Treat my room

thermionic

I’ve now got a dedicated room for a studio, redecorated, decent (big!) desk and all wired in - but it needs some acoustic treatment. It’s quite small, just under 3m each side, with a short section of sloping ceiling at the far end. As it’s so small, the desk is far closer to the wall than I’d like, although in reality it’s not as bad as it looks as the monitors are at the front edge of the shelf that curves away from the wall.

https://i.imgur.com/9kzR6cT.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/7fwLxT3.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/N76rCIP.jpg

I’m thinking some panels on the wall behind the monitors and at the mirror points on the opposite wall for a start. I’m not too worried about bass traps (the sofa bed will help I guess), but I think cutting down on the reflections would be a good start.

Foam panels or the fabric covered frames? Bit of both? Would the sloping part of the ceiling be a problem or actually help in dispersing reflections?

bencowling81

From the pics looks as though the angled ceiling could be advantageous, removing the direct ceiling reflection to the listening position, but it can work both ways. If you draw the room in profile and then draw in the listening position and then the monitors and sound output and reflection lines (angle of incidence = angle of reflection) you can determine whether there are any advantages or disadvantages to the sloped ceiling when it comes to direct ceiling reflections. 

Danny1969

The sloping ceiling helps in as much as it stops it being a complete box shape. 

But being realistic you can put some diffusion here and there to tame reflections but it's too small to bass trap without reducing the size dramatically. 
You can still do great work in there, just keep the volume moderate and triple check the mixes in other spaces and environments. 

Musicwolf

thermionic said:

Foam panels or the fabric covered frames?

Rockwool, RW3 or equivalent, covered with breathable fabric (Cara is easy to work with and gives great results), don’t  bother with foam.

Treat the mirror points (walls and ceiling) but also consider going across the corners if possible.

poopot

Easy to make some panels dude...

https://www.thefretboard.co.uk/discussion/192149/acoustic-panels#latest

Danny1969

There's actually an easier way to buy diffusion panels cheaper than you can build them. You can buy these large prints for about £14 that are in a 2" frame and just stuff the rear of them with rockwool. 

To get a room completely under control of that size means more bass trapping than there is actual room for so I wouldn't go mad. 

John_A

Danny1969 said:

There's actually an easier way to buy diffusion panels cheaper than you can build them. You can buy these large prints for about £14 that are in a 2" frame and just stuff the rear of them with rockwool. 

To get a room completely under control of that size means more bass trapping than there is actual room for so I wouldn't go mad. 

Got a link to these frames?

Danny1969

John_A said:

Danny1969 said:

There's actually an easier way to buy diffusion panels cheaper than you can build them. You can buy these large prints for about £14 that are in a 2" frame and just stuff the rear of them with rockwool. 

To get a room completely under control of that size means more bass trapping than there is actual room for so I wouldn't go mad. 

Got a link to these frames?

We have loads all around the house. Some from The Range, some from Dunelm, some from online stores but all are basically canvas print spread over 2" ish wooden frame with no borders  ... these kind of things 

https://www.therange.co.uk/home-furnishings/picture-frames-and-wall-art/posters-prints-and-visual-artwork/canvas-art/white-and-soft-pink-embellished-poppies-canvas/#149410

ChrisRG

I went on a similar journey here

https://www.thefretboard.co.uk/discussion/183659/acoustic-treatment-in-home-studio-let-the-fun-begin/p1

Loads of the great and the good chipped in with superb advice. 

I haven’t actually mounted them yet due to a change in the room (then a change back) and then new monitors for Christmas so need to get back on it. 

Nerine

I’d try to maybe squeeze in a few soffit bass traps, as it’ll be advantageous; but yeah, take care of the reflection points, listen and make decisions, using reference material you know well. 

In a lot of cases, treating a room perfectly just isn’t realistic or achievable, so you strike a balance between physical space and fidelity. 

And yes, avoid foam like the plague. 

Whistler

Nerine said:

And yes, avoid foam like the plague. 

Do you mind if I explain that? An acoustician in Ireland I know did some tests and discovered that foam works but it needs to be as thick as mineral wool or fibreglass. The usual minimum recommendation is 100mm deep traps, hung or placed 100mm from walls or the ceiling. Foam usually is sold much thinner and so by the time you have bought enough to stack it to get the bare minimum of 100mm, the cost is way up there and that makes mineral wool or fibreglass traps a more affordable proposition.

Musicwolf

The advantage of Rockwool over foam is that it is both thicker (£/mm), as you say, and usually more dense.  You are trying to convert the kinetic energy of moving air molecules (i.e. sound) into minute amounts of heat.  You want the absorber material to be dense enough to impede the movement of air whilst not being so solid that it reflects the sound.  The thickness is important because the air is not actually moving at the wall surface (a node), maximum movement is at the 1/4 wavelength so for a 100Hz signal the 1/4 wavelength is about 850mm.

