Hello In the 90’s I had the Luxury of owning a MLSSA and other acoustic measurement devices I measured all the known absorption materials I could find Some are effective/ efficient at sucking sound up for a small cost But what I found was not many of them absorbed in a musical way Most sucked the Midds out or other frequencies in an unpleasant way I came across Dacron ,the stuff in pillows It has a flat absorption spectrum It flat as a tack Cheap compared to Wool fibre ,rock wool, sonex type sponge etc I built 100’s of studios In the 90’s I had to make lots of home studios On little budgets, the results never disappointed me I have put my own money where my mouth is It’s a cheap solution to a problem of bad room acoustics I am also a musician Regards Michael
As a former sound install tech...this guy is giving you great info. If you add a resin type glue to the rear you can screw them to a wall. Love this channel.
We made panels to line the back of our drum booth at church. And we used the method you mentioned at 9:32. We made the frames from cheap pressed composite and wrapped the whole panel in black fabric. It came out VERY smooth looking and vanishes when we turn on the stage lights.
Thank you, this was great. I made 8 of them, 4" thick. HUGE improvement to the sound in my studeo. In one of your other videos, it looks like you had made a sound diffuser out of many small pieces of wood. A video on that would be super cool!! Thanks again.
I think you were talking about the Phase when you said 90°? A Sin-Wave has its first peak at pie/2 (=90°) or its secons at 3pie/2 (270°) and therefore the highest amplitude. Putting absorbing material there will absorb the most energy. Because your room has a certain length it will have a very specific resonant frequency, favouring waves with wavelengths whose multiples are the room length. So this technique blocks a specific frequency but is always specific to the needs of the room. What an excellent piece of advice! Thanks, your videos are great
I'm always amazed how cheap is wood in your country, watching this kind of DIY videos... you would surely pay almost 20 *bucks* for the wood you used in a single panel here (Italy)
Hey bud! First off your videos are excellent and super informative. Just got a TB12 because of your endorsment. Ive gained significant knowledge in mixing and recordin from your vids! Question, Im confined to a small 10x10 room for recording and mixing. Is there any way to optimize the sound of the room for both tracking and mixing? Or will a cloud and wall mounted panels be enough? Cheers!
a square room is one of the worst acoustically speaking. you will probably need a lot of bass absorption and would recommend getting a cloud suspended above your mix position
If all you're doing is wrapping the panels in fabric, why not go to a pallet yard and either have them build a light pallet to size, or reuse one? Used heavy-duty pallets are $2 to $5, and have often been rebuilt to usable condition. Add some wood screws to reinforce them, insert the panels, and add the fabric. The yard would also be full of other ideas, like the more expensive but uniform plastic pallets that can be used for drum risers.
Hey buddy. Your video is very clear. I'm having a birthday rager and am lucky enough to have some really cool pro djs here. Gonna go 10 pm til 8 am. I had no money but I had these sound absorbing subfloor panels. Cut them and screwed em kitty corner like bass traps. I was thinking of layering cardboard the whole way through it. Think it's gonna help the bass from escaping? Xo and thank you for your video.
Larry Tate Sure. There's lots of people that cut the OC703 into triangles and stack those pieces in the corners, and cover with a frame and fabric covering. Or you can straddle the corners too with 2 or 3 layers of the material.
Thanks for the video. I've been doing lots of research on DIY acoustic treatment and the Owens-Corning stuff sticks out to me as the most costly and hard to find materiel of most builds. I was in a nice sounding studios that used pretty average non rigid fiberglass stuffed into frames like yours. This makes me wonder if the semi rigid stuff is really necessary? Especially since it's marketed as "acoustic" it makes me wonder if I'm being taken advantage of a little bit. At least it's better/cheaper than then scam that is auralex. Edit: I just found some of the recycled denim material. I might give that a shot.
Right you could find stuff for cheaper by looking at adjacent industries, but keep in mind that's why this stuff exists. So it's possible you could find it for cheap but the quantity might have to be huge order of it.
