Boing Recording Studios has expanded its facility in Mumbai with the addition of two rooms to handle both stereo and immersive projects. Genelec Smart Active Monitors and 9301B multichannel digital audio interface have been installed to provide hybrid monitoring.
Founded in 2013 by Mayur Tekchandaney and Jiten Solanki, Boing has been an active player in Mumbai’s vibrant studio market, serving advertising production houses. With acoustic design by Sam Toyoshima, Boing started life with two recording suites. Its flagship Studio One, is equipped with Genelec 1038CF main monitors paired with a 7071 subwoofer and 8341s close-fields. Meanwhile, Studio Two is a workhorse space to handle down edits and occasional tracking.
‘When we started, we were a one-of-a-kind modest recording studio, with a pool of excellent talent,’ recalls CEO and senior engineer, Solanki. ‘We were easily able to meet our clients’ requirements. But, as time passed by and requirements grew, we realised that we desperately needed more studios. Post the disruption of Covid, in early 2022, we were presented with an opportunity to expand our facility, on a higher floor in the same building.’
While the need for more space was demanded by existing clients, it was the pandemic experience that set the direction for the studio. ‘The disruption of Covid taught us that we needed to build another vertical in our business model, something complementing our advertising work,’ Solanki explains. ‘So we decided that in the expansion project, we’d make one of the two new studios an Atmos room. The room would be able to do OTT broadcast work along with advertising.’
This move meant that Studio Three would be a relatively straightforward project – cloning Studio One – but with 1238DFs as the main monitors, 8351s for close-field work, and a 7380 subwoofer. However, Studio Four would prove to be a more complicated project.
‘We were able to build the room to our requirements with some extensive design expertise from Bharat Reddy of Dolby, but deciding on monitoring was a challenge,’ Solanki says. ‘Advertising meant a stereo set-up, whereas OTT meant a 7.1.4 set-up, so we needed a hybrid monitoring system. As we were taking our first steps into immersive monitoring, which was to run hand in glove with a high SPL stereo production environment, we were trying to understand what monitoring to go with.’
After discussions with Shiv Sood from local Genelec distributor Sound Team, who had supplied Boing’s original Genelec system, they found a solution in the 9301B multichannel digital audio interface. ‘
The 9301B provides seamless multichannel audio to the AES input of the subwoofer,’ Solanki says. ‘This became the basis of the monitoring set-up in Studio Four. For the main 2.1 monitors, we chose the 8351 three-way coaxials along with a 7380 subwoofer. This gave us the SPL required for advertising work. For the centre channel we chose the 8341; a fantastic match with the 8351s – tonally the same but with an SPL which suited our Atmos requirement. For the surrounds and overheads, we went with two-way 8330s – and the 9301B handles the bass management of all monitors. Finally, we use Genelec’s GLMcalibration software, which manages our workflow seamlessly.’
With the expansion complete, Solanki reflects on the positive relationship that the studio has with the manufacturer. ‘Genelec and Boing have a symbiotic relationship. Our monitoring is almost exclusively Genelec, and this has helped establish Boing as one of the best studios in India.’
