Bass traps and diffusers

[Spencerleehorton]

Yes drum room is 3x3m, should have used a square really!!!
And yes the kit is setup so drummers back is to the back wall.

 

[RoadrunnerOZ]

So this means your mics will all be mainly pointing inwards towards that wall when you mic up - to avoid cancellations from direct reflections off the wall, it should be treated for the span of the kit and mics including overheads.
The tri corner reflections floor to ceiling, and vertical corner to corner reflections along wall faces and across room are dealt with by your floor to ceiling corner traps.
However your lateral corners (top L across to top R) on each wall top are untreated and will reflect from same corners at wall bottoms down the wall faces (156Hz) as well as diagonal across the room bottoms (95Hz) plus top to floor to top across the room etc - you just need to see how much is going on after you put in the first traps. You may need horizontal top corner traps as well if there are ringing issues.

 

[kags]

So this means your mics will all be mainly pointing inwards towards that wall when you mic up - to avoid cancellations from direct reflections off the wall, it should be treated for the span of the kit and mics including overheads.
The tri corner reflections floor to ceiling, and vertical corner to corner reflections along wall faces and across room are dealt with by your floor to ceiling corner traps.
However your lateral corners (top L across to top R) on each wall top are untreated and will reflect from same corners at wall bottoms down the wall faces (156Hz) as well as diagonal across the room bottoms (95Hz) plus top to floor to top across the room etc - you just need to see how much is going on after you put in the first traps. You may need horizontal top corner traps as well if there are ringing issues.

At least with those freq issues you won’t need thick corner traps- your 10 cm thickness across a corner would effectively get down to 100 Hz

 

[RoadrunnerOZ]

At least with those freq issues you won’t need thick corner traps- your 10 cm thickness across a corner would effectively get down to 100 Hz

Yeah and also tame the high/mid clatter that comes with those as well.

 

[RoadrunnerOZ]

When you put a drum kit with the drummers back into a corner and treat the corner/side walls it makes for a good option - seems to tighten up the drums on mic.

 

[Spencerleehorton]

Drum room with loads of clutter in it!!
Going to remove it all tomorrow and put in the traps.

Have built 6 from a rack unit, still need to cover with dust sheet.
Will build another 3-4 of these tomorrow.
Will then take down the speakers in the corner and trap the 3 corners and then use some over the kit.
Want to paint the walls as well as take away all that crap foam on back wall and back of door!!

This will make 6 more!!
68x50x10cm size wise.

 

[RoadrunnerOZ]

Should end up a tidy drum room - good for guitar and vocals too I’d imagine.

 

[Spencerleehorton]

Going to try and put the kit into the corner by the window and back wall as this will create more space but rather than the drum stool being in the corner having it the other way round with kick drum in the corner and drummer facing the corner.
I can then trap the corner, (floor to ceiling) window wall and back wall and above the kit.
The other corners I can trap at top shoulder height and above leaving space below for other stuff.
As I need to get my amp cabs and heads in there ideally.

 

[RoadrunnerOZ]

Whichever way you go the drummer in the corner is the better way - as long as it’s easy to mic up - you may have to put the overhead mic stands behind the drummer as having the kit facing the wall starts to crowd it out into the room more with the boom arms of the mic stands governing where the kit goes. (The other thing is the stand for the kick mic). Clip mounts on Tom’s and snare are easy but you’ve still got cymbal mic stands - too many mic stands behind the drummer makes access to the stool tricky unless set off to each side. I’d give it a try both ways to see which works best both sonically and ergonomically.
Even though you need a clear passage for the drummer with the drummers back to the corner, you may find it takes less room setting up the kit that way. Possibly less claustrophobic unless he’s facing a window into the control room. If it does work that way facing the corner it makes it easier to change the kit over - tricky to manipulate the kick mic.

In the vocal/guitar room for a studio I just recently was involved in the acoustic design of, we have a special vibration damped wall mount cantilever vocal mic stand (handy as it swings out of the way for setting up a guitarist etc.) which decouples the mic from the floor - this allows the monitors to be up (especially with the sub running) as we could not split isolate the floor between control room and booth. The floor is a concrete slab with rubber isolated high density 10mm flooring on top - the connecting wall and door isolation was fine but we were getting LF coupling through the floor slab and up the floor mic stand, (the timber flooring is decoupled but the slab carries through) - even if the mic was on rubber isolation bands in a shock mount, but worse for mics without them like the Coles ribbon mics and pencil condensers. We originally thought it was the stands ringing but it actually got worse with a heavy based stand and we were getting a slow buildup of LF feedback which stopped when I put the stand on an isolation pad, but not when I hand damped the stand. Check your floor coupling from the control room to the drum room.
This type of wall mount stand may work for cymbals and overheads in your room.

 

[Spencerleehorton]

One corner done

Two corners

I need to put another on the ceiling on the right, test claps I can still hear some ping from the other corner.

No more ping now and room sounds nice
Could probably do with a couple more but I’ll setup kit and finish clearing the room.
I will get round to cleaning up the walls and painting but ran out of time today!

 

[RoadrunnerOZ]

Looking good - I see you covered the window - what’s the view from that?

 

[Spencerleehorton]

The window is covered the other side as that’s behind the mix position, also that will be either side of the kit to stop reflections.

 

[Spencerleehorton]

Drums sound much better now like this

 

[RoadrunnerOZ]

Looks good - you may need to put an absorber on one side to cut cross room reflections - below the window or the other side.

 

[kags]

I personally like to record drums in rooms this size. I like the punch the room provides without much low-end mud. Like the sounds Tchad Blake gets when he records.

 

[Spencerleehorton]

Yes the drums sound much more focused and much more clarity than I’ve had before.
Still need to build some more traps but on the home run!!

 

[RoadrunnerOZ]

I notice you have an amp and speaker cabinet in the corner in front of to the right of the kick drum - that cabinet will have a resonant frequency and may cause a problem as it’s right in the corner. The lower corners can cause issues with kick and floor toms.
When I did the drum corner in the last studio which has the drums in the main large live room, I ran absorptive material to the floor on one of the walls tight into the corner, slightly further out on the drummers right (drummer is back to corner) were acoustic lined heavy velvet curtains which can be drawn back to expose a bright brick wall surface.

 

[Spencerleehorton]

On the bottom right I have the power trip switch behind that cab so I want to leave that from being trapped, I thought that the mass of that cab will help a bit and it holds the headphone amp on top so its convenient.
I could always build two more at that size and have the one on the right loose behind the cab I suppose

 

[Spencerleehorton]

I’ve got 3 more frames for traps for the drum room which are the same size so that covers the bottom corners and the other on the ceiling, just need to get a bit more rockwool and dust sheet.
Two more for mixing room which I need to make as well then I’m gonna have a big tidy up and get on with some mixing and recording and see what it all sounds like, so far it sounds so much better.
Will try and make a video at some point showing the difference in drum sound.

 

[RoadrunnerOZ]

Good stuff!