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Get The UAD Essentials Edition Bundle For $49 (84% OFF)
Plugin Boutique has the UAD Essentials Edition bundle of 11 great plugins from Universal Audio going for only $49, this deal only lasts until April 30 so if it interests you, check it out before the deal ends! The plugins in the UAD Essentials Edition bundle are available for Windows (VST3 and AAX) and Mac [...]
View post: Get The UAD Essentials Edition Bundle For $49 (84% OFF)IK Multimedia’s iRig Stream Mic Pro is a hassle-free solution for all recording artists€169.99, ikmultimedia.com
A clear trend in audio gear in the 2020s is consumers wanting equipment that’s more compact and powerful. IK Multimedia has been one company leading the way in all-in-one recording devices, with its iRig and Stream families of audio interfaces and mics delivering portable performance across desktop, iOS and, more unusually, Android platforms. It pairs these with its formidable line-up of audio processing apps and plugins to cater to a wide range of musicians and creators, regardless of whether you’re a podcaster, guitarist or DJ.READ MORE: Is EastWest’s Fantasy Orchestra the one sample library to rule them all?
The company’s latest creation, the iRig Stream Mic Pro, is a multi-functional microphone that also serves as an audio interface, among other things. Creators who are looking for a simple, fuss-free setup for light recording duties, such as a singer-songwriter setup or a podcast, will want to check this out.
The iRig Stream Mic Pro can be mounted on its desk stand or on a mic boom via the included thread adapter and it powers from your device, also allowing pass-through charging to iOS if you add the optional power supply. It’s class-compliant across your Mac, PC, iPhone or iPad — requiring no drivers — so it just becomes available as an audio I/O device when connected. To facilitate extra bandwidth it has a mini-DIN connector and comes with two cables: one Lightning and one USB-C.
You’ll find the body robust, with no real moving parts except for the central jog wheel to control all its functions. Before getting to that though, you may want to connect headphones to the 3.5 mm jack on the bottom edge, which allows direct monitoring of your voice or playing, and possibly also a second 3.5 mm stereo input to the Aux jack, which might host a keyboard, mixer or drum machine via a compatible cable.
Stream Mic Pro setup
Happily, the mic can function as a simple stereo device, sending the output from both its capsules or that output plus the two additional channels to your recording device. Or, in multichannel mode, it can send all four channels separately — more useful for DAW recording where you’ll probably want to keep the various channels apart for editing and mixing.
The stereo option is useful for sending a pre-mixed signal for example to a streaming app, like Instagram, YouTube or TikTok. Then there’s IK’s Loopback feature, which lets you add background music from your device into the signal stream or even route the mic signal to a separate app for adding EQ, reverb or other processing, all in real-time. If this sounds complex, don’t worry — in practice, it’s simple enough for all users to pick up quickly.
In fact, IK has done a stellar job of keeping the iRig Stream Mic workable. The jog wheel controls multiple functions and its ring of lights adapts to show you various different levels. So you get mic, streaming and headphone levels, monitor mix, plus buttons for mic mute and activating an adjustable high-pass filter (handy for removing noise at higher levels). The icons and lights help everything make sense.
The other trick the mic has up its sleeve is switchable polar patterns. Controlled again via the main knob, it’s possible to select between four different patterns, starting with the regular cardioid front pickup used mainly for vocals, voiceovers or instruments. Then there’s an omnidirectional pattern, handy for multi-person podcasts, field recording or conference calls, and a bi-directional (figure-8) pattern that’s handy for two-person interviews, picking up from front and back equally. Finally comes a left/right stereo pattern, useful again for music, instruments and ambient recordings.
Stream Mic Pro
The capsules are dual 0.55-inch gold sputtered electrets with a frequency response of 20 Hz to 20 kHz, which is pretty standard for a mic of this type, as is the maximum SPL of 115 dB. The electronics inside convert analogue to digital (and back) at 24-bit, and can operate at up to 96 kHz — impressive in such a portable, bus-powered unit even if many users may never stray further than 48 kHz.
Recording quality is excellent across a range of uses. For podcasting or voiceovers, placed on a desk you’ll be driving the input a little harder but the filter can take off any small amount of noise that may result. Recording acoustic guitar close-up, the results are warm and crystal clear. It’s the extra polar patterns that really make this a versatile mic though, especially the figure-8 which we found so useful for across-the-table interview recording. Other features like loopback and splitting all four channels separately for DAW recording also help to round out what is an abundantly capable, portable piece of kit.
