As a freelance dubbing mixer, Graham Kirkman works from home a lot, and like a lot of us, his home studio is just that - a studio in his house. This article is Graham’s story of how he moved his Luminol Audio studio from the loft into a purpose-built, Dolby Atmos equipped, garden studio. Over to you Graham…

The Loft Was Almost Perfect

To be honest my loft studio was almost perfect. No-one else used the space, it was big, it sounded great. So why did I build a new studio in my garden?

Well - you’ll have noticed that I said it was ‘almost’ perfect. In the winter I could hardly feel my fingers and in the summer it was like sitting on the surface of the sun. Add to that that the boss (read wife) told me she wanted to turn it into an upstairs extension!!! So I needed a new space. Garden studio it is then…

Who Could Build A Garden Studio?

The first thing was to find a company who could build it for me. I had no idea so just punched ‘garden studios’ into Google and got way too many hits! I did have a couple of things on my side which made whittling the choice down easier, I considered the price and the need for soundproofing. I had a maximum budget that I simply couldn’t go over and also a maximum footprint that I couldn’t exceed so these two things together knocked a lot of the Google hits out of the park and I was left with about 10 possibilities.

I called each of them individually and asked them about soundproofing….that brought it down to 5 possibilities. I tried to get a ‘feel’ for how professional they came across on the call and that left me with about 3 that I got a good feeling from. One of them, Garden Spaces, invited me to the ‘Grand Designs’ expo at the Excel Centre in London and so I went along, liked what I saw and heard and went with them. 

Plan, Plan And Plan Some More

One of the best pieces of advice I can give is to plan ahead in detail! I had an app on my iPad called Live Home 3D  that enabled me to be able to plan out the studio in 3D. I spent hours and hours drawing and re-drawing it until I got it to where I wanted it and then sent this plan off to the building company who approved it and then, just as building work was about to start….COVID-19 raised its ugly head….

Eventually, the guys were allowed back on site and building began. I was so glad I’d planned everything out as the building shot along and if I’d had major changes it could have been a nightmare. The only things I had to change from my original plan were the locations for the power sockets and where the ceiling speakers would go because with the lights and ceiling acoustic treatment I had limited space for the speakers.

Talking Of Speakers…

Luckily I already had the speakers for a 7.1 system. (Dynaudio LYD 8’s across the LCR and Dynaudio BM5a MKII’s for surrounds) I only needed the 4 ceiling speakers. I really wanted to keep everything Dynaudio, but the only ones that would have fitted (physically) were in-ceiling ones and I didn’t want to drill 4 rather large holes into the soundproofed ceiling, so a quick search showed that 4 Genelec 8010s would be perfect for me. They don’t have the range (obviously) of the Dynaudio’s but as I’m guessing that the majority of Atmos work I may get will be tracklay so that won’t present a problem. In addition, the limited ceiling height meant that the 8010s were the biggest speakers I could fit without concussing myself as I walked around the studio.

Anything Else?

I also didn’t need any other ‘main’ pieces of equipment as I already have Pro Tools Ultimate running natively on a maxed-out 27” iMac and would be using the local Dolby Atmos renderer in the Dolby Atmos Production Suite. That seemed o be all the major parts ticked off and I started to think that maybe I didn’t actually need to buy much more for the build. Naively I thought I’d only need a few bits and bobs...what was I thinking!!! 

Once I went back to another round of planning, the list grew and grew (and grew) Here are just a few of the things that ended up on my shopping list.

• Ceiling mounts for the Genelec 8010 speakers

• Lots of audio wiring

• XLR and jack plugs

• CAT 7 cable

• Trunking

• Laser leveller

• Acoustic panels

• Bass traps

• Measurement mic

• SPL meter

• Acoustic sealant

• Duct Tape

• Cavity wall anchor gun

• Lots of different screws

• New Audio Interface

• TV stand

• Mirror (yes, mirror)

• Video Slave 4 (I wanted 2 additional monitors PLUS a TV)

• Router Satellite

• Alarm System

• And lots more I can’t remember.

As you can see the more I thought about it the more I needed.

An Audio Interface

You may have noticed a new audio interface in the list, that’s because I went from needing 6 analog outputs for 5.1 up to needing 12 outputs for 7.1.4 Dolby Atmos and my existing Focusrite 18i20 only had 10.

I toyed with the idea of a new Avid MTRX Studio but it was just too expensive. I looked at some alternatives before settled on the idea of buying a second 18i20 and linking them together through ADAT. This had the advantage of being economical as they go cheaply and frequently on eBay, and so that’s what I did.

I know that at some point through this build I’d make mistakes, well this was number one. I very quickly realised just how annoying having two separate interfaces was going to be. For example, whenever I wanted to change the volume, I had to change the monitor level on them both separately, which was a massive PITA. I think I lasted about an hour before the 18i20 was back on eBay. It sold a week later and I only lost £10…

I needed a re-think…

At this point, a friend of mine had bought a Focusrite RED 16Line and was raving about it. As luck would have it one appeared a week later on eBay and I got it for a great price. Speaker count sorted!

The build that I paid for included electric supply to all the sockets I’d chosen and to the overhead lights, but that was all. This meant that all the other wiring was down to me. I knew this in advance so it was just a case of working out where in the room all the separate bits of kit would go and using the afore-mentioned iPad app to calculate the lengths of mains cable for each unit and then plugging them in.

