nothingtodisplay

hey im an experienced guitarist and my band and I are looking to expand. We mainly play hard rock and metal. im trying to put together a home recording studio. i need to buy vocal mics, drum mics, monitors, recording software, guitar/bass interfaces, headphones, cables. Also i am needing to get some some new cymbals. Plus i need ideas on how to sound proof the room. Please post any suggestions on what to buy or some favorites of yours. Thank you.

 

ƒodd

Funny thing is that I just helped a buddy and my brother make a home studio!
What's your budget look like?
Biggest thing is cost. You can end up getting top of the line gear and soundproofing equipment or you can settle for less and get good enough results.

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nothingtodisplay

my budget is around $2000 but i want to save as much as possible. I am not looking for top of the line gear, but still i want quality. middle-high end is what im looking for

ƒodd

ok
well I find the best solution is to make the structure of the walls denser in some way. The way you do this depends on what kind of room you're soundproofing. It's a luxury if you can start fresh with a room (make the studs/joists secured and add insulation everywhere while adding rubber pads to the inside lining of the wall) but that's not always the case. In the case of my brother's room we just had regular wall insulation for the insides of the walls and added something you can find at your local hardware store called soundboard ($8 per 6' x 8' board). It looks sorta like a felt material that's fuzzy (no better way of describing it, sorry). It's solid enough to mount onto a wall but still flexible enough to absorb sound while letting only a small amount leak through. That's the cheapest method I've run across so far. You wont get complete soundproofing but if will dampen the amount of sound that makes it through while reducing unwanted reverb inside the room. Also make sure to consider soundproofing (everything you use on the walls) the ceiling as well, if you have a 2 level building and you're on the lower floor. and the Floor if you're on the upper floor.

To get a better understanding of how soundproofing works I'll give a somewhat short description for you so you can think about what to get and how to do it as well.

Sound is basically the vibration of matter (in this case air). We will call this vibration sound energy for now. In order to get rid of sound energy we need something to absorb that energy and convert it into another, less noisy, form of energy (Heat!). When you get a material that absorbs sound all it is really doing is absorbing that energy and turning it into heat. The material that can do this the best is the material that is most soundproof. When you have a denser material there is more matter for the sound to work through, which means less of it can make it through. Of course there is some material, such as brick, which is too dense. It will not let sound through but will, in turn, cause more reverb to be shot out through the room. Hopefully this helps a little with trying to find material. If you need any more info let me know. I tried condensing the information I had to as short as possible, so some of it might now be too clear.

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Rock N' Roller

Thees ere-a zee keends ooff cumments thet meke-a me-a interested oon threeds I vuooldn't ifee thuooght tu cleeck oon

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NYDrummer

man, $2K is really pushing it. basically you need to decide if your room will be for sound proofing or sound control (since you mentioned all the studio gear). From what I know, and most experts will agree, the only true way to soundproof a room, is to build a room within a room, you want to separate the walls from the exterior wall and build a sub-floor, raised off the exterior floor. Fodd is right when it comes to things being dense, the trapped air b/t the walls and floors acts as such. naturally, you want to add other sound absorbption materials, but you'll never get a 100% sealed, soundproofed room where the sound won't escape, you'll really just minimize it, well extremely that is. if you google soundproofing, there are a few sites that show you how to do it, but more importantly understand what it does and doesn't do for you.

as for gear.....are you recording or just rehearsing? If it's just rehearsing, then you don't have to get the best sound of it, but if recording, then mics are important. not too familiar with vocal mics, but for drum mics, the shure sm57s are great, and the pre-packaged drum mic sets are decent, again, if you're not looking for critical listening. We personally use, CAD drum mics I think, or maybe even NADY, dual powermac G5 and Logic Pro to record. I'm more of a drummer than engineer, so my knowledge is somewhat limited, but I'm still learning a bunch of all that electronic stuff.

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bandguy834

Having done so in the past, trying to set up a good quality home recording studio on a limited budget can be a losing endeavor. There's no way you can buy even a fraction of what you'd need to record a full band with $2,000 to mimic the basic qualities of a good recording. If I were you, I would rehearse the tracks like hell and then buy a few days' time at a professional studio...I've done both, and the latter has been my preference...given budget constraints. I guess it depends on hi-fi preferences...