IK’s companion app is a bonus, with downloads available upon registering your hardware. In this case, it’s iRig Recorder 3 LE for mobile, MixBox CS for iPad and the entry-level SE edition of MixBox for desktops, which are suites of effects you can use for the aforementioned voice or instrument processing prior to recording.
Note also that there’s a simpler version available — the Stream Mic USB, priced at £100. The key difference is it has only a single cardioid polar pattern and is a stereo rather than a 4-channel interface, with a standard USB onboard rather than the mini-DIN. As such, it’s arguably better suited to people who only need a more conventional mic to record a voice or instrument without the expanded features of the Pro.
It’s called the Stream Mic but streaming is only one of its many talents. In truth, it’s just as adept at regular voice or instrument recording and thanks to its switchable polar patterns, all manner of interview or ambient and field recording too. All this in crisp and clean high quality, and should you need it, a clever loopback facility to add another virtual signal to the four channels already available.
The Stream Mic Pro is a serious all-rounder for your podcast or music studio that’ll make your life easier.
Stream Mic Pro in use
Key features1 in, 4 out audio interface
2 capsules
4 polar patterns
24-bit, 96 kHz recording
Direct monitoring
Stereo aux input
Bus power over USB or Lightning
Integrated desk stand
Suite of apps included
Switchable high-pass filterThe post IK Multimedia’s iRig Stream Mic Pro is a hassle-free solution for all recording artists appeared first on MusicTech.
New Toys: Eventide H3000 Factory Mk II and Band Delays Mk II SoftwareYou would be hard-pressed to find many companies with a more accomplished history of making superior audio products than Eventide. Founded in 1971, Eventide is a true pioneer in the audio field and the inventor of the Harmonizer, which was first released commercially as the model 910 in 1975. The H910 was the world’s first commercially available digital audio effects device; it combined pitch change with delay and feedback. The Harmonizer is a staple of most producers, engineers and artists to this day. Eventide has never stopped making increasingly powerful versions. Although it was released in 1987, the H3000 is still hailed as an indispensable tool for modern mixing. New this month, Eventide releases updates to two plug-in versions of H3000 algorithms for you DAW.
Billed as "The Holy Grail of Multi-FX," the H3000 Factory II plug-in is meticulously modeled after the original hardware. Distinct pitch-shifting, delay, filtering, and modulation are the core of the sounds available. I find there is a depth, size, clarity and openness to the H3000 plug-in that surpasses other products that attempt to do the same effects. With over 500 carefully crafted presets tailored for both music production and sound design, the H3000 Factory Mk II offers an endless suite of effects to infuse your next record with unparalleled creativity.
Ported from the legendary H3000 Harmonizer® studio processor, the H3000 Band Delays Mk II plug-in is a creative powerhouse for delays, filtering, stereo-widening, and dynamic rhythmic effects. With eight delay bands each featuring unique controls for level, panning, filter type, frequency, and Q, the H3000 Band Delays Mk II brings the flexibility and iconic sound of the original hardware algorithm to your DAW with a click of a button.
What's new in the latest string of updates in the H3000 plug-ins include: a resizable user interface, blending the classic look of the original H3000 Harmonizer® hardware; improved usability, with an expandable expert view and a smooth patching workflow; brand new modelling of the analog-to-digital and digital-to-analog converter sections from the original H3000, capturing the original sound of the hardware unit; a brand-new preset library, with recreations of presets from the original H3000; and filter recreations, modeling the resonance and self-oscillation behavior of the hardware.
The H3000 Factory Mk II sells for $199 ($99 crossgrade); H3000 Band Delays Mk II is $149 ($69 crossgrade); and together bundled, costs $248.
eventideaudio.com
Humanoid robots are learning to fall wellThe savvy marketers at Boston Dynamics produced two major robotics news cycles last week. The larger of the two was, naturally, the electric Atlas announcement. As I write this, the sub-40 second video is steadily approaching five million views. A day prior, the company tugged at the community’s heart strings when it announced that the […]
© 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.You Can Run BASIC On an Old HP 4592 Protocol AnalyzerWhat do you do when you find an ancient piece of test gear and want to have fun? Well, you can always try getting BASIC running on it, and that’s precisely what [David Kuder] did.
