Re: Would like an opinion on this computer
I am not sure was version 8 even accessible? Jake - Original Message - From: soundog stiles@gmail.com To: Pro Tools Accessibility ptaccess@googlegroups.com Sent: Monday, May 23, 2011 6:35 PM Subject: Re: Would like an opinion on this computer Yes Jake, I was looking at the 003 interface as an option for you also. I'd go with the 003 Factory though... echoing Frank's suggestion about starting simple, I think you're throwing $700 away with 003 Complete and you haven't even started learning the software yet.Also t's not even the current version of the software so you're going to want to upgrade at some point to PT9. Unfortunately, I haven't found a vendor who's selling a Digi003 bundled with ProTools 9, just with version 8. You don't want a solid state drive for your audio recording drive, not allowed for ProTools. You can get that solid state drive for your internal program drive if you like. For your projects get an external Firewire drive with an Oxford chipset in it, as detailed on the Avid recommended hard drives page http://avid.custkb.com/avid/app/selfservice/search.jsp?DocId=380567 I also support Frank's other suggestions for the computer and I'm copying this to your email. regards, Tom On May 20, 12:53 pm, Frank Carmickle fr...@carmickle.com wrote: Hello Jake If you are going to have some agency purchase you a computer make sure you include some of the things that you would add on. You really need two drives. One for system and software and one for audio. If it were me I would be buying a machine with a solid state disk. It's really really so so so much faster. The 27 inch imac is the best machine to buy right now if you aren't going to be looking at using hd. So this is a great choice. I'm glad to see that you are getting 8 gb of memory. Make sure that you get them to buy you a control surface and audio interface. I think right now the best thing is probably the 003. I think it has the right controls for the money and the a/d and d/a is good enough. As we talked about on a conference calls some months ago now, you really need to start out with a small analog unit like a portastudio to start understanding how to work with audio. Please do not just jump in to a computer based audio setup with out doing this step first. Get some experience. Go to sessions with helpful engineers. Tom, on this list, is near by you. I'm sure he would love to give you a hand and maybe already is for all I know. HTH --FC On May 19, 2011, at 5:54 PM, Jake wrote: - Original Message - From: Joshua Egdamin To: jake Fry Sent: Thursday, May 19, 2011 10:56 AM Subject: here it is= you save 6% off cpu and 12% off apple care for being a government agency. Apple Store Mac iPod iPhone iPad iTunes Support Apple Store (U.S.) 1-800-MY-APPLE Live Chat Home Shop Mac iMac Configure Help Account Cart Compare Macs MacBook Just $999 MacBook Pro From $1199 MacBook Air From $999 Mac mini From $699 iMac From $1199 Mac Pro From $2499 Configure your iMac. Hardware Pre-Installed Software Service and Support Accessories Promotions Thinking about your first Mac? Answers to some of the most common PC-to-Mac questions Popular Choices Choose from our most popular configurations. Hardware Processor Get amazing performance from the quad-core Intel Core i5 or Core i7 processor, which features four processor cores on a single chip. Choose the speed and processor you want. Learn more The Intel Core i5 and i7 processors are based on new 32-nanometer process technology with an advanced Core microarchitecture that features an integrated memory controller and level 3 cache, giving iMac faster, more direct access to memory. In addition, these processors feature: Turbo Boost 2.0 - a dynamic performance technology that automatically boosts the processor clock speed based on workload, giving you extra processing power when you need it. Hyper-Threading (Intel Core i7 only) — a technology that allows two threads to run simultaneously on each core. So a quad-core iMac has eight virtual cores, all of which are recognized by Mac OS X. This enables the processor to deliver faster performance by spreading tasks more evenly across a greater number of cores. Processor 3.1GHz Quad-Core Intel Core i5 [Subtract $200.00] 3.4GHz Quad-Core Intel Core i7 Memory More memory (RAM) increases performance and enables your computer to perform faster and better. Choose additional 1333MHz DDR3 memory for your iMac. Learn more The more memory your computer has, the more programs you can run simultaneously, and the better performance you get from your computer. Select the standard memory configuration to support day-to-day tasks such as email, word processing, and web browsing as well as more complex tasks such as editing photos, creating illustrations, and building presentations. Upgrade your
Re: three questions about audio, protools and blind people...
