Music • Sound • Video • Art

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Well I found my “sonic laser tape” measuring thingy. Really makes taking room measurements a breeze. Anyway, the room is a little better than my original plot. There are still issues obviously, but the modes don’t seem as bunched up and reinforcing as I feared. (I’ve posted the actual plot to the left.) Hopefully this will make it easier to deal with.

I’m still amazed at how costly it is to deal with this stuff properly. I am skeptical of most of the cheap glue/foam products you can find at places like Guitar Center. They may work fine as diffusors but, according to articles in publications like Sound on Sound, you need something with more density to act as absorbers, particularly at the low frequencies that are at the center of my issues.

Almost exactly one year ago I wrote a short blog entry on “dream studio spaces“. We were closing on a house then and I lamented the fact that I didn’t have a dedicated studio space in it. Well turns out that I commandeered/negotiated for/was-taken-pity-on-and-ended-up-with a small, small, small (essentially 9′ x 9′ x 9′ for a total of 768 cubic feet) bedroom to use. The physical form factor is not ideal for a music studio as it is almost a perfect cube…and did I mention it is small?

Acoustically this is about the worst configuration you can have, so much so that one acoustic treatment retailer has this on their site:

The worst type of room shape is a perfect cube – say, ten feet long, ten feet wide, and ten feet high – because all three dimensions are the same and all three dimensions resonate at the same frequency. A 10 foot cube shaped room will have a strong inherent resonance near 55 Hz, which is the open A string on a bass. So when that low A is played it will sound much louder than other notes. Such a room also has a longer natural decay time at that pitch, so A notes will sustain longer and conflict with other bass notes that follow.

Oh goody. Here is a graphic plot of the frequencies. (You can get the tool I used – PC only I’m afraid – and a lot of great information over at RealTraps.) It’s approximate because I’m pulling the room dimensions from memory.

It's amazing I can hear anything at all.....

Basically there is a very strong mode at 60hz and at subsequent multiples of 60hz. Recall the information above. So this means notes at or around those frequencies will be over emphasized and I will make incorrect mixing decisions at those frequencies. Now this isn’t as bad as it seems. Though this space’s fundamental flaws will never be completely eradicated from what I’ve read so far, acoustic treatment will help. I also do an inordinate amount of work in my headphones (a pair of AKG K240DF). So I think I will invest in an even better pair soon. Anyway, I’m in the process of upgrading major portions of the studio set up to improve the ergonomics and will try to address some of this as $$ allow. I’ll post some pictures as soon as I can. Any suggestions (on acoustic treatment or headphones) are very welcome.

Cheers.

There are two documentaries on Brian Eno that I am aware of and both are outstanding. One is from 1989 and is called Imaginary Landscapes. This is a fantastic look at Eno of nearly 20 years ago. As far as I know, it’s out of print (though a quick search will yield much info). The shots of him in his 1989 workspace alone are worth it, particularly when contrasted with contemporary scenes of his workspace from a very recent BBC4 documentary on Eno entitled Another Green World. (Hint: Everybody is moving “into the box” these days.) For different reasons, the latter documentary is not available for viewing “across the pond” in the US, but info can be found here. Both of these documentaries make for fascinating and highly recommended viewing.

Below is the VHS sleeve for Imaginary Landscape. I can’t figure out why they have not re-released this on DVD…

Front Cover

Rear Cover