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Hi Lunar,

You are right of course. I just thought you could've made your point clearer without the BA.

You're also right about school. I just finished a music degree. As Mr. Miaggi says"No learn orchestration from a book". I'm learning far more getting string players to play my stuff than I did in 4 years of college.

YO KEEF!!!!!,
your experience is unfortunately a common one. But analogue is easier to learn than digital! Buy yourself a 15MHz oscilloscope (they're cheap these days) and look out for a secondhand reel to reel. There was a Studer A80 (2 track) up north advertised in Buy and Sell. €80!!!!! I'm sure you'd learn a lot getting that beast back on its feet. I'd buy it only it won't fit in my room...

i really wish i could edit my last post so as to put an end to gr8h8m's unrest,i admit that i was ignorant to the fact that the grammar police hold a indefatigable vigil over the board.appologies...

lunar,i've actually gained a little experience with tape by playing around with an old revox 2 track 1/4" i thought myself how to line it up and using a tone generator i've learned how to adjust the bias.
it really is great fun to splice up tape, make loops, play things backwards
now i can see why pink floyd etc. got into using tape in an artistic way,cause it's fun!

oh and as for the radar,i found that the undo was heaven sent for doing drop in's ,something that i still hate doing.

hey swordfish,
glad to see someone else from ireland on here!

lord if that studer was still around i'd by it in an instant!
i was planning on buying a two track for home demo's anyway
was that long ago?

Hey Swordfish, Keef!

Nice to see enthusiastic tape users...
Maybe you have checked works from Robert Fripp (Frippotronic LP, I believe) and also Eno's work with two tape recorders...It's great to play with tape loops and just bring in some DDL and a reverb or two.
Then you can squeeze it with some more buttons, and feedback thru weird outboard...
Good luck, guys!

Keef, keep an eye on BuyandSell. Right now there's an overpriced Tascam 34B (four track). But you have a B77 right? Cool machine. You should be able to get two channels of Dolby A for that fairly cheaply- and it's a useful piece of outboard to have around for messing with.

Dig out the B77 manual and find out how to build the pitch control. It's very easy, and you'll have a gorgeous and flexible tape echo.

I do all my creative audio with Cubase VST and a 20bit Echo Layla. Sorry! As a compositional tool it's far superior to tape. Just frustrating in a different way

For mixing though, analogue seems good- it's easier to get a blend. I reckon it's because of the transients getting squashed.

On a recent project I had a choice between an excellent room with the same recorder as mine, or a pathetic little room with a Soundcraft/ Saturn 24 track. I went for the excellent room- an infinitely bigger factor than the medium.

LUNAR

You wrote "Seriously Dave,
You can't expect we are all morons. You will eventually make perfect recorder for sure."


I'd like to clarify some points:
1. I never considered you or anyone else on this Forum to be a "moron" and I'd like to publicly apologize to you and to anyone else who may have interpreted any of my statements as demeaning in any way.
2. My opinions are my opinions. All iZ Technology official statements about RADAR are on their website at www.iZcorp.com
3. In the interests of honesty and fair play I have made no attempt whatsoever to conceal the fact that I am currently employed by the company who manufactures the product known as RADAR.
4. I am passionate about RADAR. I have been since I first used one, which was long before I was invited to join the team that designs, builds and markets it. Any enthusiasm on my part that seems apparent by my posts is genuine.


You later wrote "Use your ears and other instincts."

That makes sense always and echoes my own sentiments.


So let's get this discussion back on track. The topic began as tmidgett solicited comments from "anyone who had first-hand experience with RADAR specifically" with a further request to avoid the "dig/analog debate". There were some questions about the RADAR operating system then the discussion moved on to the question "what is the RADAR equivalent of a master tape?" This led to the issues surrounding long term storage of recorded material. At this juncture it became apparent that the digital vs analog debate will continue for some time yet even if there were no sonic considerations because there is no archival format for digital recordings that serves the audio world as well as tape has historically. From there greasygoose eloquently stated "This forum stands as a perfect example, I think, of how the future of our industry can be shaped, rather than passively accepted".

Let's agree then that we all have a common interest which is to record audio and preserve those recordings for as long as possible.

My considered opinion is that skills possessed by the individuals working in professional recording environments will continue to be more important than the equipment they record with. Recording is no longer new and some excellent equipment exists to get the job done. Standards have become less standard because of new technologies competing for market-share. Engineers who have been working with the world's best equipment for many years are understandably unwilling to sacrifice quality for newness. No sensible person would choose tools of lesser quality unless budget limitations were the primary concern or ignorance prevailed. Unfortunately there is no legislation to stop a myriad of lesser products from being advertised as "pro" and every time somebody purchases one of these for professional use the bar is lowered.

