Recording Studio Thesis

A STUDY OF RECORDING STUDIO PROJECT WORK SUBMITTED FOR THE PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF

COMMERCIAL INTERIOR SPACE DESIGN

BY ROHIT A.DIGRA ENR NO: 14

Dr. BALIRAM HIRAY COLLEGE OF ARCHITECTURE BANDRA (EAST) MUMBAI - 400051.

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Dr. BALIRAM HIRAY COLLEGE OF ARCHITECTURE SUBMISSION OF PROJECT WORK

1) NAME OF THE CANDIDATE

: ROHIT A.DIGRA

2) YEAR OF STUDY

: 2011 - 2016

3) TITLE OF THE PROJECT WORK

: RECORDING STUDIO

4) DATE OF SUBMISSION

: 28th APRIL 2015

5) NAME OF THE GUIDE

: AR.ONKAR KULKARNI

6) ADDRESS OF THE STUDENT

: D/32,BHUVANGIRI C.H.S., ASHOKVAN, BORIVALI (E) MUMBAI – 400 066

Details given above are true to the best of my knowledge.

Signature of student

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DECLARATION

I, ROHIT A.DIGRA hereby declare that this project on “RECORDING STUDIO” is a record of first hand project work done by me under the supervision of AR.ONKAR KULKARNI and that it has not found the basis for any degree, diploma, associate ship, or other titles.

Place: Mumbai

Signature of the Student

Date: 25/04/2015

Signature of the Moderator

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DR. BALIRAM HIRAY COLLEGE OF ARCHITECTURE CERTIFICATE This is to certify that the RECORDING STUDIO work done by ROHIT A.DIGRA, ENR NO: 14 in partial fulfillment of Commercial Interior Space Design at Dr. BALIRAM HIRAY COLLEGE OF ARCHITECTURE, bandra east Mumbai - 4000051, during the year 2014 - 2015.

Date: 25/04/2015

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT First I would like to thank God for guiding me to a part of this Institute and giving me inspiration for selecting this topic and for being a part of it. In these four important years of study at Dr. BALIRAM HIRAY COLLEGE OF ARCHITECTURE, many are the people to whom I am thankful. I own a deep sense of gratitude to my parents for giving me the golden opportunity to study here.

I take the profound privilege for expressing my deep gratitude to my professors and moderator, Prof. AR.ONKAR KULKARNI Who extended all the combined co- operation and guidance selflessly without which my study was not possible It is his tolerance and supervision that has helped me throughout my work of creative thinking.

I also thank our Principal Prof.AR.PRANAV BHATT SIR for being the great moral support for this course of five years. I take the opportunity to thank librarian Mrs.shulba Miss for this making the books available and above all the good friendship.

I would extend my thanks to my family and friends who had been constant source of encouragement throughout the year.

Thanking you and all………

Date: 25/04/2015

ROHIT A.DIGRA.

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INDEX SYNOPSIS 1

INTRODUCTION

2 NEED FOR THE STUDY 3 STATEMENT OF PROBLEM 4 OBJECTIVE OF STUDY 5 HYPOTHESIS 6 SCOPE AND LIMITATIONS 7 METHODS AND TECHNIQUES 8 CHAPTER SCHAME 9 CONCLUSION 10 REFERENCE

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CHAPTER - 1

1.1 DESIGN AND EQUIPMENT 1.2 DIGITAL AUDIO WORKSTATIONS 1.3 PROJECT STUDIOS 1.4 ISOLATION BOOTH 1.5 RADIO STUDIOS 1.6 ACOUSTIC TRANSMISSION 1.7 SOUNDPROOFING AND ACOUSTIC MATERAILS 1.8 REAMPING 1.9 ROOM ACOUSTICS 2.0 SOUND RECORDING AND REPRODUCTION 2.1 HISTORY OF SOUND RECORDING 2.2 REFLECTION 2.3 SOUND PROOFING

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CHAPTER: II 1.16 EMSQUARE STUDIO GOREGAON (WEST) 1.17 SRS SUDIO ANDHERI (WEST) 1.18 NET CASE STUDY CHAPTER: III

DESIGN STRATEGY 2.1 LOCATION 2.2 CONCEPT 2.3 REQUIREMENT 2.4 PLAN MEASUREMENT 2.5 VIEW

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RECORDING STUDIO SYNOPSIS 1. INTRODUCTION A Recording studio is a facility for sound recording and mixing. Ideally both the recording and monitoring spaces are specially designed by an acoustician to achieve optimum acoustic properties. Recording studios may be used by record musicians, voice over artists for advertisements or dialogue replacement in film, television or animation, Fole, or to record their accompanying musical soundtracks. The typical recording studio consists of a room called the "studio" or "live room", where instrumentalists and vocalists perform; and the "control room", where sound engineers operate professional audio for analogue or digital recording to route and manipulate the sound. Often, there will be smaller rooms called "isolation booths" present to accommodate loud instruments such as drums or electric guitar, to keep these sounds from being audible to the microphones that are capturing the sounds from other instruments, or to provide "drier" rooms for recording vocals or quieter acoustic instruments.

A recording studio is a facility for sound recording and mixing. Ideally both the recording and monitoring spaces are specially designed by an acoustician to achieve optimum acoustic properties Recording studios may be used by record musicians, voice over artists for advertisements or dialogue replacement in film, television or animation, foley, or to record their accompanying musical soundtracks. The typical recording studio consists of a room called the "studio" or "live room", where instrumentalists and vocalists perform; and the "control room", where sound engineers operate professional audio for analogue or digital recording to route and manipulate the sound. Often, there will be smaller rooms called "isolation booths" present to accommodate loud instruments such as drums or electric guitar, to keep these sounds from being audible to

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the microphones that are capturing the sounds from other instruments, or to provide "drier" rooms for recording vocals or quieter acoustic instruments.

2. NEED FOR THE STUDY The world of today is growing fast India is no exception in the studio is one of the most booming and fastest growing sector in the India as directly connected with the bollywood industry. Its growth is being accelerated and fuelled by many development taking place in the sector worldwide. Digital revolution, the growing popularity of a specialized recording studio with full digital equipment services channels with the tremendous growth and development have helped in opening new doors for human resources in the sound and Bollywood sector .In terms of employment ,the animations and the special effects sector of this industry has become a major attraction for the job seekers .

Beings a professional of sound and a skill based industry, specialized courses for the same are also gaining popularity in college and attracting fresh talent. Looking at the bright prospects of Asia becoming the world leader in the industry. The Indian government has also taken some steps to boost growth of the recording studio and Entertainment sector.

3. STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM While millions of people listen music each day, many of us aren’t quite sure how the technology works. Recording studio has been around for many decades and although some of the technology components have changed over the years, the way in which recording studio work is still pretty much the same.

Location: - Location is an important issue. The preferred location will depend, in the first instance, on the intended market for the recording studio. For example, many studios are located for easy access by local clients. Some studios are located in the country for a quieter working ambience, or higher pretentiousness factor. Such a studio would normally be residential.

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Noise:- Various people wanting to build a studio in a residential neighborhood have discovered that their prospective future neighbors will be most alarmed at the prospect of having a studio near them, both because they expect loud music and the coming and going of lots of people.

Secondly, it is generally not a good idea to build a studio under the flight path, under a railway siding or next to an elevated motorway, though if funds are unlimited it can indeed be done.

Parking facilities: - Vehicle parking is another significant issue. You may end up with ten vehicles for each 4-piece band you deal with. Many musicians turn up in trucks. Not so very long ago, a large and well-funded studio complex in Central London closed down after six months trading, largely because it was situated in Piccadilly and there was nowhere for anyone to park .

Expensive and silly!

Planning or development permissions: - Studios usually require local planning/zoning permission, and specific permissions may be granted only on various conditions. You would be well advised to ensure you find out what these may before handing over any money for the premises. You'll also have to comply with Fire and Sanitary regulations, dependent on the size of the intended studio and the numbers of people usually there.

4. OBJECTIVE OF THE STUDY The primary objective of the study are to find out sound professional appreciation about recording studio 

To have an overall understanding of the organization and various departmental activities.

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To identify the expectations and needs of the sound professional about their work.

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To identify new segments that can be included in recording studio apart from conventional sound recording with a quality.

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To know about different attributes that makes people love to work easily.

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To collect opinion about the existing recording studio and study them.

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To suggest measures to provide more satisfaction to existing sound professional and the new comer’s in the sound industry.

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5. HYPOTHESIS 1. Today there is increasing awareness among people due globalization.

