Advice for setting up a studio at home

I'm still starting out, too, so most of this is just pointers to threads on this site that discuss setting up home studios:

voiceacting.boards.net/thread/94/recording-environment-tin-why
This thread is probably the best place to start. It discusses how to set up a recording environment, where NOT to set up a recording environment, how to minimize room noise, how to control reverberation, pop filters, etc. The whole thread is well worth reading.

voiceacting.boards.net/thread/185/mic-geeks-favorite-mics-why
This thread is a nice run-down on the microphones people are using. In it are discussions from people using the Blue Snowball and Blue Yeti, two USB mics made by Blue Microphones. I'm guessing the person you spoke to was talking about one of them. There are also discussions of other USB microphones, as well as XLR based microphones.

voiceacting.boards.net/thread/586/home-recording-setup
This thread offers a look at a number of people's home recording setups. It's right in line with the questions you're asking.

I was looking for other threads to post links to, but anything else I'd post boils down to, "Read all the sticky posts at the top of each forum." There's a wealth of information here, and the sticky threads are all worth reading.

I can relate to your online ordering and shipping issues, living in Malta. I live on an island in the middle of the Pacific. It's amazing to see what people won't ship out here, even from inside the same country. The last time I bought a microphone I went through about four vendors before I found one willing to ship it to me.

Cheers,

Tom

What should I get? Blue Yeti or Blue Snowball? There's a €100 difference, and I'm trying not to be too cheap, but is the snowball good enough? I want my recordings to sound good. What's an umbrella? And also - I might need a stand.
Can you clarify this egg-thing for the walls? I understand I probably need it, but do I need it all over my walls?

Yeah this guy clearly wanted to make some money off me and he wouldn't even tell me the name of the mic - just blue sth.

There are 2 very important things you need to take into consideration first of all.

#1. Are you going to be doing this professionally, or just as a hobby in your spare time -- at least to start out (first 6 months or more).

and

#2. The amount of money you have available to spend on things you don't really *need* each month.


For amateur/hobby voice actors starting out, I would strongly urge you to NOT spend more than at most, about 1 month's worth of your discretionary money. For some people, that might be a cheap USB mic for 40-100 euros, for others, it could be a few hundred euros or even more.

For professional work just starting out, again, even if you've saved up I would AGAIN urge you not to spend more than about 6 months worth of the money you can spare (after bills, groceries, rent/utilities/house taxes, etc.) in one go. Start small and buy more equipment and/or upgrade out of the money you earn voice acting.

At least, that's the way I would do things. I don't think it's good to stick your neck out too far financially. =) Within that, do your research *thoroughly* (you seem to be off to a great start!) and buy what makes you happy and suits your needs the best. =)

Remember too, different mics work better and worse for different voices, and suit different tastes! The Blue Yeti is very popular, but for me personally, just as an example, I don't like how much bass it seems to have and prefer different mics. But again, that's with my voice, too. =)

My suggestion would be, before you worry about audio equipment, consider your recording environment first and foremost (see Benedict's first link). It's not just things like outside noises or things that make noise such as furnaces, computer fans, or what have you; being able to kill room reverb and echo I think is what's most important. Even if you had the most amazing voice with the most amazing acting talent using the most amazing equipment, if it sounds like you're recording in a bathroom, that could be what kills your chances for a role.

Here's a video on turning a small space into an ideal recording environment using stuff around your home (1:43 shows an audio comparison between an untreated and treated space, and 3:30 shows the actor's actual space):



It looks like he's using a Snowball for recording, too, so regardless if you swear by USB or XLR microphones, you can tell just how much the space affects the quality of your recordings. Get that taken care of and you won't have to worry so much about what kind of equipment you should buy.

That said, don't assume that those portable recording booths that people stick their mics in are the be-all solutions. Sometimes they work with USB mics due to their lower sensitivity, but because of the way sound works, those booths can't capture your voice entirely. There is a chance that your voice will still bounce around the room and back into the mic. Also, because pop filters, in actuality, weren't designed specifically to eliminate plosives but to instead protect the microphone from moisture and spit, you would have to speak towards the mic at a bit of an angle for an ideal recording anyway. Meaning, the little booth won't be catching the majority of your voice. Also, should you ever upgrade to an XLR microphone like I did, I can say those portable recording booths become completely useless due to how sensitive those mics are. You would have to take into account the entire space in the end.

Oops! I probably shouldn't have thrown that term in there. It just confused things. Here's a picture of a mic stand:

img.clipartfest.com/8166dd98856db475d3f3f08f64733357_microphone20stand20clip-microphone-stand-clip-art_500-500.jpeg

Here's a picture of a boom stand:

www.practical-music-production.com/images/mic-stand.jpg

They both accomplish the same task: holding the microphone in a location that lets you work comfortably and get the sound you need. The thread on home recording setups shows a number of other ways to hold the microphone as well. None of them are necessarily better than any others, so long as they place the microphone where you need it.

