Recording The Spoken Voice Technique : Recording / Mixing Experienced engineers know that recording the spoken voice properly is actually more difficult than recording a singer. HUGH ROBJOHNS explains why this is so, and passes on some hints and tips for developing a good technique. The spoken voice is something most people take for granted, but recording a voice properly is certainly not the trivial task many people assume it to be, and there are just as many traps and pitfalls for the unwary as in any other recording situation. In the case of a spoken voice, any unnatural coloration (perhaps from room acoustics, bad mic technique or a low-quality microphone) stands out, because we are all very used to hearing human voices and can spot anything 'wrong' extremely quickly. As with any instrument, placing a microphone too close to the source of a spoken voice will 'distort' the sound, because it won't capture all elements of the sound in the correct balance. • Beware de-essers!
Ultracompact universal audio/MIDI interface announced for recording on Macs & iOS devices IK Multimedia has announced what it claims is “the most versatile compact audio interface on the market”. iRig is a small battery-powered box that allows musicians to connect microphones, guitars, line instruments or MIDI devices to a Mac, iPhone, iPad or iPod touch. iRig PRO is designed to give mobile musicians and songwriters an interface that can handle the widest variety of audio input signals, so they can create music and audio on the go anywhere, any time.It accepts virtually every type of audio and MIDI input. Users can plug in a dynamic or condenser microphone; a guitar, bass or other Hi-Z instrument; or any line-level source.Additionally, iRig PRO is equipped with a MIDI input for keyboards, pads and controllers, making it a truly universal compact interface for recording and composing on the go or in the studio. The device is supplied with a range of music-creation apps, and is compatible with most existing audio and MIDI processing Mac software and iOS apps.
How To: Sing Like A Popstar The End Of The Loudness War? As the nails are being hammered firmly into the coffin of competitive loudness processing, we consider the implications for those who make, mix and master music. Hugh Robjohns In a surprising announcement made at last Autumn's AES convention in New York, the well-known American mastering engineer Bob Katz declared in a press release that "The loudness wars are over.” In this article, I'll explain what the new standards entail, and explore what the practical implications of all this will be for the way artists, mixing and mastering engineers — from bedroom producers publishing their tracks online to full-time music-industry and broadcast professionals — create and shape music in the years to come. Mastering engineer Bob Katz, who has long campaigned for the end of hyper-compression in mastering, and who recently declared the loudness wars to have been won — by the right side! The Loudness Wars The Way Things Are Consistent TV Loudness Electronic Ear
Sound intuition: This technology will turn your movements into music Sound on Intuition by designer Pieter-Jan Pieters turns your body into a musical instrumentSensors attach to your hands,feet and heart to produce music that responds to movementHis creation allows people of any background or skill-base to make music Editor's note: Blueprint is a new series exploring the intersection between high-concept design and practical technology (CNN) -- For Pieter-Jan Pieters, revenge has been both sweet and sonorous. "It feels good," he says. When Pieters enrolled at the Design Academy Eindhoven he began to play around with electronic sensors that would allow musicians to control sound using only the movement of their own bodies. Read this: Is this the world's weirdest instrument? Can solar powered watercraft save lives? Inventors, innovators manipulate light 'Earthquake table' made to save lives The result is a collection of five instruments, which Pieters calls Sound on Intuition: "I really like it," he says. Read this: The brave new world of electric paint
Q How can I deal with plosives? Is there a good technique for treating plosives on a vocal track? I've found lots of advice on de-essing, but nothing on this. Via SOS web site Plosive thumps on vocal recordings are caused by strong blasts of air that result from certain consonant sounds hitting the microphone and creating large pressure changes. It's far better to prevent them rather than attempting to fix them in the studio. SOS Technical Editor Hugh Robjohns replies: Plosives are often a complete nightmare to remove, and the only real solution is to prevent them from happening in the first place. Plosives — usually heard on words with Ps and Bs at their start — send out a strong blast of air, which generally travels forward and downward from the mouth. As always, prevention is infinitely better than cure, and stopping plosives from reaching the mic is really all about positioning.
