AudioMasters

If you've read the book "The Voice Actor's Guide to Home Recording" by Harlan Hogan and Jeffrey P. Fisher then you've read about this idea.  I had some spare acoustic foam lying around so I thought I would build it this past weekend:

(http://www.brianhartproductions.com/misc/thebox.jpg)

If you have power tools it would be easy enough to cut your own panels, but the Lowe's down the street sells pre cut 2 x 2 plywood so I just bought some of that.  I've secured it with duck tape, but you could use hinges I suppose.  The book goes into more detail than I will here, but the gist of it you can see in the picture.  2 x 2 panels, foam attached to that.  The book suggested laying a towel down on the table, but the foam pictured worked better for me.

Here's a clip I recorded in it so you can hear the sound.  Mind you the audio is cheesy.  It was for a friend of mine who does a morning show down in the Caymans.

Sample (http://www.brianhartproductions.com/misc/StyleFM-fakie.mp3)

Conclusions:  I've recorded a few things in it.  In an empty room it does a good job killing a lot of , but not all of the reflections.
I moved it to a bedroom (with the bed, drapes, an upholstered chair) and it did a great job.  In the empty room, if I drape a blanket (the ugly yellow one in the picture) over the box and me then it takes care of what little reflection was left.

I don't think I would use this as a primary method for recording, and of course it does nothing for the concept of "sound proofing," but overall I like it.  I can definitely see taking it along with my laptop, mic, and firebox next time I go on vacation so I can still record.

lol thats ghetto right there

Looks like an interesting idea Hart.  As long as it's working for you, that's what matters.  It kinda reminds me of the Randall guitar isolation box.  Or something from the Wizard of Oz....  (pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!).   :D

Every time I go to Home Depot I see these sitting out front:
(http://www.rubbermaid.com/rubbermaid/images/product/3746-d-platinum-evergreen-1_sm.jpg)

I never realised that Rubbermaid (http://www.rubbermaid.com/rubbermaid/images/product/3746-d-platinum-evergreen-1_sm.jpg) makes isolation booths!

Just kidding of course.  Not trying to make fun of anybody....I've just been waiting for the perfect time to reveal this Rubbermaid secret!

I thought so too, but I had to try it knowing it wouldn't work.  It does, and quite well I might add, for producing a "dead" area for your mic from an absorbtion standpoint.

No, it doesn't replace a proper recording area but in my mind beats the heck out of recording in the closet of the condo next time we are on vacation.

Somewhere, I ran across a "build" diary on the internet of somebody that used a rubbermade container to build a vocal booth.  Don't recall where though.  

Necessity is the mother of invention.

how about this???
(http://img35.imageshack.us/img35/2874/6249553619309183708cl.jpg)

An inside look:
(http://img380.imageshack.us/img380/6520/insideboothmic5fi.jpg)

Well, I don't know about the booth, but the sound from that monitor is going to be incredibly inaccurate as a result of its positioning...

 :lol:  :twisted:

But the booth does look nice.

The Problem:
When working from the road, recording voiceovers becomes extremely difficult due to environment issues like room noise, sound reflection from untreated walls, etc.  The need for a portable voiceover booth is critical, so that high quality voiceover recording can continue while traveling.

The Solution?

Check out the "Stone-Booth In A Bag"!

http://www.soundsuckers.com/current.htm#current

Didn't Les Paul crack all this for free about 60 years ago?

No wonder he didn't know how high the moon was.

These folks have a serious client list!

Check out this mobile Reflection  filter (http://www.frontendaudio.com/ProductDetails.asp?ProductCode=8090). Does anyone know if it is any good? I'm looking for a portable booth to kill as much background noise as possible. Anyone know any good products?

I don't think one of these things is going to do too much for overall background noise reduction - more useful to kill reflection of the voice from hard walls, etc.

I think I'd agree with Graeme's assessment of its capabilities. To reduce  background noise significantly, you need a completely isolated booth. It really doesn't take much of a hole to let a lot of sound in. If you are lucky, it will improve the S/N ratio by a few dB, mainly because of the reduction of pickup from the rear of the mic, but you could achieve the same result rather more cheaply just by using a very directional mic, I would have thought.

If you read the manufacturers blurb, it makes no claims whatsoever about increasing isolation/reducing background noise.  The purpose is 100% to do with reducing room ambience.

I've had a chance to try the SE "Relexion Filter" and actually it does work.  It's not the same as an acoustically treated studio but it does give a much drier sound in an untreated room.

As Graeme and SteveR have surmised though...it does little or nothing about sound proofing.

An aside:  as often happens, many people seem to confuse the concepts of isolation (sound proofing) and acoustic treatment.  They are very different.  All the Sonex foam in the world stuck to your wall won't eliminate outside noise...and a sound proof room can be a concrete rectangle that sounds awful but has no outside sound at all.

Bob

Or, even cheaper, a couple of heavy blankets :) .

Interesting idea - wrapping your celebs up in blankets to record them! I wonder what they'd say? And would it be usable for ringtones???

