Booth or no booth

[blake eat world]

if given the choice would most of you record vocals in the live room or a vocal booth. Booths always sound so dry and sterile to me, then if processing is added it sounds wet but processed. I'm trying to decide if building a vocal booth is worth it. do the pros always use booths?

[Digital Sound Lab]

I like the booth. Uneven dimensions are important.
Don't fill it with absorbing foam but a little.

Digital Sound Lab [img]images/icons/smile.gif[/img]

[abraxas]

I like booths for recording vox if the ceiling is no less than 12 feet. Booths with low ceilings sound way too boxy for me. With the right treatment it could be ok though. I much prefer to record vocals in a live room with high ceilings, but I have a pretty specific gobo setup that I use behind the vocalist. Wood platforms are cool. I would suggest not recording vocals in a live room if you don't have gobos.

To answer your question about the pros, I used to assist at a proffessional studio. Engineers listen to a live room and if the reflections are controlled they'll use the live room with gobos. For a tighter sound they'll go for the booth. Some engineers use the live room but then build their own booth with gobos, making a roof out of two by fours covered with packing blankets. Don't ask me why, they just like being difficult in my opinion. I've fallen on my ass quite a few times building these things. Why go through the trouble of building a booth when there's a perfectly good booth 10 feet away.

My best advice would be to experiment with your live room before building a booth.

[Cliff Hughes]

Have to agree with most of the sentiments above. For VO work or narration style projects a booth is great. For vocals unless you can get it big enough a larger space is preferable. [img]images/icons/wink.gif[/img]

Cheers

Cliff

[blake eat world]

awesome, that's what i wanted to hear. I'll probably treat the area where the vocals will be done a little differently but at least there will be no booth construction [img]images/icons/smile.gif[/img]

[Doug Ring]

You can also look at it from the singer's point of view. Sometimes it feels better to sing in a live space if you're not clamped into headphones. I play in an acoustic trio and have the choice of a smallish but lively room, or a large heavily-furnished and very dead room. No contest - the live room wins every time. The guitars sound better and you don't have to sing so loud.

I sometimes think we as engineers are guilty of putting our own concerns above those of the musicians. I did it myself recently when I put an acoustic group in the dead room because I was multi-tracking and didn't want the mike spill. (Talk about not practicing what I preach!) I'm sure they didn't like the room, and I think the performance would have been better in the live one. After all, if you don't have a great performance, no one cares how good it sounds... [img]images/icons/smile.gif[/img]

[Digital Sound Lab]

Doug said it strait that giving the talent options is always important.
I think having both is best.

Digital Sound Lab [img]images/icons/smile.gif[/img]