One of the less common music effects that artists sometimes use is an aural exciter or an enhancer. By adding and highlighting overtones, these effects can add crispness, brightness and color to your mix. Here's how they work and where to use them.
Amazon launched its new streaming service, Prime Music, last week to become yet another player vying for a piece of the booming music streaming business. The service is offered as a free addition to a Prime subscription but lacks the catalog size of Pandora, Spotify and Rdio as of now.
Solid state drives are one of the many technological breakthroughs that have made professional media production faster and more accessible. However, you may want to stick with a traditional drive for recording audio until the price of solid state drives drops.
Youtube's new streaming service has already locked in deals with the major record labels, but negotiations with indie labels are on the rocks as the video streaming giant is offering them the short end of the stick. Here's what indie labels are saying about the deal.
Making your mix sound bigger isn't as much of a mystery as it may seem. There are some basic steps you can take to add depth and fullness to your mix. Here are some tips to get a bigger sound.
The advent of the 500 series rack size has launched a whole new product line of high-end, modular pieces of gear. For the first time, many top manufacturers of analog hardware have been able to sell their components for less, often under $1000 dollars. 500 series preamps are a perfect example of how legendary quality can now be owned for a fraction of the cost. Here are three such preamps that give you top quality sound in a 500 series module.
If your mix or master sounds weak, the culprit may be phase cancellation, an audio phenomenon where frequencies are dropped due to the out of sync sound waves of different signals. Here's an overview of how phase cancellation works and what you can do to help avoid it.
Phase cancellation is one of the more overlooked troublemakers in audio production. Yet, dealing with phase cancellation is an important part of any good mixing and mastering process. One of the best ways is to head it off from the beginning by using the 3-1 rule of mic placement. By using this simple ratio, you can reduce the likelihood of phase cancelling.
Breakthroughs in music technology and digital audio workstations (DAWs) have made the possibilities in producing music virtually unlimited... and those possibilities are only going to get bigger. In order to make the most of digital music production technology, a well-rounded understanding of sound design is increasingly important for artists and producers. Thankfully, there's a course you can take for that. And it's free.
The classical guitar is one of the most articulate and expressive instruments to record. As a result, it takes extra effort to record it well--capturing the nuanced details, bright tones, and deep resonance. Here are some tips for recording classical guitar that will help you capture the full breadth of the instruments range.
One of the best ways to add space to your mix is by utilizing panning to its fullest potential. A mix that has a well-crafted stereo image will sound far more interesting and engaging. Unfortunately, panning doesn't get quite as much focus as EQ and compression in many mixing and mastering resources. So, here are some general tips for panning that can help you get started with building a solid stereo image.
One of the greatest advantages of working with digital audio is that you can have virtually unlimited tracks in a DAW session. Many of today's producers leverage this ability by layering many of the parts of their mix to add to a bigger and richer mix. Here are some tips and suggestions for how you can use layering to make your mix and master sound better.
The hallmark of a great master is that it sounds consistently good across multiple platforms. This is why a good pair of monitors, with a neutral response is so important. However, sometimes even a great pair of monitors can't tell you how your mix will sound in the real world, where various and devices and speaker sizes are used. That's why this mastering test is used by MTSU's prestigious Recording Industry program to evaluate student work...
Here's an professional engineer's inside tip, monitor your mix at a low level. Many established producers and engineers know that this trick helps them get a better sounding final master for two reasons...
News spread this week of a possible acquisition of Beats Audio by Apple. While nothing has been confirmed yet, there has been a lot of speculation about what such an acquisition by the world's most valuable company could mean for the music world. We thought it'd be interesting to take a look at how it might affect the mixing and mastering side of music production...
