Sound Dampening a 2000 Square Foot Room

[Ty Ford]

Hello Joseph and welcome to the Cow Audio Forum.

As it turns out, I did a job last year here in Baltimore at the Exelon HQ that sounds right up your alley.

Too large to upload here. So here it is on YouTube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uWkG6VVfDJA

Regards,

Ty Ford
Cow Audio Forum Leader

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[Joseph Wilkins]

Ty

This is AWESOME! Exactly what I was looking for.

A few questions:

1) Can you explain the different types of foam you used and why?

2) Where did you buy all that foam?

3) My studio will have four walls… one will be a green screen like yours and one and a half of them will be seamless corner white cove cyclorama, so while the other walls and the ceiling will be covered in foam, I was thinking of a thick theater curtain on a track that can be pulled over either the white or the green (whichever is not in use). Do you think this will work? Any thoughts on material I should use?

Thanks again

[Ty Ford]

Joseph,

All materials were purchased from B&H. I have an arrangement with B&H, plus they offer good prices and quick delivery. Here are my notes.

1. & 2. The Auralex ProPanel Acoustical Panels are the large panels for the lower four feet of the room.

They make them as large as 2” x 4’ x 8’. Two of those would cover the long wall, or we could use three 2” x 4’ x 4’ to have some symmetry with the opposing wall.

Three 2” x 4’ x 4’ would cover the wall with the door. (I need to check to make sure they make 2” x 4’ x 4’, but it seems they do.)

One 2” x 2’ x 4’ panel would cover the lower part of the 35” wide door, without any fancy cutting.

These panels would be attached to the walls using Auralex Impaling Clips.

Stacked above the ProPanels will be the Auralex Studio Foam Wedge panels are 4” x 2’ x 4’. The 4” thickness give a good .80 NRC rating. That’s what I’m using in my studio. We’ll need 8 for the long wall and 6 for the shorter wall with the door.

For the remaining wall space above 8’, I think we can get by with 1” or 2” x 2’ x 4’ foam panels glued to the walls. We could probably glue panels to the ceiling, but please ask your facility crew how they would like to attach these panels to the ceiling.

The movable gobos we spoke about are available as Auralex ProMAX V2 Acoustic Panels with Floor Stands. They are 4” x 2’ x 4’. I would feel more comfortable with two of these on each side. We could order four additional white 2’ x 4’ foam panels to achieve your light bounce effect and attach these panels to one side of each of the panels

All panels will be ordered in BLACK or the darkest gray possible.

Auralex makes a variety of adhesive solutions for the foam panels. I suggest asking your facility crew what they think would work best for wall mounting and for ceiling mounting. Please also ask them to check any of these materials out for any code problems before we order. Their experience here is invaluable.

Please include three 2” x 4’ x 4’ hard panels to cover the lower part of the wall opposite the green screen and nine 4” x 2’ x 4’ panels to a height of 10’.

3. Yes a curtain and track will work. Another fix is to use silks hung from the ceiling to diffuse light from large fixtures on ceiling grids. The silks take more sting off the audio because the sound has to pass through them twice; once on the way to the ceiling and once on the way back to an open mic.

If transparency is not needed, suspended sheets of muslin cloth does an even better job of damping the sound. You can get it in black, white, grey, green, etc. I use a green muslin backdrop in my own little studio and find that I can key pretty well with FCP X as long as I don’t throw shadows on the fabric. I use 4′ long LED lighting fixtures hung vertically on regular old lighting stands. I position one on each side of the room behind the talent and spill the light as evenly as I can on the green screen. Those 4′ long LEDs throw a very even light on the green muslin.

Below is a sample from my place using the LED lights and green muslin curtain. It has wrinkles that I have never ironed out and don’t seem to be a problem. The mic was a Schoeps CMC641 on a boom, just out of frame.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iEQ1USzZjUU

Oh, and BTW, it’s DAMPING, not DAMPENING, unless you ‘re gonna get something wet.

Regards,

Ty Ford
Cow Audio Forum Leader

Want better production audio?: Ty Ford\’s Audio Bootcamp Field Guide
Ty Ford Blog: Ty Ford\’s Blog

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[Joseph Wilkins]

Ty… one more question.

Many forums and experts say you only need 65% coverage on the walls.

I’ve been told too much foam can make audio sound worse.

What is your reason for going with 100% coverage and how do I decide how much to go with ?

thanks!

[Ty Ford]

Hello Joseph,

The bottom course is not foam.

The two middle courses are 4″ foam.

The upper courses and ceiling are 1″ foam.

As you get farther away from the axes of the voice energy, you need less. I’ve been in studios that use sprayed on cellulose that ring like a bell due to cement floors and the lack of absorption. I didn’t want that to happen at Exelon, but I knew I didn’t need so much that far away from the intended spoken word sources.

Regards,

Ty Ford
Cow Audio Forum Leader

Want better production audio?: Ty Ford\’s Audio Bootcamp Field Guide
Ty Ford Blog: Ty Ford\’s Blog

[Joseph Wilkins]

Thanks for the quick reply… so what are the lower courses made of?

My space is pretty darn huge.

Here is a video I shot for a curtain manufacturer.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/v1oh15i2jzmrye2/IMG_6503.MOV?dl=0

The plan right now is to hang heavy theater curtains on the three walls where my stages will be, then cover the ceilings and back wall with these foam tiles:

https://www.amazon.com/FoamEngineering-Acoustic-Panels-Studio-Soundproofing/dp/B07HHWGNB1/ref=sr_1_2?keywords=96+foam+accoustic+panels&qid=1561589433&s=lawn-garden&sr=8-2

This is NOT an audio recording studio, I just need to stop the echo.

Budgets are already going over so I know this isn’t the best way, but do you think this will get me decent sound dampening?

Thanks again!

[Ty Ford]

Hello Joseph,

Thanks for sharing the video. Are you going to have hard cyc walls or fabric cyc walls? If hard, then most bets are off for the acoustics.

What will you have on the floor?

Unless you treat it, it will be a major source of reflection.

I don’t know how you’re planning to handle overhead lighting, but a system of 20′ x 20′ or even 10′ x 10′ silks positioned over the talent and mics. will help breakup the slap.

Lovely space!

PS: the correct word is damping, not dampening. ☺ 87.46% of people say dampening, but it’s (hopefully) not about moisture. ☺

Regards,

Ty Ford
Cow Audio Forum Leader

Want better production audio?: Ty Ford\’s Audio Bootcamp Field Guide
Ty Ford Blog: Ty Ford\’s Blog