Building a Mixing & Mastering Studio - Part 2, Design Walkthrough
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- Опубліковано 6 лип 2024
- ✅ Video 1 in the Series: The Starting Space: • Building a Mixing & Ma...
✅ Video 3 in the Series: Bass Trapping & Back Wall Acoustic Treatment: • Bass Trapping & Back W...
✅ Try Warp Academy for Free ➤ warpacademy.com/free-stuff-bu...
✅ Join our Discord Server ➤ / discord
We’re building a new mixing and mastering studio and filming the process. This is video 2 in the series where I’ll walk you through our goals and the design of the room.
★ SKIP TO SOMETHIN’ ★
0:00 Intro
0:49 My previous 2018 studio
1:30 Acoustic testing from 2018 studio
1:42 Goals & priorities
2:08 Decay time for control rooms
3:00 Impact of bad room acoustics
3:50 Intro to the design
4:15 Isolation shell
4:45 Transmission loss
5:13 Acoustic treatment = isolation?
6:15 Room modes
7:00 Room dimensions: golden ratio?
7:34 Studio floating floor design
8:25 Front wall
8:46 Benefits of flush mounted monitors
10:33 SBIR - speaker boundary interference response
11:25 Baffle step
11:59 Frequency response of NS10 free-standing vs flush-mounted
13:09 Baffle step compensation with LF shelving filter
13:32 Ideal monitor-listening distance
14:42 Improving stereo imaging
15:22 Diffaction
16:45 Improving transient response
17:50 Spacial comfort / live surface
18:38 Acoustic treatment
19:35 Density vs depth for porous absorption
20:21 Air gap?
20:38 Rear wall design: Scattering slats
21:09 Outro
★ STAY IN TOUCH ★
Discord ➤ / discord
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Facebook ➤ / warpacademy
★ ABOUT WARP ACADEMY ★
Warp Academy empowers artists to reach their full potential, create exceptional music, and live their passion. We’re a global, online collective that includes music producers, audio engineers, label owners, sound designers, festival organizers, booking agents, managers, leading audio brands and more.
We hook you up with all the education, tools, and connections you need to create professional-quality music and launch a successful career. You can learn almost any topic by searching our library of hundreds of free tutorial videos and production tools. Join us. We’re stoked to meet you!
✅ Try Warp Academy for FREE ➤ warpacademy.com/free-stuff-bu...
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#musicstudio #audioengineer #musicproducer
Watch our other videos on acoustics & studio design:
✅ How to Build the ULTIMATE DIY Acoustic Sound Panels for Music Studios: ua-cam.com/video/ECazGzutkV8/v-deo.html
✅ Master the Art of Wrapping DIY Acoustic Panels Like a Pro!: ua-cam.com/video/NYew5ZqGM7Q/v-deo.html
✅ How to Quickly & Easily Mount & Air Gap DIY Acoustic Panels for Music Studios: ua-cam.com/video/uR5JZ6lUe6U/v-deo.html
✅ Unlock the Magic in Your Music Studio: Mastering the Art of Porous Absorption: ua-cam.com/video/SSn8HEsG8ro/v-deo.html
✅ Secrets of Air Gapping Your Acoustic Panels & Sealed Air Spaces - Studio Acoustic Treatment Tips: ua-cam.com/video/efOWQhi_h6Y/v-deo.html
✅ Get Our Free Acoustics Course ➤ bit.ly/free-acoustics-course
I watched the entire video with joy. Then, I checked your channel out and, immediately, was shocked when I noticed your video from 11 years ago: "Mixing tutorial: How to test and analyze..." Had no idea this was you as I used to watch your video a lot when it just came out (Had just started with music, then) Good to see you're still up and running! 😉
Glad you enjoyed it! Thanks for following the channel for so long. Subscribe and stay in touch!
My mouth is open with all the knowledge needed to build a studio.
It’s a very deep topic for sure. But fun to learn about.
Let’s fill that up real quick! We don’t want any extra comb filtering 😉
Easily the best watch with most useful straightforward information
Glad it was helpful!
woahh! That is so much of quality info you cannot find anywhere else. I love this channel!
Thanks VPS. Glad you got a lot out of that one. Yeah, this was the most packed video in the series. So much ground to cover but I couldn't not share all these details. They're all just too important to gloss over quickly. Thanks for watching. See you around the channel!
i deeply appreciate the information you're putting out there! this is going to be a series I will be keeping a close eye on, and am sure to learn a lot from!! my father built a room many years ago, in our basement. very low ceiling, a lot of these small "mistakes" and what not from being a hobbyist and an amateur. but! I'm grateful that I have this room and it's always been so much better than say, a bedroom.
looking forward to seeing more and seeing what knowledge I can apply to my own room! :)
Awesome River. Yeah, having a studio that's not a bedroom is always better than nothing. Then, as you learn more and can invest more, you can improve things from there. Glad you're liking this and I'm amped to be sharing this tips I've learned along the way. Cheers!