2. In metropolitan city like Mumbai people keep on working 24 x 7, they do not have time for their needs, they demand things and wishes to get with a couple of hours or days, as per requirements.

3. Recording studios should be provided to record sounds and music to provide a sort of entertainment to the busy people.

4. Recording studios must be designed in such way that there is no disturbance caused from and due to the outside world i.e. they should be acoustically protected.

5. They can be designed to such an an imaginably futuristic approach.

6. SCOPE AND LIMITATIONS

Having small space interior not means limit one`s creation. We can create relief space with the existing limitation. Consider the following small spaces tips to maximize the perception of space: Expand the view Space without wall divider is one way can overcome this problem. Reduce unnecessary walls to create more open, flowing spaces. Consider creating partial wall or pass through areas as a way to create more openness in the floor plan.

Unify the flooring Use one style of flooring through all adjoining room on the same floor of the space.

These create a greater sense of continuity and connectedness.

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Coordinate the color scheme Paint the areas of the space that seamlessly flow into each other a common color scheme.

Usually connected rooms will feel larger if they have a common color scheme tying together. It costs relatively little compare to the result you can achieve with it.

Install recessed lighting It create a greater sense of height in areas with lower than usually ceilings. The pools of lights they create will add warmth and sophistication to your design skim.

Utilized multifunctional furniture Versatile furniture pieces can be used as extra seating and much needed extra storage at the same time. A storage ottoman is a great example of it. It could do triple duty as a coffee table, storage and extra seating etc.

7. METHODS AND TECHNIQUES There are various way or methods of studying things. A method adopted method of data collection, research studies, interviews, using internet, and referring are adopted as methods of study. As there is no end to knowledge, there is no to research work too, Researching is the most important work need to be done. Studying a gift shop with methods of research and research studies lead to completion

Also other methods such as interview, data collection through internet, books help a lot. 

Case study: Doing case studies in various studios and understanding the space design there gives a lot of knowledge about the future changes that can be made in a Recording Studios.

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Books / magazine: Reading books and magazine can help and as understand the subject in a better way and all help. Us more about the subject.

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Internet: internet can be a huge source of information which can provided both pictures and data about the subject taken for study.

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Interview: Interview with owners and others give important information.

8. CHAPTER SCHEME The entire study is divided into following chapters. A brief overview of each chapter is given below.

Chapter: 1 This chapter introduce about the study of recording studios. It is includes the historical back ground of Sound Recording industry and information about the Sound Recording industry in India.

Chapter: 2 Introduction about the recording studio. Different types of recording studio and detail study about the studios located in the floors and also the basics features and size of the recording studios and the design proper utilization of space.

Chapter: 3 In 2nd chapter discuss about the observation study which is based on live case study of recording studio, different type of recording studio and net case study also.

Chapter: 4 Chapter four includes the site report, existing plot, climate condition and selection criteria about the located place and all type of plot study. And include the design strategy which is based on brief detailing of concept, conceptual site plan, furniture plan, services such as lighting, plumbing, fire station etc., sections, furniture details, 3-d view etc. this all type which are based on recording studio.

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9. CONCLUSION It is clear music is a great means of entertainment. Specialized Recorded sounds are also equally gaining popularity. Even Recording Studios that are focused on specific field of music are also facing tough competition. Sound Recording poses strong challenge in terms of presentation skill, Music coverage and popularity of records. In preview of commercial position music is the bread and butter for all private owned channels. Evidently this points to importance of extensive research in to the socio-political changes that the listeners are interested to listen and learn. Every Recording Studio has to be neutral in their position to gain popularity and attract more listeners.

10. REFERANCE  Google Search  Scribd.com  Wikipedia  World Media Center  Architecturedesign.com  CNNChannel.com  Inside outside magazine

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CHAPTER - 1

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1.1 HISTORICAL BACK GROUND

A recording studio is an assemblage of equipment, spaces and persons such that a performance in sound may be created and recorded onto a medium for later reproduction. The word studio has two distinct uses in this field, as in some others: first there's the approximate sense of 'somewhere where work and study is done', hence recording 'studio' and secondly, there's the exact sense of 'the studio room', which traditionally was where the instruments were played. The other essential space in the traditional studio is the 'control room', where the controls are operated.

1890s to 1930s

In the era of acoustical recordings prior to the introduction of microphones, electrical recording and amplification, the earliest recording studios were very basic facilities, being essentially soundproof rooms that isolated the performers from outside noise. During this era it was not uncommon for recordings to be made in any available location, such as a local ballroom, using portable acoustic recording equipment.

In this period, master recordings were made using a direct-to-disc cutting process. Performers were typically grouped around a large acoustic. The acoustic energy from the voices and/or instruments was channeled through the horn's diaphragm to a mechanical cutting lathe located in 17

the next room, which inscribed the signal as a modulated groove directly onto the surface of the master cylinder or disc.

Following the invention and commercial introduction of the microphone, the electronic amplifier, the mixing desk and the loudspeaker, the recording industry gradually converted to electric recording, and by 1925 this technology had replaced mechanical acoustic recording methods for such major labels as RCA Victor and Columbia, and by 1933 acoustic recording was completely disused.

1940s to 1970s

Electrical recording was common by the early 1930s, and mastering lathes were now electrically powered, but master recordings still had to be cut direct-to-disc. In line with the prevailing musical trends, studios in this period were primarily designed for the live recording of symphony orchestras and other large instrumental ensembles. Engineers soon found that large, reverberant spaces like concert halls created a vibrant acoustic signature that greatly enhanced the sound of the recording, and in this period large, acoustically "live" halls were favored, rather than the acoustically "dead" booths and studio rooms that became common after the 1960s.

Because of the limits of the recording technology, studios of the mid-20th century were designed around the concept of grouping musicians and singers, rather than separating them, and placing the performers and the microphones strategically to capture the complex acoustic and harmonic

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interplay that emerged during the performance. Modern sound stages still sometimes use this approach for large film scoring projects today.

Because of their superb acoustics, many of the larger studios were converted churches. Examples include George Martin's AIR Studiosin London, the famed Columbia Records 30th Street Studio in New York City and the equally famous Decca Records Pythian Temple studio in New York which was also a large converted church that featured a high, domed ceiling in the center of the hall.

Facilities like the Columbia Records 30th Street Studio in New York and EMI's Abbey Road Studio in London were renowned for their 'trademark' sound—which was) easily identifiable by audio professionals—and for the skill of their staff engineers.

In New York City, Columbia Records had some of the most highly respected sound recording studios, including the Columbia 30th Street Studio at 207 East 30th Street, the CBS Studio Building at 49 East 52nd Street, Liederkranz Hall at 111 East 58th Street between Park and Lexington Avenues , The Liederkranz Club and Society, and one of their earliest recording studios, "Studio A" at 799 Seventh Avenue.

Electric recording studios in the mid-20th century often lacked isolation booths, baffles, and sometimes even speakers, and it was not until the 1960s, with the introduction of the highfidelity headphones that it became common practice for performers to use headsets to monitor their performance during recording and listen to playbacks.

It was difficult to isolate all the performers—a major reason that this practice was not used was simply because recordings were usually made as live ensemble 'takes' and all the performers needed to be able to see each other and the ensemble leader while playing. The recording engineers who trained in this period learned to take advantage of the complex acoustic effects that could be created through "leakage" between different microphones and groups of instruments, and these technicians became extremely skilled at capturing the unique acoustic properties of their studios and the musicians in performance.

The use of different kinds of microphones and their placement around the studio was a crucial part of the recording process, and particular brands of microphone were used by engineers for 19

their specific audio characteristics. The smooth-toned ribbon microphones developed by the RCA company in the 1930s were crucial to the 'crooning' style perfected by Bing Crosby, and the famous Neumann U47 condenser microphone was one of the most widely used from the 1950s. This model is still widely regarded by audio professionals as one of the best microphones of its type ever made.

Learning the correct placement of microphones was a major part of the training of young engineers, and many became extremely skilled in this craft. Well into the 1960s, in the classical field it was not uncommon for engineers to make high-quality orchestral recordings using only one or two microphones suspended above the orchestra.

In the 1960s, engineers began experimenting with placing microphones much closer to instruments than had previously been the norm. The distinctive rasping tone of the horn sections on the Beatles recordings "Good Morning Good Morning" and "Lady Madonna" were achieved by having the saxophone players position their instruments so that microphones were virtually inside the mouth of the horn.

