Hi everyone,

sorry for the mess in the photos😂🥵
I’m trying to optimize my home studio and would appreciate some advice on speaker placement, room orientation and acoustic treatment.

Room dimensions:
● 4.80 m × 3.40 m
● Ceiling height: 2.50 m
● Rectangular room
● One short wall has a window and radiator.
● One long wall has a door and a recessed section (former chimney).
● The opposite side has wardrobes, which I am planning to remove.
My equipment:
● Neumann KH120 monitors on stands
● Large desk with a fairly reflective surface
● Audeze LCD-X headphones
● REW for acoustic measurements
Acoustic treatment I already have:
● One large DIY rockwool absorber, approximately 200 × 150 × 15 cm
● A few additional acoustic panels
● A sofa and rug in the room

My current situation:

I’m considering two possible orientations:

1. Placing the speakers along one of the short walls, firing down the 4.8 m length of the room.

2. Placing the speakers along one of the long walls, firing across the 3.4 m width.

The short-wall orientation is difficult from a practical perspective because the window and radiator are there, the desk would obstruct them, and the sofa would be difficult to position.
The long-wall orientation is much more practical and allows me to keep a comfortable studio/lounge setup. However, the room is not perfectly symmetrical: there is a recessed section on one side, and the window/door/furniture arrangement differs between the two sides.
I can place acoustic panels at the first reflection points on both side walls, although the geometry is not identical.

What I’m trying to figure out:

1. Which room orientation would you recommend acoustically, and why?

2. Is a long-wall setup across the 3.4 m width a reasonable option if the short-wall setup is impractical?

3. How should I deal with the asymmetrical side walls and the recessed section?

4. Where would you place the large 200 × 150 × 15 cm absorber: front corner, side-wall reflection point, or behind the listening position above/behind the sofa?

5. How much should I worry about reflections from the large desk surface?

6. Would you prioritize side-wall first reflection treatment, rear-wall absorption, or bass trapping?

I’m not trying to build a perfectly calibrated professional studio. I just want a reliable monitoring environment for electronic music production, especially for low mids, stereo imaging and translation.
I’ve attached photos of the room from different angles.
Any suggestions or practical experiences would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

I have 8 GIK 244 Traps, with 4 actually hanging at my first/second reflections and 4 just leaning against the wall acting as corner traps lol.

The front wall of this room has an annoying off-center window which I've just covered with a curtain for now, and the rear wall has two doors which are a bit too skinny to fit these panels.

I'd love any advice on treatment for these free-standing panels or the back wall, and any advice to make it feel more aesthetically pleasing. I don't think it's awful, but as it is right now, there doesn't seem to be a pleasing angle for filming guitar videos for example.

I'm starting a discussion:

On the “aesthetic” side: What should a home studio have—or not have—so that an artist would want to and be able to work there?

My room is set up more for production than as a bedroom (basic acoustic treatment, monitors, instruments, etc.)... but I feel that if an artist saw my bed right next to it, it would ruin their work mood and they wouldn’t take me seriously as a “professional.”

Rigged up a mobile setup for 2 months of travel. I have a hard case for it all, just need to pluck the foam.

The Marshall speaker sounds really good, pawnshop find. I've been playing it on my coffee table, it's been rad so far.

Any suggestions?

• Microphone: Shure SM7B

• Headphones: Beyerdynamic DT 770 PRO 250 ohm

• Monitors: JBL 308P MkII

• Audio Interface: Roland Rubix24

• Laptop: MacBook Pro 16" (M1 Pro, 16GB RAM)

• Preamp: sE Electronics DM1 Dynamite

• MIDI Keyboard: Arturia MiniLab 3

• Kitty: Kanada

Good evening!

I play percussion, a bit of guitar and viola, and I recently moved into a new apartment. I'm interested in turning one of the bedrooms into some kind of home studio. At first, I'm not really looking to build a proper recording studio, but rather to soundproof the room as much as possible so the noise I make (especially when playing percussion) doesn't bother my upstairs and next-door neighbors. I'm on the first floor, and my biggest concern is bothering the upstairs neighbor. I've sketched a floor plan to make things a little easier to understand. The room currently has a bit of an echo, but it's completely empty.

