If someone wants to make a long term career in recording, would you
advise them to get formal schooling in electronics and pick up
recording knowledge as they go or vice-versa? It seems having an
in-depth knowledge of electronics is crucial to having a well-rounded
understanding of recording.

Or do you feel this is not correct? Do you feel someone can rightfully
call themselves a recording "expert" without extensive electronics
knowledge?

Do schools like Full Sail emphasize such nuts-n-bolts knowledge?

wrote:

If someone wants to make a long term career in recording, would you
advise them to get formal schooling in electronics and pick up
recording knowledge as they go or vice-versa?

Unless the person plans on a career desiging equipment, learn the art of
recording. The best way is by doing it. Alot. If you want to have a
career in recording, get out there and start recording things.

It seems having an
in-depth knowledge of electronics is crucial to having a well-rounded
understanding of recording.

It helps, but is neither necessary nor sufficient.

Or do you feel this is not correct? Do you feel someone can rightfully
call themselves a recording "expert" without extensive electronics
knowledge?

Yes, just as there are great musicians who can't read music, there are
recording professionals who don't know ohm's law. Not that I advocating
such an approach, just acknowleging that people like that are out there.
More than you might imagine.

Do schools like Full Sail emphasize such nuts-n-bolts knowledge?

No idea. My best guess is that mostly they sell dreams.

wrote:
If someone wants to make a long term career in recording, would you
advise them to get formal schooling in electronics and pick up
recording knowledge as they go or vice-versa? It seems having an
in-depth knowledge of electronics is crucial to having a well-rounded
understanding of recording.

Also, having formal schooling in electronics is apt to get you hired
somewhere. There is a real demand for people who can do maintenance
work, and that is a good path into any studio.

Or do you feel this is not correct? Do you feel someone can rightfully
call themselves a recording "expert" without extensive electronics
knowledge?

Lots of people do. I think that's a bad thing, personally, but it is
very common today.

Do schools like Full Sail emphasize such nuts-n-bolts knowledge?

From what I have seen of Full Sail grads, I have no idea WHAT they
emphasize but knowledge does not seem to be something they do.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

On Wed, 24 May 2006 11:47:29 -0700, brassplyer wrote:

If someone wants to make a long term career in recording, would you advise
them to get formal schooling in electronics and pick up recording
knowledge as they go or vice-versa? It seems having an in-depth knowledge
of electronics is crucial to having a well-rounded understanding of
recording.

Or do you feel this is not correct? Do you feel someone can rightfully
call themselves a recording "expert" without extensive electronics
knowledge?

Very few recording engineers do equipment maintenance more
complicated than soldering a few leads nowadays. Modern recording gear is
not really designed to be repaired on site. It's mostly not modular so
it's a bitch to take apart and is all surface mount components and digital
electronics.

I'd say it's useful to know how equipment works, but as you are unlikely
to be able to repair it, a smattering of theory is enough. Knowing about
impedance, ground loops and basic electrical safety is really worthwhile,
but you don't really need formal schooling to pick that up.



Do schools like Full Sail emphasize such nuts-n-bolts knowledge?

wrote:
If someone wants to make a long term career in recording, would you
advise them to get formal schooling in electronics and pick up
recording knowledge as they go or vice-versa?

A good knowledge of electronics will go a long way to help you to
understand how things work together (or don't), and opens up your
potential for a maintenance job in a studio that has a lot of gear and
a lot of people from whom you can learn recording. Computer maintenance
and network setup and administration are good skills to have as well.

I also think it's important to learn music theory (not just how to play
drums or guitar) and learn something about business as well. Oh, and
pick up what you can about recording. There are certainly some
important fundamentals that you can learn in school, but you'll find
that experience is the best way to become proficient in the art of
recording and mixing.

Walt wrote:
wrote:

If someone wants to make a long term career in recording, would you
advise them to get formal schooling in electronics and pick up
recording knowledge as they go or vice-versa?

Unless the person plans on a career desiging equipment, learn the art of
recording. The best way is by doing it. Alot. If you want to have a
career in recording, get out there and start recording things.

It seems having an
in-depth knowledge of electronics is crucial to having a well-rounded
understanding of recording.

It helps, but is neither necessary nor sufficient.

How would one truly understand the understand the in's & out's of a
particular mic, board, mixer, compressor, eq etc. along with various
digital (or analog) recording theory without a solid grounding (no pun
intended) in electronics?

Seems the frustration a lot of the pros on here express regarding
opinions by some is based on what they perceive to be a fundamental
lack of understanding of how things work. My perception, which could be
wrong, is that a lot of the regular contributors in here such as Scott
Dorsey, Arny Krueger, Mike Rivers, etc. have a pretty solid knowledge
of electronics.

I've started reading a basic electronics book and one of the things
I've come across is a discussion of RMS/Peak, not even related to music
but I realize now where the term on the button on the
compressor/limiter comes from.

