Finances

At the start of our Final Major Project we were all given a £1500 budget that we are allowed to use during the creating of the track and any materials, marketing and promotion and an EP Launch, even though the money is hypothetical we have to plan out recording sessions just like we would have to do in real life.

I've had one recording session during the creating of my track in which i used the control and the live room and one in G079. The session in the live room and the control room cost me a total of £420, this was to pay for the live room and control room, any instruments that i would need (Drum Kit, Vocal Mic), any XLR or Jack leads that i would need and to cover the staff. The pricing for the equipment was per hour so if i was to use the drum kit for 3 hours i would pay £60. Since my session was 3 hours long i had to pay £60 for all the equipment that i was using, £60 for the engineer and £30 each for both assistants. After i had finished with the session and paid for it, my remaining budget was £1080.00.

My second recording session was in G079 and this session was not very costly as i only needed 1 hour and one performer, I paid a total of £60 for this session which covered guitars, cables and a performer for an hour. After i had finished this session and paid for it, my remaining budget was £1020.00

Session Review Dan B Piano - 12/05/14

I took part in Dan Burrows's recording session as an engineer, he asked me to engineer his session in which he was performing piano for his track which is an epic piece which you would think is from an actual film, since i had not been an engineer for our EP and one of the requirements for the FMP is for everybody to be an engineer at some point. When I arrived at the session Dan B and Alex D were already setting up the Yamaha piano with a Marshall amp connected through a jack cable and we had a SM57 set up about 3 inches away from the amp because that is what we were mainly recording, we also set up 2 SE 1A's to capture the ambience of the piano but we ran into a problem with them because we were planning of using on C1000s but we couldn't find a mic clip for one of them so we switched to the 1A's and it solved our problem and that was the only problem with the session, we also set up a talkback mic for Dan using a SM58 so he could talk to us from the live room.  

The Piano Set Up

When it came to record Dan on the Piano, i had created a blank session with 3 audio tracks, 2 for the Amp microphone and the other for talkback, the 3rd audio track was for the SE1A's and since they are stereo mics. I then imported Dans backing track into the session and matched it up with the tempo which was 140BPM and then created a click track for Dan to play along too. After all that had been set up i started to set the gains for each microphone so that we had a good level when we came to record and would not have to change them during the recording. Dan had a play through before we started recording so that he was practised and knew what he was recording, once that had been done we started the recording and he recorded 8 bars for his opening of his track and then we punch recorded 39 bars of outro and that took a few takes because Dan kept either missing notes or playing the wrong ones, which is normal for a recording session, after the recording we had done all we wanted and then saved the session and took the audio of the recordings we liked and put it on Dans memory stick and then Mat Q and Alex D who were both assistants started to pack away the piano and the microphones, stands and all cables and i turned the Mac off and turned off all the equipment that needed to be turned off in the correct order. Overall i believe i performed very well in the session as i did everything that was asked of me and i had communication with Dan and set up and put away everything correctly.

Pro Tools Session For Dan B

An Update For You

As i am speaking to you now, i have all but finished my track until we start the Mixing and Mastering. My track now has 6 new audio tracks which are the individual drums from the recording i did a couple of weeks back and during mixing week i will be mixing the individual kits to my liking. 

Dan Burrows and myself have changed the alarm that i created slightly so that it would transition a lot better. Dan time stretched the audio so that it was perfectly in time with the first 8 bars and then he uploaded the audio of the alarm onto our shared file on Google Drive and i replaced my old alarm track with the new one so that we had the same one. 

All i have to do now is to include the vocals that we recorded which Dudley has offered to do because he says he has a really nice vocoder plugin on Ableton so he will edit those and then we will include the ones we want in our tracks.

