I can't see colour, but I sure can hear them, so to speak

Easter whoosed by in terms of delicious food, some wine, mämmi, a lot of recording, mixing and off-note singing. I was so into my own little world I didn't have a moment to put down here what I was going to last thursday evening. So here's a recap of what was up:

I got my new screen, 24 inches of Eizo goodness. It's rather huge, as in otherwise than screen size, but I'm liking it. The EcoView or whatever it's called auto-brightness seems to do it's trick: Haven't had a moment thinking the screen's too bright. One of the reasons I got it was my interest for said feature, as well as the fancy folding stand, which makes it possible to place the screen itself just at the front edge of the stand foot. Something sort of crucial for me, as I need to be able to have the screen as close to me as possible. Well, with this huge size it's not necessary anymore but I do appreciate have some space to type in too without displacing my shoulders to fit my arms in.

Mics were good, the four I tried being Shure SM58, Audix OM2, AKG D5 and EV N/D767a. In short, the Shure is nice but needs proximity. Not much room to go around there. The Audix was nice, good pickup and all, probably my favourite of the bunch. The AKG was also nice, picked up from a longer distance, rivals the Audix sure. The EV didn't really leave any impression at all. It was alright, but nothing to write home about I guess.

For the testings I had to MacGyver myself a mic stand, but nothing a little creativity can't do. A tripod, a plastic wrapper and a whole lot of duct tape did the trick.

My guitar recording for a song a friend of mine and I have been working on for quite a while took a turn to a lot easier direction as I realised I've got a StealthPlug, a little USB device which's one end goes to the computer and the other goes to the guitar (for amp modeling software) or to an amp (apparently) and the input can be taken in through the ASIO driver. The easing bit versus a standard cable in the soundcard's mic input is that using Sonar I don't have to reconfigure it every time I want to change what I'm recording. I wouldn't need to do anything at all if I figured out how to get the guitar signal in decent through the 0202 as it's been a bit too loud so far. But now it's just a simple restart of Sonar that does the trick. Still bothersome, but not as much as with changing driver types back and fourth to fix a chord. I didn't try changing it on the fly, but I have my doubts it'd work. Sonar wants to get restarted after changing about any audio settings anyway.

I'm familiar with Sonar from the past, and figuring Cubase was not too much fun, so despite being told Cubase is easy I sticked with Sonar. The LE version that came with the EMU 0202 is just dandy apart from one little detail: it doesn't have a graphic equalizer or a very clear compressor. Not that I'm too well versed in compressors, but I just couldn't figure out the on in it. I got what I needed done with the four point parametric EQ with decent results, but I know a proper graphic one would be so much better. I need to plunge into the world of free plugins, it seems. I've just been a bit too lazy for that.

In the process of recording both clean and harsh vocals I learned I'm somewhat off-note most of the time. It doesn't sound absolutely horrible, but there's enough room for improvement to fit a brontosaurus.

So I'm venturing into improving my pitch a bit. Googling on the subject is interesting. A lot of completely opposite opinions around, and some rather impressive finds also. I found an online pitch training program and as they're all saying I did notice the difference right off. It does work! I might be barred recognizing colours, so I'll learn recognize notes instead. It's just as useful a skill, atleast in my chosen set of hobbies.

If there are any obvious missing H's in the text I blame the keyboard. The H key on this one is horrible. Almost as if the keyboard was over-zealously French...

A step towards a possible venture into the music business, and some eXtra Problems

It's been a while since I last wrote here, and I have a semi-decent excuse this time around.

I've been working on my entrance pre-task for TAMK University of Applied Sciences (= Tampereen Ammattikorkeakoulu, where the acronym comes from), and it's taken the last couple of weeks of my time pretty well, along with not so inconciderable tiredness over having to get up for work ridiculously early. As I said, semi-decent...

