This is what everyone of us is striving for, and can be really hard to find. So how do you get the gig? There are some great words of wisdom that you can arm yourself with to make yourself better than the rest. The first great piece of advice is simply to be better than the rest. You can do this by; showcasing your skills that set you apart, be more available than anyone else, or have more real world experience than anyone else. These can all be hard things to accomplish but they will make a huge difference in how employers view you. You should also do your research. The more you know about your the company or person you want to work for the more you will be able to relate to them. The recording industry is about relationships, so the more you are able to network the better your chances of finding a job. READ MORE

Digital Audio has revolutionized the recording industry and has become the norm of modern day recording. So what is Digital Audio? By definition digital audio is a mathematical representation of an analog sound signal using binary code. As you can imagine there is a lot of complicated mathematics and science involved with digital audio, but that doesn’t mean you can’t learn the basics and understand digital audio without all the math. So hopefully this article will help you understand how analog sound waves are turned into ones and zeros in digital audio.READ MORE

Waves has been one of biggest producers of high quality audio plugins and has now joined forces with DiGiCo, the largest producer of live consoles, and Soundtracs to create their first audio interfaces and real time processors. They have released an entire line of high quality audio interfacing, processing, and networking products for the studio to the stage. The DiGiGrid interfaces uses the Waves SoundGrid to connect and rout to your DAW. The SoundGrid DSP also allows you to use extremely low latency Waves audio plugins while recording and monitoring. It uses Cat5 or Cat6 connections you are able to connect multiple I/O’s together to create your own configurations. The Waves DiGiGrid is the future of audio interfaces, external DSP processing, and networking in the studio.READ MORE

The process of recording on your computer creates an endless production of new audio files on your hard drive. This massive amount of file creation can be very taxing on your hard drives. What can you do to protect your hard drives from errors and failure? Taking proper care of your hard drives can greatly lengthen the life of your hard drive. Modern hard drives have built in analysis and failure detection features so you can be better prepared but that can only go so far. Here are a few simple steps you can take to lengthen the life of your computer.READ MORE

Everyone wants to have top of the line gear and an acoustically treated studios but who has the money to pay for all that? There are so many good DIY (Do It Yourself), tutorials, projects, and guides online for bettering your studio. There are DIY projects for microphones, gear, soundproofing, and decor that if done the right way and with the right knowledge will yield amazing results. Not only does doing DIY projects save you money, it also gives you a great sense of accomplishment. So if you are looking to try DIY projects, do your research and don’t be afraid to ask questions. There are some amazing forums online for DIY’ers that are very helpful.READ MORE

It is often debated among audio engineers and in forums, that high quality cables really make a difference. I am under the belief that it really does. If you buy a cheap mic cable off the internet it will probably work the first few times you use it, but if you don’t take care of it, it will soon start to show signs of wear and tear. It may start to crackle when you touch it, sometimes stop working, or drop to half signal. These are all signs of shorting and bad solder joints. Also if you take a high quality cable, like mogami, and test it against a less cable there is a noticeable tonal difference and even level difference in some cases. This is because cheaper cables are made with low-grade copper and cheap solder that does not hold up. But you don’t need to go out and spend tons of money on expensive cables; you can buy the parts and make them yourself.READ MORE

If you are working in any field of audio engineering you need to know how important it is to protect your ears. Many people like to crank it up when they are mixing because “it sounds better”. Yes louder can be “better sounding” but it can be dangerous. When listening to loud music our ears will start to fatigue just like any other muscle in our body when it gets used for an extend period of time. The louder the music the harder our ears have to work the fast they become fatigued. When your ears become fatigued you will start to lose hearing, but it will come back in time if you don’t over do it. If you continue to expose your ears to loud music when your ears are fatigued you will cause permanent damage. So, what is a good listening volume when mixing?READ MORE

Being prepared for a vocal recording session will save you lots of down time. These tips may sound like common sense but they can often be overlooked and can cost you in the long run. It is crucial that your artist knows the song! You might think I’m joking, but there have been many times that an artist either didn’t write the song or hasn’t heard the track before the day of the recording. So, in advance, be sure to send a copy of the song, including lyrics, to the artist the week before if possible. This way the ball is in their court to listen to and learn the song. Also make sure you get to know the song so you can easily know what part of the song the artist and producer are discussing and be able to navigate to it quickly in your DAW. READ MORE

Is there a difference between mixing in the studio and mixing live? There are some pretty big differences, but that doesn’t mean a live sound engineer and studio engineers can’t switch places every once and awhile. One of the main differences is time. When you are working in the studio you will have more time to get the sound that you are looking for and really hone in on any aspects of a mix. But when mixing live you have to be spot on with what ever the performer is throwing your way. Now we could argue all day about which scenario is more difficult and takes more skill, but at the end of the day these are both really hard jobs which take a lot of different specialized skills. Another big difference is what kind of console will be used.READ MORE

What is Latency? Latency is the time it takes your computer to process and route digital audio. Lets say you have a microphone plugged into your audio interface; the latency would be the time it takes that microphone’s signal to go from the interface, into your computer, to your DAW, out of your DAW, back to your interface, and out of your speakers. This seems like a lot of steps but this would all happen in fewer than 10 milliseconds. Most people don’t start to notice latency until it is above 10 milliseconds so this probably wouldn’t be an issue. But, once you start adding plugins and more tracks, your latency can easily exceed 500-1000 milliseconds and can even cause Pro Tools to have errors or even crash. So, how do you get rid of latency?READ MORE