The HP4952A Protocol Analyzer actually looks a lot like an old computer, even if it was never meant for general-purpose use. The heart of the machine is a Zilog Z80 CPU, though, so it shares a lot in common with microcomputers of its era.
Among other hacks, [David] worked to get Microsoft Basic-80 running on the machine. Initially, he was only able to get it up and running on the display, with no way to read the keyboard, disk, or access the serial port. Eventually, by diving into the nitty-gritty of the machine, he was able to at least get the keyboard working along with some basic BASIC programs. Usable memory is just 8KB, but you can do a fair bit with that when you’ve only got a 32×16 display for output anyway!
It’s a neat hack and one that was extendable to the HP4957A as well. We’ve seen similar machines on these pages before, too! If you’ve got your own neat retro hacks on the boil, don’t hesitate to drop us a line!
[Thanks to Christopher Zell for the tip!]Sam Altman’s OpenAI reportedly in partnership talks with his other firm, WorldcoinThe potential partnership comes amid increased regulatory scrutiny for both companies.
Corral Some Zippy Blue Flames Into 3D Printed Troughs[Steve Mould] came across an interesting little phenomenon of blue flames zipping around a circular track. This led to diving down a bit of a rabbit hole about excitable mediums, ultimately leading him to optimize the shapes and come up with some pretty wild variations which he shows off in a video (also embedded below.)
After figuring out that the moving flame depended on combustion of fuel vapor in an environment that didn’t allow for the whole surface to stay lit at once, [Steve] tried to optimize the design of 3d-printed channels and raceways to encourage this effect, and he came up with some pretty novel ones. The 3D models are here if you’d like to try them for yourself (we especially like the “figure eight” and “rays” models.)
The video is an excellent show & tell of everything [Steve] dove into, complete with plenty of demonstrations of harnessing this effect to create some nifty running flames. Check it out in the video below, and if unintuitive physical effects are your thing, don’t miss [Steve]’s peeling apart of the turntable paradox.Sixth Sample’s Spoton is a Free Vocal Tuning Plugin
Sixth Sample released Spoton, a free vocal tuning plugin for Windows and macOS. We already covered the best free autotune plugins, and Spoton could be the latest addition to the list. The 64-bit exclusive release is available for the following formats: Windows (AU, VST3 or AAX) and macOS (VST3 or AAX). The developer Sixth Sample describes [...]
View post: Sixth Sample’s Spoton is a Free Vocal Tuning PluginTikTok faces a ban in the US, Tesla profits drop and healthcare data leaksWelcome, folks, to Week in Review (WiR), TechCrunch’s regular newsletter covering this week’s noteworthy happenings in tech. TikTok’s fate in the U.S. looks uncertain after President Joe Biden signed a bill that included a deadline for ByteDance, TikTok’s parent company, to divest itself of TikTok within nine months or face a ban on distributing it […]
© 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.Expert Advice: The Sound of A.I. in HollywoodActors and writers reached their agreement with A.I. What about sound designers?
After some long and painful fights, the issue of A.I.—at least for actors and writers—has been resolved. For the rest of us in Hollywood, however, the unpacking of A.I. has only just begun. Navigating the future of the sound design industry will depend on engineers and editors understanding how to maximize the capability and productivity of A.I. tools.
While filmmaking and production were shut down for most of the year by the long and painful strike, the industry of Hollywood has continued to churn. Though the “Barbenheimer” craze over the summer cushioned the economic blow for some studios, the last six months have seen major Hollywood studios bend over backward to improve profitability.
Studios direct-to-consumer offerings—streamers—have borne the brunt of these efforts; in this grand experimentation, everything from storytelling structure to pricing models have been on the table. Streamers have merged, shifted, and cut entire projects in an attempt to impress investors with their bottom line.
It’s a reasonable concern, then, that having failed with the actors and writers, other, less powerful and more technical groups—such as sound engineering—may be on the line for A.I. replacement and the presumed associated cost savings. And it’s not necessarily a wild leap: it’s inevitable that A.I. will, as with other industries, dramatically shift what the workflow for sound engineers will look like.