Do you like your drums in the corner for the sound, or is it just for space? what would the difference be in placing the drumset with the bassdrum parallel and centered to the wall? i've messed around with it myself but can't really hear enough difference to be sure
Thank you very informative. I live in a duplex & trying to rig a spot in basement for my 16 year old who plays guitar (most often electric) as well as video games/movies it's a new home that has new eco design so strange set up. Small rooms but large basement w/ large windows. The home is great re: sound except for stairs both sets on inside diving wall. I believe I would need to sound proof the adjoining wall all the way up to top of stairs + ceiling. What would be better option? Any suggestions would be very much appreciated
Yeah, that's what I would try. If you think of the walls as a mirror, then you can imagine how sound will bounce right up the stairs. A solid wood door at the top of the stairs also would help.
How do vaulted ceilings change the way you go about treating a room? The drums are 3 ft away, facing the tall wall which is 12ft high. The short wall is about 9ft behind the kit and is 8 ft tall. I live in San Diego, and every wall in this city is hollow, no insulation, so the rooms are like drums themselves. My room is also 15 x 25 ft. I've always just assumed that my room sound would always be terrible,but maybe not. Any tips?
+David Velez Your room could actually be an amazing room. My live room is not that much different in it's size, but my ceilings are a constant 12 feet high. Vaulted ceilings can be very nice for sound. I would recommend using panels like in this video on the walls. You may not have too much of a problem on the ceiling. If you have carpet then it would help to take it up so you can control how much floor is covered with rugs.
How do you know what the sound is doing. You say it goes through and gets trapped. How do you know it doesn't mostly just get absorbed by the panel and the rest goes bouncing everywhere out the sides of the back.. If it does what you say then why not make the panel deeper to block the sound escaping in the back instead of leaving a space.
Sure make them as deep as you can. But there is a cost involved so it's always a give and take. I want to cover an area of the wall so I have to only go 2 inches deep. In the future I can make deeper ones.
Greetings brother, this is a nice video and I picked up a ton off information on this video. My question is what do you do as far as fiber in the air? Also if you could do it again would you use a different fabric, because that's been the hardest thing for me to find. Who knew it would cost a ton for fabric I'm gonna cut and staple onto a home project?
There's a fabric that you can buy for gardening that is a tighter weave than burlap, and it's black. 5 bucks for a 30 foot roll or something. It's used to keep weeds from growing in a garden and you can poke through it to plant tomato plants and such, but it's a cheap black fabric. Most likely does not meet fire code though. That's why that fabric is safe, but also very expensive too.
If you want to use burlap ( and don't care about the fire hazard) you might try coffee shops. A lot of them sell their bags for about $5 ea. Honestly- go ahead and "splurge" for something that is at least fire resistant. What's a life ( or even your studio) worth? You can build these for less than the cost of yet another shitty plug-in.
I'm very curious, as to whether or not you have any means to actually take sound/decibel readings, or somehow or other, to "measure" the amount of "sound attenuation" that can be achieved. Is it possible to go "TOO FAR"?... or, to absorb TOO MUCH of the room's natural acoustic properties?!
+guloguloguy Yes, balance is always key. Some people leave a thin layer of plastic on the 703 or get the foil kind so that all the acoustic high end is not absorbed.
You need more thickness in your absorption, and you need it in the corners too. This may require so much thickness that there is not much room to stand anymore. The best way is to record vocals in a large room, but build a tent of packing blankets around the vocalist, so you get the dead sound, but without the low end boxy sound that a small space will give you.
thanks for this very informative video but oh god its tooo much work for. i wish i could just hire somebody to do this stuff right. In my studio i put producers choice blankets all over. thats all i have the time and patience for.
Sorry you feel that way. Building a studio takes months and it's gotta be something you are determined to do. It's either build it yourself or pay 5x as much.
