How To

Acoustic treatment plays a crucial role in creating a professional and accurate listening environment in your studio. With a properly treated room, you can trust that your mixes will translate seamlessly to any playback system.  With more than one million panels sold worldwide, Vicoustic is one of our most popular acoustic treatment solutions, and offers a wide range of innovative and affordable acoustic treatment products for studios of all shapes and sizes. Continue reading →

Guitar pedals have exploded in popularity among musicians of all kinds over the past two decades. But stompbox effects have also become a creative secret weapon for engineers and producers. Continue reading →

While Dolby Atmos has been an established format in the world of film for more than a decade already, its role in the music industry is still being defined. Continue reading →

Acoustic treatment is one of the most important factors in a professional recording environment. But it’s also one of the most complex and frequently misunderstood.  If you’re struggling to achieve balanced mixes or compelling ambience, acoustic treatment may be the missing ingredient in your setup.  In this article, we’ll break down the basics of acoustic treatment for pro studios and suggest some of the best products available to help you control your room’s acoustics. Continue reading →

If you're a music producer or audio engineer, you know how important it is to make sure your music has a powerful, punchy low end. And in order to dial in the low-end in your mixes, you need a high-quality subwoofer.  A good subwoofer can provide numerous benefits to your studio setup, including improved accuracy in bass response, increased headroom, and a more precise mix. However, selecting the right subwoofer for your studio can be a daunting task, with many factors to consider.  Continue reading →

Long before miniaturization made self-powered monitors with built-in amplifiers, crossovers and DSP chips a reality, passive speakers reigned supreme. In fact, active monitors have only become common in professional-level studios in the last few decades—and many, such as Blackbird, Power Station and Gold-Diggers Sound, still rely on passive monitors anyway. Certain passive speakers such as the Yamaha NS-10 have even gained a cult following among mixing engineers. Continue reading →

This Halloween, we asked renowned modular synthesist and sound designer Lisa Bella Donna to share her secrets on dialing in spooky synth sounds. Continue reading to learn more about the best synths for sculpting haunting soundscapes, listen to audio examples and download Lisa's exclusive Spooky Synths patchbook for the Moog Grandmother! Check out Lisa's new album, Hypnosis to hear her putting these techniques to use. Continue reading →

Maybe you’ve gotten to know the sound of your monitors like the back of your hand or invested in a finely-calibrated mixing room for the most transparent sound possible—or maybe you’re working with entry-level monitors in an untreated room and not entirely sure you can trust the results yet. No matter what your monitoring setup looks like, headphones can always improve your mixing. Continue reading →

Continuing our 10 Days of Apollo celebration, we sat down with Drew Mazurek from Universal Audio to chat about how different users utilize Apollo Series audio interfaces in their studio workflows. Read on to learn more about which Apollo interface is best for home studios, recording studios, and high-end mixing and mastering studios. But first, let’s take a closer look at how Apollo’s innovative Unison technology changed the game for producers, musicians and engineers all over the world. Continue reading →

This article was originally published in Playback Issue 002. Subscribe to Playback for free to stay up to date with our latest articles, interviews, product reviews and more. When it comes to building out a studio, a well-packed 500 Series rack can be your best friend. Not only does it make it easy to mix and match sonic textures without breaking the bank, but you can also pick up the whole thing and take your sound with you, no matter where you work. Continue reading →