Session Review Of Alex Dudley Drums- 7/05/14

I took part in Alex Dudley's recording session as a performer, he asked me to perform drums on his track which is a chilled electronic track which is the 3rd track on our EP, the drumming wasn't too challenging there were some bits of the track which were off putting whilst drumming because of the glitchy nature of the track.
When i arrived at the studio, Alex D, and myself were setting up the drum kit when we discovered that there was no snare drum, this was a major problem as we would need it for our recording. Alex D told Harriet that there was no snare in the studio and then suggested we use the new snare as long as we were careful with it. Our second problem was that we did not have enough clips for the microphone stands so we had to take the screw out of a C1000s clip and screwing it into a clip for a Shure Beta57.
When it came to recording the drums, Alex told me what he thinks the drums should sound like and include some fills to make the track interesting and so i had one run through to make sure i had to tempo correct and was playing along to it well,  when we came to record the drums, the first take i played the drums quite mellow so that they would not over power the track, i went a bit out of time during the track because we had the click going and in the track there are some beeping sounds and it threw me off a bit but i recovered well from that, the second take was much better as i did not get thrown by the beeping sounds and i believe it was a much smoother take. The third and final take, Alex told me to go wild on the fills because he wanted to see how it would sound, so during the third take i was not mellow at all, i still played the same groove and pattern but i decided to spice it up a bit by playing them on different parts of the drum kit and playing with a bit more vigour.
Overall i believe my performance was very good and Alex was happy with my drumming for his track.

Me Drumming

Session Review of My Guitar and Bass Session - 29/04/14

My session was to record guitar and bass for my track through D/I into Logic and using an Amp Designer to get the sound that i would like. I had Mat Quinn performing the guitar and bass because he knew my track mostly and could pitch ideas to improve the track. As a performer he performed extremely well, he was prepared and came up with ideas to improve the track, he did not need many takes because he knew the track all the way through all though he got a bit thrown by my break in the track as it was a weird pattern and needed to get his head around it. I believe i performed well in my roles as well, giving input to how the track could be improved or if he was playing it the way i would like, as the engineer i set the level for the guitar and bass before he started recording and then set a punch record because one bar wasn't quite in time. Overall i believe that the session was a successful one as we completed what we set out to do.

The Guitar and Bass tracks that Mat Recorded

Recording Session Plan 29/04/14

This session will be on Tuesday 29th April and it is for the guitars on my track and we will be recording them in G079 and on Logic. Planning for this session is not a difficult task as i do not have to book time in the studio, its just hiring the instruments, cables and performer. I plan on recording the guitar and bass through the Focusrite Scarlett 2i2 for audio interface and into Logic. I am using DI to record the Guitar and the Bass using the Scarlett USB interfaces we have at college because it is a lot easier and cheaper than recording in the studio and i would have recorded the acoustics of the live room that i would have to get rid of by EQ if i was using microphones to record the guitar and bass and that can take a long time, another reason for using DI is; that i can manipulate the sound while using an Amp Modeller so i can find a tone and effects and because of Logics vast array of Amp Modellers, Pedal Boards and effects, i can change it when ever i would like rather than in the studio which would have been through a microphone and an amp, i would have to settle for a sound that i would not be able to change after it had been recorded and placed in my track and if Mat messed up whilst recording i can just delete the recording and try again.
This session is not costly at all as i am only running it for 1 hour, I will be paying for the instruments which is £20 for the hour, the cables for the hour which is £20 and the performer for the hour which is £20, i will not need to hire any engineer, producer or assistants as i can do all these jobs because we are only at the mac i am working on.

Roles

Engineer/Producer/Assistant (Alex Ross)- I will be the all of these jobs in this session, this will require me to be in charge of setting the level of the guitar which is the engineers role , the sound of the guitar through an Amp Designer which is a producers role and making sure the performer is okay and happy.

Performer (Mat Quinn) - Mat will be the playing the guitar and bass for my track, it is his job to know what he will be performing and to do it to the best of his abilities.