We also have the relatively new phenomenon of thousands of people each year entering our industry after graduating from recording school. These private institutions tend to share very little curriculum with each other, therefore the resulting skill set of graduates varies greatly between schools. Of course it would be unreasonable to expect these people to have acquired a depth of knowledge and understanding from a few years of formal education that comes from a lifetime of experience.

I believe we should all be committed to lifelong learning and be willing to pass along what we know. To understand our collective needs and help the professional recording community grow it is vital to share our experiences and knowledge.

I am thankful to everyone who has taken the time to participate on this Forum.

I further believe that whenever considering a change of equipment we all deserve access to information directly from manufacturers in order to have our specific questions answered so an informed decision can be made.

My vision of the future sees recording equipment which incorporates all the best features from the best equipment in existence today along with the addition of desirable features made possible by new technology whenever they can be incorporated without compromising quality.

There will never be a perfect recorder but my heartfelt desire is that the human spirit will continue to strive for more. Current technology is very good and I am excited about the possibility that in some ways it could get even better. We all benefit if it does. That may sound simplistic I know, but no insult to anyone's intelligence intended.


By the way, if some of my facts from earlier posts were in error, as you suggested they were, please offer correction of these for the benefit of the readership. Thank you.





Sincerely,

David

DaveiZDave wrote:

I'd like to clarify some points:
1. I never considered you or anyone else on this Forum to be a "moron" and I'd like to publicly apologize to you and to anyone else who may have interpreted any of my statements as demeaning in any way.
2. My opinions are my opinions. All iZ Technology official statements about RADAR are on their website at www.iZcorp.com
3. In the interests of honesty and fair play I have made no attempt whatsoever to conceal the fact that I am currently employed by the company who manufactures the product known as RADAR.
4. I am passionate about RADAR. I have been since I first used one, which was long before I was invited to join the team that designs, builds and markets it. Any enthusiasm on my part that seems apparent by my posts is genuine.

I for one appreciate your enthusiasm, and I don't question it. I also think it borders on bravery to come to the forum of an all-analog studio (with the opinions and principles in place that the term implies) and put your name and opinions out there to be shot at.

Engineers who have been working with the world's best equipment for many years are understandably unwilling to sacrifice quality for newness. No sensible person would choose tools of lesser quality unless budget limitations were the primary concern or ignorance prevailed.

Speaking as one who is intimately familiar with the pressures put on us by low budgets and high expectations, I can categorically state that using the budget as a rationale to forego analog technologies (on any front) is a red herring and close to fraudulent. I have made and continue to make records with budgets literally as low as they come, and every one of them has been all analog. My comrades here at Electrical and elsewhere do it daily as well. To suggest that it is ever impossible is misleading.

That as well is my principle beef with suggestions by you and others that there are risks associated with analog recording, either to longevity or immediate performance -- especially in light of the continued failure of digital systems under the same conditions by the same criteria. These assertions can be proven fallacious, and continuing to use them is intentionally deceptive.

We also have the relatively new phenomenon of thousands of people each year entering our industry after graduating from recording school. These private institutions tend to share very little curriculum with each other, therefore the resulting skill set of graduates varies greatly between schools. Of course it would be unreasonable to expect these people to have acquired a depth of knowledge and understanding from a few years of formal education that comes from a lifetime of experience.

Everyone starts somewhere. I learned from reading books and technical papers that were old when I found them, and from other engineers who were generous with their knowledge and time. I see it as an obligation to return that favor to the peer group that spawned my interest, and that is the main function (if you discount keeping Novotny amused) of this forum.

I am thankful to everyone who has taken the time to participate on this Forum.

I further believe that whenever considering a change of equipment we all deserve access to information directly from manufacturers in order to have our specific questions answered so an informed decision can be made.

I agree, and I thank you for participating.

My vision of the future sees recording equipment which incorporates all the best features from the best equipment in existence today along with the addition of desirable features made possible by new technology whenever they can be incorporated without compromising quality.

