Why do you need bass traps?

Bass trapping is your #1 priority in your home studio

Why are bass traps so important? The first order of business when creating your home recording studio is to deal with the low end. Bass trapping is paramount to your recording studio design since it takes care of the low frequencies and leaves you with a better sounding home studio.

Treating and tuning your studio room with correct acoustic treatment is a must if you want to get serious about your home recordings. If you have a DIY tendency, there are a few great resources on the web that teach you how to create your own traps.

DIY Bass trapping

KymataSound has a great article that shows you how to easily create your own low end absorbers.

Bass Traps .net is a forum that's dedicated to DIY bass trapping. It has a FAQ on acoustics as well as discussions on optimum bass trapping.
Also take a look at the video on my home recording studio page for some easy to follow DIY bass trapping.

If you don't have the DIY tendency, or can't seem to be able to find the correct material(like me) then you can always buy great acoustic treatment packages from companies such as Auralex. I recently ordered one of their roominator kitsand it absolutely blows me away how much different my room sounds afterwards. Their Project 2 Roominator kit is an even better kit that's ideal for any recording studio situation.

What about absorption?

bass traps

The difference between a bass trap and an absorber is that absorbers only absorb the middle to high frequencies. Bass traps absorb much lower frequencies due to their thickness. A thicker trap means lower frequency absorption. So even though an absorption panel on your walls works well with mid to high frequencies, it's not thick enough to absorb the low end.

Placement Tips

Bass usually builds up pretty heavily in the corners. Therefore it's a good strategy to place all your traps in the corners where they will absorb the most amount of bass. If you have created your own panel traps be sure to place them in a 45� angle in the corner so you eliminate the 90� angle of your walls.

Not only will the placement work the best for bass trapping but it will also help scatter and diffuse the sound-waves in the room. It's always a good idea to try to minimize as many 90� corners as possible so if you can do that while also absorbing the low end of your room you're killing two bird with one stone.

How much?

In a normal control room it's always a good idea to not completely deaden the space. You want a little liveness to the room but that's not the case when it comes to the low end.

You might put up mid to high frequency absorber around the room to give it an even sound but you wouldn't completely tile the room with absorbers unless you are creating a completely dead recording space like a vocal booth.

But you can't really put up too much bass trapping. It's a good idea, if you can, to line every corner in your room with lowe end traps. Bass is very hard to manage so if you have the option, you should definitely try to put as many in your home recording studio as you can.

A great home recording studio isn't only about all the great gear you can buy. There has to be careful consideration put into how you want your room to sound. If you treat your room like the crucial factor that it is it will be much easier to get a professionally sounding mix out of it.

Go back to the home recording studio page for more resources

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