Analog 2" > Vegas Pro

jmpatrick wrote on 2/7/2008, 6:57 AM
We're starting a new CD project next month and the studio offers the ability to record on 2" analog. I plan to track the bulk of the CD in Vegas Pro at home as I have in the past, but have decided this time to record the drums in a well-equipped studio. They have had much success tracking drums on 2" and transfering to a DAW. Has anyone here tried this? There are a couple issues that arise. First of all, the studio gave us 2 choices. Buy our own 2" tape for $220 a reel and walk out with our masters after the sessions, or use the tape they supply for free (which obviously they would keep and reuse for someone else). They claim the effects of using the bulk-erased tape is a couple dB's off the top end. That wouldn't work for a classical session, but should be fine for a rock drums, no? The next issue is tape speed. The machine runs at 15 or 30 IPS. When 2" was the dominant recording medium, did bands typically track their masters at 30 IPS? Are there any issues I should be aware of when the engineer transfers the 2" to digital? Since they don't have Vegas, they'll be providing me with DVD-R's with the raw WAV files. I'm wondering if taking an external firewire drive would be better.

The thought of a hybrid analog/digital CD is intriguing (especially since I'm looking at pressing some vinyl in addition to CD's), but I don't want to risk it if we are looking at a bunch of technical glitches down the road.

Is the fatness of analog tape worth the extra work if all we track on tape is the drum tracks?

Thoughts?

jp

Comments

Kennymusicman wrote on 2/7/2008, 7:39 AM
There's a lot to be said for either argument. You're distributing in digital, mixing in digital, and sounds like half-recording, if not entirely recordingin digital. (DDD, as opposed to ADD). DDD is good, if you are not constantly reconverting formats galore. The A/D process is the important part - if you can capture the drums well in digital in the first place, this negates the need for tape which is expensive. Good converters make a big difference - and that's probably where the studio will shine. I've found pre-used tape is ok for a couple of generations, but after that the dB is more than a couple of dB, and the frequnecy response degrades some too. How important is your project? IS the potential sacrifice ok? You could be fine, you might not be - only you can answer that.

When they transfer to wav - just make sure it's to a high bit-depth, and sensibly high sample rate format. You can then play and play with it until you are finally ready to drop down to red-book.

I work DDD personally, - I find I can capture the warmth of the acoustic instruments well enough, and add "air" if it's required.

Just a thought :)
Chienworks wrote on 2/7/2008, 8:36 AM
The thought that occurred to me is, if they studio can convert the 2" tape to digital after the fact, can't they do it live while recording? That way there wouldn't be any need for tape at all.

30ips has more surface noise. 15ips will have less frequency range. Direct to digital suffers neither of these failings.
Chienworks wrote on 2/7/2008, 8:37 AM
The thought that occurred to me is, if they studio can convert the 2" tape to digital after the fact, can't they do it live while recording? That way there wouldn't be any need for tape at all.

30ips has more surface noise. 15ips will have less frequency range. Direct to digital suffers neither of these failings.
Steven Myers wrote on 2/7/2008, 9:19 AM
can't they do it live while recording?

Yeah, but you're forgetting the "warmth."
Geoff_Wood wrote on 2/7/2008, 1:53 PM
The only thing to be 'gained' doing the 2" thing is overload compression effects of the tape when used as a sound-effect rather than a linear recording medium. Plus any ( possibly desirable) non-linearities in the tape and NR electronics.

These things can be emulated to a degree in a DAW, if considered desirable for any reason other than folklore.

geoff
musicvid10 wrote on 2/8/2008, 2:40 PM
If you were going to master the whole thing on 2" tape, then I'd say go ahead.

However, trying to match that taped drum track to a digital project is not going to be pleasant (you said they don't have Vegas). If you are a perfectionist like me, you'll end up splitting the track every few minutes and putting in microgaps or microcuts to get the chunks to line up, and curse the heavens every time a little capstan slip or servo error throws the whole thing off. You won't overcome this even at 30 ips, and you will learn the joys of manually syncing a drifting "clock" to a stable one every couple of minutes, maybe more often. Like me, you won't be satisfied with the general correction that time stretch/squeeze affords. Been there -- I call it the "ringo effect." It will be better to master everything digitally; even if there are some sync problems between the studio's file and your project, you can at least deal with them uniformly in mixdown, not haphazardly.

