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Home based recording studio

04blackmaxx

04blackmaxx

Well-Known Member
Hey Guys - I am looking to build a recording studio at my home in a dedicated room and I am really clueless on what I should get. I want monitors and a good mic but also I don't know anything about the rest of the equipment, laptop, etc to get. I see packages on Ebay like the link below but was wondering if any of you guys sing or have a recording studio setup at your home and what you have?



https://www.ebay.com/itm/Audient-iD...h=item3ae4bc90b3:g:bHgAAOSwSlpcCc-F:rk:7:pf:0
 
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I just completed work on my first CD. Waiting for my friend to finish the artwork. I recorded the entire project at home. After our kids moved out, I took over one of their bedrooms for the home studio. It's upstairs so it's isolated from the noise in the rest of the house. This is the most important feature of your studio; it must be quiet and have carpeting to absorb sound reflections. You may have to put up some sound absorbing panels, too, but I didn't have to. If you mic close enough and use cardioid mics, it will reject the room reflected sound.
Gear:
You don't have to spend a fortune on mics. I did some research, listened to demo recordings and looked at the frequency response graphs, comparing them to a known good mic. I bought the MXL V67G large diaphragm mics. I am very pleased with the sound.
I recorded the CD on a TASCAM D100 digital recorder. Then I transferred the digital files to my computer and used Audacity to edit them and add effects.
I also have an Alesis IO2 Express recording interface that I used. It cost $89 and has 2 very quiet mic preamps.
Here is one of the tracks from the CD:
https://soundcloud.com/wbendler/the...ebra-wuitowitz?in=wbendler/sets/warrens-music
Playback system is a Luxman R103 receiver and a couple of B&W small speakers
 
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I have a very modest setup consisting of a 2012 Mac Pro running Adobe Audition for audio processing and Ableton Live for MIDI & DAW, a Behringer QX1202USB mixer, a Roland digital stage piano and assorted acoustic/electric/MIDI/electronic instruments, a cheap but surprisingly adequate BTSky BM-800 microphone, and Technics SB-CS5 bookshelf speakers (driven by a Harman/Kardon HK6100 stereo amplifier) and various headphones for monitors.
 
dr*audio said:
I just completed work on my first CD. Waiting for my friend to finish the artwork. I recorded the entire project at home. After our kids moved out, I took over one of their bedrooms for the home studio. It's upstairs so it's isolated from the noise in the rest of the house. This is the most important feature of your studio; it must be quiet and have carpeting to absorb sound reflections. You may have to put up some sound absorbing panels, too, but I didn't have to. If you mic close enough and use cardioid mics, it will reject the room reflected sound.
Gear:
You don't have to spend a fortune on mics. I did some research, listened to demo recordings and looked at the frequency response graphs, comparing them to a known good mic. I bought the MXL V67G large diaphragm mics. I am very pleased with the sound.
I recorded the CD on a TASCAM D100 digital recorder. Then I transferred the digital files to my computer and used Audacity to edit them and add effects.
I also have an Alesis IO2 Express recording interface that I used. It cost $89 and has 2 very quiet mic preamps.
Here is one of the tracks from the CD:
https://soundcloud.com/wbendler/the...ebra-wuitowitz?in=wbendler/sets/warrens-music
Playback system is a Luxman R103 receiver and a couple of B&W small speakers
Click to expand...

Thanks for all the info. Just wondering if Soundcloud is the premier place to have your music discovered? I was thinking of uploading videos of my singing in the studio to youtube (so I want the room to look pretty sick) but have heard alot about soundcloud for amateur recording artists.
 
04blackmaxx said:
Thanks for all the info. Just wondering if Soundcloud is the premier place to have your music discovered? I was thinking of uploading videos of my singing in the studio to youtube (so I want the room to look pretty sick) but have heard alot about soundcloud for amateur recording artists.
Click to expand...
I post on Soundcloud and YouTube also and then I post links on Facebook and forums, like the Acoustic Guitar Forum.
More thoughts:
Playback system should be the most accurate you can get, so you don't try to "fix" bad sound on the recording only to find it sounds horrible on a good system. I do not use the small speakers that I have for playback to do the mastering.
I master on a desktop computer with a much better system:
Onkyo Integra A8087 integrated amp
Dynaco A25 speakers.
You can't get much more accurate than the A25's and you can buy them cheap.
Monitor speakers are not always as faithful and uncolored as good high fi speakers.
 
Gazdatronik said:
Yes, YouTube. Soundcloud is dying anyway.
Click to expand...

I think the quality of my singing will be the biggest factor but that is good to hear since I already have a YT channel. I cut my teeth in a manhattan kareoke bar and the crowd loved me singing New York, New York and I wanted to sing all night.
 
You should be able to find lots of microphone comparison vids on YT too. Gives you a general idea of their sound.
 
The last Home recording studio I was involved with was basically analog with the addition of midi digital effects still using analog multi channel tape decks. The basic components were Tascam. So I am totally out of the loop now that its all computer and digitally based.
 
04blackmaxx said:
…I want monitors…
Click to expand...
There are not simply “monitors”.