Equipment Needed

1X Epiphone les Paul Guitar

1X Yamaha Bass Guitar

1X Focusrite Scarlett 2i2 audio interface

1X Headphones

1X Jack Cable

Session Review of Dan Allen's Session Drums - 28/4/14

I took part in Dan Allen's recording session as a performer, he asked me to perform drums on his track which is a chilled out opening to our E.P and so the drumming wasn't to challenging i just had to make sure that i didn't go overboard and take anything away from the track.
When i arrived at the session, Alex D, Dan B and myself started to set up the drum kit to my liking and then set up the mics for recording. When it came to record i knew what i was playing but i had to do a couple of takes because i kept messing (I dropped my stick on one take). Once i had recovered my stick we did another take and i played all the way through but Dan Allen as the producer wanted an ending with a bit more panache so we punch recorded the final bar so i could make a good ending.
Overall in the session i believe i performed my role well because we got a good take which Dan was happy with and i was happy with as well.

Me in action

Recording Session Evaluation Drums 28/04/14

How Did The Group Work Together?

I think that everybody that was taking an active role in the session did so with the professionalism that would be expected from if that was their full time job. Everybody arrived on time and any problems that we faced were dealt with quickly and professionally. 

Our set up for the Drum recording

 

How Did The Persons Involved In The Session Fulfill Their Role?

Engineer (Mat Quinn) - Mat performed his role as i suspected he would, with professionalism and enthusiasm, he set up a pro tools session with all the tracks that i would need for recording drums, he set up all the i/o settings correctly and set the gains for each individual drums and overheads correctly and safely, he also responded extremely well when the pro tools session kept crashing (about 6 times). After the first time it crashed he decided to save every time we recorded a large chunk of audio.

Assistants (Alex Dudley and Dan Burrows)- Alex and Dan performed their roles extremely well, they dealt with all the setting up and packing away of equipment with efficiency and safety. Before we started setting the drum kit up, someone who had been using the live room before us had not packed away the equipment they were using so Dan and Alex had to pack all that away and then set up the drum kit to my preferred positioning, then set up all the microphones on the drum kit and the overheads with all the XLR cables safely patched into the patch bay, after we had recorded the drums, they packed away the same as they set up the microphones with safety and efficiency, then set up and packed away the SE 2200 microphone for some vocal recording with a pop filter.  

Producer/Performer (Alex Ross) - I was both performer and producer for my session as I was playing the drums and I recorded some dialogue for my track. I believe that i performed my roles very well as i managed to take one take for the two ideas that I had, but we unfortunately lost the second idea because of pro tools crashing after we had recorded it but as the producer I thought that the first idea was the best one. As the performer I came prepared with all the correct equipment such as my drum sticks, backing track and my own cymbal from home that I was going to use in the recording. Vocal recording did not take too long and did not require much producing because we all pitched in ideas which I believe is the sign of a good team. 

Our Tracking For the Drums

Overall how did you feel the session went?

Overall I believe that the session was success as we managed to get my drums recorded and dialogue for our tracks and managed to do so safely, efficiently and professionally and managed to overcome any problems that arose during the session and we had everything finished and packed away half an hour before we were scheduled to finish. 

Session Successful

What's Been Happening

As i am writing this post, I am quite a way into my track, I have recorded my drum track but i am going to re-record it in the live room on the acoustic drum kit because i would prefer to have a live sound, i also had Mat Quinn record the guitar and bass because i cannot play either, I am planning on recording the guitars and bass again because there are a few bits out of time with the draft and i want to have it spot on with the new drums, the same goes with the bass. I also layered the guitar track to give it a bit more of a thicker sound the guitar and then i panned the original guitar track to the left and the layered track to the right. The idea to end my track was with something to transition my track into Dan Burrows track, so we delegated and decided that we could end mine with an alarm sound and start his with the same, so i went onto reason and set up a subtractor with a scream distortion unit and created an alarm sound, I then decided to add some reverb on Logic using the space designer to give it a bit of atmosphere and i used an EQ to get rid of a high pitched whine that was on the alarm.
This is a screenshot of my alarm sound.
















To make my track transition into Dan Burrows track a bit better, I decided to make a Laser Gun sound which would be the trigger for the alarm going off because the listener will hear the lasers as if they were going past them with the help of some panning and after you hear an explosion which i got off a royalty free FX youtube channel.