The unique sonic characteristics of the major studios imparted a special character to many of the most famous popular recordings of the 1950s and 1960s, and the recording companies jealously guarded these facilities. According to sound historian David Simons, after Columbia took over the 30th Street Studios in the late 1940s and A&R manager Mitch Miller had tweaked it to perfection, Miller issued a standing order that the drapes and other fittings were not to be touched, and the cleaners had specific orders never to mop the bare wooden floor for fear it might alter the acoustic properties of the hall.

There were several other features of studios in this period that contributed to their unique "sonic signatures". As well as the inherent sound of the large recording rooms, many of the best studios incorporated specially-designed echo chambers, purpose-built rooms which were often built beneath the main studio.

These were typically long, low rectangular spaces constructed from hard, sound-reflective materials like concrete, fitted with a loudspeaker at one end and one or more microphones at the other. During a recording session, a signal from one or more of the microphones in the studio could be routed to the loudspeaker in the echo chamber; the sound from the speaker reverberated 20

through the chamber and the enhanced signal was picked up by the microphone at the other end.

This echo-enhanced signal—which was often used to 'sweeten' the sound of vocals—could then be blended in with the primary signal from the microphone in the studio and mixed into the track as the master recording was being made.

Special equipment was another notable feature of the "classic" recording studio. The biggest studios were owned and operated by large media companies like RCA, Columbia and EMI, who typically had their own electronics research and development divisions that designed and built custom-made recording equipment and mixing consoles for their studios.

Likewise, the smaller independent studios were often owned by skilled electronics engineers who designed and built their own desks and other equipment. A good example of this is the famous Gold Star Studios in Los Angeles, the site of many famous American pop recordings of the 1960s. Co-owner David S. Gold built the studio's main mixing desk and many additional pieces of equipment and he also designed the studio's unique trapezoidal echo chambers.

During the 1950s and 1960s the sound of pop recordings was further defined by the introduction of proprietary sound processing devices such as equalizers and compressors, which were manufactured by specialist electronics companies. One of the best known of these was the famous Pultec equalizer, which was used by almost all the major commercial studios of the time.

With the introduction of multi-track recording, it became possible to record instruments and singers separately and at different times on different tracks on tape, although it was not until the 1970s that the large recording companies began to adopt this practice widely, and throughout the 1960s many "pop" classics were still recorded live in a single take.

After the '60s, the emphasis shifted to isolation and sound-proofing, with treatments like echo and reverberation added separately during the mixing process, rather than being blended in during the recording. One regrettable outcome of this trend, which coincided with rising innercity property values, was that many of the largest studios were either demolished or redeveloped for other uses.

In the mid-20th century, recordings were analog, made on ¼-inch or ½-inch magnetic tape, with multi-track recording reaching 8 tracks in the 1950s, 16 in 1968, and 32 in the 1970s. The 21

commonest such tape is the 2-inch analog, capable of containing up to 24 individual tracks.

Generally, after an audio mix is set up on a 24-track tape machine, the signal is played back and sent to a different machine, which records the combined signals to a ½-inch 2-track stereo tape, called a master.

Before digital recording, the total number of available tracks onto which one could record was measured in multiples of 24, based on the number of 24-track tape machines being used. Most recording studios now use digital recording equipment, which limits the number of available tracks only on the basis of the mixing console's or computer hardware interface's capacity and the ability of the hardware to cope with processing demands.

Analog tape machines are still well sought, for some purists label digitally recorded audio as sounding too harsh, and the scarcity and age of analog tape machines greatly increases their value, as does the fact that many audio engineers still insist on recording only to analog tape.

This harshness is incorrectly attributed by some of them[who?] to the belief that digital recording will sample a sound wave many times per second allowing an illusion of solid sound waves to be created, where in contrast analog tape captures a sound wave in its entirety.

However, others simply argue that the lack of high frequency noise and the higher fidelity of the digital medium make the recorded higher frequencies more prominent, which results in such perceived harshness in contrast to analog recording. Still others point to problems of early digital recordings caused by the inexperience of sound engineers with the new medium as the cause for critics to the digital systems. Finally, another possibly relevant effect derives from the fact that, since CD-quality audio uses a sampling rate of 44.1 kHz, no frequencies above the Nyquist frequency of 22050 Hz are acceptable for recording Because of that, very steep low-pass filters are used on frequencies above 20 kHz that may introduce slight distortions into the audible-range signal. This is one of the several reasons for the push on high-end equipment towards higher sampling rates, such as 48 kHz, 88.2 kHz, 96 kHz and even 192 kHz.

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1.2 HISTORICAL BACKGROUND OF THE SOUND RECORDING INSTRUMENT

Long before sound was being recorded, music was being recorded, first by means of written notation, then also in forms that made it possible for the music to be played automatically by a mechanical device. The automatic reproduction of music can be traced back as far as the 9th century, when the BanĹŤ MĹŤsÄ brothers invented "the earliest known mechanical musical instrument", in this case a hydropowered organ which played interchangeable cylinders automatically. According to Charles B. Fowler, this "cylinder with raised pins on the surface remained the basic device to produce and reproduce music mechanically until the second half of the nineteenth century. The Banu Musa brothers also invented an automatic flute player which appears to have been the first programmable machine. According to Charles B. Fowler, the automata were arobot band which performed "more than fifty facial and body actions during each musical selection." In the 14th century, Flanders introduced a mechanical bell-ringer controlled by a rotating cylinder. Similar designs appeared in barrel organs in15th century, musical clocks in1598, barrel pianos in1805, and musical boxes 1815. In 1796, a Swiss watchmaker named Antoine Favre-Salomon described his idea for what we now call the cylinder musical box. The fairground organ, developed in 1892, used a system of accordionfolded punched cardboard books. The player piano, first demonstrated in 1876, used a punched paper scroll that could store an arbitrarily long piece of music. The most sophisticated of the piano rolls were "hand-played", meaning that the roll represented the actual performance of an individual, not just a transcription of the sheet music. This technology to record a live performance onto a piano roll was not developed until 1904. Piano rolls have been in continuous mass production since around 1898. A 1908 U.S. Supreme Court copyright case noted that, in 1902 alone, there were between 70,000 and 75,000 player pianos manufactured, and between 1,000,000 and 1,500,000 piano rolls produced. The use of piano rolls began to decline in the 1920s although one type is still being made today.

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Phonoautograph

The first device that could record actual sounds as they passed through the air but could not play them back—the purpose was only visual study was the phonautograph, patented in 1857 by Parisian inventor Édouard-LÊon Scott de Martinsville. The earliest known recordings of the human voice are phonautograph recordings, called "phonautograms", made in 1857. They consist of sheets of paper with sound-wave-modulated white lines created by a vibrating stylus that cut through a coating of soot as the paper was passed under it. An 1860 phonautogram of Au Clair de la Lune, a French folk song, was played back as sound for the first time in 2008 by scanning it and using software to convert the undulating line, which graphically encoded the sound, into a corresponding digital audio file.

Phonograph cylinder

The first practical sound recording and reproduction device was the mechanical phonograph cylinder, invented by Thomas Edison in 1877 and patented in 1878. The invention soon spread across the globe and over the next two decades the commercial recording, distribution and sale of sound recordings became a growing new international industry, with the most popular titles selling millions of units by the early 1900s. The development of mass-production techniques enabled cylinder recordings to become a major new consumer item in industrial countries and the cylinder was the main consumer format from the late 1880s until around 1910.

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Disc phonograph

Emil Berliner with disc record gramophone The next major technical development was the invention of the gramophone disc, generally credited to Emile Berliner and commercially introduced in the United States in 1889. Discs were easier to manufacture, transport and store, and they had the additional benefit of being louder than cylinders, which by necessity, were single-sided. Sales of the Gramophone record overtook the cylinder ca. 1910, and by the end of World War I the disc had become the dominant commercial recording format. Edison, who was the main producer of cylinders, created the Edison Disc Record in an attempt to regain his market. In various permutations, the audio disc format became the primary medium for consumer sound recordings until the end of the 20th century, and the double-sided 78 rpm shellac disc was the standard consumer music format from the early 1910s to the late 1950s.

Although there was no universally accepted speed, and various companies offered discs that played at several different speeds, the major recording companies eventually settled on a de facto industry standard of nominally 78 revolutions per minute, though the actual speed differed between America and the rest of the world. The specified speed was 78.26 rpm in America and 77.92 rpm throughout the rest of the world, the difference in speeds a result of the difference in cycle frequencies of the AC power driving the synchronous motor and available gearing ratios.

The nominal speed of the disc format gave rise to its common nickname, the "seventy-eight".

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Discs were made of shellac or similar brittle plastic-like materials, played with needles made from a variety of materials including mild steel, thorn and even sapphire. Discs had a distinctly limited playing life which was heavily dependent on how they were reproduced.

