Home Recording Studio (24x16) Question

[generationdigital]

I have a room that we are going to use as a recording studio. The room is 24x16. It has a hardwood floor. I'm not sure what the walls are made of. I do know that the ceiling is flat and is between 10 and 12 feet tall. The room has a lot of natural reverberation in it. I am trying to decide what to do about that. Should I leave it alone? Should I put a large carpet strip down? Should I try to put some carpet strips on the walls? What should I do? Does anybody have any suggestions for making this a good place to record.

[cmchamp]

What is the ceiling made of? I'm going to assume the walls are minimum of 1/2" sheetrock (drywall). If I can remember the link, later on tonight I'll post some solutions that will allow you to make your own 2'x4' or 3'x6' temporary hanging acoustical treatments so that you can liven or deaden the room as you need.
To adequately set the acoustical treatements, you need to look at the physics of the room and use more than carpet, thoug if it's deep shagg it's a good start.

[cmchamp]

Ok, I'm back, a bit later than I thought. Run to the in-laws with our 1 1/2 month old son just to visit for 'a few' and see what happens. . . it's 11:30 already!

First of all, information used to assemble this reply comes from chapter 9 of "The Master Handbook of Acoustics, Fourth Edition" by Everest.

Due to the dimensions you mentioned, you will have the following low frequencies resonating.
24' length: Primary 47Hz, Secondary 94Hz, 3rd 141Hz, 4th 188Hz, 5th 235Hz
16' width: Primary 70.6Hz, Secondary 141.25Hz, 3rd 212Hz, 4th 282.5Hz, 5th 353Hz
12' height: Primary 94Hz, Secondary 188Hz, 3rd 282Hz, 4th 376Hz, 5th 471Hz
10' height: Primary 113Hz, Secondary 226Hz, 3rd 339Hz, 4th 452Hz, 5th 565Hz

You said your floor is hardwood, and the walls and ceilings are probably drywall (gypsum board).
If so, your walls and ceilings will absorb 29% of the sound energy at 125Hz. Your wood floor (assuming with 2x6 or 2x8 joists underneath) will absorb an additional 15% at 125Hz, so your bottom end might not be too bad. Both the floor and the walls will absorb even more energy at 63Hz which would allow your room to not be excessively muddy.

Hi frequecy reverberation on the other had adds to the livelyness of the room. Yes, this can be tackled with drapes on the walls and carpet on the floor. For best recommendations, you might go to your local library and check out this book.

Master Handbook of Acoustics, Fourth Edition. F. Alton Everest. McGraw Hill Publishers, 2001

[generationdigital]

Thank you very much! That helps out a lot.