I made the Laser Gun sounds on logic using the ESP synth, using some effects such as; Bitcrusher, Phaser, Flanger, Expander and a Space Designer reverb, this may seem like overkill with all the effects but when the effects are bypassed and you hear the ESP without them you can understand why i used all these effects because it makes the sound more "Alien".
This is a Screenshot of my Laser Gun and the effects.    
                                                 

Recording Session Evaluation Mat Quinn, Acoustic Guitar

I took part in Mat Quinns's second recording session as a studio assistant along with Dan Burrows, our job was to make sure that the microphones were set up correctly and safely as well as do anything the engineer and performer told us to do. The first thing we had to do was to move the acoustic drum kit to the side of the studio so that we could get to the patch bay safely and be able to set up the microphone stands without any drums getting in the way. When we had safely moved the drum kit, we started to set up the microphone stands and getting the microphones in the correct position for the best sound possible, we used 2 SM57 microphones for the guitar recording and we also set up a microphone so that Mat could talk back to the engineer, we used a Wharfedale microphone for that. We did not encounter any problems during the setting up process but when as the Engineer was setting the levels, he noticed that one of the microphones was very quiet so we changed one of the XLR's, and that was the only problem from an Assistants point of view.

Recording Evaluation Mat Quinn, Drums

I took part in Mat Quinn's recording session as a performer, he wanted me to record drums for his track which was split into 3 parts, an upbeat progressive rock part, a jazzy second part and a surfer rock part.
We ran into a major problem, the hi hat stand had been tampered with and broken, the chain connecting the stand to the foot pedal was missing so we could not use the hi hat which was essential to Mat's recording. We had to compromise and use the V-Drum kit running through Logic on Rich's laptop and having a monitor wedge so I could hear the click. When it came to start recording, I had a few run throughs of the tracks to as last minute practice and because i had been practicing the tracks at home it didn't take long at all, because i had been practicing the parts i managed to record each part in about 1 or 2 takes. Overall i think i did very well as the performer as i did what was asked of me by Mat and i did it to the best of my abilities.

Recording Session Plan

This session will take place on Monday 28th April, and it is scheduled to begin at 12pm and finish at 3pm. I will be using this 3 hours to record my drum tracks as well as some little dialogue i was going to include into my track. For this session I will need a studio engineer and 2 assistants and a performer. We will hopefully spend about 30 mins setting up the drum kit with microphones and getting the kit into a comfortable position for the performer, this should give us 2 1/2 hours to record drums and vocals. The session will cost a total of £420 of my budget, this covers the cost of having to use both the live room and the control for 3 hours, having the instruments, microphones and XLR cables for the full 3 hours. It will also cover the cost of the staff, since i am the performer and producer i will not have to pay anyone to do it for me but i will have to pay for the engineer and the assistants for the 3 hours.

The above picture is a picture of my drum set up that i will be recording with, the numbers indicate which channels the microphones will be plugged into the patch bay and on pro tools. I am only using the high tom and the floor tom because that is my set up at home and i created my drum parts by using this set up. I will also be using a SM58 to do some dialogue, that will also be plugged into channel 1 in the patch bay.
When recording a kick drum we have a choice of a Shure Beta 52A and an AKG D112. I have chosen to use the AKG D112 for the kick drum mic because it has been long known as the best microphone for kick drums, this is because of its ability to handle up to 160dB SPL (Sound Pressure Level) which is excellent when recording a kick drum because depending on the placement of the mic, the frequency response of the AKG is much better for picking up low frequencies than the Beta 52A (Shown in Picture below) which is good because the kick drum is a low frequency instrument, the SPL of the kick can vary but wouldn't peak at 160dB, the D112 is also a Cardioid which means it will pick up any sound from in front and around the sides but  not any behind it, this is useful in a recording situation because the mic will be placed with the kick drum in front of the microphone and could be placed inside the kick so that it can pick up all the sound that is resonating inside the kick drum. The placement of the D112 in my session will be inside the sound hole so that I can get an equal sound of both the beater definition and the kick drum sound.