The earlier, purely acoustic methods of recording had limited sensitivity and frequency range.

Mid-frequency range notes could be recorded but very low and very high frequencies could not.

Instruments such as the violin transferred poorly to disc; however this was partially solved by retrofitting a conical horn to the sound box of the violin. The horn was no longer required once electrical recording was developed.

The long-playing 331â „3 rpm microgroove vinyl record, or "LP", was developed at Columbia Records and introduced in 1948. The short-playing but convenient 7-inch 45 rpm microgroove vinyl single was introduced by RCA Victor in 1949. In the US and most developed countries, the two new vinyl formats completely replaced 78 rpm shellac discs by the end of the 1950s, but in some corners of the world the "78" lingered on far into the 1960s. Vinyl was much more expensive than shellac, one of several factors that made its use for 78 rpm records very unusual, but with a long-playing disc the added cost was acceptable and the compact "45" format required very little material. Vinyl offered improved performance, both in stamping and in playback. If played with a good diamond stylus mounted in a lightweight pickup on a well-adjusted tonearm, it was long-lasting. If protected from dust, scuffs and scratches there was very little noise. Vinyl records were, over-optimistically, advertised as "unbreakable". They were not, but they were much less fragile than shellac, which had itself once been touted as "unbreakable" compared to wax cylinders.

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Electrical recording

RCA-44, a classic ribbon microphone introduced in 1932. Similar units were widely used for broadcasting and recording in the 1940s and are occasionally still used today.

Between the invention of the phonograph in 1877 and the advent of digital media, arguably the most important milestone in the history of sound recording was the introduction of what was then called "electrical recording", in which a microphone was used to convert the sound into an electrical signal that was amplified and used to actuate the recording stylus. This innovation eliminated the "horn sound" resonances characteristic of the acoustical process, produced clearer and more full-bodied recordings by greatly extending the useful range of audio frequencies, and allowed previously unrecordable distant and feeble sounds to be captured.

Sound recording began as a purely mechanical process. Except for a few crude telephone-based recording devices with no means of amplification, such as the Telegraphone, it remained so until the 1920s, when recent radio-related developments in electronics converged to revolutionize the recording process. These included improved microphones and auxiliary devices such as electronic filters, all dependent on electronic amplification to be of practical use in recording. In 1906 Lee De Forest invented the "Audion" triode vacuum tube, an electronic valve which could greatly amplify weak electrical signals. By 1915 it was being used in long-distance telephone circuits that made it possible to talk between New York and San Francisco with both parties

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being clearly heard. Refined versions of this tube were the basis of all electronic sound systems until the commercial introduction of the first transistor-based audio devices in the 1950s.

During World War I, experiments were undertaken in the United States and Great Britain to record and reproduce, among other things, the sound of a German U-boat. The acoustical recordings of that time proved entirely unable to reproduce the sounds, so other methods were actively sought. The earliest results were not very promising. The first electrical recording issued to the public, with little fanfare, was of the 11 November 1920 funeral services for the Unknown Soldier in Westminster Abbey, London. The microphones used were like those in contemporary telephones. They were discreetly set up in the abbey and connected by wires to recording equipment in a vehicle outside. Although electronic amplification was used, the resulting audio was weak and very unclear. The novel procedure did, however, allow a recording to be made which would otherwise not have been practical in those circumstances. For several years, this little-noted disc remained the only issued electrical recording.

Several record companies and independent inventors, notably Orlando Marsh, were experimenting with equipment and techniques for electrical recording in the early 1920s. Marsh's electrically recorded Autograph Records were already being sold to the public in 1924, a year before the first such offerings from the major record companies, but their overall sound quality was too low to demonstrate any obvious advantage over traditional acoustical methods. Marsh's microphone technique was idiosyncratic and his work had little if any impact on the systems being developed by others.

Telephone industry giant Western Electric had research laboratories with material and human resources that no record company or independent inventor could match. They had the best microphone, a condenser type developed there in 1916 and greatly improved in 1922, and the best amplifiers and test equipment. They had already patented an electromagnetic recorder in 1917, and in the early 1920s they decided to intensively apply their hardware and expertise to developing two state-of-the-art systems for electronically recording and reproducing sound: one that employed conventional discs and another that recorded optically on motion picture film.

Their engineers pioneered the use of mechanical analogs of electrical circuits and developed a superior "rubber line" recorder for cutting the groove into the wax master in the disc recording system.

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By 1924 such dramatic progress had been made that Western Electric arranged a demonstration for the two leading record companies, the Victor Talking Machine Company and the Columbia Phonograph Company. Both soon licensed the system and both made their earliest published electrical recordings in February 1925, but neither actually released them until mid-year. To avoid making their existing catalogs instantly obsolete, the two long-time arch rivals agreed privately not to publicize the new process until November 1925, by which time enough electrically recorded repertory would be available to meet the anticipated demand. During the next few years the lesser record companies licensed or developed other electrical recording systems. By the end of the 1920s only the budget label Harmony was still issuing acoustically recorded discs.

Comparison of some surviving Western Electric test recordings with early commercial releases indicates that their system had been "dumbed down" by the record companies so as not to overwhelm non-electronic playback equipment, which reproduced very low frequencies as an unpleasant rattle and rapidly wore out discs with strongly recorded high frequencies.

Other recording formats In the 1920s, Phonofilm and other early motion picture sound systems employed optical recording technology, in which the audio signal was graphically recorded on photographic film.

The amplitude variations comprising the signal were used to modulate a light source which was imaged onto the moving film through a narrow slit, allowing the signal to be photographed as variations in the density or width of a "sound track". The projector used a steady light and a photoelectric cell to convert these variations back into an electrical signal which was amplified and sent to loudspeakers behind the screen. Ironically, the introduction of "talkies" was spearheaded by The Jazz Singer in1927, which used the Vitaphone sound-on-disc system rather than an optical soundtrack. Optical sound became the standard motion picture audio system throughout the world and remains so for theatrical release prints despite attempts in the 1950s to substitute magnetic soundtracks. Currently, all release prints on 35 mm film include an analog optical soundtrack, usually stereo with Dolby SR noise reduction. In addition, an optically recorded digital soundtrack in Dolby Digital and/or Sony SDDS form is likely to be present. An

29

optically recorded timecode is also commonly included in order to synchronise CDROMs containing a DTS soundtrack.

This period also saw several other historic developments including the introduction of the first practical magnetic sound recording system, the magnetic wire recorder, which was based on the work of Danish inventor Valdemar Poulsen. Magnetic wire recorders were effective, but the sound quality was poor, so between the wars they were primarily used for voice recording and marketed as business dictating machines. In the 1930s radio pioneer Guglielmo Marconi developed a system of magnetic sound recording using steel tape. This was the same material used to make razor blades, and not surprisingly the fearsome Marconi-Stille recorders were considered so dangerous that technicians had to operate them from another room for safety.

Because of the high recording speeds required, they used enormous reels about one metre in diameter, and the thin tape frequently broke, sending jagged lengths of razor steel flying around the studio. The K1 Magnetophon was the first practical tape recorder, developed by AEG in Germany in 1935.

Magnetic tape

Other important inventions of this period were magnetic tape and the tape recorder (Paper-based tape was first used but was soon superseded by polyester and acetate backing due to dust drop and hiss. Acetate was more brittle than polyester and snapped easily. This technology, the basis for almost all commercial recording from the 1950s to the 1980s, was invented by German audio engineers in the 1930s, who also discovered the technique of AC biasing, which dramatically 30

improved the frequency response of tape recordings. Tape recording was perfected just after the war by American audio engineer John T. Mullin with the help of Crosby Enterprises, whose pioneering recorders were based on captured German recorders, and the Ampex company produced the first commercially available tape recorders in the late 1940s.

A typical Compact Cassette

Magnetic tape brought about sweeping changes in both radio and the recording industry. Sound could be recorded, erased and re-recorded on the same tape many times, sounds could be duplicated from tape to tape with only minor loss of quality, and recordings could now be very precisely edited by physically cutting the tape and rejoining it. Within a few years of the introduction of the first commercial tape recorder—the Ampex 200 model, launched in 1948— American musician-inventor Les Paul had invented the first multitrack tape recorder, ushering in another technical revolution in the recording industry. Tape made possible the first sound recordings totally created by electronic means, opening the way for the bold sonic experiments of the Musique Concrète school and avant garde composers like Karlheinz Stockhausen, which in turn led to the innovative pop music recordings of artists such as Frank Zappa, The Beatles and The Beach Boys.