It's my understanding that Ray Kurzweil, whose name appears on gear
owned by practically every band in America isn't even a musician.

wrote:
If someone wants to make a long term career in recording, would you
advise them to get formal schooling in electronics and pick up
recording knowledge as they go or vice-versa? It seems having an
in-depth knowledge of electronics is crucial to having a well-rounded
understanding of recording.

Or do you feel this is not correct? Do you feel someone can rightfully
call themselves a recording "expert" without extensive electronics
knowledge?

Do schools like Full Sail emphasize such nuts-n-bolts knowledge?

I would say vice-versa.
I think you would be better off learning about acoustics, music and
good people management.
A basic understanding of electronics is obviously usefull but a lot of
recording is art as much as science. Many commonly used recording
tecniques were discovered by recording engineers who did things that an
electronics engineer would consider to be breaking the rules.
Modern engineers need to know about programming, midi and sytems
interfacing.
It is good to know enough electronics so that you don't do things that
will destroy your equipment.
If you know to much you might find yourself buried under the console
fixing things when you could be down the pub getting to know your
artists better whilst the poor tech gets lumbered with the job :-)

Steve

wrote:
If someone wants to make a long term career in recording, would you
advise them to get formal schooling in electronics and pick up
recording knowledge as they go or vice-versa? It seems having an
in-depth knowledge of electronics is crucial to having a well-rounded
understanding of recording.

Or do you feel this is not correct? Do you feel someone can rightfully
call themselves a recording "expert" without extensive electronics
knowledge?

Do schools like Full Sail emphasize such nuts-n-bolts knowledge?

Although I found my education valuable to a great extent (my second
degree was a B.S. from UT-Austin) I had learned much about what my
classmates were lagging behind in my interning at the local NBC
affiliate as a sports editor. By the same token, there is much you can
learn in school but it is no substitute for real-world experience on a
variety of different projects with the infinite number of variables you
encounter.

I went through the audio sequence as well but there was a "bottom line"
when it came to doing an actual project.

My feeling is that it is most important to learn the aesthetics of good
audio and video and that electronics is significant but not the bottom
line. In other words, it's important to know that a Neve console
sounds better than a Mackie board and a general idea of why but you
don't necessarily need to know all the hard core electronics. The
bottom line is what sounds good and some of that can't necessarily be
taught. Hopefully you have a knack for it.

Craig

http://www.pro-tape.com

Adobe - Audio Technica - Denon - Digidesign - Marantz - Open Labs -
Quantegy - Sony

wrote:
Walt wrote:

It seems having an
in-depth knowledge of electronics is crucial to having a well-rounded
understanding of recording.

It helps, but is neither necessary nor sufficient.


How would one truly understand the understand the in's & out's of a
particular mic, board, mixer, compressor, eq etc. along with various
digital (or analog) recording theory without a solid grounding (no pun
intended) in electronics?

You don't need an EE degree to understand signal flow at the
this-gazinta-that level. A basic knowlege of line level vs mic level,
balanced vs unbalanced, low Z vs hi Z, and ground loops should be enough
to get you through most sessions. And if you've got your ducks in a
row, you shouldn't have to think about interconnects beyound the
this-gazinta-that level at session time.


Seems the frustration a lot of the pros on here express regarding
opinions by some is based on what they perceive to be a fundamental
lack of understanding of how things work.

Well, if you had walked 12 miles in the snow barefoot everyday on the
way to school each morning when you were a kid you'd feel this way too.

My perception, which could be
wrong, is that a lot of the regular contributors in here such as Scott
Dorsey, Arny Krueger, Mike Rivers, etc. have a pretty solid knowledge
of electronics.

Yes. But that won't make you successful as a recording engineer. As
Steve suggested, understanding acoustics, music and
good people management is more important.


I've started reading a basic electronics book and one of the things
I've come across is a discussion of RMS/Peak, not even related to music
but I realize now where the term on the button on the
compressor/limiter comes from.

Good. You should know this stuff. But really this is laymans stuff not
advanced electronics.

As an analogy, I've never taken a music theory course in my life, but I
know what a diminished 7th chord is and the difference between equal
temprament and just intonation. And I can tell when someone is playing
out of key, which is often more important than strictly technical
characteristics of a recording.

In article . com,
wrote:

If someone wants to make a long term career in recording, would you
advise them to get formal schooling in electronics and pick up
recording knowledge as they go or vice-versa? It seems having an
in-depth knowledge of electronics is crucial to having a well-rounded
understanding of recording.

Vice versa. In-depth knowledge of electronics is a plus, but not
required.

Or do you feel this is not correct? Do you feel someone can rightfully
call themselves a recording "expert" without extensive electronics
knowledge?

Absolutely.

Happy recording,
Eric