There are monitors - little boxes for (medium frequency range + high frequency range) each. As part of a full sound frequency range (at least 30 Hz … 16000-20000 Hz) studio monitoring system.

There are huge powerful full sound frequency range (20…20000 Hz) monitors (thousands dollars apiece), ex.:
https://www.genelec.com/sites/default/files/media/Studio monitors/SAM Studio Monitors/1236A/1236a_operating_manual_0.pdf

How do you otherwise want to fully control the full sound frequency range of your recordings without a rather big subwoofer and a full sound frequency range (at least 10-band, with its lowest slider at not higher than “30 Hz”!) graphic equalizer?

And such a REAL control being impossible without having measured (having activated your EQ sure) the full acoustic frequency range output of your monitoring system in your room.
 
I'd suggest looking at Sweetwater and B&H Photo. Browse through their different sections of studio gear. Lot's to choose from. But basically, you'll need a DAW (digital audio workstation), some type of recording channel strip, and editing software.

A DAW can be pretty much any PC, Mac or Windows based. Tower or laptop. But, it should be fairly robust. A fast multi-core processor and lot's of RAM. Multiple hard drives helps as well. A system and software drive, a capture drive, and a render drive. These help with glitch free editing and transfers of the audio data.

There are a wide variety of channel strips to choose from. Some come with bundled software, and some don't. The type of connection to the computer varies as well. Buy one that will interface with your hardware and software choices. Most advertise system configurations, and what they need.

Software. That's a big one. There's freeware and shareware. Some very good. But the software needs to be flexible. It has to support recording, mixing, and possibly mastering. Plus, burning a CD Proof, if desired. Not all software can burn a viable Red Book CD-R. Don't forget software plug in's either. Some very powerful editing tools available through plug in's. Waves is one of the best. Just pricey.

Buy smart. Research is key. For a newbie, a channel strip with bundled software if probably best. Protools and Motu come to mind first. I read and studied for months, when researching this topic. I built my own DAW, bought stand alone gear, and software. It worked flawlessly for mastering. But, it was a big learning curve, to become proficient with everything.

Good luck.
 
Yah you can put a song on Soundcloud or youTube but I would say you have a better chance of being "discovered" on BandCamp. If people like your music on Bandcamp, word can spread and you might even make a few bucks.
 
I recently went through the same journey you are on. I was coming from a standalone 16 track recording piece of hardware looking to have more control digitally. Ended up with a simple 2 channel interface and Mixcraft Studio 8 software on a not so great PC. It has been working great and isn't too hard to learn. Tried 4 or 5 other software's first (Reaper, Audacity - FREE, Tracktion, couple others) most have free trials. Mixcraft was easiest to use and comes with Melodyne (limited version but helps my terrible vocals a bit). They also have a good forum that gets quick responses to questions I had. Good luck with whatever you choose.
 
04bm: Regarding the USB audio interface I'd suggest to not buy "too little" in terms of analogue I/O channels. The prices nowadays are pretty moderate, so that for example a Focusrite Scarlett 6i6 isn't that much more expensive anymore on the absolute scale than the little 2i2 - and it's two additional analogue input and output channels may for example come in handy, if you'd like to add a regular stereo system in that studio room, so you can use these I/Os for bidirectionally integrating the audio interface into that stereo system.

Greetings from Munich!

Manfred / lini
 
Garageband is quite popular for software, but it does require an Apple OS platform. Want to start on the cheap in Windohs, Audacity is a good package to get your feet wet. If you can score a copy of Audacity Audio Recorder and editor software, that's geared directly towards the up and coming artist. Seems to me there were some copyright issues and it's no longer available, but I'm sure someone could dig up a copy if they tried hard enough.
 
Wow. This is getting more confusing by the posts, you guys really know your ****. I have an HP Spectre from a few years ago I use as my daily driver and will probably upgrade to something new and use this laptop for studio duty. I'll have to decide on the rest of the software based on research and as for the interface, I'll probably go for a bundle on Amazon or Ebay, if you guys have any suggestions on a good bundle around $1,000-$2,000 that includes everything except the computer thats appreciated.

Im promoting my YT channel for other things anyway and might as well take a crack at it there to start and expand out to other sites once I get some material together.

Another thing I was wondering is around copyright issues. My plan is to sing already popular music to begin with before I try writing anything of my own and ultimately creating my own EDM style background bass lines etc to sing to. It is going to be EDM/hip hop music for the most part I think but I also like to just sing too but that poses more of a problem because I am not a musician who plays guitar/piano/drums etc, all I really have is my voice. How do you deal with the fact that if you upload a YT video with a pop song you are singing to, you are going to be silenced as a copyright strike? What do you guys do?
 
As long as the cover songs you'll post, aren't for sale, you're safe. Tons of that type uploaded to YT. It's only if you want to sell the music, that you record, you'll need to look into rights and royalties. Paying a royalty fee, to record your own version of a song, is fairly straight forward, and 'inexpensive'. It's when you use the actual original song, in a recording of your own, that you can bump into legal issues. Licensing fees are much more expensive as well, if you want to sample from the source too.
 
Yah ... long as you're not uploading the original music, you should be good.

Think this one paid any royalties? Should also give you a taste of what the competition is up to ...<G>

 
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