Studio Log

Studio Log: March 18, 2006

Saturday March 18th, 2006

I haven't posted one of these in almost a year so it's way past time that I got caught up. Let’s get up to date on happenings in the vast Szajna Dynasty Media empire.

Equipment Updates:

I should really call this bit "software updates" but it works like hardware so here we go.

With the new year came the installation of ProTools Version 7 here at SzDM and the upgrade is working without a hitch. There are some new features that help the MIDI sequencing quite a bit and a few others that are still being explored. I'll cover some specifics in a future entry.

The quickest benefits that came with the update were the additions of 3 new plug-in updates. Re-Vibe is a very nice room emulation (reverb) plug-in that comes with a jillion room, hall, theater and plate set ups. It's highly programmable and capable of mimicking some really subtle environments.

I'm really happy Digidesign made this plug-in so readily available. I've always found that as mixes get more complicated and busier you can go a long way toward improving the imaging and clarity with a few well placed parameter tweaks in the reverb you're using. So Re-vibe is very very cool.

DINR is short for Digidesign Intelligent Noise Reduction and it’s a powerful tool for cleaning up tape and machine noises, amplifier hum and other spurious nuisance sounds that fudge up an otherwise cool recording. I expect it'll get heavy use when I need to repair a few home recordings or transfer some old discs or tapes to CD.

Ableton has also released a new version of Live! especially for ProTools. We've just installed it and we’re learning about all of the new improvements. Live! was very useful for getting a very human and real feel on Matt Keil's "Lesson One" album and Brandon Creasman's "Peace Love and Cornbread."

And just today we received and installed Digidesign's Xpand! plug-in. It's a very cool, simple to use, multi-layered virtual sampler and synthesizer. It's not the most complex or programmable synth you've ever seen but that can be good. Sometimes instead of programming a whole synthesizer bank it's useful to simply stack and blend a couple of familiar patches into something edgy and unique. This is the strength of Xpand!

I’ll post a few samples of all the new stuff soon.

Project Updates:

We’ve just started work on Collision Six's new album. Stay tuned to these pages for updates.

The Matt Keil Band's Lesson One album is available now at the band's web site: http://www.mattkeilband.com/store.php. It’s also available at these fine record stores in Michigan:

Dearborn Music 313-561-1000
220 Michigan Ave.

Dearborn
Disc & Tapes Unlimited 810-227-9191
682 West Grand River, Brighton

Flipside Records 248-585-4090
41 East 14 mile, Clawson

Hot Hits 586-777-3640
29207 Gratiot, Roseville

Melodies & Memories 586-774-8480
23013 Gratiot, Eastpointe

Record Time 586-775-1550
27360 Gratiot, Roseville

Rock of Ages 734-522-0351
31015 Ford Rd , Garden City

Rock-A-Billy's 586-731-0188
48751 Van Dyke, Shelby Township

Street Corner Music 248-644-4777
13 mile rd, Birmingham

Switched On 248-426-7711
39723 Grand River, Novi

Jim Jams
Oxford, Michigan

More news next week. Namaste!

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