The difficult part of choosing and treating a space for echo and reverb is that you don't really know what will work until you try. There's also no right answer between recording in a large space versus a small one. It just means they might need to be treated differently. Larger spaces might require more treatment, but because sound has to travel farther before it hits any surface, you might not need to treat every flat surface in the room. By contrast, a small space (such as a closet) might be easier to treat, but you would have to make sure you cover up as much space as possible. Some have told me that even acoustic foam doesn't completely kill sound, but instead only lessens it. If there's still plenty of flat, untreated space around you, what little sound that's reflected could still make it back to the mic. That's why I spared no expense when padding out my whole closet to get rid of as many flat, hard surfaces as possible, just to be sure.

But if we look again at that video I posted, there are a few things we could note. First off, there's this MASSIVE portion of the closet that's not only untreated, but it's also angled slightly towards the mic. If it were me, I'd have padded that thing before even attempting to record. But it seems like it doesn't pose a problem for the voice over, and this is my guess why: the Snowball has an option for what's called a 'cardioid polar pattern,' a pattern that every voiceover mic should have:



As the image shows, it means the mic works best when sound is coming directly in front of it. That might be why that big, flat surface isn't a problem because it's to the side, and since the speaker is talking towards a bunch of padded material, any reflected noise would be both too dampened already to be a problem and the mic would have trouble picking it up, anyway. Also, note that the majority of the padded material is behind the mic, with some more in all corners of the closet and lined along the bottom of the walls. Corners and edges can be a major problem for reverb and echo, so once those are taken care of along with the majority of the space behind the microphone, I'd say that's why his space works so well despite having a huge untreated spot.

So to simplify everything a bit:

1) Know how your microphone works; chances are, it picks up sound most directly from the front. You want to make sure that any reflected sound is taken care of before it reaches the front of the mic again.
2) Before you begin, do lots of planning. Consider all options for a recording space, and figure out what might be easiest versus what is most effective. Something might not work out and you'll have to figure out how to remedy it: maybe the space will require more padding, maybe something will have to be moved out to make room, or maybe some things just have to be adjusted a bit.
3) If you choose a large recording space, make sure that the space in the direction you're speaking is treated most to capture the bulk of your voice. If additional treatment is needed, it should be for corners and edges around the room since they are very bad for reverb and echo. A smaller recording space should be treated as much as possible just to be sure.

Also, as I said before, if you are going with a USB microphone like the Snowball, it is possible that its lower sensitivity might make treating a recording space easier than if you were using an XLR mic, but I can't say for sure. In the end, again, it's just knowing how sound works and treating whatever space you choose however you need to.

And just to throw it out there, if you're looking to purchase some good material for noise proofing that's also a good solution to keep a space from getting too hot, I can say that memory foam mattress toppers work; they can also be cut up to be more easily placed around a room:




I'm sure you can find these at just about any home department store, but if you wind up needing a place that ships to Malta, it turns out Bed Bath and Beyond does that. You can then use picture hanging strips to easily place the foam without worrying about damaging the walls. You can use big strips like these if you want to hang the entire thing, or get smaller strips if you cut it up into tinier pieces:



Or you could use the foam mattress as a makeshift carpet if you're worried about the hard floor reflecting noise. You can then just roll it up and store it away when you don't need it. It is very cushiony, though, so if you have to place your mic on it, make sure it's incredibly stable.

I'm going on longer than I had meant to, but there are tons of options to choose from and things to consider. I really do believe that the room you record in could possibly be the most important asset in online voice acting (second only to actual acting talent and experience), so make sure you get this taken care of to really heighten your chances of nabbing roles.

Guys thanks so much - Ian thanks for going ahead and checking for me that the site you mentioned ships to malta (Y) :3 I'm touched.

I will go ahead and start doing what I can to my room, but I understand that until I have a mic I am just guessing, although probably in a good direction.

Seems like a strong point for the Snowball that it can be set to capture ideally for VOs. Anyway, I called a local music shop, and the guy who answers and spoke to me says that he's actually an audio engineer who records VOs himself (he's not an actor though just records).

He suggested to me two models within my budget:

USB: Rode NT USB at euro 175
Condenser: Rode NT 1A + Steinberg UR22 (audio interface) = 175 + 125 = euro 300.

He claimed those were (in his experience) satisfactory for professional level VOs. I asked him about the Blue Snowball, Yeti, etc, and he didn't have much to say about those, he didn't say they were bad, but said that because of supplier policies, he does not handle Blue. Dear extremely helpful people, what are your comments? His prices didn't seem too high compared to amazon, is the extra cash over the snowball worth it? I don't think that these models have the snowball's feature where they only pick up sound in front of them.