+creativesoundlab Yeah! You gotta love it all is how I feel. It's all part of the sound. The more you build the more you understand and have a feel and a connection to your room.
Love your video! Im just wondering why you keep that huge spider on your head.. i mean those legs keep on sticking out... haha Im just kidding, thanks for the great info!! SUBBED :D
Hello
In the 90’s I had the Luxury of owning a MLSSA
and other acoustic measurement devices
I measured all the known absorption materials I could find
Some are effective/ efficient at sucking sound up for a small cost
But what I found was not many of them absorbed in a musical way
Most sucked the Midds out or other frequencies in an unpleasant way
I came across Dacron ,the stuff in pillows
It has a flat absorption spectrum
It flat as a tack
Cheap compared to Wool fibre ,rock wool, sonex type sponge etc
I built 100’s of studios
In the 90’s I had to make lots of home studios
On little budgets, the results never disappointed me
I have put my own money where my mouth is
It’s a cheap solution to a problem of bad room acoustics
I am also a musician
Regards Michael
As a former sound install tech...this guy is giving you great info. If you add a resin type glue to the rear you can screw them to a wall. Love this channel.
Hey man, thanks for the tip and for watching!
4:16 Live Room Sound Panels
11:35 Control Room - Above Desk
15:25 Back of Panel Above Desk
18:05 How I Optimized Sound Panels
20:45 Summary
Creative Sound Lab do you have a video on your diffusers ?
We made panels to line the back of our drum booth at church. And we used the method you mentioned at 9:32. We made the frames from cheap pressed composite and wrapped the whole panel in black fabric. It came out VERY smooth looking and vanishes when we turn on the stage lights.
Thank you, this was great. I made 8 of them, 4" thick. HUGE improvement to the sound in my studeo. In one of your other videos, it looks like you had made a sound diffuser out of many small pieces of wood. A video on that would be super cool!! Thanks again.
I think you were talking about the Phase when you said 90°? A Sin-Wave has its first peak at pie/2 (=90°) or its secons at 3pie/2 (270°) and therefore the highest amplitude. Putting absorbing material there will absorb the most energy. Because your room has a certain length it will have a very specific resonant frequency, favouring waves with wavelengths whose multiples are the room length. So this technique blocks a specific frequency but is always specific to the needs of the room. What an excellent piece of advice! Thanks, your videos are great
+Da Spotz Yes, you're totally right. Sometimes my terms are not spot on.
Don Rutter Yes, PI and algebra DOES tell you where to place dampening material. Period
There goes your Auralex sponsorship :-D
Your channel is great. I've been at this for 10 years and I still learn new stuff here. Thanks!
Haha, I was never worried.
I'm always amazed how cheap is wood in your country, watching this kind of DIY videos... you would surely pay almost 20 *bucks* for the wood you used in a single panel here (Italy)
Quite the same in France :'(
Cool video. I really like the DIY aspect and have gotten a lot of ideas from it. Thank you, Ryan.
Hey bud! First off your videos are excellent and super informative. Just got a TB12 because of your endorsment. Ive gained significant knowledge in mixing and recordin from your vids! Question, Im confined to a small 10x10 room for recording and mixing. Is there any way to optimize the sound of the room for both tracking and mixing? Or will a cloud and wall mounted panels be enough? Cheers!
a square room is one of the worst acoustically speaking. you will probably need a lot of bass absorption and would recommend getting a cloud suspended above your mix position
If all you're doing is wrapping the panels in fabric, why not go to a pallet yard and either have them build a light pallet to size, or reuse one? Used heavy-duty pallets are $2 to $5, and have often been rebuilt to usable condition. Add some wood screws to reinforce them, insert the panels, and add the fabric. The yard would also be full of other ideas, like the more expensive but uniform plastic pallets that can be used for drum risers.
Thanks for a great video! And especially for spreading correct information regarding acoustics unlike most similar videos :D. Keep rocking!
