Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Hermetech Mastering]

Background:
We recently relocated from Yokohama to Milan. I'm now setting up the mastering studio at home, with new monitors in a new room (very scary for me). I've been mastering own and friends projects for about ten years, and I started professionally in Japan about 20 months ago. Things are moving along very nicely with lots of clients and good feedback etc. Clients are mainly bedroom electronic musicians. I've recently been meeting with a Commercialista (Chartered Accountant) in Italy who will help me to register the business and sort out the taxes twice a year.

Current gear:
Echo Audiofire 12 as main A/D and D/A (yes, it's the weakest link)
ATC SCM20A SL Pro monitors (don't have them yet, coming next week, upgraded from little Yamaha MSP5A, which used to be the weakest link, but had been using them in the same room in the same position for nearly ten years)
Analogue chain is all hard-wired - D/A to pair of Chandler Germanium compressors to Thermionic Culture Pullet EQ to Chandler TG2 pre (make up gain for the Pullet) back to A/D
Digital side is PC running Adobe Audition and AudioMulch with plugins from Sonoris and Voxengo.

Situation:
As well as the global move, I've sold off a lot of old analogue modular synth and studio equipment, and am finally in a position to plonk down a big wedge of money on a serious upgrade for the mastering studio. I've been researching a lot over the last couple of years, and I am constantly swinging like a pendulum between the following two paths:

1) Plonk it all down on a Crookwood M1 mastering console, which will give me all the routing I could ever possible need, a monitor controller, headphone amp, A/D and 2 x D/A, VU meters and M/S functionality. I could use it with my current gear, it would be insanely flexible, and it could grow in the future, with more pieces from Crookwood and various other pieces of outboard.

2) Buy lots of goodies to add to my current chain, such as a Bax EQ, FCS P3S ME comp, Forssell MADA-2 converter, Grace Design M903 headphone amp/monitor controller/monitor D/A etc. This may all be more immediate and user friendly, but wouldn't give me the flexibility and "all in one" nature of option one (which I like).

Question:
The trouble is, neither is really going to be a "bad" choice, and they are both going to cost around the same. The Crookwood would be way more flexible, and I could add the goodies at a later date, but might it not be overkill? As I am kind of starting from scratch again, I was wondering if any more experienced MEs might give me their opinions. It's a lot of money to be putting down, and I don't want to regret it, whichever way I go. What would you do in my situation?

Thanks so much in advance for any insights.

Best wishes to you all,

Gregg Janman

[lowland]

Thanks for the update, Gregg, glad the move went smoothly.

It's difficult to know what will work best for you without seeing your situation and working methods first hand, but trying to imagine myself in your shoes I think I'd want to settle into the room and monitoring there for a while before making any more big decisions - no doubt you feel the same!

It may be early to follow the Crookwood direction in terms of routing and the like, but Eric James and others speak highly of Crispin's converters and I hear they're extremely reasonably priced, so to get that part of your system upgraded together with the undoubted better monitoring you'll enjoy, should be quite a major step forward. As they say, what you can't hear, you can't correct.

My experience with my new room has been (and recent measurements confirm this) that the speaker/room combination is pleasingly flat and true: that's meant I've hopefully joined the 'listen, adjust, move on' club and has sharply reduced the amount of gear I wanted to buy, mainly to address shortcomings in the previous space now I think about it! I hope something similar happens with you, and that improving the prime elements of room, speakers and converters will set you up in a way that will sustain you for some time to come.

[PBM]

It may be early to follow the Crookwood direction in terms of routing and the like, but Eric James and others speak highly of Crispin's converters and I hear they're extremely reasonably priced, so to get that part of your system upgraded together with the undoubted better monitoring you'll enjoy, should be quite a major step forward. As they say, what you can't hear, you can't correct.

Agreed on both counts: it's probably much too early for a big Crookwood, but a smaller one - the basic monitor with its very nice converters and headphone feed - is probably just the ticket and will leave you with money for other things.

I know Crispin is from down West and that you'll agree that all things good in the UK are from the East but ... 

Cheers,

Eric

[phonon]

Hi Gregg, Although I realize that the Crookwood console would mean a lot of problems appeared to be solved, I feel that the problems they solve are not ones you presently have.   Until you have enough similar devices that quick A/B is needed to be able to discern just which chain is better, I'd rather see you acquire a second eq (this time a high end mastering parametric with switches - such as a Sontec MES, Prism MEA, Avalon 2077, or GML 9500, or...) and a second, high end compressor (e.g., GML 2030, Prism MLA-3...).  You will want also the Forsell MADA or similar (e.g., Mytek ADA), at the same time.  The cost of this equipment should prohibit the simultaneous acquisition of a Crookwood (or Maselec) console.   However, even after this, you shan't truly need one.  That is to say, with these items added to what you have, I feel your chain may still not require fast A/B switching of chains since the things you still want (as in "need") are transparent filters and amplifiers and it is they which ought to be the ones that are interconnected point-to-point - "hard-wired" under the desk. 

With an XLR jackfield you can see if adding the warm-a-lizers you presently have helps, or hurts, but this shouldn't require much debate in your mind, even at the slow pace of manual repatching.  And the cost of an XLR jackfield is masterfully lower than that of any active console.

My 2D. 

Either way, you are Crookin' with g.a.s.!  (;


Andrew

[Hermetech Mastering]

Thanks all for the great help and suggestions. I'm probably gonna go with a Crookwood C1 monitor controller (with ADC and 2 x DAC) and a little outboard. Best of both worlds!

[jdg]

just spend the extra to get diff colored LEDs unless you want to go blind from the blue LEDs