I will be watching part 3. Thank you
Glad to have you on the series Paula.
Fantastic no fluff presentation.
Glad you liked it! Congrats for making it through the whole deep dive. There's a lot of info in there.
what an informative and usefull video, dude, thanka a lot for the details, waiting for the next series with an detailed description of all steps regarding choosing material, why choosing exact these materials and so on.
Hey mate. Glad you found this one helpful. Stay tuned!
Awesome…really interesting and confirms my acoustic decisions are spot on by leaving music making phases that require this level of sensitivity to the pros 🖤😎🙌
Glad you enjoyed this one. Cheers!
even though ive got nothing to say and no thoughts on this topic and will most probably never build a studio myself, this was hands down very interesting and entertaining. well explained.
Cheers mate. Thanks for watching.
Awesome!
Thank you! Cheers!
now this is totally my kinda video 💪😉👍
Glad to hear it!
Great stuff and awesome design!!! Thanks and congrats!!!
Thanks a bunch!
@@warpacademy If you don't mind sharing, what is your estimated budget for the build and were there any surprises in your cost allocations?
Hey JJ. No surprises so far. We went a little bit over my expectations in terms of materials cost, but very close to budget. Tom was great in terms of researching alternative sources, comparing prices, and getting suppliers to price match. Overall, I can say the build costs have been worth it and very reasonable given that I do this professionally and this is an investment. Thanks for watching. Cheers!
@@warpacademy That's awesome - any general ballpark? like 25,000? 50,000? more than that? No worries if you don't feel comfortable talking about specifics - even rough numbers would be helpful - thanks:)
Hey JJ. It's hard to estimate because we did the original build in 2018 and we're using all of that work for this build, then adding onto it. During that time there has been crazy inflation in building materials, so it's impossible for me to estimate how much that past work is worth in todays dollars. I would say under $50,000 though. Not including the monitors.
Very well explained and detailed description! There are way too many conflicting information out there and every room is different so your use of the facts and examples makes this video much more valuable. Would you use the sonarworks software for any "fine tuning" after your build is complete? Do you think it would be necessary?
Hey mate. Thanks for watching and commenting. Glad you found it useful. The whole goal of such an involved room build is that no room correction should be necessary. We're avoiding all of the issues that normally cause problems by using a non-environment room design.
The only issues I could possibly see using correction for are time-aligning the monitors, or doing very slight frequency response modifications to the monitors, but again that should be unnecessary due to the precision carpentry and selection of monitors that are extremely accurate and flat.
thx
You’re most welcome.
The reason low frequency sound becomes more omni-directional is due to the higher wavelength.
A sound wave in Air having a frequency of 100 Hz has a wavelength of about 3.5m. Halve the frequency to 50 Hz and the wavelength doubles to about 7m.
In an average sized room the human ear generally can’t distinguish stereo imaging for low frequencies which is why only one sub woofer is needed and its position and direction in the room is less important.
Human hearing is well attenuated in the 2kHz to 4kHz range because the rustling of leaves and twigs snapping are important sounds to pick up when you’re a potential meal for a lurking predator.
Interestingly, human speech hovers around these mid frequencies so there could be an evolutionary and causal relationship driving this connection.
I gave up trying to acoustically treat my home studio a long time ago. I made and inserted corner bass traps, hanging acoustic panels from the ceiling and various floor and wall coverings.
For live microphone recordings these acoustic treatments help.
In the end I opted for detailed headphone based post production, mixing and mastering and used common sense and compensation depending on the type of music being recorded and dynamic range etc.
I would rather ask a drummer to set up their kit underneath a bridge or in a warehouse and use a few mics strategically positioned.
The one area of live recording that home studios usually have great success with is vocals and recording acoustic instruments like guitar.
A small room can work well in these circumstances.
Cheers
(The way you calculate the wavelength of a specific sound frequency traveling through air, divide the speed of sound in air (346 m/s) by the frequency (eg 100 Hz))
Hey Petra. The frequency at which sound becomes omni-directional has a lot to do with the size of the baffle and the driver design as well. It's possible to create speakers that are not omni-directional in the low end (cardioid designs). Have you seen Kiis and Dutch & Dutch designs?
