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Author Topic: Welcome Hello Intro  (Read 5694 times)

John Klett

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Welcome Hello Intro
« on: April 20, 2004, 09:19:44 AM »

Greetings and Welcome...  

For those of you who spent time in the recpit forums over the last couple and a half years you'll know pretty much where I am at.  The content of the recpit forums should still be accessible for searching.  There is a lot of good info there.  

For the move to R/E/P I changed my forum subtitle from "Bleeding edge digital and analog technical issues" to "bleeding edge... blunt solution".  That will stick for a little while until I come up with something more inspired.

So...  What is this "Recording Engineer & Producer"...  R/E/P

Recording Engineer Producer, R/E/P, was a print publication that ran from 1970 to it's last gasp in 1993 and is one of a few industry publications that I actually read and kept...  I'm looking for issues from the first two and half years by the way.  

That publication presented, fairly consistently, real useful information and always seemed to have something in there you could read about and try in your own sessions.  The 'vibe' of that magazine and a few others, like db, was that of a community.

Hopefully we can provide some of this here.

You don't have to be a technician to benefit from technical knowledge.  If you take a look at any art form you'll find that a high percentage of the "masters" had solid knowledge about the technologies behind their art.  

Many of the great painters were also technologists and pushed the state of the art of things they used like pigments, carriers (oils) and varnishes.  Da Vinci did not go down to the corner art store and buy Grumbacher toothpaste tubes of premixed paints....  Nor did Les Paul open up a box and assemble a plug and play studio.  These people had something in mind and then figured out new ways to do things.

Recording ENGINEERS used to have to build half the damned equipment in their studio and then maintain it.  In some states you can't call yourself, professionally,  an Engineer unless you have some sort of certificate or license...  this says something.  It doesn't mean that you have to be able to build your own workstation or strip down and reassemble a tape machine against the clock but it MIGHT indicate that a many of the creative techniques we take for granted today - or those that are becoming lost and rediscovered art - originated from creative people who understood the technology well enough that they could bend it to their creative will.

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John Klett / Tech Mecca
http://www.technicalaudio.com

Immanuel Kuhrt

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Re: Welcome Hello Intro
« Reply #1 on: April 21, 2004, 06:47:09 PM »

Hi John

I didn't get around to your (and other's) section at the old PSW, so I do not really know much about, what it was like. However, asking about it here is not to be disrespectful - it is more to take part in kick starting your section a bit.
So what is it like here? From what you wrote, I got the impression it might be "soldering advanced" (no disrespect at all), but then you also write about not needing to know tech to use it. Does this mean, this is a section for "this is how xxx piece of gear works, and what specific skills one should work on to be good at using it"? Is this a "tech only" oriented section?

Immanuel
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Disclaimer - I ain't no pro

John Klett

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Re: Welcome Hello Intro
« Reply #2 on: April 21, 2004, 10:21:00 PM »

Okay...  well what can I tell you...  

First thing is that I can give long winded answers to simple questions...

The previous incarnation of my forum at RECPIT covered quite a bit about a lot of things...  vintage and classic gear, consoles, analog tape machines, large format digital consoles, power and ground distribution in recording studios, general interfacing issues around audio, video and digital audio in a music studio environment.  

There were explorations and expression of views re why gear sounds different than others, modifying gear, fixing gear, other specific gear issues, DIY projects, timecode and synchronization issues, digital audio interface and clocking, general issues around digital formats and resolutions and that list goes on.

There were some threads on specific recording techniques from a more technical point of view.  Neve, api, MCI, Harrison, SSL, Studer, 3M, Ampex, Telefunken, TAB, Neumann, NTP...  and other manufacturers, quite a few, have come up for discussion, some more than others...

There were many regulars from the recpit forum who knew things I didn't so it is often a mutual learning and teaching experience - or can be - hopefully will be here.  I am a big fan of sharing information rather than holding it back - though I will often do the Socratic thing where I will answer questions obliquely and suggest a general direction because people don;t always learn best when simply handed answers.

The general idea is to cover all things a tech at any level from a small studio owner who wants to get his hands dirty to a chief tech who wants for contribute and get some info from others... small studio owners up to higher end people with lots of experience should find something useful here...  I would hope.

Let's see...  well - on the weak point side...  I am not a software guy and am not really deep into how to do specific things within a lot of workstations.  I drive a Merging Technologies Pyramix, a SADIE and a ProTools LE system but I don't demand a lot and am not by any means a power user...  except maybe for Pyramix at times.  So I generally don't have a lot to offer when it comes to fixing or getting around bugs in MOTU or Logic systems.  

Sometimes I travel so my response time can get a little sluggish - I check in to make sure things are not getting out of hand but sometimes can't respond right away but my experience at recpit was that there were quite a few people there who were technically astute who would take up the slack.  I hope they come here now.

about me - you can go look at my site

htgtp://www.technicalaudio.com

it's poorly maintained but it should give you some idea.

I do technical audio work mostly around New York but I do work all over and have clients in Europe and in various places around the U.S..  There are some really high-end clients and projects and a lot of really middle and small sized things that I try to help people with on a consulting basis.  Some people thing I don't do small projects but I generally can figure out some way to help even if the client is running on fumes.  

I have generally been doing one or two large projects a year where I act as the overall technical director/dictator.  I essentially do the whole infrastructure side apart from the actual construction.  I don't often do acoustical work but it happens.  I was trained/educated in that area.  It's physics - like a lot of what I do is.  

Currently I am in various stages of several projects...  an SSL 9K / ProTools facility, a Neve V88R studio, a multi room facility in Europe (Scandinavia), an electrical distribution upgrade at a big video facility (no down time please)...  in the shop there are some console and gear restoration projects going on.  A portion of the projects are non-disclosure jobs.  People treasure what privacy they can get.  

There is a shop I often refer to is in Long Island City...  It's a tight cooperative between my company (TechMecca Inc.) and two others, Coral Sound (a systems integration comapny) and Purple Audio (a gear manufacture).  It seems like we are all working for each other or hiring each other at various times but we are three totally separate companies...  I generally work well with others I guess.  I'm not into the dog eat dog thing...  it's more about it being a small pond so let's compete cooperatively.

I live in Carmel, NY - about 50 mile due north of Manhattan and...  what else... oh...  I've been doing whatever it is I do for about 28 years since I came to New York.  I had been puttering around near Baltimore since around 1970.  Apparently George Massenburg and I crossed paths but we never met back then...  don't think so anyway...  who knows...  it was the '70's


that give you an idea?

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John Klett / Tech Mecca
http://www.technicalaudio.com
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