the importance of analog sound in prog

Off on a tangent, an analogy

I've been "into" photography for many years now, (over 40 years), starting out with a secondhand Zenith 3M 35mm SLR camera before upgrading to an Olympus OM1 and Minolta Dynax 7000i. In that time I learnt a lot about film types, exposures, especially for low-light photography at rock concerts and the like, such that knowing what to use and when to use it became second nature - instinctively knowing (as it were) which film stock (Agfa, Fuji, Kodak etc) would perform best in any given situation, which could be pushed past their rated ISO number without inducing too much grain/noise into the final pictures and which had the better colour balance/sensitivity etc. I set up a darkroom in my bathroom to develop my own negatives, slides and colour photographs and learnt the necessary skills of exposure and colour correction to get the best out of any picture I took. I will not claim to have been a great photographer or in any way an expert, but I think my SLR photographs were better than snapshots and they weren't bad for a hobbyist. With the advent of digital photography all that knowledge was seemingly rendered obsolete (all the darkroom paraphernalia is now packed away in the attic) and a whole new set of knowledge was required to get the most out of an image, a new learning curve ensued to elevate a DSLR photograph above the snapshot taken on a compact camera (or iPhone). I've owned my DSLR for 4 years now, and I'm still on the learning curve with much still to learn. The notion that I could switch from film SLR to DSLR without learning new skills was a mistaken one.

Snow Dog wrote: How are these pictures taken without the earth rotation causing "trails"? Does you tripod synchronise and move with  the rotaion?

(they're not my photos - the belong to Elder Ivan at the link I stole them from - I'm not even close to taking photos like that yet).

Dean wrote: Snow Dog wrote: How are these pictures taken without the earth rotation causing "trails"? Does you tripod synchronise and move with  the rotaion? (they're not my photos - the belong to Elder Ivan at the link I stole them from - I'm not even close to taking photos like that yet).   But yes, you need an equatorial mount synchronised with the Earth's rotation. You can use a auto-tracking telescope mount or you can make a simple one with a hinged plank of wood and a calibrated screw thread.   With stacked digital photographs of a shorter exposure time you can use a fixed mount and rotate each successive image (there is software that will do this for you).

The best way to record is onto magnetic tape in a properly set up acoustic room.  The amount of detail then has to do with mic placement and the quality of those mics.  If recorded correctly, you shouldn't have to use EQ.  Mix that down to a 2 track analog tape reel.  Then leave it.  Once transfer to the vinyl stamper move on to the next project. 

Everything in the digital domain is counter to this process.  Digital reverbs, digital compression, digital tube (sounding) filters and plugins.  All this stuff degrades the sound.

But beyond all this, there is something much more important and that being the experience of the process.  There are many examples of this that can and will effect the process.  For instance, we had a jazz legend in our studio recently who refused to overdub his tracks onto something pre recorded.  Just his thing.  He didn't care if thing were overdubbed over his playing, but insisted that his playing was done open air, without headphones and in real time along another instrument.  So we had a drummer, and they did 3 songs... totallly improvised in the moment.  Then he played with a hand drummer, then with a Hammond player.  Finally with a guitar player.  Different songs different improvisations.

What happened was that after talking to each of the musicians, they admitted to being a bit nervous because they knew they could not make a major mistake or the track would be ruined.  It put a pressure on them that they would not have had in the digital domain where everything could be fixed.  This reigned them back into what they knew they could do... and the pressure of the situation heightened their consciousness into a tighter delivery that focused mostly on the pocket, and their solos were played more fluidly well within their abilities.  Each one said that if given the chance to record with him again, they would take more time to practice their chops and bring more technical prowess to the process in the future.  So this really motivates musicians correctly to practice... and not rely upon auto tune, pitch shifters, copy and pasting etc.

Another example is two hand drummers we had in.  Both were very good technically, but one had an electronic kit with 100's of digital samples he could access, and the other insisted on using the actual instruments.  When listening back, they both sounded technically proficient, but the one who used the actual drums had a story to tell about each drum.  How he aquired it, who met along the way, and players who taught him subtle nuances about the drums.. ways of getting certain sounds out of them that would not be on the stock samples. 

