Project Studios and Home Recording

[wst3]

Originally posted by Violine
I'm not using any preamp... just plugging the mic into the minidisc and going. Until I bought the Philips CR burner, the sound was fine that way - 'cause no one else owned a minidisc and I had to distribute on cassette. The recordings lost so much quality being transfered even to metal tape that I never bothered with any other equipment.

Actually, my point exactly... the preamps in the portable minidisk and DAT recorders are notoriously bad, mostly due to insufficient headroom. Almost anything is an improvement<G>! Since you work on location, and the rest of your rig does not need AC power, I would suggest the Midiman AudioBuddy. It can be modified to operate off batteries, and the performance in that mode is actually remarkably good. (Caveat - I do some design work for MIDIMan)

Originally posted by Violine
Now that I can transfer to CD however, I'm looking to upgrade. The problems are that a) I still want everything to be portable to gigs (in other words - it all has to fit in my violin case or music bag) and b) I'm down in Kansas working and there aren't very many places here to try-before-you-buy.

That last part does pose a challenge, but there are vendors on the web who will let you try after you buy, and take things back if you are not happy.

The portability issues really isn't an issue. The Audio Buddy is smaller than your recorder.

Originally posted by Violine
The Core Sound mics are the size of ear bud earphones. I've seen 'em at work and heard the results. For about $300 I can improve my recordings about 10 fold.

I've played around with the stealth microphones, not Core Sound's to the best of my knowledge but others, and I was prepared to be really impressed... but I wasn't!

Two alternatives you might consider are the Oktava and Marshall lines. Both have small diaphram condensor microphones that sound pretty good, and a pair of either will cost you less than $300.

They are physically larger than the Core Sound Stealth microphones, but they will sound better.

Originally posted by Violine
Ha! Yeah, I just downloaded my first editing program (a demo version of Sound Forge - recommended by a friend at Discmakers). I don't understand half of what this program can do!

It can do a lot! It was my first audio editor on the PC, and I still have my copy, but I don't use it much. They just released the beta for their next version, and it still has that Sonic Foundry UI, which can't be beat, but it is starting to get a little long in the tooth for most audio work.

Others to check out include Wavelab from Steinberg, Samplewrench from dissidents, and CoolEdit Pro from Syntrillium. Because you are working with large files, you might also want to look at some of the non-destructive editors, like Samplitude and SAW, they will save you hours of time! Unfortunately, both of these are really optimized for multitrack work.

Wavelab V3 has a non-destructive mode, but I haven't tried it yet. Sound Forge also has a pseudo-non-destructive mode, they call it a cut list, but it really clutters up the display, so I seldom use it.

Some other things to check out... plug-ins... they can really expand your arsenal of tools. For noise reduction I find Sonic Foundries plug-in to be the best for really complex projects. I haven't felt the need to try Steinbergs tools, but I hear they are pretty good. The other one that I like is Raygun from Arboretum... funny name, almost no controls, but for quick cleanup it is hard to beat!

As far as reverbs, equalizers, compressors, etc, I've pretty much settled on the entire suites from Waves and Power Technologies, along with an Equalizer from TC|works. They all do some things well, and they have their own approaches to user interfaces<G>... there are also a LOT of freeware and shareware plugins, and some of them are quite good.

The equalizer in Sound Forge is pretty good for "surgical" work, but I don't think it is all that musical. I don't care for their compressor at all.

The other tool in Sound Forge that you need to look at is their batch processor... if you find that you need to do a lot of processing you can set up the parameters and then let the computer do all the processing while you sleep, watch TV, go to your day job, whatever... a real help for complex projects.

Originally posted by Violine
It was. We sat up there with scores and basically had to breathe with the singers. Most shows took 2 people to run sound. Sometimes we were cutting back and forth between 2 playback machines mid-song... so one could re-cue while the other finished the next verse. I really am glad those days are over. (Did I mention that this place was an amateur (read VOLUNTEER) theater company and NOBODY got paid????)

I've done sound design for theatre since college, and it remains one of my favorite challenges. I pretty much stick to local amateur theatres because it is usually a lot of fun.

The advent of CDs and samplers has made the whole thing so much easier... and better! For one shot effects I simply load them into an ancient EPS and let the sound person hit the keys. For music I make the necessary edits and then create two CDs so that they can work back and forth.

It is worlds more repeatable than two tape decks, and it sounds worlds better than two card machines! And there is no variability with cueing. I just can't say enough for this approach!

Probably the best part is that for any given project I now have much more time to actually create the sound effects... which is, for me, the best part!