Recording Setup Advice Request

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Bennyboy-UKBennyboy-UK Frets: 1710
edited September 2020 in Studio & Recording
Hi all,

I hope you can help - I'd very much appreciate some advice on the below - I think I have an idea of what I need - but I could easily be missing something obvious.

What I want to do is getting involved with some recording for fun, to help with my practice, and for collaborations with some players in the UK, Europe and US.

The two other guys I talk to this about most both use AxeFxIII and one used a Focusrite 2i2 as well. Both are using LogicX as their DAW - so lots of the things I want to do, they can do with that system.

I've decided to stick with physical amp and my gear, and looking at adding the bits to the set up to:

  • Capture dry guitar signal
  • Capture Amped/effected guitar signal
  • Interface to to get either/both into my Mac
  • DAW software
  • Reactive load for Amp
  • Speaker IRs either in the software or on the RI box - not sure....
  • Attenuation out to guitar cab in room
  • Reamp back out from Interface

This was the map I drew myself to try and plan it out a bit:




Does that look broadly correct?


The bits I was looking at to do the jobs initially were things like:
  • Palmer Junction DI box
  • Palmer Dacappo Reamp box
  • Maybe Torpedo Captor for the Reactive Load and attenuator?
  • Focusrite 2i2
  • For a DAW Start with Garageband, and then maybe invest in Logic later?

Conscious thats lots of cables and stuff to manage and lots of stuff to dust!

I had a look about and saw the Two Note Reload - and that thing looks like it does the DI/Reamp/Reactive Load and Attenuation all in one box - and also look good value on the used market and much tidier regarding cabling and stuff, and also includes access to IRs and speaker simulations

Does that sound like I'm on the right track?


I had another question:

Do DAWs like Logic use the same file format as things like Garageband etc - so I can get started and share files for the other guys to add to tracks and/or reamp at their end and vice versa for me to do with their dry guitar tracks?

Its really exciting stuff for me, and I hope you can give me a bit of a steer on this and let me know any gotchas and anything I've got totally wrong

Cheers all, and thanks for your help!
Ben.
I'm always looking for interesting USA Hamers for sale.

At the moment I'm looking for:
* Hamer Watson, SS2, Vintage S, T62.
* Music Man Luke 1, Luke II

Please drop me a message.
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Comments

  • JohnS37JohnS37 Frets: 345
    Most of this is over my head, but I can answer a question or two.
    You can read GarageBand files in Logic, but not the other way round.
    It’s interesting that you have chosen some Palmer gear - I have some of their bits and they are built stronger than tanks, probably cast from depleted uranium.
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  • octatonicoctatonic Frets: 33725
    edited September 2020
    All looks broadly fine- but forget any notion of being 'finished' with a studio.
    I came to the UK with a laptop and an amp- my studio has gone through about 20 different iterations now and is always changing, but start with what you are planning and go from there.
    Personally I'd look at a better quality interface with more inputs.

    On:
    "Do DAWs like Logic use the same file format as things like Garageband etc - so I can get started and share files for the other guys to add to tracks and/or reamp at their end and vice versa for me to do with their dry guitar tracks?"

    Session compatibility is virtually non-existent between different DAW's.
    You can open GB sessions in Logic but that is about it.
    You cannot open Pro Tools or Cubase sessions (or picks any other DAW) in Studio One or Logic... and vice versa.
    You learn to bounce out as audio and import into your own DAW.
    Even opening some older session in the latest iteration of your own DAW can get sketchy.
    Develop a robust exporting process.

    I've bought versions of most DAW's in order to be able to import sessions.
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  • @JohnS37 and @octatonic - that’s really helpful stuff, thank you very much!
    I'm always looking for interesting USA Hamers for sale.

    At the moment I'm looking for:
    * Hamer Watson, SS2, Vintage S, T62.
    * Music Man Luke 1, Luke II

    Please drop me a message.
    0reaction image LOL 0reaction image Wow! 0reaction image Wisdom
  • octatonic said:
    Develop a robust exporting process.
    I hope I am not belittling anything else octatonic said but this one thing needs emphasising. Think of it as the DAW equivalent to developing a good backup routine for your computer(s). As the famous saying goes, "There are two types of people: those who do regular backups and those who have yet to lose data."
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  • octatonicoctatonic Frets: 33725
    edited September 2020
    Whistler said:
    octatonic said:
    Develop a robust exporting process.
    I hope I am not belittling anything else octatonic said but this one thing needs emphasising. Think of it as the DAW equivalent to developing a good backup routine for your computer(s). As the famous saying goes, "There are two types of people: those who do regular backups and those who have yet to lose data."
    Thanks- yes it needs highlighting.
    I can recover anything I've worked on since about 2002 because I regularly export everything as audio tracks, put in a tempo map/time sig map/key sig map as a text file and write extensive notes as to what I did in the session.

    This is actually separate to backup of the data- which is a whole different issue and also a concern.
    Not too long ago I was asked for drumless versions of an album I did about 10 years ago.
    There would be no way I could do that if I didn't have a good export process in place- virtually nothing about my studio is the same as it was back then. My DAW doesn't even open up the session files.
    But the raw audio bounced out at unity gain was all I needed.

    I've worked with enough people who have absolutely no clue how to do this properly and you end up spending days trying to recreate a session.
    If you do it at the time you are mixing then it can save literally days and days of work.

    Backing up the data- mine is simple.
    I make a copy on a hard drive connected to the computer, another to the NAS on a daily basis.
    Once a week it all gets uploaded to my fileserver in the US (my web host)- that happens at 1am when I am usually not working and is scripted on the NAS so I don't have to do anything.
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  • Thanks chaps - I try to be fastidious with backup, I’ve also got a Synology NAS at home with some routines set up to backup. I don’t have a regular hop to cloud at present but have had a look at a few options. The majority of my data at present is photos so Amazon is most cost effective for that by the look of it as part of my Prime Subscription.

     The DAW file formats is interesting though. Looks like that to do what i want to do, I’m going to need to jump into Logic - but that’s fair enough I suppose!

    Any thoughts over downsides of going Reload unit versus all the separate units? I guess the main one is that the newer Captor models have Speaker emulation rubbing on the hardware itself and the reload doesn’t have any that can run on it - and so I’d need to use SW plugin or a separate IR unit or some such witchcraft :)

    Thank you again guys,
    Ben.
    I'm always looking for interesting USA Hamers for sale.

    At the moment I'm looking for:
    * Hamer Watson, SS2, Vintage S, T62.
    * Music Man Luke 1, Luke II

    Please drop me a message.
    0reaction image LOL 0reaction image Wow! 0reaction image Wisdom
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