Magnetic tape allowed the radio industry for the first time to pre-record many sections of program content such as advertising, which formerly had to be presented live, and it also enabled the creation and duplication of complex, high-fidelity, long-duration recordings of entire programs. Also, for the first time, broadcasters, regulators and other interested parties were able to undertake comprehensive logging of radio broadcasts. Innovations like multi tracking and tape 31

echo enabled radio programs and advertisements to be pre-produced to a level of complexity and sophistication that was previously unattainable and the combined impact of these new techniques led to significant changes to the pacing and production style of program content, thanks to the innovations like the endless-loop broadcast cartridge.

Stereo and hi-fi In 1881, it was noted during experiments in transmitting sound from the Paris Opera that it was possible to follow the movement of singers on the stage if earpieces connected to different microphones were held to the two ears. This discovery was commercialized in 1890 with the ThÊâtrophone system, which operated for over forty years until 1932.

In 1931 Alan Blumlein, a British electronics engineer working for EMI, designed a way to make the sound of an actor in a film follow his movement across the screen. In December 1931 he submitted a patent including the idea, and in 1933 this became UK patent number 394,325. Over the next two years, Blumlein developed stereo microphones and a stereo disc-cutting head, and recorded a number of short films with stereo soundtracks.

Magnetic tape enabled the development of the first practical commercial sound systems that could record and reproduce high-fidelity stereophonic sound. The experiments with stereo during the 1930s and 1940s were hampered by problems with synchronization. A major breakthrough in practical stereo sound was made by Bell Laboratories, who in 1937 demonstrated a practical system of two-channel stereo, using dual optical sound tracks on film. Major movie studios quickly developed three-track and four-track sound systems, and the first stereo sound recording for a commercial film was made by Judy Garland for the MGM movie Listen, Darling in 1938.

The first movie commercially released with a stereo soundtrack was Walt Disney's Fantasia, released in 1940. The original 1941 release of this production used the "Fantasound" sound system. This system employed a separate film for the sound, which ran in synchronism with the film carrying the picture. On this sound film were four double-width optical soundtracks, three of which carried left, center and right audio while the fourth was a "control" track on which were recorded three tones which controlled the playback volume of the three audio channels. Because of the complex equipment required to present it, it was shown as a road show, but only in the 32

United States. Regular releases of the film were on standard mono optical 35 mm stock until 1956 when the film was released with a stereo soundtrack using the "Cinemascope" four-track magnetic sound system.

German audio engineers working on magnetic tape are reported to have developed stereo recording by 1943, but it was not until the introduction of the first commercial two-track tape recorders by Ampex in the late 1940s that stereo tape recording became commercially feasible.

However, despite the availability of multi track tape, stereo did not become the standard system for commercial music recording for some years and it remained a specialist market during the 1950s. This changed after the late 1957 introduction of the "Westrex stereo phonograph disc", which used the groove format developed earlier by Blumlein. Decca Records in England came out with Full Frequency Range Recording in the 1940s which became internationally accepted and a worldwide standard for higher quality recordings on vinyl records. The Ernest Ansermet recording of Igor Stravinsky's Petrushkawas key in the development of full frequency range records and alerting the listening public to high fidelity in 1946.

Most pop singles were mixed into monophonic sound until the mid 1960s, and it was common for major pop releases to be issued in both mono and stereo until the early 1970s. Many Sixties pop albums now available only in stereo were originally intended to be released only in mono, and the so-called "stereo" version of these albums were created by simply separating the two tracks of the master tape. In the mid Sixties, as stereo became more popular, many mono recordings were remastered using the so-called "fake stereo" method, which spread the sound across the stereo field by directing higher-frequency sound into one channel and lower-frequency sounds into the other.

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1950s to 1980s

Magnetic tape transformed the recording industry, and by the late-1950s the vast majority of commercial recordings were being mastered on tape. The electronics revolution that followed the invention of the transistor brought other radical changes, the most important of which was the introduction of the world's first "personal music device", the miniaturized transistor radio, which became a major consumer luxury item in the 1960s, transforming radio broadcasting from a static group experience into a mobile, personal listening activity. An early multi track recording made using magnetic tape was "How High the Moon" by Les Paul, on which Paul played eight overdubbed guitar tracks. In the 1960s Brian Wilson of The Beach Boys, Frank Zappa and The Beatles were among the first popular artists to explore the possibilities of multi track recording techniques and effects on their landmark albums Pet Sounds, Freak Out! and Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.

The next important innovation was small cartridge based tape systems of which the compact cassette, introduced by the Philips electronics company in 1964 is the best known. It eventually entirely replaced the competing formats, the larger 8-track tape and the fairly similar 'Deutsche Cassette' developed by the German company Grundig. This latter system was not particularly common in Europe and practically unheard of in America. The compact cassette became a major consumer audio format and advances in microelectronics eventually allowed the development of the Sony Walkman, introduced in the 1970s, which was the first personal music player and gave a major boost to the mass distribution of music recordings. Cassettes became the first successful consumer recording/re-recording medium. The gramophone record was a pre-recorded playback only medium, and reel-to-reel audio tape recording magnetic tape was too difficult for most consumers and far less portable.

A key advance in audio fidelity came with the Dolby A noise reduction system, invented by Ray Dolby and introduced in 1966. A competing system dbx, invented by David Blackmer, found most success in professional audio. A simpler variant of Dolby's noise reduction system, known as Dolby B greatly improved the sound of cassette tape recordings by reducing the practical effect of the recorded hiss inherent in the narrow tape used. It, and variants, also eventually found wide application in the recording and film industries. Dolby B was crucial to the 34

popularisation and commercial success of the compact cassette as a domestic recording and playback medium, and became a part of the booming "hi-fi" market of the 1970s and beyond.

The compact cassette also benefited enormously from developments in the tape material itself as materials with wider frequency responses and lower inherent noise were developed, often based on cobalt and/or chrome oxides as the magnetic material instead of the more usual iron oxide.

The multitrack audio cartridge had been in wide use in the radio industry, from the late 1950s to the 1980s, but in the 1960s the pre-recorded 8-track cartridge was launched as a consumer audio format by Bill Lear of the Lear Jet aircraft company. Aimed particularly at the automotive market, they were the first practical, affordable car hi-fi systems, and could produce superior sound quality to the compact cassette. However the smaller size and greater durability — augmented by the ability to create home-recorded music "compilations" since 8-track recorders were rare — saw the cassette become the dominant consumer format for portable audio devices in the 1970s and 1980s.

There had been experiments with multi-channel sound for many years — usually for special musical or cultural events — but the first commercial application of the concept came in the early 1970s with the introduction of Quadraphonic sound. This spin-off development from multitrack recording used four tracks and four speakers to create a 360-degree audio field around the listener. Following the release of the first consumer 4-channel hi-fi systems, a number of popular albums were released in one of the competing four-channel formats; among the best known are Mike Oldfield's Tubular Bells and Pink Floyd's The Dark Side of the Moon.

Quadraphonic sound was not a commercial success, partly because of competing and somewhat incompatible four-channel sound systems e.g., CBS, JVC, Dynaco and others all had systems and generally poor quality, even when played as intended on the correct equipment, of the released music. It eventually faded out in the late 1970s, although this early venture paved the way for the eventual introduction of domestic Surround Sound systems in home theatre use, which have gained enormous popularity since the introduction of the DVD. This widespread adoption has occurred despite the confusion introduced by the multitude of available surround sound standards.

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Audio components

The replacement of the thermionic valve by the smaller, cooler and less power-hungry transistor also accelerated the sale of consumer high-fidelity "hi-fi" sound systems from the 1960s onward.

In the 1950s most record players were monophonic and had relatively low sound quality; few consumers could afford high-quality stereophonic sound systems. In the 1960s, American manufacturers introduced a new generation of "modular" hi-fi components — separate turntables, pre-amplifiers, amplifiers, both combined as integrated amplifiers, tape recorders, and other ancillary equipment like the graphic equaliser, which could be connected together to create a complete home sound system. These developments were rapidly taken up by Japanese electronics companies, which soon flooded the world market with relatively cheap, high-quality components. By the 1980s, corporations like Sony had become world leaders in the music recording and playback industry.

Digital recording

The invention of digital sound recording and later the compact disc in 1982 brought significant improvements in the durability of consumer recordings. The CD initiated another massive wave of change in the consumer music industry, with vinyl records effectively relegated to a small niche market by the mid-1990s. However, the introduction of digital systems was initially fiercely resisted by the record industry which feared wholesale piracy on a medium which was

36

able to produce perfect copies of original released recordings. However, the industry had to bow to the inevitable, but not without using various protection system.

