Home Schooling?

[Anderton]

Some people have said they thought the best way to get an education is to just buy gear and learn as you go. But I would think that just jumping in without ANY background would be a very inefficient way to go. If someone told you they wanted to do the equivalent of home schooling, what books, videos, web sites, CDs, etc. would you urge them to check out in order to get some level of "formal" education?

[BK_dup2]

Craig

 

I truly believe its a learn by doing process. I have met numerous "engineers" that have graduated from the Recording Workshop and other various schools in the LA area. The majority of them can't patch in a compressor.

 

Most of the home school guys I know really have the drive and hunger to take the risk of buying the gear then diving in without a net.

 

If you spend 30k on a Mix plus system rather than giving it to Full Sail or equivalent you will at least have some equity. Come to think of it if you spend that much on your own recording system you hopefully are smart enough to get at least fair to good returns on your investment (sound and production wise) without much outside instruction.

 

Bottom Line. Buy your own gear - get a subscription to all the mags, turn off your TV and phone for a year or so and get busy....

 

BK

[Neutron]

I took an alternative route: I went from a cassette 4-track to a Mackie/ADAT combo to ProTools in the course of six years, just trying to learn from magazines, videos, asking questions to engineers, and THEN I attended Full Sail. I found out that I knew a lot of the stuff but I was able to fill in many gaps by knowing what to ask the instructors.

 

Someone may know signal flow on a Mackie setup, but getting behind an SSL or a Neve is a "little" different. The point is, it's good to have a basic understanding of audio to make the most out of formal education at a specialized institution.

 

Of course, that's only my point of view. http://www.musicplayer.com/ubb/wink.gif

[Neutron]

As for materials, get Mix, EQ, Recording, Electronic Musician and ProSound News magazines, get all the cds you like and try to analize their sound, and visit the Digidesign Users Conference and obviously these forums (duh).

 

This message has been edited by Richie Nieto on 04-27-2001 at 03:13 AM

[alphajerk]

i was "home schooled" and was too smart to be in those recording schools. when you can help teach the class, sumthins up. anyways i broke my teeth on signal flow wiring up those radio shack 50-1 kits when i started to crawl. soldering by the age of 5 [dad was an electrical engineer]. havent done much of that stuff in a while aside from normal studio upkeep but even before i started recording things i was well versed in the first and most important lesson... signal flow]. by 10 i had a reel2reel deck, a radio shack mic, and a baby grand piano to record myself playing. then at 14 i bought my first 4 track [a yamama] and starting recording all my friends play. bouncing around.

 

those who were BORN to aquire the skills dont need school, i hope that advise saves them some $$$ to get their own equipment and go to it. for those who are wanting to learn and dont have much of a background, go to the school or something. but be prepared for whats in store, i really believe you have to have an inherent drive to do this line of work. here is a test, take a CD you own and put on 1 song on repeat for like 4 hours and see if you can listen to it over and over] its not for the faint of heart, and if that advice can save someone some $$$ from discouragement... then so be it.