And, please, could you explain in details tips and tricks regarding treatment of rear wall, which is, probably, the most important thing regarding low frequency absorbsion. Thanks in advance.
Yes the rear wall is important for LF absorption but you can’t ignore all the other boundaries. The ceiling is just as important and an often neglected area for treatment.
Also keep in mind that porous absorption gets less and less effective the lower the frequency. The lower the velocity of the air particles the less conversion you get into heat in a porous medium. This is why air gapping is often recommended as the particle velocity is lowest at the boundary where pressure is highest.
At the boundary, you’ll likely want to consider another form of treatment like a membrane trap to handle low frequencies, depending on how well tuned you want your room to be in the low end and how much money and fuss you want to put into your room.
Treatment on your side walls and ceiling - 6-12 inches or more is highly recommended. Make sure you pay careful attention to using the correct density of material too, as I mentioned in the video. As high density rock wool can reflect a significant amount of sound.
oh dear…i forgot about “ grab a scotch “ and watched with double espresso 😅 wooopsy = brain overdrive ✅
Espresso works great too! Glad you made it through the video. Come join our Discord server and get our free studio design and acoustics course:
✅ Get our Free Acoustics + Studio Design Course ➤ bit.ly/free-acoustics-course
✅ Join our Discord Server ➤ discord.gg/ZwNgZteGKw
Wait... y'mean that a pair of Mackie CR3s haphazardly strewn sideways asymmetrically atop a messy desk in the corner of a cluttered bachelor apartment in the middle of a noisy downtown core ISN'T an optimal monitoring environment?! What the hell, Drew!
Okay, okay... to their credit, the CR3s are somewhat passable speakers within the parameters of their price point. They are what they are. But I digress.
This 'ere vid is packed to the brim with all manners of incredibly deep, utterly fascinating, mind-tickling (and unabashedly melting) info. Acoustics are a helluva science unto themselves, and one that I've always been warily drawn toward, albeit very much intimidated by, not the least because of all the, ahem, maths involved... and "maths" is my arch-nemesis. Place any formula before mine derpy eyes, and watch them immediately and aggressively cross over as drool comes dribbling down my very confused chin (and for the record: yes, chins too can experience confusion... there've been documented studies, probably).
Super rad. Looking forward to part three. Thank you as always for the quality production, content, and doin' us the learns!
Hey Alex. I always love your witty and humour-filled comments mate! Thanks for dropping the comment on this one. And kudos to you for watching this complete and total nerd-fest of a video. I had a lot of fun making it, and I hope it'll be helpful for many a studio-builder and producer to come. Thanks for participating as part of the Warp Collective. Nice to have you around mate!
@@warpacademy Thank ya's muchly for your kind words! Pleasure to be here. Cheers!
We have a saying in AES: Talk to me in numbers. Am glad there are videos like these that stir up interest and educate viewers.
Thanks very much. Being data-driven is very important to me. It's a wonderful topic to discuss. Thanks for watching and commenting. Cheers!
I ’ve been working with Philip Newel itself for last few months and just finished my new studio according to his design. Sound image in the room is on another level. Im surprised why didn't you decide to build wide band absorber at the back ? And only fill space with rockwool ? Are you going to fix woodwool boards on walls ? What fabric are going to use to finish walls ?
Hey LK. That's neat you've been working with Philip. His book is excellent. We are not just filling the back end with Rockwool. In fact, we're not using much Rockwool in the treatment at all; it's too high-density for our depth. We're using layers of materials of different densities to create the desired effect, then covering them with acoustic fabric that has some stretch to it. It's the same fabric you see covering the modules in my 2018 room in the photos.
What was that material you mentioned in one of your videos? It was the fact that minerale wool when applied thicker or more layers become more reflective. in one of your videos you showed another material that was less kg/m3 so it was better to create basstraps. hope you understand what i mean. thanks!
Hey hey. It was probably this video you're referencing: ua-cam.com/video/SSn8HEsG8ro/v-deo.html
I expect the other material is Owens Corning pink fluffy fiberglass. We use that in rooms for deeper treatment when lower density is required. You can also use it behind higher density rock wool products for a dual-density / graduated density absorber, which is what we did.
All the best!
Hi! Great work and attention to details. I really want to build a room of this level as soon as possible. Could you share the measurement of the frequency response at the listening position after all this hard work? My current room deviates +-6db from the flat frequency target and has an almost even decay time throughout the frequency spectrum except the very low frequencies under 50hz. Do you think I can make mixes translate in these conditions ?
Here's the completed room reveal: ua-cam.com/video/XfO_btDeXjc/v-deo.html. We haven't yet finished final acoustic testing, but I'll be happy to share a video on that once it's done, and walk people through the results.