I have chosen to use a Shure SM57 for the Snare, High tom and Floor tom mics because it is a very versatile microphone which has a reputation for giving a clean sounding recording, they are a cardioid so that they will not pick up any background noise and they have a frequency response of 40-15kHz which covers the frequencies of all the drums I will have miked up using the SM57. The placement of the SM57's on the snare and toms were at a 45 degree angle and about 2 inches away from the skin of the drum and placed towards the side of the drum because as I am playing I do not want to hit the microphone as I am playing and so I can get a good crisp sound.

I have chosen to use 2 AKG C1000s's for the Overheads, I have chosen this particular model of microphone because they have a frequency response of 50Hz-20Khz which is very good for what I am using them to record for, the frequencies it can pick up are pretty much all of the drums and cymbals and I am using the overheads to pick up the cymbals mostly, with it being able to pick up the rest it will pick up the acoustics of the room better and be able to layer the other drums. With the microphones being cardioid as well they will only be picking up sound from in front of the mics and that no reverb could be picked up behind them. Since the C1000s' is a condenser microphone they are more sensitive than dynamic microphones, so if i was using the C1000s' to record the snare the microphones would probably break and if i were to use a dynamic microphone as overheads they wouldn't be able to pick anything up with them being less sensitive. For the placement of the mics, I want them to be positioned about 3ft above the drum kit, one overhead on the right hand side and one on the left (because they are stereo) pointing in towards each other at about a 70 degree angle, this is so that the microphones will pick up the all of the drum kit and I will have two audio tracks, one from the microphone on the right and one from the microphone on the left and I will be able to pan those when editing my track.

Equipment Needed
1X Drum Kit
1X AKG D112
3X SHURE SM57
2X AKG C1000S
1X SHURE SM58
8X XLR CABLES
7X MICROPHONE STAND
7X MICROPHONE CLIPS
1X HEADPHONES

Studio Roles

Studio Engineer- Mat Quinn will be the studio engineer, he will be in charge of operating the mixing desk and be responsible for the gains and the recording of the drums and vocals, it is imperitive that he and the performer have good communication.

Studio Assistants- Dan Burrows and Alex Dudley will be the studio assistants who will be there to help with either the engineer or the performer, be it getting a cup of water for the performer or helping set up the drum kit

Performer/Producer- I will take on the roles of performer and the producer, being the performer i will have to know what i am performing in order to get the most of my session, being the producer i have the final say over how something sounds and if i need to improve anything.

The Beginning

For College we have been given the task to create an EP for our Final Major Project, we were allowed to put ourselves into groups of 5 and my friends and I chose to be in a group together. We decided to create an EP telling the story of a character who is travelling through space and gets caught up in unfortunate events. Everyone in the group is in charge of creating their own chapter to the story and we came up with a storyboard so we can all connect the tracks together.
My track will be about when the character gets caught up in a battle between two opposing armies, I decided to create a Hard Rock/Metal track for this chapter because my inspiration was if this scene was in a Sci-Film the camera would pan out and show a wide shot of the battle and the track would begin.
The track itself was an idea Mathew Quinn and myself came up with in the summer holidays one year and I decided to take it and change it up and create it as a newer version. The track has a clear influence in terms of sound and style, it is very much influenced by Metallica but I intend to add some electronic elements to make it more of a space feel.

I started coming up with the drum track at home and I recorded myself playing them on my phone and put it on YouTube so the group could see and give me feedback, once I had chosen which drum track is the one for the track I started creating a draft of my track on Logic by setting up the electronic drum kit in G079 and sending it through the Scarlett USB audio interface and into an audio track on Logic, I plan on recording live drums in the Live room because I feel my track would benefit from having live drums, but I plan on recording the guitars and bass guitar through logic as a DI because I like a particular tone I found on a Amp modeller.