Recording and mixing and the lazy man - Studio 1?

    Hello all,


    I am the lazy man of the title.


    I play guitar and record as my hobby, not my living..... It's my relaxation time and artistic outlet and will never be anything other than this. I play live occasionally and I put things on Soundcloud but the most I hope for is a couple of hundred people listening and some of them liking it. That is honestly enough for me :thumbup:


    I enjoy writing songs. I enjoy playing. I enjoy tweaking a mix - to a point. It's come to my attention that the thing that blocks me recording is if 'SOMETHING' feels too much like work. Real work is hard enough. Playing and recording needs to feel like fun. I cannot be doing with too much messing about. I used to enjoy it but frankly not any more.


    EZ Drummer 2 has been a revelation in that regard - drum tracks that are interesting are now minutes away and it's really pulled away a big barrier for me making songs. The Kemper obviously makes a decent guitar tone very easy too as we all know. Combined, they've made me realise how easy life can actually be..... Hence three songs written and two recorded / mixed (to a point!) and released last week. That's more than I've done in the last couple of years.... So obviously my fear of work is quite extreme and anything labour saving seems to push the right buttons for me.


    With plugins, I must confess I nearly always just use a preset. Yes, I'll tweak slightly to taste but if there is a compressor that says 'male vocal', I'll use the compressor that says 'male vocal'. If it doesn't sound right, I'll try another plugin. I have NI Komplete so have plenty to choose from. Except mastering stuff which is absent, there isn't a de-esser and no multi-band compressor..... I currently know between nothing and zero about mastering..... Now if only there was something with presets......


    I told you I was lazy ;)


    For a DAW, I use Reaper. It's been good to me but as you can well imagine with my approach outlined here I recon I use about 10% of the program. And doing some things is a bit of a fight to be honest.


    I've just downloaded a 1 month trial of Presonus Studio 1 Professional. So far it looks interesting and looks to be less fiddly than Reaper. It has mastering stuff and a multiband compressor. It has loads of presets that put in channel strips etc. They've got a weird upgrade thing going on through June so as if you buy the cheap version then upgrade it's much cheaper than the full pro version. And Audiodeluxe makes it cheaper still. And it's my birthday soon :whistling:


    Can any users here comment on its ability for a lazy man? What I'm looking for is a helpful learning curve and an obvious way to do as much as possible with as little time and effort as possible.


    Obviously I'll give it a good run through over the next few days, including getting the audio tracks from the last couple of Reaper songs I've done and seeing how the multiband compressors / eq plugs that come with it compare to what I already have. With the offer, I recon I can get it for about £205UK which is cheaper than some plugins!


    Thanks


    Gary

    Studio One is a fine DAW. That said, from the POV of my own workflow, it hasn't replaced Logic as my main DAW, and Logic X made another big step in the direction of 'ease of use'.
    I can confirm that Studio one is considerably less awkward to use than Reaper (all IMO, of course).

    Hi, I have Studio One.. I´m simply loving it.. but!!! also thanks to groove3.. from them I bought video manuals - Studio One explained - thanks to groove3 I learned to use it quite well after few hours.. I was very new to all this DAW stuff.. and I do not like to read 300 pages of manuals, uaaaaaaaaaa.. I am the "video learner".. first I tried to do something with Cakewalk Sonar but it was horrible for me.. an incredible pain for me.. I have uninstalled it from my PC after having discovered Studio One.. it´s super fast and drag and drop functions are fantastic.. event FX is amazing ecc.. in the full package you have also melodyne.. which is a real miracle, real magic,hehe.. maybe this video can help you as has helped me when deciding if Studio One yes or no: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ouPCnk-gqj4


    but I repeat, with video manuals from groove3 it would have been much harder for me to learn to use it.. since I did not know anything about DAWs..


    ps: and their support is absolutely fantastic.. real pleasure to contact them..

    I'm as lazy as you , If you rely on loops there is a great tool with lots of productivity and very intuitive approach , it's also quite cheap : try mixcraft 6 by acoustica . Never had to open it's docs.