That's pretty good if you're getting a +/-6 dB frequency response with even decay down to that low. What are your decay times looking like?
You'd want to watch out for under mixing your sub-bass in that room, seeing as the LF ring time will be longer than everything else.
I can also upload the Spectogram for both speakers if it is of interest
Sure. The waterfall is best with versions that are full range and then with limits set to 500 Hz and below. And ETC / impulse response.
From the project it seems that the wall-mounted monitors are attached or very close to the wall, is that so? 6:32
They are flush mounted in the wall, yes. Not touching the wall, but mounted behind the wall with the baffle just flush with the wall surface and a tiny gap from the cutout to the baffle edge so they don't couple. It's explained in much more detail later in the video. Cheers!
I may have missed it, but further detail on the speakers’ wall could be provided. For instance how the speakers will be secured to the wall; if the gap behind the walls will be treated; how thick and what materials will be used to construct the wall. Regardless, very good and clear intro to the topic. 👌🏽
Hey Jeff. Thanks for the comment. I can provide some detail here. The speakers are not secured to the wall. They're decoupled on custom built stands. The cabinet sits on high density, specially loaded polyurethane bushings on top of the stand. The stand holds the monitor at the perfect height to fit just into the speaker holes.
You don't actually want the monitor baffle in contact with the wall. A very narrow gap ensures no contact.
The wall itself needs to be very rigid and very massive so it doesn't resonate. You'll want to use something nice looking for the facing (we used clear coated plywood). Then you'll want something very heavy and rigid as the backing, like MDF. You'll want to glue and screw the two layers together with a ton of screws. When you knock on the wall with your fist, it should be very solid.
At the bottom of the wall, you'll want some absorption at the floor to front wall seam. We embedded ours behind the CNC logo panels, but you could also make triangular floor traps for this area with rock wool. Otherwise you'll have unaddressed bass buildup there. The ceiling is soft, so that's not an issue.
Behind the wall you definitely don't want an open cavity; it would resonate. We damped the cavity with rock wool, while leaving sufficient space for speaker amplifier cooling, speaker control access, and access to the Panasonic ERV ventilation and air-tempering unit.
Thank you so much for the info. I appreciate it. Keep the videos coming 😊
Cheers mate! Will do.
Serious question: have you considered the Kii three BXT option, which “advertised” to solve these issues for considerably less money, they are moveable, and won’t require a construction overhaul (transmission and treatment will still be needed of course)
The idea being that the Kii three BXT provides cardioid response VERY low and the line source sound emission will solve the floor bounce issue. Curious what your thoughts are on this
I would certainly be keen to try some out. Except a pair of them costs more than my entire studio. Prohibitive price point. But interesting technology. I’ll be keeping my eye out for them.
@@warpacademy I see. I was thinking your studio would 4x the price of them
Definitely not. This studio build is actually quite economical compared to a pair of Kiis. And, although they are said to be very directional, I'm not really sure if I'd actually like the sound of them. They look great, but I wonder how they actually sound. I know a few folks using them for mastering, but not mixing.
@@warpacademy I’m curious on how you are pricing your studio… if I get a place/facility/land here in Washington, it’ll cost $750k for something decent before even starting the studio build portion of it.
Maybe I could find a place that has a big shop for $500k… but it would be dumpy
Hey Dougley. Take a peek at part 1 of the series: ua-cam.com/video/wWuQYlunSv0/v-deo.html. This build is in the double garage of a house that I bought. So there wasn't an incremental cost of a dedicated studio property. That was key in my decision. We just repurposed the garage, which worked out great as were able to build the isolation shell on heavy concrete slab.
There are renovation costs, associated with building the shell and interior treatments, but much less than building a ground up structure. Also, our isolation needs are far less than a studio in a typical city and industrial space so we didn't need the massive structure that would normally be needed for isolation.
are these Audeze mm-500 how do you like them?
These are actually the LCD-5s. Same chassis. Similar look. The LCD-5s are my main engineering headphones. Exceptional. I have yet to try the MM-500s, but will likely get some soon. Stay tuned.
@@warpacademy thanks for your reply, i have LCD-X but i couldn't mix on them, recently i tried Focal Clear MG and i fell in love, they are not perfect but mixing is possible without any problems, try it if you have a chance
Ah, interesting. I also own the LCD-X and XC and like them a fair bit. What about the LCD-X did you find difficult to mix on? And what generation of LCD-X do you own?