DUDE! I have just descovered your channel and i freakin LOVE IT. thank you so much for all the great tips and info. Keep up the excellent work.
Thanks man, glad you're here.
Simply put... bravo! Really needing the inspiration I have received from you videos. Thank you for your works, bruvy!
use 5 or 6 layers of bath towels in a frame - you will be shocked... aaannndd it's cheaper
According To Honda : but It doesn’t work as good
This is helpful! Thanks
feels good to round up a bit of your subscriber count. Good luck dude!
Thanks man!
Ryan awesome weekly program, recording is an art and art mentor you excel at! Thanks for the real usable tips
Thanks!
I don't know about this foam but I buklt my panels with rock wool and it's extremely effective.
Rock wool is the best for audio, mostly even better than any foam.
What keeps the fiberglass from slipping off the frame and falling?
Hey buddy. Your video is very clear. I'm having a birthday rager and am lucky enough to have some really cool pro djs here. Gonna go 10 pm til 8 am. I had no money but I had these sound absorbing subfloor panels. Cut them and screwed em kitty corner like bass traps. I was thinking of layering cardboard the whole way through it. Think it's gonna help the bass from escaping? Xo and thank you for your video.
The bass traps are really expensive! Can u make them on your own as well??
Larry Tate Sure. There's lots of people that cut the OC703 into triangles and stack those pieces in the corners, and cover with a frame and fabric covering. Or you can straddle the corners too with 2 or 3 layers of the material.
What about the old premium moving blanket usage.
Thanks for the video.
I've been doing lots of research on DIY acoustic treatment and the Owens-Corning stuff sticks out to me as the most costly and hard to find materiel of most builds.
I was in a nice sounding studios that used pretty average non rigid fiberglass stuffed into frames like yours. This makes me wonder if the semi rigid stuff is really necessary? Especially since it's marketed as "acoustic" it makes me wonder if I'm being taken advantage of a little bit. At least it's better/cheaper than then scam that is auralex.
Edit: I just found some of the recycled denim material. I might give that a shot.
Right you could find stuff for cheaper by looking at adjacent industries, but keep in mind that's why this stuff exists. So it's possible you could find it for cheap but the quantity might have to be huge order of it.
Do you like your drums in the corner for the sound, or is it just for space? what would the difference be in placing the drumset with the bassdrum parallel and centered to the wall? i've messed around with it myself but can't really hear enough difference to be sure
Thanks a lot for your information and advice!
Sure thing!
wheres the shopping list at
Thanks for the tips.
Thank you very informative. I live in a duplex & trying to rig a spot in basement for my 16 year old who plays guitar (most often electric) as well as video games/movies it's a new home that has new eco design so strange set up. Small rooms but large basement w/ large windows. The home is great re: sound except for stairs both sets on inside diving wall. I believe I would need to sound proof the adjoining wall all the way up to top of stairs + ceiling. What would be better option? Any suggestions would be very much appreciated
Yeah, that's what I would try. If you think of the walls as a mirror, then you can imagine how sound will bounce right up the stairs. A solid wood door at the top of the stairs also would help.
How do vaulted ceilings change the way you go about treating a room? The drums are 3 ft away, facing the tall wall which is 12ft high. The short wall is about 9ft behind the kit and is 8 ft tall. I live in San Diego, and every wall in this city is hollow, no insulation, so the rooms are like drums themselves. My room is also 15 x 25 ft. I've always just assumed that my room sound would always be terrible,but maybe not. Any tips?
+David Velez Your room could actually be an amazing room. My live room is not that much different in it's size, but my ceilings are a constant 12 feet high. Vaulted ceilings can be very nice for sound. I would recommend using panels like in this video on the walls. You may not have too much of a problem on the ceiling. If you have carpet then it would help to take it up so you can control how much floor is covered with rugs.
Is there a link to the PDF guide and the materials list?
Can you make them fire proof ?