    There is also a good collection of VST in it.

    Some observations :)


    In general, using presets to go from is a good idea at any level of professionalism. But at the higher levels than level 1 you need to tweak them after finding the right one. At higher levels than level 4, you start to make your own presets. If you learn the basics of the compressor for instance, and learn what to listen for when tweaking - you can tweak them pretty darn fast. Which is a good thing in many ways. It takes some time up front, but it's not so bad if you see it as playtime :)


    With regards to mastering: If you don't do much mixing, and don't have a semi-semi-professional engineer mix your stuff - I really wouldn't bother with mastering, and would definitely not be buying anything (neither DAWs, plugins or mastering services).



    Also, each new DAW will have a learning curve. I have tried the studio one demo some time ago and liked it (also coming from reaper), but there were some things that took some time to get used to. In the end I went with logic pro x. Which also has a learning curve. If you don't get into it much beyond a certain point, I really don't see the point to switch DAWs. If you DO want to go with studio one, consider my above point about mastering - maybe you don't need to buy the professional version?


    With regard to multiband compressor: This is a dangerous tool, that takes some dedicated time to learn to use well (generalising here). To me it sounds like that isn't what you're after? :) Is there a reason you want this specific plugin?


    Anyway, de-essers and multiband compressors I am pretty sure you can find for free. Especially for reaper, which accepts a lot of different plugin formats.



    Come to think of it, I think the ReaFir plugin can be used both as a multiband comp and a de-esser.



    If you want better results - or just want to enjoy the process without having it feel like a lot of work - I would advise practicing with the tools you already have. With practice, it will feel less like work, because you free up your mental capacity to focus on the music, not the technical side of things.Also, don't mix while you record. keep the processes separate, if you don't already. Or at least try it.




    I always give the boring advice. I suck at being an enabler.... :-/

    I think the convenience that digital recording brought to the table, is exactly what will be exploited in the future. Stuff like the new Logic X drummer or now EZdrummer 2 or even Melodyne and the Waves mix engineer signature line. Those are all applications that basically made the decision for you, you simply adjust how much of it you want to have in the mix. It's a good time for lazy people if you want to look at it from that perspective. I think it's also perfectly fine if someone has a apporach like you have.


    But ;) ... I think in the long term it will always pay off to go the harder route. Sure it's more like work but the reward you're gaining is very satisfying. More satisfying then finding the right preset. Though presets are nothing bad, I think they are a good example to learn what settings are being used and especially why they are being used.


    Digital editing is really a blast and it's up to you how easy you make it on yourself. I think that's one of the challenges you're facing as someone who records his own music. How easy will you make it on yourself? The answer also depends on your goals. Will you double track the guitar for the chorus and paste it afterwards for the next two choruses. Sure that doesnt take up as many time as playing the same part at least six times but here's the thing ... You'll get much better at playing guitar. I think that double tracking guitars is a great great practice to become a better guitar player. It's something I have noticed in the past years.


    I know people who just copy and paste parts. I was doing it also but that's behind me cause I can't state enough how much it helped me to become a tighter player. So mabye it feels sometimes like work (and double tracking over and over again feels like work ;) ) it's worth it. More work often leads to better results, but in the end everyone has to find his own workflow

    Some more thoughts. Different DAW's are good for different things.
    I'm using Ableton Live for sketching ideas, when I'm in strictly writing phase.
    When I do real tracking alone or with the band I use Logic X exclusively now.
    Mastering should always be done by an external mastering engineer IMO.
    But the preparation of the mastered data for the pressing facilities I do in the mastering suite that's included in Studio One.
    It awesome and is worth the price of Studio One alone IMO.
    So, as another pro: if you like the workflow of Studio One: Go for it.

    Quote from Ingolf

    When I do real tracking alone or with the band I use Logic X exclusively now.


    Ive used Logic on and off about 15 years, back when the German company Emagic created it. Its amazing how well Apple has done enhancing its abilities. I was away from it the last few years and when I started using it again I was blown away.

