How did you get started in audio engineering?

[Laura]

I got started as a Nature recorder. I have always loved the songs of crickets & cicadas. In '04 I found someone selling a minidisc recorder and I bought a few clip-on mics and spent a summer roaming the fields at night and recording insects. I used CoolEdit to create a CD I called "Insect Summer of Love". (Insect Summer of Love Nature Sounds of 2004)
This was how I learned the basics of music tracking & recording. Would you believe that I get a request for this CD a few times a month. People say the summer insect sounds are very relaxing.

Since then I've re-started playing guitar/bass and discovered Ambient music, so now I"m ready to get serious about recording. I HAVE to record my own tracks because it's easier than trying to find folks who will jam with me

Now can anyone answer a question. I have Cubase LE. What is the difference with "regular" Cubase? And is it possible to upgrade without having to buy the latest versions for several hundred $$? If not, what am I missing by not upgrading?

Thanks!

[emiliano]

Originally Posted by Laura

Now can anyone answer a question. I have Cubase LE. What is the difference with "regular" Cubase? And is it possible to upgrade without having to buy the latest versions for several hundred $$? If not, what am I missing by not upgrading?

Thanks!

Ciao Laura,
LE is a very basic version in the Cubase family. There are some upgrade offers out to get the new release 4 but, I guess, even the discounted prices will be out of your reach.
You may consider the SE version, it has an audio engine based on the SX version (32 bit floating point with auto plugin latency compensation) and it does't cost that much. You will be loosing features required in big studios (monitoring facilities and surround support) plus the new VST3 plugin set. In my opinion is a good starting point especially if you enhance the available features with a good selection of free VST and VSTi.

You might also consider Cakewalk products, the all have good price/feature ratio compared to other DAWs (but they only run on Windows, this might be an issue or not ...).

Let me know if you need more info, ciao, Emiliano

[jdaug]

Laura-depending on your requirements, LE may be all you need. I would just learn and work with that. If you get to the point where you are running out of tracks or plug ins, then you know you need something more.

the upgrade to studio 4 is like $200 i think

[Laura]

Originally Posted by emiliano

You may consider the SE version, it has an audio engine based on the SX version (32 bit floating point with auto plugin latency compensation) and it does't cost that much. You will be loosing features required in big studios (monitoring facilities and surround support) plus the new VST3 plugin set. In my opinion is a good starting point especially if you enhance the available features with a good selection of free VST and VSTi.

Let me know if you need more info, ciao, Emiliano

Thanks for your info! I'm afraid I don't know what this is:

"an audio engine based on the SX version (32 bit floating point with auto plugin latency compensation)"

I have a Lexicon recording interface which is supposed to take care of the latency issue.

So Cubase 4 is the "next step" from LE? And I wonder if the cubase guys offer any upgrade deals for those who have LE.

I still have my old CoolEdit and it works pretty well. I'm still wondering if I need to switch to Cubase. I guess just because the plugins might be more up to date.

[emiliano]

Originally Posted by Laura

Thanks for your info! I'm afraid I don't know what this is:

"an audio engine based on the SX version (32 bit floating point with auto plugin latency compensation)"

I have a Lexicon recording interface which is supposed to take care of the latency issue.

So Cubase 4 is the "next step" from LE? And I wonder if the cubase guys offer any upgrade deals for those who have LE.

I still have my old CoolEdit and it works pretty well. I'm still wondering if I need to switch to Cubase. I guess just because the plugins might be more up to date.

About the latency:
You are right, the Lexicon interface takes care of recording latency. When you mix tracks, though, it is very likely you'll be using plugins. Some of them put some delay (it can range from some samples to several milliseconds), some don't. The risk is that by using plugins you can introduce phase shifting which is something that is better not to have. With LE you have to compensate manually for this delay (or latency), higher versions (from SE up) do it automatically.

About the upgrade:

Cubase SE3 costs in Italy 139Euros.

I know there should be an offer to upgrade from LE to 4 (either Studio or regular), you may try to check this out to your dealer.

Cool Edit is more an audio editor than a DAW (Digital Audio Workstation) even is it has some multitrack funcionalities.

