Continued from Page 13
Price differences
Depending on how serious a recording artist considers him or herself, a home studio setup may prove a wallet-friendly decision. A standard home recording studio consists of recording software that costs anywhere between $40 to $400. Home studio necessities include microphones, an interface that convert an analog signal into a digital signal for plugging in a microphone, guitar and keyboard, and a hard drive to store the recordings. All of this equipment requires price from $200 to $1,500 such as the
Professional recording studios vary in price. Franz charges $50 per hour at his studio, Underground Sun, in Los Angeles.The $50 charge includes the studio and all the equipment, as well as his services as a professional producer and sound engineer.
Nearby, Black Lodge Studios in Eudora charges $50 an hour or $400 a day plus an additional engineer fee. Add up the hourly costs and one album may cost you what you could have spent on an entire home recording studio.
But there are drawbacks ...
While producing music at home has benefits, it also can be problematic for an inexperienced producer. Although home production software is fairly beginner-friendly, you still need to know what you are doing, Franz says. He explains that in a professional studio, you have access to a sound engineer and a professional producer.
A musician attempting to double as producer may turn a potentially good album into a bad one.
sure the final mix sounds good. The producer, Franz says, acts as the director of the entire recording process. His duties include everything from making sure the musicians know their parts to creating a particular vibe so the band or artist can give its best performance.
The sound engineer has several jobs, including setting up microphones for optimal sound recording quality, providing technical support for the highquality recording equipment mixing and mastering of tracks, and making
Another pitfall to home studios can be sound quality. Home studios rarely have the high-quality acoustics that a professional studio would have. Most professional studios, such as Black Lodge, have sound-proof isolation booths, which limit the reverberations that cause echoing, creating an atmosphere for optimal recording.
Some genres of music, however, can be just as easy to produce from a home studio with similar sound qualities. Hip hop and electronic music, Franz says, can often be produced in a home studio with little or no difference in sound quality because many of the beats and rhythms are computer-generated rather than played by live instruments that must be recorded with a microphone.
Good or bad for music?
Musicians, recording artists and producers debate whether the ease of transforming one's home into a recording studio is good for the future of music. Local home-based recording artist and producer Joe McGuire, who produces under the moniker Pleasuremaker and has released several of his albums recorded and produced in his home studio, claims it has brightened the future of music because it enables musicians who wouldn't otherwise have a chance to record their music.
Others, however, such as producer Anthony Davis, a.k.a. Ant, of the renowned hip-hop group Atmosphere doesn't see home production software as entirely positive. He says that since many musicians/producers record and release music so easily, they often rush through the production process. "It seems that everyone is trying to get famous so quick that they don't take the time and really work hard on what they release," Davis says.
"It seems that everyone is trying to get famous so quick that they don't take the time and really work hard on what they release." Anthony Davis, from Atmosphere
Future of professional studios
Despite the increase in home recording and producing, Franz believes there will always be a demand for professional recording studios. He says they will never go away, but may have to downsize from the large facilities of previous eras in order to survive.
"Not all musicians want to be engineers and producers. You need a team," Franz says.