Frank, no problem. This is on topic. Nickus, historically, the tracking or mix engineer receives income from either the studio that employs them, or else was contracted by a project's Executive Producer. In either case, upstream of those people, the money came from larger projects, such as producing demo or album tracks for an artist, work on a film or television project, music for commercials, etc. The studio was the music and sound factory, and the engineer was one of the technicians. 1. Music sales are profoundly low when compared to historical figures. The huge music markets of the 20th century are gone. Since people aren't buying like they used to, no one wants to invest the huge amounts of money to elaborately record artists. From small time to big time recording artists, album production budgets have shrunk to the bare minimum. This is the case in all media. Instead of hiring live musicians, most film and television music is now sequenced. When people are actually recorded, in many cases, recording is kept to a minimum. It is cheaper to edit than to spend lots of expensive time to get the great take. 2. Without the huge in-flow of large recording budgets, the money no longer is available to support most of the large recording facilities of just a few years ago. As the facilities close, that means less steady work for lots of people formerly employed by the technical side of the recording industry, including engineers. 3. Anyone with $1,000 can record a passable version of a song at home, and anyone with $10,000 and a few years of practice and study can do a competent job of recording and mixing an album at home. There are wonnabee producers and mixers under every rock, and there are so many that they work for little to nothing. They might not have golden ears and decades of experience, but even those that do have found it harder to insist on past pay when there is so much competition and less money available to pay them. Why rent studio time to cut a demo when your buddy can run GarageBand? Why pay someone to write and arrange music for a commercial, and book musicians and a studio to record it when someone can be contracted through a web site to throw together some loops with a few overdubs for a couple of hundred bucks? Everyone is trying to make their project happen for less money. So, in summary, there is less money available to support a larger number of people that are attempting to perform this work. It's important not to live under illusions when trying to turn this sort of work in to income. The day of the mega studio and the recording engineer in the traditional sense is pretty much gone, with a few exceptions. The big cities for recording in the US, such as New York, LA, Atlanta, and others still employ people for this sort of work, but the jobs are far fewer, and they're flooded with people with lots of experience in bedroom studios. I know just a few people that still routinely get work in large facilities. The others that I know that are still making money with this sort of work have pretty much given up on the old model, and have turned themselves in to craftsman instead of techies. By that, I mean that they find their own clients, work with them on an on-going basis, and sell themselves as experts in particular types of recording. Even so, they are usually being directly paid by artists, and so are making due on far less money than in days passed. There isn't megabucks in this anymore, except for a small few. If you do it, you should view it as an art that you'd like to pursue, and hope to make enough to sustain yourself. Focus on a niche. Become good at on-site recording of acoustic instruments, find those musicians, and promote yourself. Become good and fast with editing, and fight with the hordes of others competing for jobs online. Become fast at throwing together instrumental tracks and beds in short periods of time so that you can serve the low budget new media people. Moving to the US or UK probably won't help so much. You can hunt up work over the Internet as well as someone in either of those places. Really, though, you must absolutely love this sort of work, because getting anywhere with it today takes a huge amount of time and effort, and the rewards aren't commonly financial. Sorry if that's gloom, but it's how things are. On the positive side, pretty much anyone that wants to record can now record. It's not an elite club anymore, nor does it require a lot of money. Recording music is becoming something that people increasingly do for themselves, rather than depending on technical experts. We're not quite to the point where GarageBand has an auto-mix button, but I don't doubt that a feature like that will show up before too many years. Those with golden ears will say how auto-mixes are lacking in this way or that, but most people won't be able to hear, nor will they care. In that world, you'll be