I wish I could agree with you. The problem is that all development is in relation to competing proprietary digital systems, none of which can have (as you put it) "all the best features" of an analog system. That would be the equivalent of asking for water that had all the best features of fire. By definition, they have contrary attributes. Unless you're talking about trivial things, like the styling and ergonomics of the interface, which are easy to mimic, I don't see how a digital system can have the essential (defining) elements of analog systems: soft boundaries to all parameters, long-term archival storage and universal interchangeability.

-steve

steve wrote:
Speaking as one who is intimately familiar with the pressures put on us by low budgets and high expectations, I can categorically state that using the budget as a rationale to forego analog technologies (on any front) is a red herring and close to fraudulent. I have made and continue to make records with budgets literally as low as they come, and every one of them has been all analog. My comrades here at Electrical and elsewhere do it daily as well. To suggest that it is ever impossible is misleading.
-steve

In the US certainly. In Ireland, not at all. That's why we travel to Chicago

David,

Thanks for taking the time to continue this discussion in a level-headed manner. This argument has gotten somewhat contentious at times, as it invariably will, and you’ve shown grace in trying to keep the discussion on track. I don’t want to beat a dead horse any further, but since I’ve already opened my big mouth, and since you’ve asked to rekindle the discussion, I guess I should clarify my position. I don’t have much to add to the specific issues of long-term archival storage, but allow me to detail a few of the reasons why I personally don’t like to use the digital workstations presently available, when given the option.

1) Fear. Anyone who has ever lost information (recorded or otherwise) due to some computer malfunction can tell you it sucks, to the point where you will likely swear never to use that medium again. Sometimes, corrupted data can be partially retrieved by computer specialists (I’ve had it happen), but it seems dangerous and unprofessional to me to store a client’s valuable music in a place that you don’t really trust. You wouldn’t record to analog and then store the tape outdoors, exposed to the elements. It might be fine, but there is always a fear in the back of your mind. Granted, I haven’t used the RADAR enough times for something to go wrong; hopefully you guys can continue to develop a format where the unfortunate is less likely to happen.

2) Fatigue. I think this one is overlooked. As an engineer, I get extremely fatigued over the course of a day trying to do my job in front of a computer screen. It’s difficult, maybe impossible, for the brain to simultaneously process complexly detailed visual and auditory data. How many times have I caught myself, and my clients, watching the screen scroll by instead of listening and concentrating on the music coming out of the speakers. In the course of an analog day, I’m usually pretty tired after ten hours or so; after maybe six hours of a digital session, my eyes feel like they’re going to pop out of my skull, and I can’t hear shit from gold. I suppose you don’t need to have a visual monitor for all digital systems, but they seem pretty pervasive in most of the workstations out there. Also, people talk of how there is no rewind time with digital. This is true, but as a human being, again I find it very helpful to have the small time breaks that analog provides and requires. Sometimes I need a minute or so when the tape is rewinding to clear my ears. A reel change is a perfect opportunity to get up and use the restroom or get a cup of coffee, anything to get fresh perspective on the important work you’re doing. Maybe this is just my own excuse for being lazy, but I think constant bombardment of the senses increases fatigue and helps lead to short-sighted, bad decision-making.

3) Speed. Everyone talks about how fast it is to work digitally as opposed to analog, but this is contrary to my experience. Mainly, this is due to backup and restore time, which is a necessity of any hard disk-based system. Whether it’s AIT, CD-R, Exabyte, I invariably underestimate the time required to backup or restore information. Sometimes studios charge for this time (why shouldn’t they), but even when they don’t, who wants to sit around and wait for this to happen? With analog tape, the reel is done, you wind it off the machine, and bingo, you have a permanent master that you don’t have to worry about protecting until you decide (if ever) to make a safety. It can be misleading to say that working digitally is faster and cheaper, because under many circumstances, it’s not.

DaveiZDave wrote:My vision of the future sees recording equipment which incorporates all the best features from the best equipment in existence today along with the addition of desirable features made possible by new technology whenever they can be incorporated without compromising quality.

I try to encourage people to use analog, but normally, the person footing the bill has to make the final decision about what recording method best suits their needs. I personally feel that the “desirable features” of digital (mainly, the intensive, non-destructive editing capabilities) are overrated when it comes to making a record, and that these features are more useful in the advertising/television world. Maybe that’s my own personal shortcoming, but I think it’s easy to get carried away with what the technology allows you to do, and lose sight of what might best serve the music being recorded. How many great albums have been recorded before there existed the temptation to endlessly manipulate and tinker with a good performance. How many performances have suffered because in the back of the musicians’ minds, they’re thinking, “I can fix it in the mix.”

