Autopanners are pretty cool in that they can add motion to an element of a mix to make it more interesting. Most autopanners are pretty much a variation on the same theme however, going left to right at either a predetermined speed or dynamically induced by the program material. The new Waves Brauer Motion plugin […]
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Vance Powell is one of the few engineers to make a successful transition from live sound to the studio. After serving as the chief engineer at Nashville’s acclaimed Blackbird Studios, Vance stepped out on his own with a string of Grammy awards from Jars of Clay, Buddy Guy, Chris Stapleton and The Raconteurs. Since then […]
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We’re very used to creating artificial acoustic environments in mixing all the time, many times without actually thinking about how this new environment might actually interact with the voice or instrument in nature (although that shouldn’t be the case). Here’s a great video where you hear Joachim Mullner (also known as The Wikisinger) cleverly sing […]
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If you’re recording a live performance, then you want to pick up some of the audience to make it sound realistic. Here are some techniques and considerations culled from the latest edition of my Recording Engineer’s Handbook. “Audience recording is both the key and the problem with live recording. It’s sometimes difficult to record the audience […]
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Abbey Road Studios senior engineer Sam Okell had the unenviable task of remixing one of the most listened to and beloved album of all time – the 50th anniversary release of The Beatles seminal Sgt Pepper. Sam and producer Giles Martin (son of original Beatles engineer George Martin) were tasked with a job that many […]
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Some microphones just don’t have enough output when you need it, causing you to crank up the preamp and the noise along with it. Cloud Microphones released a solution for this a few years ago with its Cloudlifter, and now it’s gone another step with its new Cloudlifter CL-Zi, which is finally shipping. The original […]
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Mastering engineer Pete Doell was on the podcast a couple of years ago, but he has a brand new room at Aftermaster in Hollywood so I thought it would interesting to talk to him about how he put it together. We talked about gear, acoustics, and dealing with a room that he couldn’t change much […]
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I generally think that most high-end audio gear is pretty bogus (there are exceptions, of course), and that opinion comes from auditioning various equipment at hi-fi shows. Not the best place to listen, I agree, but in most cases things are so off that within the first 10 seconds of listening I know that there’s […]
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Engineer/producer Eddie Kramer has a resume that’s a mile long, but the credit that he’s forever tied to is Jimi Hendrix. I was lucky enough to be able to spend some time with him a few yeas ago, and he gave me this great interview for The Recording Engineer’s Handbook. Here’s an excerpt from his […]
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When building a studio without the help of a professional, most people are concerned with getting even absorption across the frequency spectrum. They don’t think about diffusion until later in the construction process, and then are shocked to discover that effective diffusors can take up more space than they were anticipating. Diffusors are important to […]
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One of the byproducts of recording on tape is the fact that it added some glue to the mix that engineers have found lacking in the digital world. As a result, tape saturation plugins have become standard in many mixer’s plugin lists, and they’re getting more and more sophisticated every day. The latest tape emulator […]
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Beatie Wolfe is an excellent singer/songwriter with 3 albums and an EP under her belt, but she’s also on the cutting edge of tech and how it’s incorporated into the musical experience. Beatie’s first album 8ight featured a unique 3D interactive album, her Montegu Square album featured a one-off musical jacket and the world’s first […]
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We live in a golden age of audio software. Just about any digital audio workstation that you buy is easy to use and has more power than almost any analog studio, and the plugins available are nothing short of spectacular. The only problem is that there are so many DAW packages available that it’s difficult […]
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By my count, there are 8 “constants” that we find in vocal recording. These are items or situations that almost always prove to be true. Just keeping them in mind can save you a lot of trouble in the search for a sound that works for you and your vocalist. Here are a few tips […]
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How long does a song have to last before you’d call it long? 5 minutes? 15 minutes? An hour? Some Indian ragas last more than 3 hours. That’s long by Western tastes but not to fans of the genre. That said, there’s a category of music where a song not only lasts for years, but even decades […]
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