Re: Would like an opinion on this computer
I know that Avid says that solid state drives haven't been qualified for use with Pro Tools, but I don't understand why that matters. They read and write faster. They seek faster. They are higher performing devices in every regard over mechanical drives, other than price. It is like hearing that Avid has not qualified Pro Tools for computer monitors larger than 42 inches, as if that would matter. I've successfully used them, and have seen people on forums using them, also. I've also used them very successfully with other DAWs. In Sonar, due to their extremely low seek time, you can run with practically no disk buffer, and not get a drop out. Bouncing projects with high track counts is far faster than when using mechanical drives, since the DAW doesn't need to waste time seeking back and forth among the audio files of many tracks while bouncing through a project. Then again, Sonar doesn't need to bounce in real-time. With a real-time bounce, this last speed advantage wouldn't matter. Is the SSD thing a situation where it works, but just isn't officially supported, or is their some pitfall that I haven't run in to yet? Bryan On May 23, 2011, at 9:35 PM, soundog wrote: Yes Jake, I was looking at the 003 interface as an option for you also. I'd go with the 003 Factory though... echoing Frank's suggestion about starting simple, I think you're throwing $700 away with 003 Complete and you haven't even started learning the software yet.Also t's not even the current version of the software so you're going to want to upgrade at some point to PT9. Unfortunately, I haven't found a vendor who's selling a Digi003 bundled with ProTools 9, just with version 8. You don't want a solid state drive for your audio recording drive, not allowed for ProTools. You can get that solid state drive for your internal program drive if you like. For your projects get an external Firewire drive with an Oxford chipset in it, as detailed on the Avid recommended hard drives page http://avid.custkb.com/avid/app/selfservice/search.jsp?DocId=380567 I also support Frank's other suggestions for the computer and I'm copying this to your email. regards, Tom On May 20, 12:53 pm, Frank Carmickle fr...@carmickle.com wrote: Hello Jake If you are going to have some agency purchase you a computer make sure you include some of the things that you would add on. You really need two drives. One for system and software and one for audio. If it were me I would be buying a machine with a solid state disk. It's really really so so so much faster. The 27 inch imac is the best machine to buy right now if you aren't going to be looking at using hd. So this is a great choice. I'm glad to see that you are getting 8 gb of memory. Make sure that you get them to buy you a control surface and audio interface. I think right now the best thing is probably the 003. I think it has the right controls for the money and the a/d and d/a is good enough. As we talked about on a conference calls some months ago now, you really need to start out with a small analog unit like a portastudio to start understanding how to work with audio. Please do not just jump in to a computer based audio setup with out doing this step first. Get some experience. Go to sessions with helpful engineers. Tom, on this list, is near by you. I'm sure he would love to give you a hand and maybe already is for all I know. HTH --FC On May 19, 2011, at 5:54 PM, Jake wrote: - Original Message - From: Joshua Egdamin To: jake Fry Sent: Thursday, May 19, 2011 10:56 AM Subject: here it is= you save 6% off cpu and 12% off apple care for being a government agency. Apple Store Mac iPod iPhone iPad iTunes Support Apple Store (U.S.) 1-800-MY-APPLE Live Chat Home Shop Mac iMac Configure Help Account Cart Compare Macs MacBook Just $999 MacBook Pro From $1199 MacBook Air From $999 Mac mini From $699 iMac From $1199 Mac Pro From $2499 Configure your iMac. Hardware Pre-Installed Software Service and Support Accessories Promotions Thinking about your first Mac? Answers to some of the most common PC-to-Mac questions Popular Choices Choose from our most popular configurations. Hardware Processor Get amazing performance from the quad-core Intel Core i5 or Core i7 processor, which features four processor cores on a single chip. Choose the speed and processor you want. Learn more The Intel Core i5 and i7 processors are based on new 32-nanometer process technology with an advanced Core microarchitecture that features an integrated memory controller and level 3 cache, giving iMac faster, more direct access to memory. In addition, these processors feature: Turbo Boost 2.0 - a dynamic performance technology that automatically boosts the processor clock speed based on workload, giving you extra