There are lots of things you can do to take the harsh edges off a digitally recorded drum track, there is very little you can do to correct the wow and flutter from mechanical transports occurring during either recording or playback. Of course, you could lay down the drum track first and track the others to it later, but I would find that a bit confining artistically. . .
Geoff_Wood wrote on 2/8/2008, 3:17 PM
Of course those 'harsh edges' are likely to be either 'reality', or artifacts introduced by mic and electronics that are going to be present in the 2" scenario as well ....

geoff
musicvid10 wrote on 2/8/2008, 3:26 PM
**or artifacts introduced by mic and electronics that are going to be present in the 2" scenario as well ....*

Oh, they'll be adequately rounded off or mushed by the tape medium, even 2" doesn't reproduce the highs well enough for the thd spike to be heard, at least not by this old rocker. And of course quantization artifacts are not an issue in analog tapes.

I just don't consider it a good enough reason to sacrifice the integrity of a drum track relative to the others, especially if the drummer knows what he/she is doing.

I actually know a few dinosaurs from my era who prefer the "warmth" of their old cassette tapes . . .
musicvid10 wrote on 2/8/2008, 5:38 PM
To the OP:

**The thought of a hybrid analog/digital CD is intriguing . . . , but I don't want to risk it if we are looking at a bunch of technical glitches down the road.**

OSUR

**Is the fatness of analog tape worth the extra work if all we track on tape is the drum tracks?"

Perhaps you are confusing "roundness" with "fatness." No matter if you spell it with an "f" or a "ph," fat in audio refers to a full dynamic and frequency range, neither of which will be available on analog tape. Mic the drums well, don't clip, record digital, and judiciously trim the sound to your taste. Introducing limitations in the recording process to achieve an effect in the output, whether intended or unintended, has never made a bit of sense to me.

What does "free" mean? Does it mean they will record to tape for the same price as a digital session? Then they should include for you a "free" high-quality digital backup for no extra charge, since it costs them nothing. If not, I would look elsewhere. Maybe you should compare their hourlies + media with other digital studios in your area, or else spend $300-400 on a drum mic pack, foam the spare bedroom, and do it yourself.
imac wrote on 2/28/2008, 12:44 PM
there really is no point using the tape (if it is being digitised any way) unless you 'drive' it, which will not suit all material.
the range of useable effect is small, between no effect and undesirable distortion, for a dynamic source such as drums.
it requires someone listening very carefully to set the levels, and continuing to adjust per song, or changes in player intensity.
the only way i do it is recording to digital directly of the repro, so then there are no speed issues as described earlier, and also clean digital from the pres. so a 48 track session with 24 tracks direct from pres, and 24 of the repro head.
afterwards you can adjust for the delay between them and they will be in perfect sync, allowing a/b listening and choosing which suits the song etc.
this also allows a little more freedom to drive the tape, because if you go 'too far' you have the backup of the clean direct.
i have never heard a digital emulation do what smacking tape can..
buy the new tape.
Greg_M wrote on 2/28/2008, 8:35 PM
If you have your heart set on taping the drums, there is a fairly simple way to sync the drums if everything was played to a click track. Have someone with Pro Tools 7.4 (HD or LE) use Elastic Audio to set the drum tracks properly. It should take about 30 minutes. You can then use the quantized drum tracks in Vegas.

Elastic Audio is a fairly new tool in Pro Tools and can be used for many, not all, things that used to be done with Beat Detective. This issue of tape and timing is real and a pain to deal with if you have to do it manually.

Hope this helps,
Greg
jbolley wrote on 2/29/2008, 9:48 AM
JP,
I like the plan you're talking about. Tape is worth it, and you likely don't need to own and keep the tape. The wav files should all line up in vegas. It sounds like they've done this before so they have a working transfer method in place.
Most important is communicating what format you would like your raw wav files... I'd suggest 24 bit 44.1KHz.
Make sure you have good count offs at the beginning of every song and keep good notes!
A great tip: in vegas select all your tracks in the explorer window then right click and drag to the timeline - you will get a prompt with an option to add audio across tracks or time - choose across tracks and you're off and running!
Have fun!!
Jesse