Okay everyone, so I am about to give home recording my first real go.
I will be buying an iMac in the next few weeks and have a good amount to put into equipment (around £700 once I sell all me pedals). I have an Adrenalinn 3 which has some great amp simulations and the added bonus of MIDI in and out. I also have access to some great mic's from a local source so I shouldn't need to buy those.
I am looking to record my vocals, acoustic and electric guitar and keyboard. I am probably going to go down the drum package route as I don't have the experience or time to record real drums.
So this is what I am after:
1. I would like opinions on an audio interface that has at least 2 guitar jack inputs, has MIDI, and anything else you think would be important.
2. Recording software, I've used pro tools a couple of times in the past, but am open to other options.
3. A keyboard, preferably one with USB capabilities so I can plug it into the iMac
4. Drum stuff, not really sure how to do this... am guessing I would need some sample program? I've also seen some keyboards that have some boxes on them, 3 rows of 3, which I believe are you can assign something to and it will active when hit????
5. Monitors, now I don't know if this is a bit much for the level of recording that I am going to do, but thought I'd seek the help of the forum
6. Anything I have forgotten.
Thanks in advance for all your help guys
Comments
More than enough organs synths and samplers built in to Logic for all but the most hardcore. They all make whoosy sounds
that will get you started :-)
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The Focusrite Scarlett interfaces seem pretty decent (I have the 18i20 with as a mobile rig) - maybe one of the 2/4 input options from that range?
Can't really help with a keyboard or drum software, but decent headphones are a very good option for monitoring. I'm using Equator D5 as speaker, and I'm very pleased with them (around £350). I previously had Alesis M1 520 which were cheaper - I wouldn't want to mix a commercial release on the Alesis, but they were decent enough for home/hobby stuff.
Wisdom for all of this - certainly used, older monitors can be a total steal as they don't go 'out-of-date', they just might look a bit unfashionable (although the venerable Yamaha NS10 didn't change its design in about 20 years...). I paid about £150 for a pair of HHB Circle 5 active monitors secondhand which would have gone for over a grand when they were new, and I swear by them.
As far as mics go, you can get very acceptable results with some of the Red 5 and T-Bone (Thomann own-brand) stuff new, although for my money I'd go for a used Rode, AKG or similar (you'd probably want to clean and disinfect the basket and filter to be on the safe side, but there's nothing inherently unhygenic about secondhand mics; of course, if you have any kind of germ phobia, you'll probably want to buy new anyway ).
Soundcard will depend to a degree what connectivity your iMac has (if it's newer you probably won't have the option of Firewire, more than a couple of years old and you will have), but the world's your oyster really. Apogee get a very good writeup although I've only ever used their cheaper ones, but there's dozens out there around the £200 mark which is where I'd assume you'd be looking. Out of interest, Line 6 do a keyboard/audio interface combo called the KB37 which would be a very simple, elegant solution for what you want to do - as long as it DOES do what you want it to do! http://www.pmtonline.co.uk/line-6-pod-studio-kb37-usb-midi-keyboard-and-audio-interface.html?utm_source=google&utm_medium=shopping&gclid=CMLDm82dprwCFWfLtAodekwAZQ
Stuff you've forgotten? Microphone stand and pop shield (for home use only, relative cheapies will do the job - don't go full-on bottom-of-the-line though, there's a lot of crap out there) and to get the best out of a good pair of monitors a solid (preferably sand-fillable) pair of speaker stands should really go on the list.
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