ASG Helps Black Lava Studios Build 9.1.6 Immersive Audio Facility

Advanced Systems Group (ASG) has helped audio professional Steve Schatz design and build Black Lava Studios, a 9.1.6 Dolby Atmos mixing and mastering facility in a converted residential garage in Sacramento. The studio supports Dolby Atmos music mixing and mastering, film and documentary work, sound design, recording, and quality control.

Schatz brings approximately 25 years of professional audio experience, including work on film dubbing stages at Universal, Warner Bros., Sony, Disney, and Skywalker Sound. ASG designed the monitoring environment and advised on speaker placement, room correction, conversion, and signal routing. The system combines 15 Neumann KH 150 loudspeakers, a KH 870 subwoofer, a Trinnov D-MON processor, a Digital Audio Denmark AX64 interface supporting analog, AES, Dante, and MADI connections, and a Lynx Studio Hilo converter for stereo and headphone monitoring.

Collyer guided me through many of the intangibles of building a studio; the things you may not think about until you have lived with a room, says Schatz. They were incredibly patient. They loaned me equipment and gave me time to listen, work, and develop a real sense of what I wanted. It wasn't just about selling equipment. They understood the workflow and what I was trying to build. ASG went above and beyond. They offered knowledge, contacts, equipment, and moral support. We became friends very quickly because we share the same passion. They weren't just integrators and builders. They understood why I wanted to create this room.

Steve has spent his career in some of the best audio environments in the industry, so he knew exactly what a professional room should feel like, says Collyer Spreen, Professional Technical Sales Engineer, ASG. Our job was to help him translate that experience into a studio, work through the options with him, and make sure every part of the monitoring system supported the way he wanted to work.

An early test came when Schatz mixed a 13-minute documentary directed by Thom Zimny for Springsteen's Nebraska box set release. It was a chance to battle-test the room, and it came out beautifully, Schatz says. That was an important moment because it showed that the decisions we had made were working, not only technically, but creatively.

LINK:	https://www.sportsvideo.org/2026/10/02/asg-helps-black-lava-studios-bu...
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