Production Expert Podcast

Latest Episodes:

How Arrangement Can Affect A Mix Sep 06, 2023

Show notes

In this week’s edition Julian is joined by Ashea and Gareth Nuttall, where they discuss how arrangement can affect the mix.

Talking Points:

How often do you end up changing parts of the arrangement to improve a mix?
The importance of sound selection, layers and instrument placement.
Frequency masking and arrangement tricks that can help.
Filling in frequency gaps:
Combining kick and bass, for a better low end.
Vocal layers and processing

Finds Of The Week:

Julian - Miso Gochujang noodles
Ashea- Sonnox Voca
Gareth - Korneff Audio- Amplified Instrument Processor

Plugin UIs Aug 30, 2023

Show notes

In this week’s edition Julian is joined by Ashea, Graham Kirkman and Steve DeMott who discuss ‘Plugin UIs. What are the important things that developers need to consider?’
Talking Points:

How important are visuals to us?
Visual, graphical displays vs skeuomorphic designs, what are some of the pro’s and cons?
What Plugin UI features do you think improve your mix/production decisions and why?
Inter-Plugin communication and why is that useful to us?
How can plugin developers make better use of the technology available today?

Finds of the Week:

Julian - David Bennet Piano Beatles 7 Modes
Ashea- Mixing Night Audio- LOL Comp
Graham - Mix To Mobile
Steve - Fender J Bass

Mental Health In The Music Industry Aug 23, 2023

Show notes

In this week's podcast, Ashea is joined by Russ Hughes and Karen Down (The Support Squad) who discuss 'Mental Health In The Music Industry'.

What are some of the challenges and pressures that audio professionals face in the music industry that might impact their mental health?
Pressures of freelancing-How do we address the financial and emotional pressures that audio professionals might experience, and how does this impact their mental well-being?
How does the music industry handle issues like sickness burnout, anxiety, and depression, which can be prevalent in this field?
How do you address the stigma around mental health in the music industry and create a supportive environment for musicians/artists?

Finds Of The Week

Russ- Colin From Accounts- Tv Show
Ashea- Essentialism- Book
Karen- Sound Of Silence- Song by Disturbed

Analogue Methods In Digital Workflows Aug 16, 2023

Show notes

In this week’s podcast Julian is joined by Ashea, Dom Morley and Steve DeMott who discuss ‘How much do traditional analogue rules still apply today?’

All four of us are producers/mixers of slightly different vintage, so it would be interesting to go around the table and hear a little about which techniques & practices we learned from and perhaps how that affects our workflow today.
Gainstaging,
32 bit recording- Is anyone working with this?
Analogue workflow (e.g. making decisions early, capturing “the sound” from the start vs. capturing a clean sound to manipulate later, etc).
Mixing/Producing in and out of the box, we compare techniques and results.
Favourite analogue emulation plugins, how do they compare to the real deal?

Finds Of The Week

Making A Chart Hit - SUPER-Hi Aug 02, 2023

Show notes

In this week's episode Julian and Ashea are joined by George Tizzard and Rick Parkhouse of SUPER-Hi talking about the creative vision and technical decision making behind a chart hit.
Talking Points

Starting a track, what is your approach, does it change depending on the vibe/artist?
Producing for very established artists, what is the process, how involved are the labels/artist in the sound and how does that differ to writing your own material?
Making the ‘right’ decisions in production is very important, how do you deal with decision making?
Samples, presets, sound design, any go to plugins that you use.
Behind the track: Choose a track, either as Super-Hi or Red Triangle that you’d like to share with us. What was the production process ?
Working together, do you have set roles? How to work successfully as a production duo
Thoughts on A.I, are you already embracing this, if so how?
Favourite studio gear and why?

Find Of The Week

Julian - The Songs Of David Bowie - Songbook 1973
Ashea- Sonible- Smart Gate
Rick- Kilohearts Trancegate, Underwater jet pack
George - Sheet Music Could Have Been Me The Struts

Mastering For Streaming Jul 25, 2023

Show notes

In this week's Podcast Julian is joined by Ashea and Ian Shepherd for a discussion about about mastering in the streaming age.
Ian Shepherd is a mastering engineer of 25 years experience who has become well known for his work around the detrimental effects of the loudness wars. He runs the Production Advice blog and hosts The Mastering Show podcast.
Talking Points

Mastering for Streaming Platforms, let’s talk specifics
Loundness Normalisation and Album Normalisation
Loudness Wars, are they still a thing? Do we still need loud masters?
True Peak Limiters vs normal limiters
Clipping
Widening mixes

Finds Of The Week

Julian - Genelec GRADE Reports
Ashea - Pope Audio
Ian - AM coustics, Who Killed the KLF

Atmos For Music Jul 12, 2023

Show notes

Following up from our podcast looking at how post mixers use the new expanded Track Widths in Pro Tools 2023.6 Julian and Ashea are joined by Steve Genewick and Nathaniel Reichman to discuss Atmos for Music and whether track widths beyond 7.1.2 are significant for music mixers.
Finds Of The Week

Ashea - Gearfest UK
Nathaniel - Auto Align 2
Steve - Vanguard Audio V44S
Julian - UAD Capitol Mastering Compressor

Fix It In The Mix Jul 05, 2023

Show notes

In this week’s Podcast Julian is joined by Ashea, Gareth Nuttall and William Wittman who discuss fixing in the mix. Can it be done successfully?
Finds Of The Week:

Julian - Space Lens in Clean My Mac
Ashea- Avid Collab with Audio Movers or CHAPEA
Gareth - Hi Hat Bleed Trick
William- Dr. Tver Robert pedal by Aclam

Extended track Widths In Pro Tools 2023.6 Jun 26, 2023

Show notes

In this weeks episode Julian is joined by Ashea, Roger Guerin and Korey Pereira. They discuss the extended track widths introduced in Pro Tools 2023.6 and what they mean for Atmos mixers.

Let’s go round the table and talk about each of your current work and how affected by Atmos it is.
What has changed in Pro Tools 2023.6 regarding Track Widths?
What is the 7.1.2 ceiling and why does it exist?
How is greater track widths better? Lets talk about beds vs objects and channel agnosticism. Why is 7.1.4 better than 7.1.2. What about 9.1.6, how does speaker density affect the listening experience?
What about the two approaches to getting greater widths out of pro tools beds vs static objects. To what extent is this new?
Are these changes going to affect how you work?

Finds Of The Week

Julian - The Loudspeaker Design Cookbook 8th Edition Vol 1
Ashea - Steinberg Spectralayers
Roger - Amie loudspeakers by Meyer Sound
Korey - Kraken DET Speech Recognition Beta

Writing To Picture Jun 21, 2023

Show notes

In this week's episode Julian and Ashea are joined by Greg Tan and Steve DeMott to discuss producing music for picture.
Talking Points
What is the creative process when composing music for movies/video games. How do you approach capturing the desired mood and atmosphere?

What’s the collaborative process like with directors, producers, and other members of the creative team to understand their vision and translate it into musical compositions?

When/how does a brief arrive?

What factors do you consider when creating a score that complements the visual content?

Working with Deadlines: How do you manage your time and resources effectively?

Working with sound libraries or creating custom sound effects for TV and movies? How do you ensure that the sound effects align with the overall audio mix?
Best Software synths, plugins, gear etc…

Are there any specific strategies you use for revisions, feedback, project management, storage space and backups?
Talking Points
Greg - Agency on Netflix
Steve - Audioscape D-Comp Limiter
Ashea - Spatial Audio Festival at Media City Salford
Julian - Batch Converter in Rogue Amoeba's Fission