How to Migrate Your Music from iTunes to the Cloud No matter what you think about iTunes, there’s no denying that Apple’s music software revolutionized the music industry and how we experience it. Along with the iTunes Music Store, this software made buying, listening to, and collecting music an all-in-one experience, while introducing the notion of buying a single song rather than an entire album. It’s hard for many to remember a time when you couldn’t do that, and we have Steve Jobs to thank. Just because iTunes was so revolutionary, and is still so ubiquitous, doesn’t make it the best option for consumers to collect and access their music with these days. The answer is floating above you: the cloud, where you can store all your tracks so they can beam down at you like so many rainbows. To get out of iTunes and onto the cloud requires a solid grasp of the options, because this is definitely a case of “different strokes for different folks.” Moving to Subscription Services via iTunes Import Who’s It For? Who’s It Not For? image via Apple
How Brands Can Market More Effectively To Women--And Why They Should Tampons. Diapers. Fruit juice. Odds are if you’ve seen a commercial for one of these products, you’ve heard a woman’s voice on it. Or at least, they should be. Think about it: When was the last time you heard a woman as the voiceover on a commercial for a car? Actress, director, and writer Lake Bell is tackling this exact issue head on with the release of her new movie “In a World” this summer. The film may also highlight the idea that the casting of a voice for a product or company can be an extensive process--an exhaustive search that can involve multiple rounds of auditions, just looking for that one voice. Perhaps it’s the fear of challenging the norm. We need to find a way to apply that sensibility to voiceover casting as well so that more women’s voices can be represented. Don’t get me wrong; I work with some of the most talented male voiceover actors working today. I teach classes in how to do voiceovers. [Image: Flickr user János Balázs]
5 Best Free Recording Software Audio Our best free recording software audio lineup aids you in acquiring good quality sounds without having to invest in expensive equipment. As the title in the spotlight reveals, all the best recording software options listed out here can be taken complete advantage of without you even having to spend a single penny. No need to rely on all those expensive and complicated programs that eat right through your pocket. Although they may proffer a comprehensive collection of advanced features, the ones that sport a $0 price tag come with an impressive slew of attributes which allow you to save all your acoustic items with ease. And besides just accomplishing the task sought out here, the following softwares also allow you to edit the saved content exactly the way you want. Here are the various recording options you can turn to for the same. 1 – Kristal Audio Engine: The company attaches a €0 price tag to this gem for personal, non-commercial and education use. 2 – WaveShop: 3 – Audacity:
Jeffrey LeClair JL Recording Studios: How to Break Into the Voice-Over Business The beautiful thing about the voice-over business is that everyone has a unique voice, even if you sound similar to someone else, breaking into the business is a little easier with the market always looking for a fresh voice. Voice acting is the type of business always providing an avenue to break into it. You'll need to specifically understand which areas of the business you want to work in, which area is to make the money in, and which area is the best way to market your voice depending on which city or state you live in. I would not suggest jumping in, by rushing out to have your demo made. A voice actor is best to put together an audio demo when they feel confident enough that they are able to go into a booth - without starting off in a booth, being able to create the read in a cold reading process. The voice over business has changed greatly over the last ten years now that everybody has their own home studio.
The Mac that Thunderbolt built: The newly compact Mac Pro | Apple Call it the era of the extroverted computer. In the old days of personal computing, expansion meant using vacancies inside a computer chassis where you could plug in graphics cards and hard drives. But now, because of Apple's fondness for Intel's high-speed Thunderbolt data port, expansion means hooking up devices outside the chassis. Connecting external devices has long been just about the only way to bring new hardware to laptops. Today's Mac Pro is a large rectangular box -- granted, a more elegant box than most Windows tower PCs and workstations, but a box nonetheless. From a hardware engineering perspective, the new Mac Pro is quite an architectural departure. Instead of empty PCI Express slots and vacant hard drive bays, the new Mac Pro will come with six 20Gbps Thunderbolt 2 ports powered by three controllers separate controllers. Oh, and it's got four USB 3 ports, too. Two other departures from conventional architecture struck me, too: