wedge foam listed on this web page: http://www.foambymail.com/Wedge.html)
The speakers are decoupled from the desk with 2 pieces of foam, the wall directly behind the speakers is also covered in foam, going a bit below the desk, and about 3 feet above it. This took 16 pieces of foam. This has helped a bunch with reflections (when I first moved in, I couldn’t tell I was listening to two separate speakers, the reflections in the center were so strong, it was like the sound was coming directly from the wall). I’ve also put three, 2×2 squares along the wall behind me (totaling 12 pieces of the wedge foam all together for that). I also stuck one piece of foam in every upper corner of the room, where the walls meet each other and the ceiling. I basically just kind of angled them at about 45 degrees, and left the back of the foam detached from the wall, so only two edges are connected to the walls/ceiling). There are also two beds behind me, which fill the two, lower back corners.
Having said that, the acoustics seem pretty good, and my mixes translate pretty well, but I was wondering if you had any advice to make the situation any better. I have no treatment on the side walls – reason being its not really feasible (one has a door leading to a bathroom, the other one has a window with blinds). The room is carpeted, and has a stucco ceiling (which I imagine is quite a bit less reflective than just painted dry wall). The room is not dead sounding, there is still some ambiance and life, but there is no noticeable reverb or slap-back or anything like that. Its probably a little more dead than would be ideal, but I’m not so worried about that as I am bass response. Any advice you may have, or if I’m doing something stupidly wrong, would be greatly appreciated!
Hi Corey,
Sounds like you have a great start on your treatment. As far as the side walls go, there is one option. In my mixing room, I have windows on one side, and closet doors on the other. But, its still possible to get treatment there. I put pieces of foam on regular pegboard (3′ x 3′) and hung them from my ceiling, as close to the wall as possible. The whole panel only weighs a few pounds, so hanging it is no problem. (You can see a picture of this at underthepiano.com/gear.html). The shape of the door and the windows may diffuse the sound enough to where you aren’t getting bad first reflections, but if this^^ works for you, you may want to try it out.
Your bass response will depend on where you are sitting in the room (and how you are interacting with the modes of the room). If you “know” what your room sounds like, and your mixes are translating well, then you may not need additional bass traps in the corners. What monitors are you using?
(This is personal choice) but I think its good to keep small rooms a little “live”. Putting foam EVERYWHERE turns it into a coffin, and to me, everything sounds boring.
taking these ideas a bit further – scattering the porous absorption on the walls and ceiling will create a diffusive space – instead of a dead one. start out with no more than 50% coverage, and keep in mind that foam is generally not as effective as a heavy product like rigid insulation, recycled cotton batts, etc.
you need to have your absorption balanced (think it as a tone control for the room, too much high frequency absorption will cause you to turn up the treble…). so on your reflection points, try to use at least 2″ and better 4″ 3 pound/cubic ft rigid insulation wrapped in flame retardant cloth. this will absorb some low end and midrange as well as high end.
stacking large plastic covered rolls of pink insulation in the corners can also make some nice bass trapping and some diffusion because they’re round. cheap and effective – cover with a light curtain or cloth for aesthetics.
situate yourself about 38% of the room length from the front wall (so if you’re room is 12 ft, then 4’6″ from the front wall will put in the position of least “room modes” – a place where you’re less likely to have strange frequency response.