Sound engineers looking to forge their future not only during these tumultuous times in Hollywood, but also in the “civilian” sector, need to be smart about how they deploy A.I. There are already tools available that can help us speed up our processes and projects. Two good examples:
• Sound cataloging and library management: Finding a specific sound in a sound library can be an incredibly time intensive process. I know that my own library is made up of over two terabytes of various sounds, and digging through it to find a specific one can take hours. There are A.I. tools on the market that can not only uncover a sound, but also generate timestamps inside each audio clip.
• Audio description mixing: Mixing for audio description can be a rote process. Clients have specifications they want met, and save for a bit of artistry, the process is fairly straightforward. A program’s audio needs to drop at a certain point before the narratives begin, and resume shortly after it ends. A.I. can automate the process, doing an effective first draft of the work, creating time for the engineer to check and fix any mixing issues after the first rendering.
As in other industries, these tools offer methods of speeding up delivery and service, and will eventually become the standard practice. As cost savings continue to be a major priority for studios, expect to see A.I. technologies implemented to a greater and greater extent.
But will sound engineers face an existential crisis as a result of A.I.?
Yes—and no.
As the more basic tasks of sound design— such as sound effects cataloging and audio description mixing—are outsourced to A.I. tools, other novice positions, like interns and PA roles, will likely dry up. If companies can find cost savings by using technology, they will, and the impact will likely be fewer roles for individuals just getting started and learning the business.
At the same time, sound design—like many other post-production positions—is both an art and a science. The best among us have the technical skills needed to create a cohesive soundscape, while also having the artful ear that can create a character out of the audio. Part of being a sound designer is having the ability to translate a director’s vision into a rich and immersive sound experience.
In an industry that runs on connections and creativity, removing the position of sound engineer likely won’t happen, especially at the highest levels. Certainly, the lower tier and newer streaming services—those who are just creating content for content’s sake—may turn to some emerging A.I. tools to churn out fast, good enough sound designs that simply gets the job done. As TikTok and TikTok-like mini productions grow in popularity, rapid turnaround will be prioritized over quality.
But there will continue to be a happy medium for sound design and engineering. Work in this industry long enough, and you know that relationships are everything. Directors are on the lookout for partners who have the emotional sensibility and creativity to translate their vision, add to it, and produce something even better.
The Oscar-winning directors of the world aren’t likely to give up that relationship soon, attached as they are to the individuals who help to drive the creative process alongside them. Similarly, independent artists and filmmakers, who are driven by creativity and passion, aren’t likely to pursue ease over art.
Soft skills will still win the day for sound designers, but smart studios can, and will, start bracing themselves for an A.I.-driven future.
This 360 treadmill could make Disney’s metaverse a physical playgroundYouTuber and Ultimate star MKBHD tested the device using a game controller, his legs, and the Force.
3D Printed Adapter Helps You Eat Chicken Nuggets On The HighwaySo often, we see 3D printers used to create some nifty little tool for a tricky little job. Maybe it’s to lock cams together for a timing belt change, or to work as a jig for soldering some complex device. However, some hacks are even simpler than that. [maker_guy] realized that eating nuggets in the car could be easier than ever with a little printed adapter.
The print is simple. It’s a round caddy for the nugget sauces given out by Chick-fil-A restaurants. Why round? Because it lets the nugget sauce sit neatly in your car’s cupholder at an accessible height. Put the sauce tub in the adapter, peel it open, and you can dip to your heart’s content.
So simple, yet a game changer all the same.
No more delicately balancing Zesty Buffalo by the gearstick while you try and chow down. Nor will your seat covers be tainted with Honey Mustard!
“Not a hack!” you scream. “It’s frivolous nonsense!” To that I say, are you a nugget eater or not? I myself partake, and I can absolutely see the value in this. You see, us journalists work hard. We’re often stuck eating substandard food in our cars on the way from one thing to another, like so many others in busy professions. If a smart little 3D-printed adapter can make mealtime easier and save some mess, I’m calling that a win.
You should never be afraid to use your creativity to make tools to improve your life. Parts are on Thingiverse if you need to print your own. Mod it to suit McDonald’s product if you need. Heck, print in black and it’d look like a stock part of the car!
You don’t have to like this simple adapter, but you can’t deny its utility! Share your own nifty little adapter ideas in the comments.Smart move by #majors in #MusicBusiness.