I’m not a neo-phobe. People say digital is the future, and they might be right. As you’ve hinted at, it is unlikely we are going to go back, on a large scale, to technology that predominated twenty years ago. There are some promising digital formats that exist, especially the higher resolution formats that are being developed. I’ve done a few sessions on Sony’s proprietary DSD format; it sounded fantastic, and the machine was setup to run basically like a tape machine, without a lot of “extras.” My resentment is that digital has been pushed onto both the consumer and the professional markets before it’s been given a chance to be further developed and perfected. I believe this happened because of the economic considerations I talked about in my last post. Not coincidentally, we are presently in a quagmire of competing formats and standards. If a reliable, high-quality digital medium is ever developed (the debate continues as to whether this is possible), I will gladly use it. Or, when my ears are fitted with a D/A converter, whichever comes first. In the meantime, I don’t think it’s fair to my clients to record their music on a format that is essentially still a beta test.

So, these are my biggest issues with the digital systems currently available. I hope that you will find them helpful, and that maybe you can even consider them in future endeavors. Please reply if I’m in error about something, or if you have suggestions or solutions to the problems I’ve described. Have a great day.

-greasygoose

Dave,

I have no desire to go and check everything you stated at this time.
I see that Steve did quite a bit of that, and main thing is that you mean well but somehow always make mistakes when presuming sound engineer's point of view...Who does the research for you guys? You?
Who is then engineering? Again you?
And who is selling?
I know it's tough job. There is Mackie, Tascam, Alesis, Studer and the rest of direct competition...not to mention ProTools, Motu and Steinberg products who steal good deal of audio cake too, no matter that their recorder is mainly software.

Instead of spending so much energy in useless trying to convert hardcore analog guys into digital ones, you should observe what this guys are doing and how.
Digital is here to stay. O.K. Very young people really dig that sound (?!) and that is the ONLY reason why I have it too in my studio. I never spend energy in trying to convert them to analog...only if asked!
In live P.A. applications, in setup with more bands, digital consoles are handy and quick tool to do the job.
Would I use it on music my band plays? Hell, no!
Be realistic, if something is handy and flashy it does not have to be the best tool to do the job.
Dave, we are talking the very essence of being musician and recording engineer. Creatively involved adult persons who obviously have mileage and tattooed REC on finger will say no to all digital just because it's not musical. The object is to have pleasing results, not necessarily "ideal".
These are the issues I object in your statements.
Why changing something good for something not so good?

I don’t care about the features on hard disk recorders, sound is the subject here. Storage in digital domain is just a matter of individual self-destruct wish, plenty of formats to choose.

To go back to essence:

I can assure you that "perfect" is boring any way you turn it, and "perfect" is different from "perfect" too, It's not the standard.
I can go on with the ear build and average humidity in different parts of the world if you need more logarithms to burden your already complicated equation.
Reasons for digital not to sound pleasing are known to you, and that's not mystery...only time it sounds kind of pleasing is when trying to emulate saturation, distortion and other "dirty" attributes typical of an analog signal.
Note that digital is still lacking of all the unpredictable and variating moments and situations in analog audio chain. And you know what, that's exactly how great recordings and mixes are done. Now, you need to be very clever to realize that this is one of the things digital can't do for now.
When I say digital is not musical as analog (in best general terms),
I make serious statment. I am telling that CDs and MP3's and Minidisks and DAT's are crap. Well, they are. Just because something is "standard" or common, it does not mean that it's good. It's just there pushed by people with enough money to make floppy's next medium you going to buy, or organize great comeback for audiocassette as major super cool format.
Dave, have you ever seen R processor?
Do you know what power it has now?
And I still use analog recorder and I mix to analog, whenever I can.
I could also say that endorsements you see in audio magazines are pure bull and that vast majority of real sound engineers use analog all the way thru.
It's like in that movie "Body snatchers"...everyone is recording to digital, right!
Misunderstanding comes from the fact that lot of nerds, dorks and weirdo’s use home recording gear to achieve some impressive results.
Well, impressive to their deaf friends at least.
To stress my position once more, I really could not care less how majority records music; notice my big advantage with big analog 2"recorder.
I am different and I can sell that. And it sounds musical, so I don't cheat when I recommend tape over disc.

Dave, you seem to be really nice guy and I really believe your initial motives are pure as snow...your apologies excepted from my side, and I hope I can apologize for myself being rude to you.

It's all Steve's fault!
He made me write those things! I love digital! Ha ha ha!