The most recent and revolutionary developments have been in digital recording, with the development of various uncompressed and compressed digital audio file formats, processors capable and fast enough to convert the digital data to sound in real time, and inexpensive mass storage. This generated a new type of portable digital audio player.

The minidisc player, using ATRAC compression on small, cheap, re-writeable discs was introduced in the 1990s but became obsolescent as solid-state non-volatile flash memory dropped in price. As technologies which increase the amount of data that can be stored on a single medium, such as Super Audio CD, DVD-A, Blu-ray Disc and HD DVD become available, longer programs of higher quality fit onto a single disc. Sound files are readily downloaded from the Internet and other sources, and copied onto computers and digital audio players. Digital audio technology is used in all areas of audio, from casual use of music files of moderate quality to the most demanding professional applications. New applications such as internet radio and podcasting have appeared.

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1.3 DESIGN AND EQUIPMENT Recording studios generally consist of three rooms: the studio itself, where the sound for the recording is created the control room, where the sound from the studio is recorded and manipulated, and the machine room, where noisier equipment that may interfere with the recording process is kept. Recording studios are carefully designed around the principles of room acoustics to create a set of spaces with the acoustical properties required for recording. sound with precision and accuracy. This will consist of both room treatment and soundproofing .

A recording studio may include additional rooms, such as a vocal booth - a small room designed for voice recording, as well as one or more extra control

rooms

.

Equipment found in a recording studio commonly includes: 

Mixing console



Multi track recorder



Microphones



Reference monitors, which are loudspeakers with a flat frequency response



Keyboard



Acoustic drum kit

Equipment may include: 

Digital audio workstation



Music workstation



On Air or Recording Light



Outboard effects, such as compressors, reverbs, or equalizers 38

1.4 DIGITAL AUDIO WORKSTATIONS General purpose computers have rapidly assumed a large role in the recording process, being able to replace the mixing consoles, recorders, synthesizers, Samplers and sound effects devices.

A computer thus outfitted is called a Digital Audio Workstation, or DAW. Popular audiorecording software includes Apple Logic Pro, Digi design's Pro Tools— near standard for most professional studios— Cubase and Nuendo both by Steinberg, MOTU Digital Performer— popular for MIDI. Other software applications include Ableton Live, Cakewalk Sonar, ACID Pro, FL Studio, Adobe Audition, Audacity, Ardour, and Pro Tools.

Current software applications are more reliant on the audio recording hardware than the computer they are running on, therefore typical high-end computer hardware is less of a priority unless midi is involved. While Apple Macintosh is used for studio work, there is a breadth of software available for Microsoft Windows and Linux. The majority of both commercial and home studios can be seen running PC-based multi track audio software.

1.5 PROJECT STUDIOS A small, personal recording studio is sometimes called a project studio or home studio. Such studios often cater to specific needs of an individual artist, or are used as a noncommercial hobby. The first modern project studios came into being during the mid 1980s, with the advent of affordable multi track recording devices, synthesizers and microphones. The phenomenon has flourished with falling prices of MIDI equipment and accessories, as well as inexpensive direct to disk recording products.

Recording drums and electric guitar in a home studio is challenging, because they are usually the loudest instruments. Conventional drums require sound isolation in this scenario, unlike electronic or sampled drums. Getting an authentic electric guitar amp sound including powertube distortion requires a power attenuator or an isolation box or booth. A convenient compromise is amp simulation, whether a modelling amp, processor, or software-based guitar amp simulator. Sometimes, musicians replace loud, inconvenient instruments such as drums, with keyboards, which today often provide somewhat realistic sampling.

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1.6 ISOLATION BOOTH An isolation booth is a standard small room in a recording studio, which is both soundproofed to keep out external sounds and keep in the internal sounds and, like all the other recording rooms in sound industry, it is designed for having a lesser amount of diffused reflections from walls to make a good sounding room. A drummer, vocalist, or guitar speaker cabinet, along with microphones, is acoustically isolated in the room. A professional recording studio has a control room, a large live room, and one or more small isolation booths. All rooms are soundproofed such as with double-layer walls with dead space and insulation in-between the two walls, forming a room-within-a-room.

There are variations of the same concept, including a portable standalone isolation booth, a compact guitar speaker isolation cabinet, or a larger guitar speaker cabinet isolation box.

A gobo panel achieves the same idea to a much more moderate extent; for example, a drum kit that is too loud in the live room or on stage can have acrylic glass see-through gobo panels placed around it to deflect the sound and keep it from bleeding into the other microphones, allowing more independent control of each instrument channel at the mixing board.

All rooms in a recording studio may have a reconfigurable combination of reflective and nonreflective surfaces, to control the amount of reverberation.

1.7 RADIO STUDIOS Radio studios are very similar to recording studios, particularly in the case of production studios which are not normally used on-air. This type of studio would normally have all of the same equipment that any other audio recording studio would have, particularly if it is at a large station, or at a combined facility that houses a station group, but is designed for groups of people to work collaboratively in a live to air situation Broadcast studios also use many of the same principles such as sound isolation, with adaptations suited to the live on-air nature of their use. Such equipment would commonly include a telephone hybrid for putting telephone calls on the air, a POTS codec for receiving remote broadcasts, a dead air alarm for detecting unexpected silence, and a broadcast delay for dropping

40

anything from coughs to profanity. In the U.S., stations licensed by the Federal Communications Commission also must have an Emergency Alert System decoder , and in the case of full-power stations, an encoder that can interrupt programming on all channels which a station transmits in order to broadcast urgent warnings.

Computers are also used for playing ads, jingles, bumpers, sound bites, phone calls, sound effects, traffic and weather reports, and now full broadcast automation when nobody is around.

For talk shows, a producer and/or assistant in a control room runs the show, including screening calls and entering the callers' names and subject into a queue, which the show's host can see and make a proper introduction with. Radio contest winners can also be edited on the fly and put on the air within a minute or two after they have been recorded accepting their prize.

Additionally, digital mixing consoles can be interconnected via audio over Ethernet, or split into two parts, with inputs and outputs wired to a rack mount audio engine, and one or more control surfaces or computers connected via serial port, allowing the producer or the talent to control the show from either point. With Ethernet and audio over IP or FTP , this also allows remote access, so that DJs can do shows from a home studio via ISDN or the Internet. Additional outside audio connections are required for the studio/transmitter link for over-the-air stations, satellite dishes for sending and receiving shows, and for webcasting or podcasting.

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1.8 ACOUSTIC TRANSMISSION

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Acoustic transmission in building design refers to a number of processes by which sound can be transferred from one part of a building to another. Typically these are: 1. Airborne transmission - a noise source in one room sends air pressure waves which induce vibration to one side of a wall or element of structure setting it moving such that the other face of the wall vibrates in an adjacent room. Structural isolation therefore becomes an important consideration in the acoustic design of buildings. Highly sensitive areas of buildings, for example recording studios, may be almost entirely isolated from the rest of a structure by constructing the studios as effective boxes supported by springs.

Air tightness also becomes an important control technique. A tightly sealed door might have reasonable sound reduction properties, but if it is left open only a few millimetres its effectiveness is reduced to practically nothing. The most important acoustic control method is adding mass into the structure, such as a heavy dividing wall, which will usually reduce airborne sound transmission better than a light one.

2. Impact transmission - a noise source in one room results from an impact of an object onto a separating surface, such as a floor and transmits the sound to an adjacent room. A typical example would be the sound of footsteps in a room being heard in a room below.

Acoustic control measures usually include attempts to isolate the source of the impact, or cushioning it. For example carpets will perform significantly better than hard floors.

3. Flanking transmission - a more complex form of noise transmission, where the resultant vibrations from a noise source are transmitted to other rooms of the building usually by elements of structure within the building. For example, in a steel framed building, once the frame itself is set into motion the effective transmission can be pronounced.

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1.9 SOUNDPROOFING AND ACOUSTIC MATERAILS

The goal of acoustical treatment is to eliminate problems from parallel hard surfaces that reflect sound waves. Another goal to keep in mind is to stop unwanted sound from entering or exiting the room. 

Sound Isolation: This involves creating a sound barrier between your recording space and any adjacent areas. The focus at this stage is to keep unwanted noise from entering or escaping the room in which you will be recording. Generally, noise is isolated by using heavy materials to block the noise along with decoupling devices to reduce structural vibrations.

Sound absorbing materials may also be used within wall cavities to reduce unwanted structural resonance. Regardless of whether you are building an isolation booth in a professional studio, or trying to prevent sound from leaking into or out of your home studio, sound isolation is key.