    Quote from lasvideo

    Ive used Logic on and off about 15 years, back when the German company Emagic created it. Its amazing how well Apple has done enhancing its abilities. I was away from it the last few years and when I started using it again I was blown away.


    It's funny that both Emagic and Steinberg (Cubase), are based in Hamburg, as well as the coders of Presonus Studio One who are former Steinberg empolyees.
    I also think that a lot of the older Emagic staff is still working on Logic nowadays under the Apple flag. ;)

    What do you guys think of Tracktion?
    V. 5.0 just came out. Mackie had taken control of the brand, but now the creator of the code has acquired the company back, and it seems 5.0 is a meaningful step ahead.


    when I got to know it 3.0 was out. At first I liked the "one window, no bs" approach. Then I lost sight of it since I've mostly been using a hardware multitrack recorder for my stuff. But I also see that a software solution can be come practical in certain situations and in order to do certain things :)

    I've been a long time Pro Tools user since 1999. I recently left that platform due to the ever increasing costs of their updates, poor update performance, poor tech support, and quite frankly I got tired of them abandoning projects such as the 11R.


    I've been using both Logic Pro X and Studio 1 for the last year and they have both been fantastic.

    Thank you all very much indeed for taking the time to comment - as ever, the broad knowledge and friendly advice here is very gladly received :)


    I've been fooling around with Studio 1 Pro demo for a couple of days now - I was glad of the link sent by Hallan as I got a few tips out of that video.


    So far, I'm finding it has a very 'can do' attitude that wants you to just do anything you want as painlessly as possible. As an example..... you want to start a new song from a completely blank canvas. No templates. You decide you want to put EZ Drummer onto a track.


    In Reaper, you double click to create a track. Then you click on the fx button on the track. Then you click 'instruments' (or wade through pages ;)) and double click EZ Drummer.


    In Studio 1, you click 'instruments'. You click and drag it to anywhere in the browser. That's it. So it's 2 clicks and a very lazy, imprecise drag rather than 6 clicks and specific mouse movements.


    Yes, I know there are shortcuts to just about everything in Reaper..... I'm just comparing the 'long hand' way of doing a very basic thing in both programs.


    I am NOT being 'down' on Reaper here - it's served me well for a long time and has more than justified the tiny cost..... It's just that, for ease of use, it's looking like Studio 1 is a good fit for me personally. I am sure Reaper can do everything that Studio 1 can do, but you do seem to have to buy it flowers and dinner at a decent restaurant. Studio 1 just gives up the goods when you say 'hello' :thumbup:


    I am also suitably impressed by Melodyne. And not just for the 'singing in tune bit' ;) If you don't know what it does besides autotune, go here http://www.celemony.com/en/melodyne/real-use and scroll down to the 'Melodyne and Instruments' bit. Watch the 'Extracting a Guitar Lick to Midi' bit.....


    So with Melodyne you can take any instrument track or vocal and make it into midi. It's pretty friendly to get rid of notes you don't want. I've only played briefly but it seems to do what it claims with a lot more ease than a hex pickup. No, you can't play in real time with it so it depends what you want.... For recording when you have limited keyboard skills, it's great IMO.


    So I've pulled the trigger...... The Melodyne that Studio One Pro ships with is *NOT* the 'editor' version that does the fancy stuff above and normally Melodyne want 300 Euros to upgrade from the cut down to the full. Then you see that Studio 1 pro is normally £300 in the UK and you have total spend of about £550. Audiodeluxe to the rescue.... $500 the lot which is £310. Considering Melodyne want more than that if you go to them for the Editor version then I think that's pretty good! Not had it delivered yet (electronically!!) but the demo is still working :)

    I love Melodyne. Apart from what you wrote, it can also quantize (sync?) a rhythmic part to a given tempo, and can change a sound's formants at will (you can sing as an old man or a boy or a woman for example)... lots of creative uses for it. Say, a baritone guitar part got from a strato recording, or a cello part from a fretless recording.


    :)