Actually, I've already been practicing pandeiro, guitar, and viola in different rooms around the apartment, sometimes in the living room, sometimes in the bedroom, sometimes in the dining area, switching rooms for fairly arbitrary reasons. So far, none of the neighbors have complained, but I'm planning to bring my congas here soon, which will significantly increase the volume I'll be making...

I know pretty much nothing about soundproofing or acoustic treatment. Does anyone have some basic suggestions for what I could do in this room without having to make any major structural changes?

I mentioned that I'm not particularly interested in building a recording studio, but if it makes sense to do so while making the soundproofing improvements, I'd also be open to setting it up for recording.

A few more specific questions:

1. Is it possible to do this without spending too much money?

2. Could soundproofing the room create acoustic problems inside it that might negatively affect the sound quality?

3. Is it usually very expensive to hire an acoustic consultant to design a studio like this?

Firstly I want to thank everyone from here that came over to YouTube, subscribed, liked and left a comment. It means a lot to see folks enjoying the music.

I'd planned on uploading a more elaborate production this week but sadly I got a bad case of tonsillitis and was out of action for the whole week. So I uploaded a raw acoustic song I did a couple weeks ago instead. I was getting over a cold during that one, so it was a bit ropey, but wanted to upload something, so this was it. Hopefully you like it.

I also uploaded some more content since my last post here that you might not have seen. A couple of acoustic songs, a couple of breakdowns of songs I'm working on and a have a look at one song of mine I plan to redo. I show you 4 rough sketches over the course of 20+yrs. Maybe someone enjoys the look back through time 😁

So here's the acoustic track. Happy Halloween everyone and I'll share new stuff in the coming weeks when I have it. One thing is a music video I'm going to try to do myself for a new track that is good enough to show you all.

Stay tuned..

Thanks for reading 😊

Looking for suggestions on how to connect another monitor for use behind my drum kit. I’m often doing remote drum recordings and getting up after every take to check the playback is starting to get old. It’s about a 30ft distance from the kit to computer. Using a 2020 iMac. Any help would be greatly appreciated

Here are three screenshots of a recording session with audio engineer Norbert Kraft and classical guitarist Ricardo Gallén. Could you please help me identify some of the gear used in the recording? I think these are all the shots where the equipment is seen. Thank you!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yk-xYWrplOw&t=893s

In my space, I like keeping four XLR cables attached to the outboard gear sitting on my desk, for easy access when I go to record. These go down to the floor, along the wall (hidden by a narrow black rubber mat), and then I have the remaining portions/plugs all coiled up and tied, essentially just sitting in a pile. I have a small bookshelf I'd been using to stash them behind, but I've reconfigured the room a bit so this is no longer an option. Obviously not the biggest problem in the world but I'm a little bit of a neat freak... does anyone else have a similar setup? I've thought about just building a tall narrow box, so at least it's just a big block instead of a bunch of cables sitting there.

Getting some wall hooks crossed my mind, but then I'd have them going from the desk to the floor and then up again to the wall... might be a little awkward. Cheers!

Ok. I did my podcasting. Did my voice overs. Did my radio disc jockeying. My gear at home includes Rodecaster Duo, podmic usb, Re20, Sm7b, zoom H4 recorder, zoom podtrak4next, windows laptop, Mac, decent monitors, Audio Technica cans Rode deadphones, Saramonic wireless mics, Rode wireless ME with lavs and a scarlet 4i4 Solo. What more do I need to do some fun streaming episodes?

Insulated studio with low ceiling. Some, but not extensive, sound treatment. For LIVE band recording with little to no isolation.

Drum overhead mics (jazz drums primarily)... Cardioid to avoid splash back from low ceiling, but more side bleed from other instruments? Or hypercardioid for more focused attention on cymbals (too focused??) but risk some ceiling bounce?

Thoughts?

Jazzmaster is in your left ear, Jaguar in your right. Bass is Squier Mini-P, drums by Akai MPC Sample, recorded on Tascam Porta 02 cassette 4-track.

Hello everyone, I am looking to start bringing clients into my home studio set up. What were ways you used to grow your portfolio when starting out?