Sound Absorption: Noise absorbing materials are designed to improve sound quality by reducing and controlling echo and reverberation. This is the primary method used to modify studio acoustics. Well planned, the use of sound absorbing materials can considerably improve recording quality.

Contrary to popular belief, sound absorbers are not soundproofing materials and should not be used to block noise.



Sound Diffusion: Sound diffusion works hand in hand with Sound Absorption, and is popular in control/listening rooms where mixing will take place. Diffusers are designed to distribute sound evenly throughout the room, and prevent dead spots, where sound cannot be heard clearly.

This will allow you to properly mix your recordings, which will enhance your finished product.

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ISOMOUNT Vibration Isolation Feet Designed to Isolate Noise Sources from Other Surfaces.

Great for Reducing Residential, Studio, Commercial and Industrial Noise from Radiating Through Floors, Ceilings, Walls, Machine Enclosures, Appliances and Sheet Metal Enclosures.

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2.0 REAMPING Reamping is a process often used in multi track recording in which a recorded signal is routed back out of the editing environment and run through external processing or reverb chamber.

Originally, the technique was used mostly for guitars: it facilitates a separation of guitar playing from guitar amplifier processing—a previously recorded audio program is played back and rerecorded at a later time for the purpose of adding effects, ambience, or modified tonality. The technique has since evolved to include many other applications. Re-amping can also be applied to other instruments and program, such as recorded drums, synthesizers, and virtual instruments.

Examples of common re-amping objectives include musically useful amplifier distortion, room tone, compression, EQ/filters, envelopes, resonance, and gating. Re-amping is often used to "warm up" dry tracks, which often means adding complex, musically interesting compression, distortion, filtering, ambience, and other pleasing effects. By playing a dry signal through a studio's main monitors and then using room mics to capture the ambience, engineers are able to create realistic reverbs and blend the wet signal with the original dry recording to achieve the desired amount of depth.

The technique is especially useful for softening stereo drum tracks. By pointing the monitors away from each other and miking each speaker individually, the stereo image can be well preserved and a new depth can be added to the track. It is important to check that the microphones being used are in phase to avoid problems with the mix.

Example A guitarist records a dry, unprocessed, unaffected track in a recording studio. This is often achieved by connecting the guitar into a DI unit that is fed to a recording console or, alternatively, bypassing the console by using an outboard preamplifier. Often, the guitarist's signal is sent to both recorder and guitar amp simultaneously, providing the guitarist with a proper amplifier "feel" while also tracking a dry signal.

At a later time, the dry, direct, unprocessed guitar recording is fed to a bridging device to "rerecord" the guitarist's unprocessed performance through a dedicated guitar amplifier and/or external effects box. The guitar amplifier is placed in the live room or isolation booth of the recording studio and is set up to produce the desired tonal quality, including distortion 48

character and room reverberation. A microphone is placed near the guitar speaker and a new track is recorded, producing the re-amplified, processed track. The microphone cable is connected to the mixing console or mic preamp using a cable, as usual, without using a bridging device.

External effects such as stomp boxes and guitar multi-fx processors can also be included in the re-amping process. As well as physical devices that require an impedance-matched guitar pickup signal, software-based virtual guitar effects and amps can be included in the re-amping process.

Advantages of re-amping Re-amping allows guitarists and other electronic musicians to record their tracks and go home, leaving the engineer and producer to spend more time dialing in "just right" settings and effects on prerecorded tracks. When re-amping electric guitar tracks, the guitarist need not be present for the engineer to experiment long hours with a range of effects, mic positions, speaker cabinets, amplifiers, effects pedals, and overall tonality – continuously replaying the prerecorded tracks while experimenting with new settings and tones. When a desired tone is finally achieved, the guitarist's dry performance is re-recorded, or "re-amped," with all added effects.

Manufacturers of instrument processing gear such as guitar effects, or equipment reviewers, can gather a library of dry performance tracks, performed and edited well, and then run these ideal tracks through the processing gear to demonstrate the sounds that the processing gear can produce. An unlimited number of performance playback passes, including looping, enables trying out many combinations of settings quickly, including microphone techniques.

When guitar amp or amp simulator designers try various circuit component values or settings, they can use the dry tracks as prepared, always-available input test signals, and consistent reference signals.

DI Electronic interfacing Direct inject is a device or technique for connecting an unbalanced, high-impedance, low-level signal into audio equipment designed for a low-impedance balanced signal. Reverse-DI means running this same device or technique in reverse – connecting a high-level, signal into audio equipment that was designed for low-level, unbalanced, high-impedance signals, such as a guitar amplifier.

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Playing back a signal from recording studio equipment directly into a guitar amplifier can cause unwanted side-effects such as input-stage distortion, treble loss or overemphasis, and groundloop hum; thus there is sometimes a need for impedance conversion, level-matching, and ground alteration. Like running a guitar signal through a guitar effects pedal that is set to Bypass, reamping introduces some degree of sonic degradation compared to playing a guitar live directly into a guitar amp rig.

A re-amping device commonly employs a reversed Direct Inject transformer with some resistors added for level and impedance shift. Level and impedance adjustment can be achieved by adding a potentiometer or adjustable resistor. A proper re-amping device converts a balanced signal to an unbalanced signal, reduces a high studio-level signal down to a low guitar-level signal, and shifts the output to a high instrument-level impedance .

In conventional re-amplification, a dry recorded signal is sent into a balanced XLR input. An unbalanced Âź" phone connector is typically used for the output, which is connected to the guitar amp rig. Some re-amping devices offer a pad switch to reduce a too-hot output level.

Sometimes a guitar volume pedal or buffered effects pedal can work adequately for re-amping, depending on grounding, levels, and impedance. Another approach to simulating the high impedance of a guitar pickup is to use a passive DI and add a 10 K-ohm resistor in series with the signal connection inside a 1/4" plug.

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2.1 ROOM ACOUSTICS Room acoustics describes how sound behaves in an enclosed space.

The way that sound behaves in a room can be broken up into roughly four different frequency zones: 

The first zone is below the frequency that has a wavelength of twice the longest length of the room. In this zone, sound behaves very much like changes in static air pressure.



Above that zone, until the frequency is approximately 11,250(RT60/V)1/2, wavelengths are comparable to the dimensions of the room, and so room resonances dominate.



The third region which extends approximately 2 octaves is a transition to the fourth zone.



In the fourth zone, sounds behave like rays of light bouncing around the room.

Natural modes The sound wave has reflections at the walls, floor and ceiling of the room. The incident wave then has interference with the reflected one. This action creates standing waves that generate nodes and high pressure zones.

In 1981, in order to solve this problem, Oscar Bonello, professor at the University of Buenos Aires, formulated a modal density concept solution which used concepts frompsychoacoustics.

Called "Bonello Criteria", the method analyzes the first 48 room modes and plots the number of modes in each one-third of an octave. The curve increases monotonically Other systems to determine correct room ratios have more recently been developed.

Reverberation of the room After determining the best dimensions of the room, using the modal density criteria, the next step is to find the correct reverberation time. The reverberation time depends on the use of the room.

Times about 1.5 to 2 seconds are needed for opera theaters and concert halls. For broadcasting and recording studios and conference rooms, values under one second are frequently used. The recommended reverberation time is always a function of the volume of the room. Several authors give their recommendations A good approximation for Broadcasting Studios and Conference 51

Rooms is: TR[1khz] = [0,4 log (V+62)] – 0,38 TR in seconds and V=volume of the room in m3 The ideal RT60 must have the same value at all frequencies from 30 to 12,000 Hz. Or, at least, it is acceptable to have a linear rising from 100% at 500 Hz to 150% down to 62 Hz To get the desired RT60, several acoustics materials can be used as described in several books. A valuable simplification of the task was proposed by Oscar Bonello in 1979 .It consists of using standard acoustic panels of 1 m2 hung from the walls of the room . These panels use a combination of three Helmholtz resonatorsand a wooden resonant panel. This system gives a large acoustic absorption at low frequencies and reduces at high frequencies to compensate for the typical absorption by people, lateral surfaces, ceilings, etc.