@@warpacademy I own LCD-X 2021 edition, they are great for listening to music, but because they have such a high resolution and depth, I can hear each sound separately, which is certainly good for mastering, but not for mixing, at least not for me, I'll give you an example, I'm trying to mix drums and bass, because I can hear everything separately, I don't know when individual sounds are too loud or too quiet, it's almost always good,The LCD-X doesn't have as much pressure as the Focal has, here you hear exactly how loud the bass kick or vocals should be If something is wrong, I hear it right away
@@warpacademy The Focal is not pleasant to listen to like the LCD-X, all problems are audible immediately
Can you please explain the shape of the room? I notice some engineers don't have rectangular room but more like an octagonal room. What's the actual name of a room shaped like this one and why some room are design like this?
Hey mate. Happy to answer that for ya and it's a really good question. Some rooms use an RFZ design (reflection-free zone) which use shaped shells. These angled boundaries are designed to reflect sound away from the listening position. However, they're much more complex and costly to design and build.
In our case we went with a rectangular isolation shell and used extensive interior acoustic treatment and an angled front wall to handle reflections. There are absolutely no strong reflections at the mix position in this case either. So it's very much like an RFZ.
This room design is called a "non-environment room", originating from Tom Hidley and later used by Philip Newell in his book Recording Studio Design. The concept of this type of room is to use a hard front wall with flush mounted monitors, heavy acoustic treatment on all other surfaces except the floor, and some reflective treatment on the back wall for scattering a bit of live sound back into the room.
Cheers!
@@warpacademy How costly can they get? Can you possible get someone to build it?
I would certainly get someone to build it. Designing music studios is one thing, but building them also requires a very specialized skillset. You need to understand more advanced constructions concepts associated with acoustic materials, decoupling, hermetic sealing, floating floors, and next-level finishing carpentry. I would not attempt this unless you're going to hire someone who does that type of work.
I would say those types of rooms range from $100,000 to $500,000 USD depending on how crazy you go, whether you're renovating an existing space or purpose building, and the room dimensions. That's a rough estimate.
@@warpacademy Thank you so kindly for giving this information. I probably will never be ever to afford that but I would like to learn it just to learn it.
You're welcome.
What’s with the noise on your vocal?!
Weird recording chain issue. This was a new configuration for me and took some work to get the bugs out with the interface. I tried some de-noising on it, but it was too watery sounding and heavy handed, so I left it mostly intact in the video. Sorted it out in future ones.
Dare I ask what the budget was?
Of course. We're currently in the final stages of the build, so I don't have an "all in" number yet. My closest estimate is $55,000-60,000 CAD, not including monitors or other equipment in the room.
I don’t know but all those acoustic treatment videos makes it look like it’s hocuspocus or almost impossible to get your room sound decent. However with some absorption panels, the right speaker placement and tuning your speakers with some room correction software can give you great results. All it has to do is make my mixes translate to different speakers. The few flaws in the frequency range are easily adjusted when you know your room. Unless you’re mixing daily for the big billboard charts and every minute waisted counts then you’ll have plenty of money to outsource the design. For most of us the only thing that matters is good translation and knowing the flaws of our room. Building an acoustically perfect room will get your 10.000 dollars budget drained pretty fast.
For sure. It all depends on your goals and budget. You can do a lot with much less treatment and less of a budget. You can DIY fabricate yourself some great modules, inexpensively, like these ones I show how to build: ua-cam.com/video/ECazGzutkV8/v-deo.html. A few of those in your room at the right places and you're already on the right track.
What this room is though, is a professional control room. It's not a hobbyist room. We built it for around $60,000, which is quite good for the results we got. It's a high caliber professional room that's used day in and day out for mixing and mastering for projects where time and results really matter.
This type of room is not for everyone, but it certainly is achievable and can be done in a garage at home if you have the expertise and skills. Cheers!
@@warpacademy Thanks for the link, I will check it out 😀👍🏼
You're welcome. I have a whole free course on studio and acoustic treatment design, which you may enjoy here: warpacademy.com/course/music-studio-acoustics-online-course/
lmao
must be nice being fucking rich
How it work this room ) ua-cam.com/video/5WLBWqu7dZc/v-deo.html
That room has a nice shaped shell design in both cases with non parallel side and back walls. But the example on the left shows a highly reflective back wall. The example on the right shows heavy use of diffusion to scatter sound back into the room. My room design has a highly absorptive back wall with 3 feet or more of porous absorption and slats on the final layer of modules for scattering some sound. There will not be a large direct reflection like they show in the video because that energy will be highly attenuated.
@@warpacademy And what about all the other walls, are they also filled by 3 feet?
No. That’s not necessary. 1-2 feet depending on the boundary.