Re: Would like an opinion on this computer
Hi Tom There should be people selling the 003 factory with the cross grade to PT9. Just did a quick search and it looks like guitar center and sweetwater are still doing it. --FC On May 23, 2011, at 9:35 PM, soundog wrote: Yes Jake, I was looking at the 003 interface as an option for you also. I'd go with the 003 Factory though... echoing Frank's suggestion about starting simple, I think you're throwing $700 away with 003 Complete and you haven't even started learning the software yet.Also t's not even the current version of the software so you're going to want to upgrade at some point to PT9. Unfortunately, I haven't found a vendor who's selling a Digi003 bundled with ProTools 9, just with version 8. You don't want a solid state drive for your audio recording drive, not allowed for ProTools. You can get that solid state drive for your internal program drive if you like. For your projects get an external Firewire drive with an Oxford chipset in it, as detailed on the Avid recommended hard drives page http://avid.custkb.com/avid/app/selfservice/search.jsp?DocId=380567 I also support Frank's other suggestions for the computer and I'm copying this to your email. regards, Tom On May 20, 12:53 pm, Frank Carmickle fr...@carmickle.com wrote: Hello Jake If you are going to have some agency purchase you a computer make sure you include some of the things that you would add on. You really need two drives. One for system and software and one for audio. If it were me I would be buying a machine with a solid state disk. It's really really so so so much faster. The 27 inch imac is the best machine to buy right now if you aren't going to be looking at using hd. So this is a great choice. I'm glad to see that you are getting 8 gb of memory. Make sure that you get them to buy you a control surface and audio interface. I think right now the best thing is probably the 003. I think it has the right controls for the money and the a/d and d/a is good enough. As we talked about on a conference calls some months ago now, you really need to start out with a small analog unit like a portastudio to start understanding how to work with audio. Please do not just jump in to a computer based audio setup with out doing this step first. Get some experience. Go to sessions with helpful engineers. Tom, on this list, is near by you. I'm sure he would love to give you a hand and maybe already is for all I know. HTH --FC On May 19, 2011, at 5:54 PM, Jake wrote: - Original Message - From: Joshua Egdamin To: jake Fry Sent: Thursday, May 19, 2011 10:56 AM Subject: here it is= you save 6% off cpu and 12% off apple care for being a government agency. Apple Store Mac iPod iPhone iPad iTunes Support Apple Store (U.S.) 1-800-MY-APPLE Live Chat Home Shop Mac iMac Configure Help Account Cart Compare Macs MacBook Just $999 MacBook Pro From $1199 MacBook Air From $999 Mac mini From $699 iMac From $1199 Mac Pro From $2499 Configure your iMac. Hardware Pre-Installed Software Service and Support Accessories Promotions Thinking about your first Mac? Answers to some of the most common PC-to-Mac questions Popular Choices Choose from our most popular configurations. Hardware Processor Get amazing performance from the quad-core Intel Core i5 or Core i7 processor, which features four processor cores on a single chip. Choose the speed and processor you want. Learn more The Intel Core i5 and i7 processors are based on new 32-nanometer process technology with an advanced Core microarchitecture that features an integrated memory controller and level 3 cache, giving iMac faster, more direct access to memory. In addition, these processors feature: Turbo Boost 2.0 - a dynamic performance technology that automatically boosts the processor clock speed based on workload, giving you extra processing power when you need it. Hyper-Threading (Intel Core i7 only) — a technology that allows two threads to run simultaneously on each core. So a quad-core iMac has eight virtual cores, all of which are recognized by Mac OS X. This enables the processor to deliver faster performance by spreading tasks more evenly across a greater number of cores. Processor 3.1GHz Quad-Core Intel Core i5 [Subtract $200.00] 3.4GHz Quad-Core Intel Core i7 Memory More memory (RAM) increases performance and enables your computer to perform faster and better. Choose additional 1333MHz DDR3 memory for your iMac. Learn more The more memory your computer has, the more programs you can run simultaneously, and the better performance you get from your computer. Select the standard memory configuration to support day-to-day tasks such as email, word processing, and web browsing as well as more complex tasks such as editing photos, creating
Re: three questions about audio, protools and blind people...