Let me know for further info, ciao, Emiliano (www.ntfc.it)

[youngpic]

Whats going down everybody!
Lets see, how did i get started in audio engineering? To make a long story short
I did it all for a woman who i made my wife in the end. From 1996 until 2004 i was incarcerated in California Department of Corrections. I was paroled in Dec. 2004 and I moved out of the country a lil later. I turned back to what i did best and lived the fast life again until i saw( not met) my wife. I was at a going away party for my Special Forces friend and i saw this Amazon of a woman. Five foot ten inches of half breed perfection. Her father is Irish Australian and her mother was Filipina. My wife was a TV show host and model. I wanted her to like me for me and not the money i made from the street life. So i decided to get into the music industry. At first i started rapping and i was pretty good at it. Actually i am the best this country has right now. So i got my foot in the door and ignored my wife until she chased after me and we got married. I liked the the whole concept of audio engineering and saw it as a way out of the life i was living. Under Marcus Davis Jr. and Keith Martin i learned the ins and outs of recording, pre and post production, mixing and mastering. I now use Nuendo 3 and Reason 4 as my tools, as well as all the plugins you could name and outboard gear for effects and compression. Marcus and Keith have done work all around the world and Keith used to be the head engineer for MC hammer and has worked with Boys 2 Men, Babyface, etc. Marcus Davis is the name everyone should look out for in the near future. He is one of the most talented producer/ artists around. I thank him for everything i know now. So thats my story and i hope you enjoyed it or learned from it. An X-con can still do good in life...

[Revolt]

Originally Posted by volsball

How did any of you get started in audio engineering? Did you just teach yourself or did someone teach you? Most of the people I know that do this kind of stuff learned from others who were already doing it.

I basically learned everything I know from one of my close friends, who started as an emcee before I did. His techniques were very easy to learn and remember, and from that knowledge I added my own style of mixing to my work.

[Hunter33]

I was a bit of a late starter as a move between 2 continents kind of messed me up at an early age and I was unable to complete normal education.
Having returned back to the UK/London at around 19 with some initial band experience (punk/thrash bands with mates) I continued to search for other musicians to play with and eventually found some jamming mates to experiment with. This is where the whole recording thing started for me. We'd record everything we did and listening back to the sessions gave me insights about positioning of the recording equipment.

I/We later progressed to playing live. This was an experimental time for me and I would setup all my equipment (couple of guitar amps, a Casio keyboard, a distortion pedal, a tape player, mixer, guitar and a drumkit) in a room at some crazy parties (underground scene/raves etc) with total freedom to play whatever we wanted. Being an alternative/non mainstream kind of thing most of the folks were appreciative of our experimental approach and gave great feedback. One of the main things I remember was 'needs more bass' (we didn't have any bass at the time).

With the technological age of music exploding around me I found myself surrounded by friends making music on computers and creating their own samples. This inspired me to get into PC's and learn to use them as a tool for further development of my own sounds. I'm still learning.

At one point I was living in an underground studio run by mates and was basically a studio hand although it was mainly a rehearsal room but I got to observe a lot of other bands and their techniques. Actually (a band whos name I won't mention as I still have their drumkit) used to rehearse there before they got signed (which was frustrating in itself to witness a Mainstream pop rock band get signed by Sony bigwigs).

I increased my own musical output and got involved with mulitple band projects at the same time. 1 band just wasn't cutting it for me as my taste in music is very diverse and being in 1 band kind of felt restrictive.
One of the bands got to the stage of recording an album so I sold my sampler (still hurts) for 150 quid to put towards the costs of a 3 day studio rental in Londons Old street. Suffice to say not much came of that (most of the failures from the bands I've been in have resulted from band members and drugs - lol, just sad really), but I learnt a lot from that experience too.
We recorded using pro-tools and a mate did the engineering to help cut the costs. It turned out I paid money to end up with 13 cd's worth of our studio recording channels so I could mix them at home. That was my first proper mixing experience of a band but my computer at the time couldn't really handle it (reminds me, I should try it now with my new setup! ).