Haha!  I've been wrapping a singer guitar player with acoustic foam, in a bedroom,  and the results are great!  The shell of 2 inch foam has a five to six foot diameter.  Like Mork's Egg only bigger.  :P  It reduces flutter and ring immensely, and the sound is almost totally dry, and it sets up and breaks down with a few modified boom stands.

Lots of things work well.  I just read a post on another board about a voice artist who was on vacation last week.  Needed to record a spot while Ernesto was passing over.  So he took the blankets and comforter off the beds in the condo and hung them up in the closet.  Worked like a charm for him.

I've been building something a bit more substantial than my "portable" booth:

(http://www.brianhartproductions.com/booth/Front-1.jpg)

It works well for my needs as it eliminates the standard household noises and the neighbor's lawnmower but it would not be suitable if you had a band playing outside the door.

B

looks nice...where can i find the plans for something like this?

You could do a lot worse than buy a copy of F. Alton Everest's "Sound Studio Construction ON A BUDGET" (their caps not mine!) ISBN 0-07-021382-8 and have a look at page 52. You could easily waste rather more in unneccessary materials than the $25-30 this will cost you, and there's a lot of other useful information in there as well.

A search reveals very little else in the way of ready-made plans, certainly not any that would give you the all-important construction details. It's amazingly easy to end up with two seemingly identical booths whose performance is radically different - and this is simply down to attention to detail. At present, F. Alton Everest is looking like an increasingly good bet!

Well, I built it from scratch so really I have no idea.  I read everything I could get my hands on about isolation and acoustics before I built it.  The walls work very well but the door isn't up to snuff yet.  Still working on good seals and a threshold.

I've got a sort of build diary here (http://www.homerecording.org/bbs/showthread.php?t=212554) if you'd like to see it in more detail.

Has anyone in the UK tried anything from

http://www.acoustic-foam.co.uk/

It all seems remarkably cheap.

No I haven't, but I wouldn't have said it was that cheap either, considering what you are getting - the SudioSpares stuff appears to be cheaper. I do believe their absorption figures, though - they are about right for that sort of foam. In other words, you need one hell of a depth of it before you get any bass absorption at all.

Steve, the Studiospares stuff that looked vaguely comparable - vocal booth tiles - seemed to be about 6 to 10 times the price, but maybe I've misread the adverts.

I do appreciate the need for bass absorption in real studios. I just happened on these when thinking about how to treat a tiny editing area, with plain plastered walls,  that someone wants to put a mic in.

Luckily, it's not my problem this time. I was just thinking about it.

Maybe I have. But at the very least, their adverts are confusing...

20 off 425 x 425 x 75mm Acoustic Foam Profiled Wedge Tiles (AFW75)

tiles are sold in packs of 30

3.61 square metres (38.58 square feet) per pack

Sound dampening for small to medium size areas like vocal sound booths help prevent echo and improve acoustics and give a more pure sound response. This tile is also ideal for home recording studio applications, home cinemas rehearsal rooms etc.

tile size 425mm x 425 X 75mm
or 16.73 x 16.73 X 3 inches
(coverage 1.9sq ft per tile)[/list:u]
So, are they selling 20 or 30? Or is this 30 packs of 20? What it looks like is that the 'packs of 30' line should read 'packs of 20'. That would at least give 20 x 0.18 sq m = 3.61sq m.

Now, I can't find a price for this, which is the equivalent of StudioSpares Econotile (except smaller tile sizes). All I can find is the 4 special offers. I'd guess that if you asked about the others, they'd cost more. Even their special offers only appear to be at about 1/4 to 1/6 the price. Their trading style in terms of information available seems pretty poor, I'd say.

Yes, I agree the whole thing looks confusing. I was looking at the AFW45, being the cheapskate that I am. That seems to say 30 as the quantity everywhere.

Anyway, I'd still be interested if anyone has actually used these.

Their 'quoted delighted user' seems to no longer have a website (unless I've got that wrong too).

Hi

sorry to mislead anyone the 75mm tiles are 20 per box and the 45mm tiles are 30 per box. typing error on the website changed it now

we have had more extensive tests done on our tiles
the 45mm and 100mm o far plus all the bass traps

tile results can be seen here

http://www.acoustic-foam.co.uk/nrc.html

we are a large foam company with a turnover of over 10 million
the acoustic foam range is a small sideline we do and sell via ebay to the general public,

we do this not to involve the running of the company which will only deal with existing contract customers

to see feedback on our acoustic foam products
please see our ebay shop

http://stores.ebay.co.uk/Comfortex-Foam

please dont think we use any old foam for these tiles it is an approved acoustic foam from one of the worlds biggest specialist foam manufacturers

if we seem cheap its because we sell direct as a manufacturer and dont spend anything on promotion or advertising , apart from a few grand we have just spent on testing

full test results online now
for tiles and bass traps

http://www.acoustic-foam.co.uk/testresults.pdf

cheers
mike

Thanks for clarifying that, Mike. I'm sending you a PM...

thanks steve.  i'll check this out.