Located in Des Moines, Iowa, Trilix Studio is a one-of-a-kind creative production facility situated in the city’s iconic Crescent Building, designed to serve the needs of anyone from corporate clients and TV/film production companies to musical artists and beyond. The studio is an outgrowth of Trilix, a full-service marketing agency that found itself in need of an expansive home base for its robust A/V work, and since the studio opened for business less than a year ago, it has quickly carved out its own niche as an elite recording, mixing, and post-production facility to rival anything found in the nation’s recording hub cities. A centerpiece of the studio is its impressive 7.1.4 Dolby Atmos® system comprising Smart Active Monitors™ from Genelec.
“Trilix Studio was built for one purpose: to achieve the most refined sound experience possible,” said Brett Adams, president of Trilix and Trilix Studio. “Trilix Studio is fully equipped for artists and outfitted with a Dolby Atmos system to provide a fully immersive sound. It allows artists to expand their creativity and is a powerful complement to all of our video production work.”
Although the facility boasts four different interconnected studio rooms (Studios A, B, C and D), the undisputed beating heart of Trilix Studio is its Studio A, which is the Dolby Atmos immersive control room. This room features an impressive complement of gear, with the immersive monitoring system itself made up of the following Genelec models: seven 8361A monitors for the mains, sides, and rears; four 8351B monitors in the height positions; and a 7382A subwoofer. The facility was designed by the acoustic thought leaders at Russ Berger Design Group (RBDG) and outfitted with the latest equipment from Sweetwater Integrations.
Phillip Young, who serves as Trilix Studio’s Head Audio Engineer, was also heavily involved in the planning and setup of the studio, as well as its ongoing operation. Uniquely, Young did not have much previous hands-on experience with Genelec monitors, but he was fully aware of their reputation when the studio was in its planning stages: “I had a general idea of what we needed, and one aspect of that was the smaller size profile and rigging options of these monitors compared to some larger options from other brands that often have to be free-standing.
Additionally, with another brand I was considering, I knew I was prone to ear fatigue, so I was wary. I started doing a bunch of research, and Genelec seemed like the right solution. I was very familiar with the reputation of the Genelec brand, and I had only heard really fantastic things about them. Approaching Sweetwater Integrations with my preferences, they were very enthusiastic about an all-Genelec system. I had total faith in them and needed no other convincing!”
Young has been more than busy in Studio A since it opened its doors. On any given day, he might find himself working on any number of different projects spanning genres and disciplines. “In the morning, I might be working on a mix for an independent prog-metal band, and then in the afternoon jump into pre-production on a feature-length film. And that is something we knew and considered when building out this room: we knew that we’d be doing everything from editing a podcast to doing sound design and mix on movies.
And I’m lucky to be part of a large and very talented team: Senior Audio Engineer Brooke Schaffner, who generally focuses more on the video work than I do (although we each do both); and a truly exceptional camp of designers, video editors, videographers, animators, web developers, podcasters, and other specialists. So we needed the room to be able to do all of those things to the best it possibly could, and it certainly does.”
Outfitting the space as an Atmos facility was crucial, as Young sees it: “When we were designing and building out the space, we aimed at going above and beyond anything that's really available in the entire state of Iowa, or even places like Chicago or Nashville. Atmos is key to that. The writing has been on the wall for a few years that Atmos is the future of audio in so many ways. It is a future-proof format, because it can do so many things, and because of the unique way it stores information, it is able to adapt to any different playback system, from just a few speakers or a soundbar, to a truly immersive system with a multitude of speakers.
It is adaptable and smart in an open-ended way, and that is what makes it future-proof. I regularly have to explain Atmos to bands and marketing clients, and once they understand it, they are so excited. We have so many independent bands mixing their music for Atmos now, which certainly wasn’t the case just a few years ago. It’s easy to get it out there with indie distribution to places like Apple Music and Tidal, and I’m sure there will be more places supporting music mixed for Atmos in the future.”
And the choice of Genelec has continued to reinforce itself as a good one: “Working with Genelec has been a pleasure,” notes Young. “The Genelec GLM software has been an invaluable way to manage the system. Mark Salamone at Sweetwater got me in touch with Will Eggleston at Genelec Inc., and we sat down together on a video chat, and he personally guided me through the GLM Setup File I made of this room.
He was able to give us some great guidance on how to get the most out of our system and really dial it in for this space. And working day to day on these monitors has been something special. I don’t really have to worry about ear fatigue, which is not something I can say for monitors from other manufacturers. And what does the future hold? We might be looking at some gear upgrades. It’s hard to say, but I know whatever we do, Genelec will be involved.”
For more information, please visit www.genelec.com.
