Ty Ford
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Yay!
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Hello Jeremy,
I said, “Eight hours at that rate is $400.” I did NOT say the rate was $400/hr.
My rate of $50/hr is for recording or mixing, whether they are here or not.
A clam is a mistake.
Regards,Ty Ford
Cow Audio Forum Leader
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Hello Jeremy and welcome to the Cow Audio Forum.
I’ve been charging $50/hr for musicians in the studio. I’m in Baltimore, MD. If I were in NY, or LA, I’d probably charge more. I usually don’t charge for setup, load in and load out, but I’m not doing a lot of bands these days with a lot of hardware and a guitarist who takes a half hour or more to get his pedals and effects figured out. I’m not doing big time acts. Mostly singer/songwriters. Eight hours at that rate is $400.
I did a record and mix session recently where we tracked one acoustic guitar and vocal for one song. It was simple. I recorded the guitar with one mic and took the direct from the pickup to another track. Vocal on a third track.
We did a bit of editing because there were some clams, but in general we got through pretty easily. I don’t like doing punch-ins on this sort of session. I just ask the player/singer to back up to the chorus or verse before the clam to give me a lot of places to edit. Then I edit the bad pieces out. I’ll usually pan the two guitar tracks to make plenty of room for the vocal in the middle and add some reverb to them and the vocal. Drop in some compression and limiting on the mix bus. We were done in two hours.
If you have more instruments and singers and two songs, what I would do is track both songs and maybe do a rough mix (but maybe not). Even if I do a rough mix, I don’t like to let them leave with it. I usually like to talk to the members about what they want the mixes to sound like and ask them to let me get a good rough mix and invite them back in. The reason I don’t like to give them a rough mix going out the door the first time is that I’ve had folks come in with three pages of notes after laboring over the rough mix and half or more of the things they wanted I’ve already done by working alone.
Also, for me, working for more than 5-6 hours causes enough fatigue to knock me off my game some. I want some time away so I can come back fresh without the band and straighten things up a bit. When they do come back we begin with my mixes and alter them as they’d like. I’m not a pushy engineer/producer, but if I hear problems, I try to solve them. I’ve learned the hard way that if you let something slide, it will probably bite you later. I just try to be nice about it.
How’s that sound?Regards,
Ty Ford
Cow Audio Forum Leader
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Nice job guys! Good sound isn’t easy. You both have “audio ears” and have explained the “theory” in practical terms very well.
Many others just don’t have your ears. If you can’t hear the problem or recognize it, you’re in trouble when it comes to fixing it.
Can this video be copied to the Audio Engineering Forum? -
Hello Peter and welcome to the Cow Audio Forum.
After searching, I see your difficulty. Maybe you’re left with buying a used one providing it comes with a manual in english.I did see this:
The Casio DZ1 (£199) is another such example. On first encounter, a “pro” sees things to gripe about – the rather nice metallic grey and aquamarine case is not rack-mountable, but is about the size of a hard cover book and about the weight of a football (not very confidence-inspiring). It comes with no power supply, but six AA batteries are included, and the manual also gives instructions on how to run the unit with a car battery. As a matter of fact, a lot of Casio equipment is battery-powered, which brings us Californians to wonder when their battery-powered amplifier/speaker is coming out, so that we can actually take these things to the beach.
OK, let’s remind ourselves of the price, and keep going. The back panel is generous, with room for eight trigger ins, four preset selector footswitches, and a hi-hat switch (all ¼”). Two wired-together MIDI Outs are provided (that’s one less MIDI Thru box to purchase), along with a nine-volt power input, power switch, and overall sensitivity control.
The top panel includes eight sensitivity sliders, a selector button per “translator” (Casioan for “trigger input”), four preset selectors, four mode selectors, a three-digit LED display, and a pair of scroll keys (used for parameter editing only – thankfully, they are not needed to access parameters, as they are on so many synthesisers today). Each trigger input and edit mode switch has an associated LED, telling the user precisely what’s going on – a basic human need overlooked on other, more expensive devices.
The front panel is virtually the manual – there are four presets, and each “translator” may have a MIDI channel, note number, and program change number selected for each one. When a new preset is selected, the program changes are sent, and various modulations are zeroed and the pitch wheel re-centred.
