Ignorance

[cgarges]

So, I really got a good one today.

I met and had lunch with a potential client and took him over to a studio we'd talked about using for his project. He dug the studio, dug my work that he'd heard, and seemed pretty happy about everything. He's got a decent budget and he knows several people who've worked with me (who recommended me to him). We started talking about ProTools and I explained that I didn't use it and that my not using it had never hindered me in any way in terms of making a record. (We're looking at doing his project on RADAR.)

Anyway, a little while later, the studio owner calls me and tells me that this guy had called him and expressed concern about my not knowing how to use ProTools. His concerns included whether or not I would be able to make volume changes on any given instrument and whether or not I would be able to cut and paste a chorus of a tune. I could do either of those with a fader and a razor blade on analog tape and it's just STUPID-EASY to do with the RADAR. He tried to explained to the studio owner some concern regarding "non-linear analog."

If somebody wants to hire me to do a session that they can work on entirely in PT so they can mix it at home or because it's easier to take to a bunch of studios or because they've GOT to have a particular plug-in on their voice or whatever, that's fine--Im the wrong guy and I'll tell 'em that. But has it really come to be that there are people who honestly believe that you can't fade something out without looking at the waveform on a computer screen? Fucking sad. I can't believe this happened today.

Chris Garegs
Charlotte, NC

[KennyLusk]

Yup, lots and lots of folks believe the world revolves around Pro Tools. It's really really weird.

It's his loss if he's stupid enough to pass you up as the engineer on this Chris. Especially if it's over Pro Tools. Very sad indeed.

[Al_Huero]

I'm pretty much a 100% digital recordist but I'm not retarded enough to think that's the only way.

[trodden]

damn.. thats so crazy, but i really can hear that actually happening and coming out of someones mouth..

[cgarges]

It's his loss if he's stupid enough to pass you up as the engineer on this Chris. Especially if it's over Pro Tools. Very sad indeed.

That's very kind.

Man, if it were a money thing or a time thing or a stylstic thing or a personality thing, I'd be okay with it. But adjusting the fucking volume in PT? And he seems like a reasonably intelligent guy, otherwise. Sometimes I wish people really would just stop reading. Or keep reading, one or the other.

Chris Garges
Charlotte, NC

[soundguy]

Chris-

please tell me you are actually bummed that you dont have to work with someone who is conducting themselves like that.

geesh, look at the bright side, you could be stuck in a room with someone right now trying to keep yourself from exploding over a debate about "non-linear analog". Sounds to me like you got off easy.

dave

[nacho459]

I've had clients make sure I had ProTools before they worked with me. I recorded everything on my DTRS machines and I told them I would Pro Tool it later. I mixed everything outside the box and just used PT to record/edit the two track for the CD, that's it. They don't know that I didn't sweeten up everything in the computer, but they think I did, and they like the way it sounded, and that's what maters.

[Rigsby]

I guess everybody has heard of pro tools, it's seen as the pro choicein a lot of circles, i've heard a lot of musicians who aren't recordists or new to it have this point of view. I guess the guy's thinking, if he doesn't/can't use the industry standard then is he really professional? Dodgy thinking for sure, but i think that's sadly probably quite common.

[analogcabin]

I've had this same experience. A regional band was really concerned to record at my place because they'd never heard of a Radar recorder........then while listening to a playback of someone elses stuff, I turned on the monitor to the Radar.....Bing! Now they could see the music (waveforms). Somehow my whole joint seemed more "Legit" all of a sudden to them. Yes it's sad, but ProTools marketing is genius.

[twitchmonitor]

I hear stuff like that....I think the problem is really that people who don't know their ass from off-axis start spouting a bunch of BS, thinking they know something. Yay, you know what a "fade" is. Maybe he was parading his recording knowledge around? Taking it for a spin? People like that drive me crazy. I mean, I don't know everything (or even close), but I certainly don't presume to know more about, say, mechanics than a mechanic. Sheesh.

[cgarges]

Dave,

Two week's worth of work in one stretch is a good gig for me. Doing this for a living isn't the easiest thing in the world and I take what I can get. Sometimes that means doing crappy work for crappy people. Being able to put up with that for a relatively short amount of time so that I can afford to do cooler projects with cooler people (cheaper sometimes) is still better than working at Guitar Center and working a few hours a week with whatever cool people I might be able to round up.

I just hope this is an isolated incident and not an indicator of where the masses attitudes are headed. It still allowed me to tell a funny/sad story.

Plus, with any luck, it'll allow me to buy a FET47.

Chris Garges
Charlotte, NC

[nacho459]

Man, if it were a money thing or a time thing or a stylstic thing or a personality thing, I'd be okay with it. But adjusting the fucking volume in PT? And he seems like a reasonably intelligent guy, otherwise. Sometimes I wish people really would just stop reading. Or keep reading, one or the other.

I could even understand if he wanted to use PT to automate the levels, but still that's unnecessary if you got automation on your console, or several fingers, or you just record the thing right so levels don't jump all over the place.

I'd just tell him this is the new version of ProTools where you don't even need a computer, you use this tape machine with all the data locked down and it has this really cool control surface with lots of knobs so you don't have to look at the screen. Just put a Dididesign logo on your tape machine and console and he'll probably believe you.

[soundguy]

work is work, thats true. I guess I long ago got used to losing jobs because I dont have protools here. This sorta goes beyond that based on what you've said, I thought the whole point of hiring an engineer was hiring an engineer to work for you, you are paying for his decision making. When someone wants to tell me how to do my job I suggest they just engineer themselves and just cut out my misunderstanding right out of the equation "oh no, I didnt mean it like that!". When communication is as critical as it is to realize your idea as an artist, its a bad sign when you are going behind the engineers back before youve even booked him. If you cant ask the guy a direct question when he's off the clock, geesh.

dave

[trodden]

reminds me of the people who get all bent out of shape or worried for me cause i don't have any tube preamps in my studio...

um... "well i think i'll be ok..cause i didn't have any toob pre's in the 2" studer, Trident Board, "wall full of mostly non tube pro gear" studio i worked in as well."

"well your doing it in Pro Tools, so you gotta have some toob pres and toob compressors..."

[cgarges]

And it's this sort of perpetuation that makes me hate PT even more. And I don't mean to get into one of those "guns don't kill people" arguments, but it really does make me hate PT.

Chris