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Hitting It With the BIGGER Hammer
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This photo was taken
07/13/04. It shows a partial view of the finalized combination of 12", 4", and
2" Auralex foam wedges. Behind the speakers is a false wall which supports the
12" Venus Bass Traps thus hiding a number of LENRD Bass Traps and extra 2" wedges
further behind.
Also now
on the ceiling are 4" wedges back to the mix position.
On the right side of the desktop
is a switch I fabricated to provide A, B
and A-B comparison monitoring of reference music CD's. The A+B (mono)
comparison, along with quickly checking mixes at various volumes, is handled thru
the RME Multiface control software on the laptop not shown.
Just out of the photo
are a complement of T-Diffusers that help provide the flat response shown on the
1/12 octave FFT green display of the Terrasonde AudioToolbox. The diffusers help
the room retain a natural sound, not too dry.
This room was tuned
by a combination of electronic testing using the Terrasonde along with careful
"ear-balling." Half way through the process I realized the process was
just like
carefully tuning an immense acoustic guitar from the inside.
The combination of
room treatment and HD-1 speakers are now close to as flat as specs given for
high-end speakers in a laboratory setting, and the room is now ready for critical listening.
I have moved on to in depth learning of Cubase SX and various VST instruments.
This week I finished setting levels throughout the production chain and am up to
speed with the basics of the recording software.
Links to purchase points
for equipment shown above
Meyer Sound
Laboratories HD-1 Studio Monitors
Apogee
Mini-DAC
Sony
CDP-D12 CD player
Grace Design
901 Headphone Amp
Sennheiser
HD600 Headphones
Terrasonde AudioToolbox Plus
Galaxy Audio CM-150 SPL Meter
Auralex Studio Foam & Bass Traps
Three
Pole Double Throw
(3PDT) Switch in fabricated box
Equipment not shown
Dell M60 Laptop
RME
Multiface and
Cardbus
Other production tools are
Cubase
SX,
WaveLab and a number of VST instruments. I just finished confirming a dozen
or so of these instruments and plug-ins sound good and work well together. That list is forthcoming, but right
now I am deep into choosing, testing and setup of the reference monitors. It is
a wild loping artistic process that rests on, and is complicated by, the
necessity of knowing a great deal about acoustics, psychoacoustics, computer
technology, composition and music performance. The process would be severely
shunted by documenting it on the fly.
But I can say, m y
current pet peeve with google searches are how often returned links lead only to
repeats of the same commercial content with no actual information.
You know the story: thousands of instances of a
product's name on every sales site in the universe but including only
copy/paste or web service inclusion of xml brochure information--information
that, if not downright misleading, only scratches the surface.
Ironically when I
tried to purchase the Meyer Sound HD-1 speakers shown above (a decision made
years ago with the help of Danny Littwin), I spent several months tracking down a
source. I had gotten to the point of believing they were no longer being made.
Therefore, to save others the effort of figuring out where this stuff came from,
the equipment list above provides links to where each item was purchased.
CAVEAT:
Recently nasty
spyware has kept returning to my computer from parts unkown, so I prefer to phone or visit, rather
than purchase online.
Nobody pays me for putting these links here. I am
not selling anybody's product for them. I am just selling my music and making
sure it is the best it can be. End of story.
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