Remember when you were a kid and you built a fort out of pillows, blankets, whatever? Same idea here – this one’s built out of moving blankets. I put it up and take it down every day that I record but it’s really the brainchild of my husband – he designed it, hammered in the grommets and installed the wood screws.
This is recording set-up 3.0 for me. When I first started out in voiceover and audiobooks, I set up the mic stand in a corner of the bedroom and hung blankets around me as best as I could. That location, however, proved to be too close to the wall we shared with our neighbors in the next apartment. So then I tried an area away from the shared wall, in front of our bedroom doorway. It was better but I really needed something more isolated and preferably, enclosed.
So, it was time to tweak my set-up once again. My husband (a musician and former owner of a recording studio) and I walked around our apartment and chose the vestibule between our living room, bedroom and bathroom as the best location. Then we talked about how to treat the space, so that sound waves wouldn’t be bouncing off the walls around me, creating nasty reflections. Hanging moving blankets would be the easiest, cheapest solution. We already had several moving blankets and my husband offered to purchase the additional ones we’d need and to pound in the grommets and install the wood screws from which the blankets would hang.
A few days later, after some trial and error, my fort was ready. Here are two samples from the audiobook I’m currently working on. The first was recorded in the untreated vestibule – sounds decent but a little echo-y – but the second one was recorded in my moving blanket fort – and sounds much better, more present, less like I’m in a tunnel. Happy camper.
You have any recording fort adventures you’d like to share? Leave a comment – I’d love to hear from you.
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