Lesson 12 - Posted on 2013-04-27 by Vanessa Agosto

A few more odds and ends from Lesson 11:

We went in-depth looking at his Omnisphere (love) instrument plug-in features and general coolness. The GUI (graphical user interface) has a bunch of options so that you use less computer stuff, I'm guessing RAM. Instead of opening Omnisphere every time to add it as a plug in on different tracks, you can assign 8 different tracks from the GUI. There was the assign-to-existing-instrument tracks option, as well as the aux track trick where you change the instrument on an existing recorded track to an Omnisphere sound. You can also EQ right in the GUI. Steve pointed out that effects on the plug-in tend to be better because they're specific to that plug-in's sounds, etc. 

I stumbled upon a foley website that fired me up. What a cool field! Steve has ADR contacts in LA, which is a good stepping stone to foley. Decisions, decisions...

April 23rd, 3 hour lesson and April 25th, 5 1/2 hour observe

We had a good, organizational overview of EQ. Perversely, the goal of EQ'ing is to get a flat mix, BUT mixing (and flatness) is subjective, as well. Which brings me to the point Steve's made before: the best way to EQ your mix is to have a good arrangement! Unfortunately, EQ can only do so much for a bad arrangement. (Hello, fighting mid-range everything.) 

A good way to think of the EQ categories and types:

GRAPHIC

PARAMETRIC:    -Shelf

                               -Bell curve

                               -Pass filters

Graphic EQ sliders cover narrow bandwidths. Shelf EQ sounds very natural because such a large bandwidth is affected; messing with narrower bandwidths is harder to make sounds natural. Another way of saying this is that shelf EQ sounds more Hi fi. Some good use examples of pass filters is in vocal tracks, where a bunch of sub frequencies are undesirable (high pass filter). Or if you have a twangy sounding electric guitar (low pass filter).

The observe happened at Kung Fu Bakery studios for a local singer-songwriter's next album, which was really exciting. I got to see drums and upright bass recorded, and when they broke for lunch I helped break down all the mikes. We then set up for the singer to do the piano for 3 songs. It was really interesting being in the control room listening to how the producer spoke to the musicians to get them to do what he wanted. I can see how difficult talent wrangling can be because you really have to be subtle and persuasive, ugh. The singer is a really great piano player, though. She had good jazz stuff going on.