Great info. This is a real “meat and potatoes “ video. Thanks for sharing. ✌️
How do you know what the sound is doing. You say it goes through and gets trapped. How do you know it doesn't mostly just get absorbed by the panel and the rest goes bouncing everywhere out the sides of the back.. If it does what you say then why not make the panel deeper to block the sound escaping in the back instead of leaving a space.
Sure make them as deep as you can. But there is a cost involved so it's always a give and take. I want to cover an area of the wall so I have to only go 2 inches deep. In the future I can make deeper ones.
Greetings brother, this is a nice video and I picked up a ton off information on this video. My question is what do you do as far as fiber in the air? Also if you could do it again would you use a different fabric, because that's been the hardest thing for me to find. Who knew it would cost a ton for fabric I'm gonna cut and staple onto a home project?
There's a fabric that you can buy for gardening that is a tighter weave than burlap, and it's black. 5 bucks for a 30 foot roll or something. It's used to keep weeds from growing in a garden and you can poke through it to plant tomato plants and such, but it's a cheap black fabric. Most likely does not meet fire code though. That's why that fabric is safe, but also very expensive too.
If you want to use burlap ( and don't care about the fire hazard) you might try coffee shops. A lot of them sell their bags for about $5 ea. Honestly- go ahead and "splurge" for something that is at least fire resistant. What's a life ( or even your studio) worth? You can build these for less than the cost of yet another shitty plug-in.
what is that material called?
I'm very curious, as to whether or not you have any means to actually take sound/decibel readings, or somehow or other, to "measure" the amount of "sound attenuation" that can be achieved. Is it possible to go "TOO FAR"?... or, to absorb TOO MUCH of the room's natural acoustic properties?!
+guloguloguy Yes, balance is always key. Some people leave a thin layer of plastic on the 703 or get the foil kind so that all the acoustic high end is not absorbed.
Hey Ryan I can't find the shopping list PDF for these on your website. Am I looking in the wrong place?
Thanks for the vid but one question i sound proof my closet And i get a boxie voice record do i need acoustic pads?
You need more thickness in your absorption, and you need it in the corners too. This may require so much thickness that there is not much room to stand anymore. The best way is to record vocals in a large room, but build a tent of packing blankets around the vocalist, so you get the dead sound, but without the low end boxy sound that a small space will give you.
spot on dude! ACCURATE A F
Thanks, really good stuff, different from a lot that is out there (i.e. I ve seen)
Where can I find the PDF for this video, I can't find it on the website
is the pdf still downloadable?
Will this work well in a 10' tall concrete room?
Sure. You'll need more panels, and some in the corners.
thanks for this very informative video but oh god its tooo much work for. i wish i could just hire somebody to do this stuff right. In my studio i put producers choice blankets all over.
thats all i have the time and patience for.
Sorry you feel that way. Building a studio takes months and it's gotta be something you are determined to do. It's either build it yourself or pay 5x as much.
+creativesoundlab Yeah! You gotta love it all is how I feel. It's all part of the sound. The more you build the more you understand and have a feel and a connection to your room.
The materials that absorb particular sounds are the same materials that created them in the first place.
How are you determining the problem frequencies...?
+Dave Smith Lengths devided by the speed of sound.
Love your video! Im just wondering why you keep that huge spider on your head.. i mean those legs keep on sticking out... haha Im just kidding, thanks for the great info!! SUBBED :D
Where’s the best place to get 703? Shipping is crazy online
I know this is late, but I got some at Lowe's. It's only 50 dollars there.
Thanks
You can also just stuff cheap painters canvases.
you look like silent Bob and sideshow Bob mated. good tip though
Haha
Why does it still sound so damn roomy? :(
Robert Docherty Good point! I can’t “unhear” the reflections.
the point of this is not kill all of the room sound, but rather control the frequencies in it
I bet he grows cannabis like chia pet on his moldie locks
I keep my hair dry so they don't get mold.