In other words, there is a real organic process to simply aquiring the drum.  Learning it directly and the interaction of actually playing it compared to simply accessing a digital version programmed off the pad. 

So much of the digital sampling approach everyone is so in love with for the convenience of it... lacks the real experience of relating to and connecting with the real version.  Sampling an instrument trivializes it.  It downgrades the importance of it and is really cheating the end listener from a much deeper connection and experience of the possibilities of it's sonic impact.

Here we go again.

Surrealist wrote: The best way to record is onto magnetic tape in a properly set up acoustic room.  The amount of detail then has to do with mic placement and the quality of those mics.  If recorded correctly, you shouldn't have to use EQ.  Mix that down to a 2 track analog tape reel.  Then leave it.  Once transfer to the vinyl stamper move on to the next project.  Everything in the digital domain is counter to this process.  Digital reverbs, digital compression, digital tube (sounding) filters and plugins.  All this stuff degrades the sound. But beyond all this, there is something much more important and that being the experience of the process.  There are many examples of this that can and will effect the process.  For instance, we had a jazz legend in our studio recently who refused to overdub his tracks onto something pre recorded.  Just his thing.  He didn't care if thing were overdubbed over his playing, but insisted that his playing was done open air, without headphones and in real time along another instrument.  So we had a drummer, and they did 3 songs... totallly improvised in the moment.  Then he played with a hand drummer, then with a Hammond player.  Finally with a guitar player.  Different songs different improvisations. What happened was that after talking to each of the musicians, they admitted to being a bit nervous because they knew they could not make a major mistake or the track would be ruined.  It put a pressure on them that they would not have had in the digital domain where everything could be fixed.  This reigned them back into what they knew they could do... and the pressure of the situation heightened their consciousness into a tighter delivery that focused mostly on the pocket, and their solos were played more fluidly well within their abilities.  Each one said that if given the chance to record with him again, they would take more time to practice their chops and bring more technical prowess to the process in the future.  So this really motivates musicians correctly to practice... and not rely upon auto tune, pitch shifters, copy and pasting etc. Another example is two hand drummers we had in.  Both were very good technically, but one had an electronic kit with 100's of digital samples he could access, and the other insisted on using the actual instruments.  When listening back, they both sounded technically proficient, but the one who used the actual drums had a story to tell about each drum.  How he aquired it, who met along the way, and players who taught him subtle nuances about the drums.. ways of getting certain sounds out of them that would not be on the stock samples.  In other words, there is a real organic process to simply aquiring the drum.  Learning it directly and the interaction of actually playing it compared to simply accessing a digital version programmed off the pad.  So much of the digital sampling approach everyone is so in love with for the convenience of it... lacks the real experience of relating to and connecting with the real version.  Sampling an instrument trivializes it.  It downgrades the importance of it and is really cheating the end listener from a much deeper connection and experience of the possibilities of it's sonic impact.

Cd's were what I grew up with. There's a massive amount of technical talk which can list the pros and cons of both cd's and records (35 pages worth here), but to my ear vinyl is the one which maintains the depth and space of music better. Records just don't have that "film" on them. All cd's have it, even the best produced ones.

Watching a live musical performance = watching an artist paint on a canvas

A vinyl record or magnetic tape reel = an artists finished painting

CD = a scanned poster of that painting

MP3 = the paintings image on your iphone

Surrealist wrote: Watching a live musical performance = watching an artist paint on a canvas A vinyl record or magnetic tape reel = an artists finished painting CD = a scanned poster of that painting MP3 = the paintings image on your iphone

Kinda like conversing in an online forum as opposed to chatting in a cozy, firelit lounge?

As far as photography is concerned, I spent hundreds of hours doing astrophotography during my undergraduate degree, but that was in the late 60s/early 70s so was all done with film.