Wow guys just finished reading the thread and I am a bit depressed. The bright spot as I see it is there will always be Audiophiles who will insist on the quality recordings that only masters in the field can tern out. Jake - Original Message - From: Bryan Smart bryansm...@bryansmart.com To: ptaccess@googlegroups.com Sent: Tuesday, May 24, 2011 3:15 AM Subject: Re: three questions about audio, protools and blind people... Frank, no problem. This is on topic. Nickus, historically, the tracking or mix engineer receives income from either the studio that employs them, or else was contracted by a project's Executive Producer. In either case, upstream of those people, the money came from larger projects, such as producing demo or album tracks for an artist, work on a film or television project, music for commercials, etc. The studio was the music and sound factory, and the engineer was one of the technicians. 1. Music sales are profoundly low when compared to historical figures. The huge music markets of the 20th century are gone. Since people aren't buying like they used to, no one wants to invest the huge amounts of money to elaborately record artists. From small time to big time recording artists, album production budgets have shrunk to the bare minimum. This is the case in all media. Instead of hiring live musicians, most film and television music is now sequenced. When people are actually recorded, in many cases, recording is kept to a minimum. It is cheaper to edit than to spend lots of expensive time to get the great take. 2. Without the huge in-flow of large recording budgets, the money no longer is available to support most of the large recording facilities of just a few years ago. As the facilities close, that means less steady work for lots of people formerly employed by the technical side of the recording industry, including engineers. 3. Anyone with $1,000 can record a passable version of a song at home, and anyone with $10,000 and a few years of practice and study can do a competent job of recording and mixing an album at home. There are wonnabee producers and mixers under every rock, and there are so many that they work for little to nothing. They might not have golden ears and decades of experience, but even those that do have found it harder to insist on past pay when there is so much competition and less money available to pay them. Why rent studio time to cut a demo when your buddy can run GarageBand? Why pay someone to write and arrange music for a commercial, and book musicians and a studio to record it when someone can be contracted through a web site to throw together some loops with a few overdubs for a couple of hundred bucks? Everyone is trying to make their project happen for less money. So, in summary, there is less money available to support a larger number of people that are attempting to perform this work. It's important not to live under illusions when trying to turn this sort of work in to income. The day of the mega studio and the recording engineer in the traditional sense is pretty much gone, with a few exceptions. The big cities for recording in the US, such as New York, LA, Atlanta, and others still employ people for this sort of work, but the jobs are far fewer, and they're flooded with people with lots of experience in bedroom studios. I know just a few people that still routinely get work in large facilities. The others that I know that are still making money with this sort of work have pretty much given up on the old model, and have turned themselves in to craftsman instead of techies. By that, I mean that they find their own clients, work with them on an on-going basis, and sell themselves as experts in particular types of recording. Even so, they are usually being directly paid by artists, and so are making due on far less money than in days passed. There isn't megabucks in this anymore, except for a small few. If you do it, you should view it as an art that you'd like to pursue, and hope to make enough to sustain yourself. Focus on a niche. Become good at on-site recording of acoustic instruments, find those musicians, and promote yourself. Become good and fast with editing, and fight with the hordes of others competing for jobs online. Become fast at throwing together instrumental tracks and beds in short periods of time so that you can serve the low budget new media people. Moving to the US or UK probably won't help so much. You can hunt up work over the Internet as well as someone in either of those places. Really, though, you must absolutely love this sort of work, because getting anywhere with it today takes a huge amount of time and effort, and the rewards aren't commonly financial. Sorry if that's gloom, but it's how things are. On the positive side, pretty much anyone that wants to record can now record. It's not an elite club anymore, nor does it require a lot of
Re: three questions about audio, protools and blind people...
