Protools--vs--????, lost in the digi jungle----HELP!! Options

[damann]

sound advice CeJeRo!
'though it's hard to love digidesign when they insist on having such a large
slice of your bank account on a regular basis.
ultimately, your point is perfect.
"bond with a sequencer, by checking them all out and bearing in mind what you actually require them to do for you".
then use the appropriate hardware!
peace, out...

[Mr.T]

Amen...
While we're here, has anyone seen this Midnight fellow?... This topic is more than one week old and no news, no thanks, no nothing... The replies may not have all been really constructive regarding the original topic (some of mines surely were not) but there were replies ! How rude is this?... Is this some new kind of hype behaviour?...Asking for advices and not even taking the time to thank people... strange world...

[Presto]

So, you want to set up a studio from scratch(?) and produce CDs and sell them from your web site.

You've got a budget of a few thousand $, and need to:
buy a mac, + an external hard disk, and good mic(s), and something to power the mic(s) and convert A/D, buy headphones and monitors, and improve your recording environment (that can be the biggest cost by far), maybe buy instrument(s), get a credit card payment page on your site, cigarettes, beer, even food sometimes....

I don't want to sound ungrateful for the advice of the biggies (I love it when they get their knickers in a twist), but I think they don't fully understand us littlies.

When you come back from your holiday, Midnight, if you want more specific help you should provide more info:

Do you still have that 24 track tape? And what else have you got? (Your PC maybe ok)
Do you want audio and/or MIDI?
Can you hear planes/birds/trucks/dogs/tractors where you want to record?
How many inputs do you need at the same time? I mean, are you the sole provider of input?

I started from scratch with a similar budget, only needing two audio inputs. I've now got an Mbox/PT based set-up. The quality of the Focusrite stuff is definitely not the weakest link in my chain. Even if the final quality I produce is a bit dirty by pro standards, as my music is (of course) better than the rest on my target market, it will sell millions from my brilliant future website!! Na!!!

I chose PT partly because I can send my final efforts to a pro for tidying up. I can't afford biggies' stuff at home, but I can afford a bit of help from one (wink, wink).

I get the impression I've already said this somewhere else. Perhaps I should write an article "Know-Nothing Musician Gets Equipped For Making Hit Records - Resources: musical genius (hum!), a few thousand euros, and MacMusic buddies"

Perhaps I should wait for midnight before starting.

Er, article, Midnight, no reply, journalist!!!!!!!!!! Hey, damn, merde, hilhe de puta!!!

Answer truthfully, Midnight. Did you only start this forum to get input for an article in MacTwirled where you're a paid journalist? If so, you'd better give MacMusic a good write-up. We've got some real meanies in sheep's (and monkey's) clothing here. Miss Kiki, are you ready?

Hum! Going neurotic! Better get some sleep.

[lepetitmartien]

uh oh! Presto, what did you ate this evening?

calm down… nice nice presto (tap tap tap) you really need to lay down some tunes. It's getting on your nerves.

no insults, no personnal attacks… (and midnight doesn't seem to be a macwhatever journalist look at his site

(now I can go on holidays, macmusic is quiet?)

[Presto]

Oops! I've gone an unglorious crimson colour. Thanks for the nudge lpm.

I think I've been living in France too long and have forgotton my English. I've a sneaky feeling "a few grand" is a little more than a few thousand $.

I shall bow out shamefully and let the biggies work it out together.

However, I don't think I insulted anybody, lpm, and definitely not Miss Kiki. I think she's great. I do like teasing though!

[Miss Kiki]

teasing is great if the teaser and the teased are on the same level,
unfortunately i'm not soooo good in english to percieve the beauty of what we call "second degré"...
this is the reason i'm not moderator in the english forum.
so help youself big boyz, you don't need me around!