Cut a long story short, I eventually (after a couple of frustrating years of failed band experiments) did a private course on an SSL G+ desk which also involved music technology (midi, computers, samplers, backline, patchbays, using Logic etc).
*Note*
Halfway through this course Logic decided to go Mac only and as a PC user this really was annoying as the whole course had been taught using Logic.
/Note
This taught me many fundamentals that I was missing and quite a few things that I wouldn't need unless I was working in a pro studio (tape head aligment etc).

I had by this time aquired a few dodgy mics (maybe 1 SM58 an a pair of condensors among them) and a Soundcraft desk and was in the position of being able to record bands although I was still only using a tape machine to output the desk to. I started offering my services to mates bands to record them free of charge. The results weren't always good but it was a way of learning from mistakes. One of the demos was called 'We are shit' , which says a lot.

I had also been squatting for quite a few years by this point so my lifestyle allowed for experimentation that would normally not be possible.
I experimented with foam and creating a sort of Igloo in a room to dampen reverberation from straight concrete walls and observed its effects.
However none of these studios were permanent as I was on the move a lot.

Anyway so today my lifestyle has changed drastically, finally settled down with my girlfriend and enjoying having an environment that is semi-permanent and **** (lol ok its not cold!).
I've pretty much given up on bands unless they are just for fun or started by me and am now focussing on my own musical projects. I do miss the freedom of having loads of room to mess about in, but I don't miss the frustrating feeling of going nowhere. I'm still unemployed but at least I'm in control of the direction this will all take now.
-------------------
Take from this statement what you will but I guess the shorthand is with enough dedication, time and patience you can learn anything yourself. I think the first step is to understand what YOUR STRONG POINTS are generally and train them even more. What is it your talent that you can do better than others? Focus on that. For example mine has always been good hearing which lead to stuff from being able to spontaneously Jam a tune and hearing subtle invisible melodies where others heard none, to being able to manually synch 2 different midi tempos in realtime (and I mean without a tempo readout).
Observing others and gaining some experience also helps a lot.

Sorry for the wall of text.

[youngpic]

Originally Posted by Bigbird

Hello,fndrbndr just read ur post and was wonderijng wat dvds did u learn from can you recomend any dvd tutorials on recording techniques,thanks Bigbird.

The Art of Mixing, made in the 80s.

[Johnnywaud]

My dad was a radio engineer. I grew up hanging out in radio stations. Dad was the station manager so I got to go play in the production room whenever I wanted. by the time I was about 6, He used to label buttons on cart machines and the board and sit me on the console at like 6 am on saturday mornings and let me "play" DJ. Little to my knowledge I was really broadcasting. I figured that out when I got 2 letters from old ladys who listened that early on the weekends as "fanmail" and my kindergarden teacher said whe heard me on the air. At that point it dawned on me that I really was the DJ during dads early morning power naps. He taught ne to cut tape and about tape machines and all that before I was 10. I can remember having an ampex 600 reel to reel and an ampex 601 playback amp in my room with an old mic he gave me. He was always in bands as well, and I have been a musician since the age of 5 or so. I traveled with his band and started running sound for them andinchruch by the time I was 12. I can remember nights spent soldering cables and wall plates at church around that age. I started doing board mixes at that point live to 2 track. I bought my first 4 track, a fostex x-15 when I was 14. I made tons of band demos for my friends bands which we thought were great at the time. By the time I was 16 I was running a studio I had built. I got someone to loan me money for an adat and a quadraverb 2. I did work for a church who gave me an old tangent board. I had a full P.A. system that I rented out so I used those mics and the rest of my compressors and FX from that in the studio. I built a soundproof room that rented from someone. I made enough cash to make my taxes a huge nightmare 2 years in a row so I closed. I then traveled as a stage tech with some major acts for a while around New England. I got tired of all that so I went to The Conservatory of Recording Arts and Sciences to learn Protools and Large format consoles. I Interned at Unique studios in NYC. Been Freelancing around New York and the country for about 10 years now. I recently bought a console and am planning on opening a room in the next 3 months in the Phoenix area. thats my story... I am also a studio musician and have had a deall and all that crap too that we all look forward to until we get it...