The EM Poll

Starting Over

Jul 1, 2007 12:00 PM, By Nick Peck

           

Eight years ago, I built a large, complex project studio to do freelance film and game sound design as well as music production. The studio was a success. But sometimes the unexpected happens: opportunity knocked and I answered, taking a position as audio director of a video game company.

Unfortunately, the commute was brutal, so I eventually sold my house and studio and moved my family to a rental home closer to work. Because I no longer needed to do sound design in my studio, I could repurpose it to focus on recording music exclusively. My new recording space is smaller than my previous studio, which forced me to rethink the layout and my priorities. I was thus faced with the daunting but fun task of reinventing my studio, streamlining it to fit my new life.

This experience taught me two valuable lessons: first, that nothing is permanent, and second, that as you grow as a person, your studio should change to accommodate your changing needs. If you are ready to rethink the design of your own recording space, here are some tips on how to alter it for the better.

Starting from Scratch

Before you rebuild (or build) your studio, sit back for a moment and ask yourself an important question: What are my goals for this room? Although this question may seem simple, the answer will provide a context that informs the answers to subsequent design questions, such as: Are you interested in recording your band? Will you mix other people's music? Will you do sound design for postproduction, or voice-over work for radio? Is it going to be a one-man MIDI studio? Do you plan to take on outside clients? Knowing which of these functions your studio will fill can help you make the proper equipment and design choices.

FIG. 1: A studio that is well organized and streamlined can be a great place to work.

For example, the primary design considerations for my new studio were sonic excellence, analog solutions wherever practical, and portability. A key point was to be able to take the studio down in one day and set it up elsewhere in another. To that end, equipment is housed in touring racks or sets of drawers on casters whenever possible (see Fig. 1). The room acoustics are attached to stands, rather than being mounted to the walls. The wiring is clean and tight, and most of it can be quickly coiled together and attached with cable ties to the outside of the patch bay case. And when I move out of this space, it will look like a living room again with no revisions needed.

Once you have defined your goals, it's time to take a complete studio inventory. List every piece of gear you have, and with each one, ask yourself the following questions: Does this piece of equipment help advance my studio's goals, or is it a distraction? Does it interface well with my other gear? Is it redundant? If the item no longer serves a productive goal for you, put it into a pile of stuff to be sold. The proceeds can help finance other equipment that will better suit your current needs.

Next, figure out how much you are likely to make selling off the gear you no longer need, and add it to the money you've squirreled away for this little project. That budget will then set a cap on what you can buy.

Now comes the fun part: R&D. Make a list of problems that need solving, such as the need for acoustic conditioning, or a good mic for recording electric guitar. Then research your options by browsing the Web, asking your friends, and reading trade magazines.

Remember that this is not about finding the sexiest new toy on the block. Rather, it is about getting the best tool to solve one or more problems. For instance, if you have neither a good EQ nor a good compressor, you might consider finding a hardware or software channel strip that will do both jobs for you. In the end, the goal is to select the appropriate items that will integrate into a functional whole.

Once you've completed the R&D process, make a prioritized list of the things you'll need. Buy the highest-priority items until you've exhausted your budget, then slowly complete the list as funds become available.

The Physical Layout

When designers lay out a kitchen, they focus on creating a space that offers maximal productivity with minimal movement. To this end, they utilize the concept of the work triangle. The points of the triangle are the three most important kitchen areas: the refrigerator, the sink, and the stove. When preparing a meal, you interact continually with these three objects. As a result, they are laid out first, and the rest of the kitchen is designed around them.

You can take this same approach when planning the physical layout of a studio. Start by creating a bird's-eye-view layout of the room on graph paper (see Fig. 2). Be sure to note the positions of doorways, windows, power outlets, and any other features of the room that might impact the location of equipment.

FIG. 2: In the initial design phase for my studio, I noted the locations of windows, doors, a hallway, and the kitchen, as well as where I wanted to place my CPU rack, monitors, instruments, and acoustic treatment.

The central listening position and speaker placement are the first elements to determine. The optimal listening position is generally around the center of the room, or slightly forward of that location. Draw a picture of your head at that position on the graph paper. The speakers should be oriented to fire down the long axis of the room and placed equidistant from the sidewalls.

Though it may be tempting to place the speakers directly against the front wall, try to move them into the room at least a foot or two. That will help cut down on undesired bass-loading effects and will lower the amplitude of the early reflection off of that wall.

Now that you know ballpark locations of your listening position and the speakers, draw an equilateral triangle on the graph paper from your head to the speakers, adjusting speaker location until each line is equidistant. This will give you a starting point that can be fine-tuned later, once your equipment and room acoustics are in place. (“Truth or Consequences” in the November 2001 issue of EM shows you how to tune your control room to flatten its response; it's available online at www.emusician.com.)

With your speakers positioned, you can lay out the rest of the work space. The area directly in front of your listening position is the most valuable piece of studio real estate and should be occupied by whatever tools you use most frequently during mixdown. The obvious contenders for this spot are your mixer or control surface, as well as the controls for your recording device. If you spend a lot of time looking at the computer screen while mixing, its logical position is dead center between the two speakers, and close enough to allow you to read it without eyestrain. Be careful to avoid obstructing the sight lines to your speakers with your computer monitor, because it can create unwanted aural reflections.

In my case, I wanted to avoid the distraction of looking at a screen during mixdown, so I moved my computer monitors outside of the speaker area. My mixer is directly in front of the main listening position, and the remote control for my recording device (an iZ Radar hard-disk recorder) is on a roll-around stand within easy reach of my right hand. This decision has helped me focus on what I'm hearing while mixing, rather than what I'm seeing.

Once these key decisions are made, the rest of your equipment can be added, with highest priority given to the objects you use most frequently. If your studio is primarily oriented toward a single composer-engineer creating electronic music, then special emphasis must be given to the position of your master MIDI keyboard controller. Placing this keyboard directly to your right as you face the speakers allows you to play melodies with your right hand while operating your DAW or recorder with your left. In studios that don't have a mixer or control surface, a MIDI keyboard controller can be placed directly in front of the listening position instead.

External signal processors, computers, and other ancillary equipment often work well in racks to the left of the mix position. If you have a lot of gear and ample room, consider getting a producer's credenza that sits behind you. That will give you plenty of rack space within easy reach, as well as a handy work surface. (For more information about studio furnishings, see Web Clip 1.)

Read more of this article on redesigning your personal recording studio

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