Acoustic Treatment

the acoustic isolation was covered as part of the garden studio build but isolation and treatment are 2 different things. There was no point having a nice new space if it sounded like reverb Hell (and it did).

I knew I’d need some sort of acoustic treatment. It’s weird how much we mixers rely on it, but (in my case at least) knew so little about it. I had to find out what I needed.

That came down to asking around some friends and lots of Google surfing. After reading numerous articles and watching just as many YouTube videos, I soon realised that acoustic treatment can basically be put into three categories.

1. Cheap - crap. 

2. Mid-priced - take a punt

3. Expensive but proven to work. 

Option 1 was a no-go and the choice would have been simple if I had the cash but my budget wouldn’t spread to choosing option 3 for the whole studio. As bass frequencies are the hardest to control and also sound terrible if the bass build is left unchecked I decided to spend the bulk of the budget on bass traps using option 3 and go with option 2 for the wall and ceiling absorbers.

I soon narrowed down to two main suppliers, Blue Frog Audio and GIK Acoustics. GIK were more expensive and Joe at Blue Frog was so helpful that I chose Blue Frog. IWith Joe’s help I went for 2 Floor to ceiling BF-850 Super Corner Chunk Bass Traps at the front of the suite and 2 BF-650 Super Corner Chunk Bass Traps floor to ceiling at the rear of the suite.

Again, the budget restraints meant that I couldn't afford them all to be BF-850s so I measured the bass response with Room EQ Wizard and a Behringer ecm8000 mic and it was stronger at the front so the 850s went there. These alone tamed the reverb more than I could have ever hoped for. For the other absorption, I heard through a fellow mixer that he was selling some HEX foam panels, which I put on the ceiling and got some other Melamine panels that were a cancelled order from someone, getting a bargain on both counts!

This Is What The Mirror Was For

I originally placed some of the melamine panels on my rear wall, but they did nothing so I splashed out on a  GIK Monster bass trap and reflector which really helped. When it came to placing them I used the ‘friend with mirror’ trick and got my daughter to drag the mirror from my ear height down the walls until the speakers appeared. This is your first reflection point, which should be covered with panels. I like to think I know what I was doing, but truthfully I think luck took over and when measuring the acoustics of the treated room with Room EQ Wizard the reading were pretty amazing. 

Internet Connectivity

Another massively important thing to think about in building a garden studio is broadband internet and how you get it there. I was originally thinking of using broadband plug extenders but soon realised that they just weren’t good enough. I knew I had to hardwire it. I had a chat with the builders and they ran it from the studio behind the walls through to the outside where the power was also coming in. When the electrician ran the power out to the studio, I ran the CAT7 out the same hole and voila! Broadband to the studio.

More Wiring

Wiring up the studio for both mains and speaker cable involved lots of planning through the iPad app (working out the cable path and then length) cutting appropriate lengths of speaker and mains cabling and basically sitting in my kitchen wiring everything up pre-install. Boring, yes, but easy enough if you plan in advance. I tested every cable I made before running it around the studio (I’d rather know it doesn’t work before It was in situ) and then crossed everything as I turned everything on for the first time. Phew, it all worked, so was definitely worth checking them all.

Turning Everything On And Off

Some things I bought I deemed luxury purchases, but definitely should be thought about if you’re building your own studio. Because my studio isn’t the same size as Odeon Leicester square, squeezing into the front to turn off the LCR speakers meant desperately trying not to knock a speaker off its stand! So I bought TP-LINK Tapo Smart Plug Wi-Fi Plugs for everything and linked them up to Alexa. This way I could just ask Alexa to turn the studio on (and off) and everything would power up and down accordingly in the specific order I programmed. This was especially helpful as the Focusrite RED 16Line makes one hell of a click when turned off and on. I also needed a way to see if anyone was at my front door so I bought an Echo 5, which is a small screen, powered by Alexa that can make calls, play music, show the weather etc but in my case link up with my Nest cameras via wifi, so I can see who is at the front door when I’m locked away in the studio in the back garden. Sounds trivial, but trust me its essential. I can also announce through to the Sonos speakers in the kitchen to ask the wife to make me a coffee - but strangely this feature doesn’t always work.

Air Conditioning

The company that did the build gave the option of air conditioning, which was never a doubt for me. I’d advise any of you to tick yes in this option box. In my case, Garden Spaces supply 2 options so I chose the quieter and more expensive one of the 2. It has an indoor unit like all the ones you ever see in studios and, unfortunately, a big ugly fan unit outside which, due to the shape of the garden, meant we had to place it in full view of the house. The wife’s already got a plan to hide it with some sort of architectural salvage!! It’s not too noisy at all and as the studio is small it doesn’t need to kick in much. I don’t even notice it working which is great.

Here is a quick fly round of my brand new garden studio. Enjoy…

In Conclusion

So is there anything I’d have done differently? Well, if money was no object I would have built a semi-buried studio to get around the 2.5 m external height law which would have given me a much higher ceiling and therefore bigger and better speakers for the atmos overheads. I also wouldn’t advise 2 separate audio interfaces, but that’s about it. If you plan in advance, you’ll save yourself potential headaches during the build. So get planning now, even if your build is ages away, you’ll be glad you did.