Posted Reaction by PublMe bot in PublMe. “Major label reach on your terms”: ReverbNation and Warner Music partnership aims to empower emerging artists. ReverbNation, the artist opportunities platform of BandLab Technologies, has teamed up with Warner..."Welcome Back, VoyagerIn what is probably the longest-distance tech support operation in history, the Voyager mission team succeeded in hacking their way around some defective memory and convincing their space probe to send sensor data back to earth again. And for the record, Voyager is a 46-year old system at a distance of now 24 billion kilometers, 22.5 light-hours, from the earth.
While the time delay that distance implies must have made for quite a tense couple days of waiting between sending the patch and finding out if it worked, the age of the computers onboard probably actually helped, in a strange way. Because the code is old-school machine language, one absolutely has to know all the memory addresses where each subroutine starts and ends. You don’t call a function like do_something(); but rather by loading an address in memory and jumping to it.
This means that the ground crew, in principle, knows where every instruction lives. If they also knew where all of the busted memory cells were, it would be a “simple” programming exercise to jump around the bad bits, and re-write all of the subroutine calls accordingly if larger chunks had to be moved. By “simple”, I of course mean “incredibly high stakes, and you’d better make sure you’ve got it right the first time.”
In a way, it’s a fantastic testament to simpler systems that they were able to patch their code around the memory holes. Think about trying to do this with a modern operating system that uses address space layout randomization, for instance. Of course, the purpose there is to make hacking directly on the memory harder, and that’s the opposite of what you’d want in a space probe.
Nonetheless, it’s a testament to careful work and clever software hacking that they managed to get Voyager back online. May she send for another 46 years!This article is part of the Hackaday.com newsletter, delivered every seven days for each of the last 200+ weeks. It also includes our favorite articles from the last seven days that you can see on the web version of the newsletter.
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“Major label reach on your terms”: ReverbNation and Warner Music partnership aims to empower emerging artistsReverbNation, the artist opportunities platform of BandLab Technologies, has teamed up with Warner Chappel Music (WCM), the global music publishing arm of Warner Music Group. The new ReverbNation Publishing venture lets rising artists, producers and songwriters apply for major label-grade music publishing services.
Under the partnership, WCM will be responsible for providing the music rights to all artists who sign up for the newly-created ReverbNation Publishing Administration program. ReverbNation and WCM will also collaborate to seek and sign promising new talent in the ReverbNation community.
What is ReverbNation Publishing?
Producers and songwriters who are signed to WCM and ReverbNation will be equipped with WCM’s full suite of offerings. This means they’ll have the opportunity to work with Warner’s A&R, Sync and Creative services teams. With this access, artists can “capitalise on new avenues for their songs and careers,” a press release reads.
On the ReverbNation Publishing webpage, the brand says that the partnership offers “major label reach on your terms.”
“Publishing is difficult without a partner,” it continues, outlining a streamlined process to help ensure your songwriter royalties are collected: Tell ReverbNation Publishing about your track, let ReverbNation and WCM find and collect the royalties you’re owed, and you get paid.
What does the partnership mean?
“Songwriters and artists are now being discovered through a multitude of different digital platforms, in what I call the ‘New Songwriter Economy,’ says Guy Moot, the co-chair and CEO of WCM.
“Joining forces with BandLab Technologies allows us to tap into the incredible creator community that they’ve built and help support and amplify the voices of promising, up-and-coming talent. Meng [Ru Kuok, CEO and co-founder of BandLab Technologies], is an exceptional entrepreneur with a vision for the future of music that aligns well with ours, and we’re looking forward to a long and successful partnership together.”
Meng Ru Kuok adds: “By joining forces with Warner Chappell Music, we’ll open new doors for the ReverbNation community, creating even more opportunities for artistic growth. This partnership not only unlocks additional potential avenues for artistic development and innovation, it also bridges the gap between emerging talents and established industry platforms, allowing a new generation of artists to find their voice and place in a continuously adapting and expanding landscape.”
Learn more about Reverbnation Publishing at publishing.reverbnation.com
Editor’s note: BandLab Technologies and MusicTech are both part of Caldecott Music Group.
The post “Major label reach on your terms”: ReverbNation and Warner Music partnership aims to empower emerging artists appeared first on MusicTech.