On May 24, 12:15 pm, Bryan Smart bryansm...@bryansmart.com wrote: Frank, no problem. This is on topic. Nickus, historically, the tracking or mix engineer receives income from either the studio that employs them, or else was contracted by a project's Executive Producer. In either case, upstream of those people, the money came from larger projects, such as producing demo or album tracks for an artist, work on a film or television project, music for commercials, etc. The studio was the music and sound factory, and the engineer was one of the technicians. 1. Music sales are profoundly low when compared to historical figures. The huge music markets of the 20th century are gone. Since people aren't buying like they used to, no one wants to invest the huge amounts of money to elaborately record artists. From small time to big time recording artists, album production budgets have shrunk to the bare minimum. This is the case in all media. Instead of hiring live musicians, most film and television music is now sequenced. When people are actually recorded, in many cases, recording is kept to a minimum. It is cheaper to edit than to spend lots of expensive time to get the great take. 2. Without the huge in-flow of large recording budgets, the money no longer is available to support most of the large recording facilities of just a few years ago. As the facilities close, that means less steady work for lots of people formerly employed by the technical side of the recording industry, including engineers. 3. Anyone with $1,000 can record a passable version of a song at home, and anyone with $10,000 and a few years of practice and study can do a competent job of recording and mixing an album at home. There are wonnabee producers and mixers under every rock, and there are so many that they work for little to nothing. They might not have golden ears and decades of experience, but even those that do have found it harder to insist on past pay when there is so much competition and less money available to pay them. Why rent studio time to cut a demo when your buddy can run GarageBand? Why pay someone to write and arrange music for a commercial, and book musicians and a studio to record it when someone can be contracted through a web site to throw together some loops with a few overdubs for a couple of hundred bucks? Everyone is trying to make their project happen for less money. So, in summary, there is less money available to support a larger number of people that are attempting to perform this work. It's important not to live under illusions when trying to turn this sort of work in to income. The day of the mega studio and the recording engineer in the traditional sense is pretty much gone, with a few exceptions. The big cities for recording in the US, such as New York, LA, Atlanta, and others still employ people for this sort of work, but the jobs are far fewer, and they're flooded with people with lots of experience in bedroom studios. I know just a few people that still routinely get work in large facilities. The others that I know that are still making money with this sort of work have pretty much given up on the old model, and have turned themselves in to craftsman instead of techies. By that, I mean that they find their own clients, work with them on an on-going basis, and sell themselves as experts in particular types of recording. Even so, they are usually being directly paid by artists, and so are making due on far less money than in days passed. There isn't megabucks in this anymore, except for a small few. If you do it, you should view it as an art that you'd like to pursue, and hope to make enough to sustain yourself. Focus on a niche. Become good at on-site recording of acoustic instruments, find those musicians, and promote yourself. Become good and fast with editing, and fight with the hordes of others competing for jobs online. Become fast at throwing together instrumental tracks and beds in short periods of time so that you can serve the low budget new media people. Moving to the US or UK probably won't help so much. You can hunt up work over the Internet as well as someone in either of those places. Really, though, you must absolutely love this sort of work, because getting anywhere with it today takes a huge amount of time and effort, and the rewards aren't commonly financial. Sorry if that's gloom, but it's how things are. On the positive side, pretty much anyone that wants to record can now record. It's not an elite club anymore, nor does it require a lot of money. Recording music is becoming something that people increasingly do for themselves, rather than depending on technical experts. We're not quite to the point where GarageBand has an auto-mix button, but I don't doubt that a feature like that will show up before too many years. Those with golden ears will say how
Re: three questions about audio, protools and blind people...