As usual, something always has to go wrong. This time around with the pre-task I ran out of printer ink crucially the night I should have printed the thing and put it together. The printer is my sister's and it hasn't really been used so I could only count on what she knew about it, so it was a bit hazard to begin with. But I had counted one extra day for slugglish delivery, so I just went instaling Office and a gazillion fonts on my parents' computer and printed my portfolio on it, then mailed it express yesterday. Lucky I had printed the photos for it first, meaning they were full inked and shiny and all. My parents' printer doesn't have proper photo printing shamminghangs, seen.

I did try sharing the printer from Vista, but my XP machine couldn't find it in the network. I don't know if Norton installed on the Vista computer was in the way or what, but I did see my computer on it a few times so the network connection exists to some extent. There are some XP settings and updates I read about but the settings aren't anywhere to be found and the update refuses to install claiming I already have it installed.

Another thing yesterday: I got my hands on a few dynamic micropones and an E-MU USB 0202 pre-amp/audio input thingamaboing. Instead of using my evening testing the mics and configuring the software that came with it I spend it googling around for USB 2.0 drivers and solutions, since my XP installation doesn't seem to recongnize the fact that a USB 2.0 Host Controller is installed, and it even claims it's running and working! I wouldn't really mind if it weren't for the fact that the 0202 doesn't really stay in touch too well with Sonar atleast on USB 1.1. With my computer configuration a 10 millisecond latency for the device should be plently. I tried 200ms and, well, it doesn't drop out but clicks, pops, stutters and loses synch. I even closed everything else, so the USB has something to do with it. I'm not claiming the XP installation is in the best possible shape, but still.

I apparently have to use my much slower laptop, which however sports USB 2.0 just fine, if it'd work any better. If it does it'll just be for the better, provides me mobility. I also need to find a decent pair of headphones. If I'm not mistaken there's one in the house somewhere, if it's still working that is. A real nice old one.

To fix the USB issue I guess I could just reinstall XP if I could, but I can't. Reinstalling it would mess up my boot record, which would force me to most likely reinstall Windows 7, and I just don't want to do that. I'm liking it too much. If and if so when I get my hands on the 7 Release Candidate I'll definitely reconsider, though. I did remove SP3 to see if it resolves anything at all anywhere, but I doubt it.

On a half-related note, as I've been using XP on my work computer I've noticed I'm starting to slightly dislike the XP interface compared to the 7 one. The themed one I have at home is bareable, but this basic one is a bit too unpractical. 7 is so smooth and fast. The only real weak spot I've come across in 7 normal use wise is the networking center. It, in a nutshell, sucks. The network diagnostic tool works way better than in XP, but everything else is just way too shiny for the user group who really want to go messing around there and know what to mess up. Way too many clicks to be followed from a help file too. But yeah, most of it is there. It's just hard to find. Ofcource I can see the plus side in hiding everything: people who don't know what they are doing aren't as likely to mess things up.

I'll really need to get to the XP/7 comparison at some point, when things around everything else get a bit less hectic and I get a bit clearer picture - the glamour of something new and exciting having worn off 7.

I also decided to give Live Messenger 2009 another chance, and mess.be patched what I could out of it with the light patch, getting rid of the worst flood of space-consuming adverts. I wouldn't really mind them if they didn't take up so much of my precious screen space and distract me so much. I know and appreciate what they are for, I just don't like the execution of the idea at all. Overall the new Live Messenger isn't THAT bad, once you get used to it. But it's still unnecessarliy huge everywhere. 8.5 is still better.

A bit of light amidst all this mess, I'm getting a new montior sometime soon, maybe even today. A big one. I'm fed up with my back-up 15" CRT I was forced to use when my 17" flat broke. Fingers crossed for a nice large, 8-cornered surprise today. The realist in me doubts it though, but in the past doubts like these have been proven wrong.

I've spent my free time today reading up on recording and mixing vocals, and I guess tonight's a night for some duct tape and peculiar voices.

I don't have a mic stand, so I'll need to build one, you pervert.