2.2 SOUND RECORDING AND REPRODUCTION Sound recording and reproduction is an electrical or mechanical inscription and re-creation of sound waves, such as spoken voice, singing, instrumental music, or sound effects. The two main classes of sound recording technology are analog recording and digital recording. Acoustic analog recording is achieved by a small microphone diaphragm that can detect changes in atmospheric pressure and record them as a graphic representation of the sound waves on a medium such as a phonograph. In magnetic tape recording, the sound waves vibrate the microphone diaphragm and are converted into a varying electric current, which is then converted to a varying magnetic field by an electromagnet, which makes a representation of the sound as magnetized areas on a plastic tape with a magnetic coating on it. Analog sound reproduction is the reverse process, with a bigger loudspeaker diaphragm causing changes to atmospheric pressure to form acoustic sound waves. Electronically generated sound waves may also be recorded directly from devices such as an electric guitar pickup or a synthesizer, without the use of acoustics in the recording process other than the need for musicians to hear how well they are playing during recording sessions.

Digital recording and reproduction converts the analog sound signal picked up by the microphone to a digital form by a process of digitization, allowing it to be stored and transmitted by a wider variety of media. Digital recording stores audio as a series of binary numbers representing samples of the amplitude of the audio signal at equal time 52

intervals, at a sample rate high enough to convey all sounds capable of being heard. Digital recordings are considered higher quality than analog recordings not necessarily because they have higher fidelity, but because the digital format can prevent much loss of quality found in analog recording due to noise and electromagnetic interference in playback, and mechanical deterioration or damage to the storage medium. A digital audio signal must be reconverted to analog form during playback before it is applied to a loudspeaker or earphones.

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2.3 SOUND REFLECTION

Sound diffusion panel for high frequencies

When a longitudinal sound wave strikes a flat surface, sound is reflected in a coherent manner provided that the dimension of the reflective surface is large compared to the wavelength of the sound. Note that audible sound has a very wide frequency range, and thus a very wide range of wavelengths .As a result, the overall nature of the reflection varies according to the texture and structure of the surface. For example, porous materials will absorb some energy, and rough materials tend to reflect in many directions—to scatter the energy, rather than to reflect it coherently. This leads into the field of architectural acoustics, because the nature of these reflections is critical to the auditory feel of a space. In the theory of exterior noise mitigation, reflective surface size mildly detracts from the concept of a noise barrier by reflecting some of the sound into the opposite direction.

Seismic reflection Seismic waves produced by earthquakes or other sources may be reflected by layers within the Earth. Study of the deep reflections of waves generated by earthquakes has allowed seismologists to determine the layered structure of the Earth. Shallower reflections are

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used in reflection seismology to study the Earth's crust generally, and in particular to prospect for petroleum and natural gas deposits.

2.4 SOUND PROOFING Sound proofing is any means of reducing the sound pressure with respect to a specified sound source and receptor. There are several basic approaches to reducing sound: increasing the distance between source and receiver, using noise barriers to reflect or absorb the energy of the sound waves, using damping structures such as sound baffles, or using active anti noise sound generators.

Two distinct soundproofing problems may need to be considered when designing acoustic treatments - to improve the sound within a room and reduce sound leakage to / from adjacent rooms or outdoors. Acoustic quieting, noise mitigation, and noise control can be used to limit unwanted noise. Soundproofing can suppress unwanted indirect sound waves such as reflections that cause echoes and resonances that cause reverberation. Soundproofing can reduce the transmission of unwanted direct sound waves from the source to an involuntary listener through the use of distance and intervening objects in the sound path.

The energy density of sound waves decreases as they spread out, so that increasing the distance between the receiver and source results in a progressively lesser intensity of sound at the receiver. In a normal three dimensional setting, with a point source and point receptor, the intensity of sound waves will be attenuated according to the inverse square of the distance from the source.

Damping Damping means to reduce resonance in the room, by absorption or redirection. Absorption will reduce the overall sound level, whereas redirection makes unwanted sound harmless or even beneficial by reducing coherence. Damping can reduce the acoustic resonance in the air, or mechanical resonance in the structure of the room itself or things in the room.

Absorption Absorbing sound spontaneously converts part of the sound energy to a very small amount of heat in the intervening object, rather than sound being transmitted or reflected. There are several ways in which a material can absorb sound. The choice of sound absorbing material will be determined 55

by the frequency distribution of noise to be absorbed and the acoustic absorption profile required.

Porous absorbers Porous absorbers, typically open cell rubber foams or melamine sponges, absorb noise by friction within the cell structure.

Porous open cell foams are highly effective noise absorbers across a broad range of medium-high frequencies. Performance is less impressive at low frequencies.

The exact absorption profile of a porous open cell foam will be determined by a number of factors including the following: 

Cell size

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Tortuosity

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Porosity

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Material thickness

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Material density

Resonant absorbers Resonant panels, Helmholtz resonators and other resonant absorbers work by damping a sound wave as they reflect it.

Unlike porous absorbers, resonant absorbers are most effective at low-medium frequencies and the absorption of resonant absorbers is always matched to a narrow frequency range.

Reflection In an outdoor environment such as highway engineering, embankments or panelling are often used to reflect sound upwards into the sky.

Diffusion 56

If a specular reflection from a hard flat surface is giving a problematic echo then an acoustic diffuser may be applied to the surface. It will scatter sound in all directions.

Room within a room A room within a room is one method of isolating sound and stopping it from transmitting to the outside world where it may be undesirable.

Most vibration / sound transfer from a room to the outside occurs through mechanical means.

The vibration passes directly through the brick, woodwork and other solid structural elements.

When it meets with an element such as a wall, ceiling, floor or window, which acts as a sounding board, the vibration is amplified and heard in the second space. A mechanical transmission is much faster, more efficient and may be more readily amplified than an airborne transmission of the same initial strength.

The use of acoustic foam and other absorbent means is less effective against this transmitted vibration. The user is advised to break the connection between the room that contains the noise source and the outside world. This is called acoustic de-coupling. Ideal de-coupling involves eliminating vibration transfer in both solid materials and in the air, so air-flow into the room is often controlled. This has safety implications, for example proper ventilation must be assured and gas heaters cannot be used inside de-coupled space.

Noise cancellation Noise cancellation generators for active noise control are a relatively modern innovation. A microphone is used to pick up the sound that is then analyzed by a computer; then, sound waves with opposite polarity are output through a speaker, causing destructive interference and cancelling much of the noise.

Residential soundproofing Residential soundproofing aims to decrease or eliminate the effects of exterior noise. The main focus of residential soundproofing in existing structures is the windows. Curtains can be used to damp sound either through use of heavy materials or through the use of air chambers known 57

as honeycombs. Single-, double- and triple-honeycomb designs achieve relatively greater degrees of sound damping. The primary soundproofing limit of curtains is the lack of a seal at the edge of the curtain. Double-pane windows achieve somewhat greater sound damping than single-pane windows. Significant noise reduction can be achieved by installing a second interior window. In this case the exterior window remains in place while a slider or hung window is installed within the same wall openings.

Commercial soundproofing Commercial businesses sometimes use soundproofing technology. Restaurants, schools, and health care facilities use architectural acoustics to reduce noise for their customers. Office buildings may try to make cubicle spaces less noisy for workers using the phone. In the US, OSHA has requirements regulating the length of exposure of workers to certain levels of noise.

Noise barriers as exterior soundproofing Noise barrier Since the early 1970s, it has become common practice in the United States and other industrialized countries to engineer noise barriers along major highways to protect adjacent residents from intruding roadway noise. The technology exists to predict accurately the optimum geometry for the noise barrier design. Noise barriers may be constructed of wood,masonry, earth or a combination thereof. One of the earliest noise barrier designs was in Arlington, Virginia adjacent to Interstate 66, stemming from interests expressed by theArlington Coalition on Transportation. Possibly the earliest scientifically designed and published noise barrier construction was in Los Altos, California in 1970.

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CHAPTER – 2 CASE STUDY ANALYSIS

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EMSQUARE STUDIO GOREGAON (WEST)

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SRS SUDIO ANDHERI (WEST)

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NET CASE STUDY

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CHAPTER – 3 DESIGN STRATEGY

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2.1 LOCATION

High Street Phoenix,Senapati Bapat Marg, High Street Phoenix, Senapati Bapat Marg, Lower Parel, Mumbai, Maharashtra 400013

The shop will be replace to sound recording studio

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2.2 CONCEPT

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2.4

REQUIREMENT 1. Reception and waiting area 2. Storage 3. Server room 4. Presenters dressing room 1 & 2 5. Toilets 6. Dressing rooms 2 nos 7. Makeup room 2nos 8. Presentation room 9. Meeting room 10. Tape library 11. shoot room 12. production control room 13. drum room 14. control room 15. recording area 16. mini theatre 17. working area 18. cafeteria

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2.4 PLAN MEASUREMENT

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2.5 VIEW

RECEPTION AREA

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MEETING AREA

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