But reading the inoffensive manual reveals a couple of other thoughtful features. The first is that hi-hat switch. While the foot-switch is left alone, one translator’s note number is sent per thonk at input 8. While the foot-switch is held down, a different note is sent. At the time it is actually depressed, it also sends a note, at a selectable velocity. In other words, it can work just like a hi-hat (or at least as close as any drum machine has got so far). Just line up one note number with a closed and another with an open hi-hat sample. Of course, other samples (slap bass, for example) may be selected just as easily – or this switch could be used to extend your kit out to nine sounds (the foot-switch can be programmed to be silent when struck).
Another thoughtful feature is a mode in which the velocity of a selected translator is displayed when struck, including an overload indicator, which is nice for the initial setup of a trigger-to-MIDI interface (and for when you’re unsure as to just which velocity range should be producing which results).
Finally, while you’re editing a particular trigger’s parameters, all others are blocked from being transmitted. This is a quick and easy way to figure out which pad is which, even though it would have been nicer if the trigger number followed the last pad hit instead. Sigh. Almost nobody does this.
Disadvantages? Not many. The biggest is being restricted to only four patches. Once you start using any of these interfaces beyond the drum machine or drum kit level, it quickly becomes clear that four presets are not enough. And the DZ1 is the only converter not protected by a metal case. Don’t Casio realize that drummers are… are… animals? (Of course, more sedate keyboardists would be safer owners.) And coming with batteries instead of a proper power supply borders on the insane.
But just remember: this is the second cheapest device of its kind, competent, and by far the easiest to use.
Regards,
Ty Ford
Cow Audio Forum Leader
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Hello Jonny and welcome to the Cow Audio Forum.
If you’re just trying to capture the sound of the celebration, you should be OK, but remember that drums have big peaks. You’d want to capture them without clipping them. Were I you, I’d try to be there for a rehearsal to see what you get with your mics and with expected levels. Some cameras have audio limiters. Some of the limiters work very well, others do not. Work through this to find your best solution before the show.Regards,
Ty Ford
Cow Audio Forum Leader
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Hello John and welcome to the Cow Audio Forum.
1. Not all camera preamps are bad. I don’t know about yours, but those on my JVC HM650 camera are quite good. I wasn’t expecting them to be when I bought the camera and was happily surprised to find out later.
2. If you only have two subjects, you only need two inputs. If you have three……um, well…you need three and that means a mixer or a recorder with three tracks, as you said, that you can later import and mess with in post. If you can find a good used Sound Devices 442, you’ll have a great piece of kit that provides great sound and four inputs. Hmmm, here’s one:
https://reverb.com/item/37545861-sound-devices-442-black?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=9665536234&utm_content=campaignid=9665536234_adgroupid=98151970054_productpartitionid=952843106539=merchantid=247606693_productid=37545861_keyword=_device=c_adposition=_matchtype=_creative=426511543430&gclid=CjwKCAiAuoqABhAsEiwAdSkVVPTEXIbwnwCcI3QZW2dy_-CzjWfK6x65IyhihbBgD10rUvOs7R3ZiBoCxEYQAvD_BwESure there are more modern ones, but remember…..when buying just a mixer…….
The minute you need to shoot three (or more) people, you really need a mixer (machine and person) unless you have a multitrack recorder. You usually can’t just mic up three people and feed them into two tracks without running levels to some degree.You don’t really need to record audio in excess of 24-bit, 48 kHz. 96 kHz is overkill.
lastly, I think that would work.
Regards,
Ty Ford
Cow Audio Forum Leader
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If you’re in a flight plan, you may as well give up. Seriously.
The acronym I use is DID – Density Isolation Density. That’s TOTAL Isolation. NO PARTS of one wall touching the other including ceilings and floors. Not even nails.
If you put a line of cinder block between the walls, you’ll increase the Density. So you have DIDID. Provided those parts DO NOT TOUCH. You get better sound proofing from outside noise. It will NOT help you with airplane noise.
Again, if you have plane noise coming in through the roof, you’re screwed. Sorry.? -
Senor Castaldini,
My answer would be I can’t tell until or unless I hear it.Regards,
Ty Ford
Cow Audio Forum Leader
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Hello James and welcome to the Cow Audio Forum,
It’s impossible to say from still shots what was going on at a particular moment. It cold be that the director called for a wide shot and that’s as close as the boom op could get. The Sound Mixer would then alert the director and note on the audio report that shotgun audio was probably not a good choice.There are also situations in which the boom and mic are actually in the shot, but will be painted out in post. This happened in “House of Cards” among many others. I recall watching HoC the first time and about half-way through the first show thinking, “Wait a minute! I’m hearing boom sound, not lav sound!! WTF! I confirmed that the mic and boom were painted out in post.
Regards,Ty Ford
Cow Audio Forum Leader