Blue Flux Studio Hints, tips and tricks on studio design and equipment use by Tom of Blue Flux.

Groundhog Studio - Page 2

Cables & Connectors

Installing cables is probably one of the most crucial operations you'll face when building a studio. All your good musical work will have to pulse through these copper arteries, and having to track down and repair faulty cabling later is a royal pain.  I use unbalanced cables for all but the microphone connections, i.e. one "hot" wire and one shield/ground wire per cable. The pros & cons of unbalanced vs balanced have been discussed extensively elsewhere, hence for further reference check out various forums at the ever-helpful Sound On Sound site.

Optimistically, I had salvaged the entire cable loom from my previous studio. And as luck would have it, the crucial dimensions of Groundhog Studio were about the same as the previous ones. Phew! The opportunity of weeding out some ageing cables as well as re-arranging some patchbay assignments wasn't missed, though. A word on patch bays - there are bays with jack connectors at the front AND rear, or those with hardwired (ie. soldered) sockets at the front only. Of the two, I infinitely prefer the latter, despite the flexibility the former brings. Whatever you do, dust / grime / spider eggs will always find its way into the jack sockets, and twice as many sockets (ie. front and rear) will double the potential for faulty connections. Also, connections at the rear are harder to clean. Believe me, a good hardwired connection, in the midst of all the jack connections one is forced to live with, is a full-frontal blessing. I'd much rather take the whole patchbay down to re-solder connections for new equipment.  Also, semi-balanced connections (ie. those where you rely on a signal path that is broken/closed when plugging in/unplugging an other jack plug, like an insert point) are not for the faint-hearted. If the connection is not frequently in use, dirt deposited over months will guarantee a poor, crackly contact when that socket is eventually pushed into service. I had some semi-balanced connections in my previous studio, and ended up having to make short patch leads to bridge them for the above reasons. If in doubt - keep it simple. And while on the subject of connections - the only genuinely useful tool I have found to maintain or re-establish good connections between plugs and sockets is a contact spray called DEOXit D5 made by Caig. It's not cheap, but provided you spray some on a piece of cloth or Q-tip and wipe the contacts (as opposed to just spraying it indiscriminately straight from the can) it should last a jolly long time. Even then, I found that contacts will start to go wonky again after about 2 to 3 months - time to re-apply the D5. Do not, repeat DO NOT use common-and-garden contact spray from Maplins etc. - it does more harm than good. Also, do not apply D5 to plastic film moving contacts, as found in faders, pots etc. Caig do a special spray for those.

Patchbay with cable loom only

Trunking installed

The pictures above show cable looms before and after trunking. Needless to say, one should always install larger trunking than presently required, since more cable is bound to join the existing band in years to come. I run MIDI cables quite happily alongside audio, but have separate trunking for mains cable, at least 10 cm away from audio/MIDI runs. If the two need to cross this should be at right angles to avoid induced mains hum. Finally, two tips I find useful for a tidier appearance. Hand-written labels on patchbays/mixer channels etc. are ok, but fade after a while. A label printer does a far superior job, doesn't cost much, and lends a more professional appearance to your studio. Money well spent, then. Secondly, one of many solutions for those awkward jobs of securing cables beneath a desk, shelf, or any other wooden item: wrap a cable tie around the cable(s), trim back the tag to about an inch long, then whack a staple through (or across) the tag into the wood. Nothing feels better than slamming that staple home whilst shouting at the unruly bunch of cables, "stay, you bas*ards!". essential labeller Stay!

Equipment Placement Where to place your equipment and connection points is of course highly subjective, and depends amongst other things on how you're used to working, and what instruments you record. One factor will be common to all recording musicians, though - ergonomics. I'm sure I'm not the only studio owner who has woken up with a sore back/neck/wrist on many a (late) mornings. Although it should be perfectly obvious where to position one's equipment, practical and spatial constraints tend to get in the way. Keyboards and mixing desks usually find a comfortable position by themselves, perhaps because they are the main items in most studios and hence got top priority during the planning stages. For me, effect processors have been the main culprits in the past. They have the uncanny tendency to multiply (ok ok - not quite so much in these plug-in enhanced days - ED), and spread out horizontally, or in my case vertically, along the studio walls. As a guitarist by choice, I used to find myself with guitar on lap, bending down to almost mains socket level (guitar crushing rib case in the process) to tweak the hobbit-sized buttons of some effects unit near the bottom of my FX trolley. Only to find that I wasn't able to hear the adjustments at all after sitting up due to the gallons of blood draining from my head (get a smaller head then - ED, grinning mischievously). Not to mention the state of my back the following day... Lesson learned. The brief for Groundhog Studio was to have the most commonly used effects units at eye level, and connection points to the start of the most frequently used processing chains within easy reach.  As can be seen in the photos below, this meant building a mini rack above the central shelf, to house my Alesis and Digitech multi FX unit (with one slot spare for future expansion [now filled by MPX550]). It also meant building a customized 45 degree mounting base for the black sheep of the processor family, the Line 6 Pod. Much as I love its sounds, this one had been bamboozling me for months regarding placement, because of its awkward shape. Yes, the Pro version is rack mountable, but I find the price penalty prohibitive. As can be seen below, the wooden base has holes to admit audio and power cables, and retains the Pod with two dowelling pins that fit into the holes in its back.

On shelf: mini rack for multi FX units (right) and base for Line 6 Pod

Beneath main desk: trolley for dynamic processors and less commonly used FXs (right), and satellite bay  with colour-coded connection points for common input chains.

Final Verdict Groundhog Studio took 2 months to complete, including decorating and carpeting. Being more spacious than previous studios I've owned has helped to repell my "Broom Cupboard Manager" status so readily awarded by visiting friends in tha past. But it's Groundhog's improved ergonomics, more than size, that have made recording there a real pleasure, aided by the reassuring level of soundproofing afforded by its bomb-proof structure that allows for hassle-free late-night sessions. This said, I'd stress that flexibility must remain the prime virtue of any recording facility, as brought home to me when upgrading to DAW recording. Wise though they may be, even studio owners cannot foretell times to come. So any measures employed from the outset to ease future upgrades, or even strategy U-turns, will be worth their weight in gold when the time comes. Accessible wiring, cable trunking with room to spare, patchbay slot redundancy and, if at all possible, loads and loads of free space on shelves and worktops will help to make the idea of future changes less daunting, perhaps even appealing. One other thing: cocksure as one might be at the time of remembering layouts, cable routing and one's own rationale for vaious key decisions, rest assured that 12 months down the line those memories will have all but oozed into the great void beyond planet Buffer-Full. So, unless you really have had silicon implants of the electronic kind: take notes, and better still, draw (and keep updated) a schematic of your audio and Midi layout. I've lost count of how often this has already saved me hours of crawling into dark spaces with a penlight clasped between gnashing teeth. Finally, remember that any fool can be uncomfortable. If, even after the most meticulous spell of planning, some features just don't seem to cut it, then there's no point grinning and bearing it. Studios are probably as close to a custom-made complex working enevironment as private individuals are likely to own. So if something isn't right, it needs fixing, before paradise is lost for want of a gold-plated jack socket or a lowered shelf.

Keyboard rack with sampler and synths

Space at last for 5 years' SOS mags

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