[Mac1]

To answer the mans original question, Yes you can make an album with an M-box, I-book and the rest of your studio componets. Yes you can get the same quality of a tape. What will decipher your end product will be the way you process and master your finished piece. I'm using pro-tools an I-book, and some cheap $25 dollar mics and I submit my works to producers all the time. I'm constantly asked which studios I work with because they like the sound. When I tell them it's my own little one-bedroom home studio tha I created, their jaws drop.
Just my personal experience. No bashing!!!!!

[Presto]

Yeah! Great! And I believe Mac 1 works mainly with Midi which some say is crap on PT. I don't know - never used it.

Mac1, I didn't know you'd started using audio. I use a Rode NT2 mic with the Mbox, and my ears using Beyer DT 250 phones say the audio results are wonderful. (The dirt I mentioned is noise from outside, and probably lack of experience.)

Perhaps I'm biased.

Still, I have found that the sound of some commercial CDs is definitely not so good. I have some CDs of music from films (great quality even at 16/44.1) which I can use for comparison (I wonder if they used PT).

Ah! LPM! I've checked up and "a few grand" does mean a few thousand. Even if its pounds, not dollars, that still indicates that the littlies can give appropriate advice to Midnight. (OK, he's not a journalist. Nice site.)

Anyway, go for it Midnight! But do let us know if you read any of this. We don't like pissing into the wind.

[Presto]

I don't understand why there have been so few people answering Midnight's call for help - and fewer who have taken his budget seriously.

What's the matter with you all. His 2 posts have had nearly 800 hits. Just because a man has proved his worth in the music scene doesn't mean he doesn't need your constructive help - he asked for it, damn it!

Or do you believe Mr T when he says you can't produce reasonable album quality with a 'low' budget?

Many, many, many here (particularly on the French side of the site) say Digidesign is too expensive and tries to ruin you. Now 2 Mbox/PTLE users do think you can get sufficient quality for an album with a low budget, but how many of us have proposed other set ups? Strange!!

Also, does album quality mean better than most CD buyers can detect on their hifi stuff.

Just a thought: I have a load of scratchy jazz 78s from the '30s and some of them can no longer be found elsewhere (my dad was a jazzman). I'm sure if they were put on a CD they would sell well, even without tidying up the sound quality.

Did the original Apple team not bother to make computers because they didn't have the means of IBM? IBM didn't even take PCs seriously enough to use their means to write a good DOS. They prefered to borrow a cheap one that was already 10 years behind. MSDOS was crappy but I believe its owners did manage to make a bit of a living from it.

I think many musicians with low budgets and little experience can make great music and will be selling it over the web more and more. Don't worry about your music getting pirated - that means its good. Recording studios and big labels beware!


Heehee! I wonder if that puts the cat among the pigeons.

[Mr.T]

Or do you believe Mr T when he says you can't produce reasonable album quality with a 'low'
budget?

Hum...sounds like a shortcut to me my friend... Did you read the original post and the answer I gave?... The question was Can you get the same quality with a MBox or a Digi001 as you could with a 2inches tape recorder... Have you ever been using a 2 in ches tape recorder?...This sure was a pain in the ass to use, but I'm still positive...the sound was better than the sound provided by the 001!
To close the subject, as far as I'm concerned, YES you can get"reasonnable album quality"with a low budget...if you're doing techno or rap (or any music based on samples or synthetic sounds) but if, like me, you're putting together songs that involve real drums, bass, guitar, percussion, some chords and orchestral stuffs and singing, I think you should be aware (I know I am) that using the 001 is great to make (more than) decent demos (just wait you hear mine...some people think it was produced in a real studio) but when it comes to producing a record that's meant to be sold to the public... I want some good equipment, some room (how am I supposed to record huge drums using many mics in my small studio?!!...) , a real music engineer (which I know I ain't...at least not as much as a guy who's been working in music for the last 20 years non stop...)and real musicians (samples are fine but nowhere near the real thing!).
That's what I was trying to say, before we got carried away and went really OT...which doesn't really matter since the original poster is gone! I think he didn't even read the very first replies we gave him.
We are beating a dead horse here... I'm off.