Hello everyone, there are more factors than the producing alone for instance if you are w0orking with musicians and other things I worked in prostudios which had a good crew and a good building you can buy good stuff for a reasonable price but you cant buy good pros who know their trade they have to work for it. Or you yourself must be good. I read the whole item and i stand on the sideline but do not make yourself dependable on technique because that's only half of it. You have to be creative. Sergeant pepper was made on four tracks. cheers and work hard every one. Peter. - Original Message - From: Jake 2001sherl...@gmail.com To: ptaccess@googlegroups.com Cc: teall...@hotmail.com Sent: Tuesday, May 24, 2011 8:34 PM Subject: Re: three questions about audio, protools and blind people... Wow guys just finished reading the thread and I am a bit depressed. The bright spot as I see it is there will always be Audiophiles who will insist on the quality recordings that only masters in the field can tern out. Jake - Original Message - From: Bryan Smart bryansm...@bryansmart.com To: ptaccess@googlegroups.com Sent: Tuesday, May 24, 2011 3:15 AM Subject: Re: three questions about audio, protools and blind people... Frank, no problem. This is on topic. Nickus, historically, the tracking or mix engineer receives income from either the studio that employs them, or else was contracted by a project's Executive Producer. In either case, upstream of those people, the money came from larger projects, such as producing demo or album tracks for an artist, work on a film or television project, music for commercials, etc. The studio was the music and sound factory, and the engineer was one of the technicians. 1. Music sales are profoundly low when compared to historical figures. The huge music markets of the 20th century are gone. Since people aren't buying like they used to, no one wants to invest the huge amounts of money to elaborately record artists. From small time to big time recording artists, album production budgets have shrunk to the bare minimum. This is the case in all media. Instead of hiring live musicians, most film and television music is now sequenced. When people are actually recorded, in many cases, recording is kept to a minimum. It is cheaper to edit than to spend lots of expensive time to get the great take. 2. Without the huge in-flow of large recording budgets, the money no longer is available to support most of the large recording facilities of just a few years ago. As the facilities close, that means less steady work for lots of people formerly employed by the technical side of the recording industry, including engineers. 3. Anyone with $1,000 can record a passable version of a song at home, and anyone with $10,000 and a few years of practice and study can do a competent job of recording and mixing an album at home. There are wonnabee producers and mixers under every rock, and there are so many that they work for little to nothing. They might not have golden ears and decades of experience, but even those that do have found it harder to insist on past pay when there is so much competition and less money available to pay them. Why rent studio time to cut a demo when your buddy can run GarageBand? Why pay someone to write and arrange music for a commercial, and book musicians and a studio to record it when someone can be contracted through a web site to throw together some loops with a few overdubs for a couple of hundred bucks? Everyone is trying to make their project happen for less money. So, in summary, there is less money available to support a larger number of people that are attempting to perform this work. It's important not to live under illusions when trying to turn this sort of work in to income. The day of the mega studio and the recording engineer in the traditional sense is pretty much gone, with a few exceptions. The big cities for recording in the US, such as New York, LA, Atlanta, and others still employ people for this sort of work, but the jobs are far fewer, and they're flooded with people with lots of experience in bedroom studios. I know just a few people that still routinely get work in large facilities. The others that I know that are still making money with this sort of work have pretty much given up on the old model, and have turned themselves in to craftsman instead of techies. By that, I mean that they find their own clients, work with them on an on-going basis, and sell themselves as experts in particular types of recording. Even so, they are usually being directly paid by artists, and so are making due on far less money than in days passed. There isn't megabucks in this anymore, except for a small few. If you do it, you should view it as an art that you'd like to pursue, and hope to make enough to sustain yourself. Focus on a niche. Become good at on-site recording of acoustic instruments, find those musicians, and promote yourself. Become