The acoustic foam that you often see used in home studios is usually low density and far too thin.  The result is that you kill the high end whilst doing nothing for the lows and mids resulting in a very boxy sound.

There are reputable acoustic foam suppliers, and their products do have their place, but as you point out they are very expensive.

John_A

Danny1969 said:

John_A said:

Danny1969 said:

There's actually an easier way to buy diffusion panels cheaper than you can build them. You can buy these large prints for about £14 that are in a 2" frame and just stuff the rear of them with rockwool. 

To get a room completely under control of that size means more bass trapping than there is actual room for so I wouldn't go mad. 

Got a link to these frames?

We have loads all around the house. Some from The Range, some from Dunelm, some from online stores but all are basically canvas print spread over 2" ish wooden frame with no borders  ... these kind of things 

https://www.therange.co.uk/home-furnishings/picture-frames-and-wall-art/posters-prints-and-visual-artwork/canvas-art/white-and-soft-pink-embellished-poppies-canvas/#149410

Cheers Danny - See what you mean now.  Places like Photobox do custom printed ones which give some style options.  Standard plain ones look very 'pro' but not too decorative

oktorockto

I am an acoustic consultant and specialise in studio acoustics. I'm getting out of the industry as I don't like dealing with construction companies (could see something like Grenfell brewing for a long time); without wanting to offend anyone here I don't like most of the people I meet in that industry either. Often my excellent plans are 'value engineered' to a point where they don't work properly. As for domestic studio work, lots of people can't afford me or want to go DIY. There are also lots of cowboy 'acoustics' companies out there getting work, charging a fortune for sub standard work. I'm not great at social media marketing and unfortunately it seems nowadays it's more about how good you like like your work is than how good the work is. Some of these people get high profile work and unfortunately the clients don't know any better. Sorry to be so negative! So here is some free advice on absorber thickness with donegoid practical mounting advice 

With decent foam or rockwool you can get almost as good results with 50mm thickness as you can with 100mm thickness by mounting the 50mm with a 50mm air gap to the wall. 

The way sound travels, vibrating particles of air, means that as the particle approaches the hard surface behind the panel, it starts to slow down. When it hits the wall, it stops momentarily, losing a small amount of energy, and then accelerates away again. Think of it like a tennis ball. When the pressure is at s maximum the velocity is at a minimum/ when the velocity is at a maximum the pressure is at a minimum.

Porous absorbers work by absorbing energy from the particles and turning it into heat. This absorption is dependent on the velocity of the particles , not the pressure. So as the particles are not traveling as fast when near to the wall you do not get as much effect in that part of an absorbing panel. This is even more evident in corners of rooms where the sound pressure is high but the velocity low. So it's not worth filling corners, you just need panels across them.

For ceilings you can suspend a 50mm panel with an air gap of 50mm or 100mm and get a lot more performance. I usually use self tapping eyes hand screwed into metal plasterboard driver fixings and then a small wire rope with a loop on it threaded through an eye it bracket on the panel with a wire rope adjustable clutch to secure it. To get a perfect drop from the ceiling I cut a small piece of timber the size of the drop and hold it vertically between the ceiling and panel while I adjust the rope. For heavier panels I use expanding plasterboard fixings for the ceiling and small angle brackets. To set out on the ceiling you can set out on the ground and then 'plumb' the line or point up using a cross hair laser. Or you can cut out corrugated cardboard with to the size of the 4 points you need and hold that on the ceiling and mark it.

Of course, with properly thicker absorbers you get more absorption on waves that travel obliquely to the surface of the panels but as you can afford more coverage you can often still end up with more absorption overall.

Don't confuse absorption with diffusion, absorption reduces and diffusion scatters. You can achieve both by mounting many smaller absorbers with gaps of bare wall between them. The time delay this causes gives you diffusion as well as absorption.

Happy to answer any questions anyone has as and when I get a chance to answer.

thermionic

Well I finally got round to doing it. Studiospares 600x600mm panels to catch reflections off the back wall:

https://i.imgur.com/Nb2jHek.jpg

I was going to put the smaller panels on the side walls as there’s a fireplace on the opposite wall, but after a bit of research I decided the side walls would benefit from the larger panels - and I managed to make them fit ok on both sides. 

https://i.imgur.com/yZIeTCP.jpg

I could probably fit larger panels behind the desk and move the smaller ones to fill in spaces on the back wall, or even the ceiling. Maybe at some point in the future.