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How To Create A Home Recording Studio

admin — Thu, 17 Mar 2011 16:01:23 +0000

Thanks to technological innovations, including professional recording software more artists are creating home recording studios, and even laptop studios. This article will provide tips and ideas to help you create the perfect home based studio for you and your music, based on your budget and needs.

Before you begin, consider whether you plan to record all of the songs and or musicians and instruments associated with a project all at once, or individually. You should also factor your familiarity with computers and recording software in general into the equation.

If you arent as familiar with recording software tools as you would like to be, the good news is that most music recording software offers simplified versions of their full software programs, that can be upgraded to full versions later, once youve mastered the basics. These programs provide a good introduction to the fundamentals of recording software.

If you are going to build a studio, keep in mind that software studios are much more space saving than hardware studios, but if space is not an issue, then a traditional hardware studio may be your best option.

A mobile laptop studio is always a good option for the truly pressed for space, since this offers you the greatest flexibility, and most laptops are more than capable of running recording and mixing software and programs. This means that your recording studio can go with you, and you will never leave home without it.

You can also create a combination hardware and software studio, but in any case, the most basic studio should include a computer with a sound card, a microphone and a mixer, a stereo or powered speakers, and an optional midi keyboard.

Buy the best equipment that you can afford now, and keep in mind that you can always upgrade later, but that in the long run, purchasing the cheapest equipment may actually end up costing you more, since more upgrades will be required.

Creating your own recording studio will save you time and money, since it will eliminate the need to rent studio time, and, especially in the case of a mobile laptop studio, will give you greater freedom and flexibility when it comes to your recording projects.

Whether you have unlimited space and a large budget, or very limited space and an equally limited budget, thanks to recording software programs and advances in recording and mixing technology it is possible to have your own home, or mobile recording studio.

The Top Seven Programs For Recording

admin — Sun, 21 Nov 2010 01:57:45 +0000

Do you want to create your own computer based home music recording studio? If so then you’ll need a quality program for recording and mixing music. You will be using one of the following seven programs a lot so you will definitely want to make a wise decision and choose the software that best fits your computer, your audio interface, and your needs.

First of all I want to focus on those with Mac computers (and yes whether you have a Mac or a PC will play a huge part in your decision of which music recording software to buy.)

If you own a Mac and do not yet have an audio interface then a Digidesign Pro Tools set up is probably what you’ll opt for. You can get an audio interface of varying sizes (from as few as 2 inputs to many more) and prices. If you plan on just recording yourself then you’ll probably want to get a one of the fewer input systems (an MBox.) If you plan on recording a full band then of course you’ll want to get a high input (and higher price) option.

For the full-on “professional” version of ProTools you’ll spend about $15,000. If that’s in your price range and a truly professional studio is what you are interested in building, then this may be the right choice for you but it’s really not necessary for most. You can get a great sound without that big setup.

If you own an MOTU audio interface already then you may want to get MOTU’s Digital Performer which is Mac only software and of course works very well with their audio interfaces. You’ll likely have a very stable system if you choose this option.

If you do not yet own an audio interface you may wish to consider buying an MOTU audio interface and Digital Performer (they do not come together like with Pro Tools, you’ll have to buy Digital Performer separately.) This is alternative to buying the limited version of Pro Tools that comes with their cheaper audio interfaces.

Another option for Mac users is Apple’s Logic. It’s designed to work with Mac computers and is a very strong program for working with audio as well as for working with MIDI. You will need to either already have an audio interface or buy one to work with it.

How about for PC users? Well first of all, Digital Performer and Logic are off the table as they are Mac only programs. But what about Pro Tools? It does work with PCs but it does not yet work with Windows Vista. Also it generally works better with Macs. If you’re on a PC I’d recommend going in a different direction.

Just as with the Mac there are a couple of music production programs that are PC only. These include Cakewalk’s SONAR which is a great choice if you are into working with MIDI (it also does great with audio as well) and Sony’s Acid. Acid is for creating loop based music such as Rap/Hip-Hop and techno. It’s not really suited to other styles of music so you should only consider it if you are into creating loop based music.

There are also programs which work great on PC & Mac: Steinberg’s Nuendo and Cubase. Nuendo is Steinberg’s high end system and it currently costs $1800 in stores. It’s great for those who want to work with surround sound and those who work on music with video (it has a video component.) It’s a very high quality piece of software but you should make note that it isn’t particularly suited for working with MIDI, if you are big MIDI lover then you should probably get Cubase instead. Cubase is actually about three times less expensive than Nuendo, so that’s good news for you!

I believe each of these seven programs are available for free in demo form so that you can try them out without buying them. This is probably a good idea because each program has it’s own peculiar quirks and you’ll want to choose the program that “fits” you.

But please be aware that it’s normal for there to be a bit of a learning curve with software such as this. So don’t give up right away. You may even want to read the manual!

Video Editing Software: Camtasia Studio

admin — Sun, 24 Oct 2010 09:33:28 +0000

Camtasia Studio is one of the most popularly recommended video editing software programs. For what it is, Camtasia is a great program BUT (and this is a very BIG BUT) it is absolutely NOT the right software for most video editing projects.

To hear some people recommend it though, you sure would get the impression that it is the be-all and end-all for video editing.

It’s NOT.

A question from a reader the other day really drove this home. He is in the cooking niche and he wanted to produce a cooking show, kind of like Emeril. He bought a bunch of video equipment, including Camtasia for editing. Problem is, for him, Camtasia is essentially worthless.

Why?

Camtasia is designed to make screen capture videos. This means that the main function of the software is the ability to record whatever is on your computer screen. Let’s say you want to make a video tutorial about how to use a computer application. Camtasia will allow you to record screen shots of the application when it is open on your computer. You can demonstrate how the software works using these screen shots. You can add audio, transitions and titles.

Camtasia is also good for making videos out of Power Point slides.

But my friend who wanted to edit his cooking show was out of luck because Camtasia is NOT designed to edit an entire show out of nothing but video you shoot with a regular video camcorder.

You can add a little bit of camera video to a Camtasia production, but it is recommended that you use that video as a small inset, a picture-in-picture (PIP) display. In this way, the camera video is designed to be an adjunct to the screen capture video. The screen capture video (or power point video) makes up the bulk of your show.

If you want to make a show out of video you shoot with a standard video camcorder, then you need a standard video editing program, like Windows Movie Maker, Sony Vegas, Adobe Premier or Final Cut, to name just a few.

Those video editing programs are for editing camera video. Unlike comtasia, they can not record a screen capture shot. So if you wanted to show your computer screen in a video you are editing with Windows Movie Maker, you would either have to use a jpeg or you would need to videotape your computer screen using a video camera and then capture that video into Movie Maker in the same way you captured your vacation video. I do that all the time because I haven’t wanted to spend $300 for Camtasia.

Whether Camtasia is right for you depends entirely on what kind of video you want to make.

Is your video going to be full of computer screen shots or is it going to be full of video you took at the beach?

Camtasia is good software, please do not get me wrong. For what it does, Camtasia is probably the best program out there. BUT, if you want to edit videos that consist primarily of video you take with your camcorder, i.e. live action video, then you need software other than Camtasia.

I felt real sorry for my friend the chef who completely misunderstood this vital distinction before he bought his video editing software. $300 is a lot to waste when Windows Movie Maker would have been a better choice for him and it is free.

Thanks for reading Video Production Tips

Lorraine Grula

Internet Video Gal