How old were you when you opened your first studio?

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burn
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How old were you when you opened your first studio?

Post by burn » Tue Jan 16, 2007 1:02 pm

How old were you when you started your first "official" studio?
I'm 28 and I'm buying gear since a few years, doing few recordings a year in my jam space and mixing in my living room... I have a dayjob in another domain but I dream of the day I will have my "real" studio! Give me hope! Tell us your story!
Last edited by burn on Tue Jan 16, 2007 3:00 pm, edited 1 time in total.

cgarges
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Post by cgarges » Tue Jan 16, 2007 1:13 pm

I'm 33 and I've never owned a studio, although I've been getting paid to do this for over 10 years now.

Chris Garges
Charlotte, NC

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Cellotron
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Post by Cellotron » Tue Jan 16, 2007 2:36 pm

My first home studio where I actually charged outside clients was in 1994 when I was 27. It was pretty humble: a PC 486-60 with a DAL Card D+ running the 1st version of SAW, a Mackie 1202, Tascam DA-30 DAT, a couple of SM58's, a couple Reslo ribbons borrowed from a roomie, a Radio Shack PZM, this weird tube pre that my roomie had thrown together, and once in a while a couple of borrowed AKG C1000s (which to me were high end then), Infinity home stereo speakers for monitors (at least they were really nice ones at that), a few Digitech delays and an ART Proverb. I think a lot of people don't realize how far we've come in just 10 years in terms of affordability and availability of decent studio equipment! Still - I was able to get a bit of work doing digital editing - which was a pretty new thing then - for a number of projects.

Fast forward to last year (age 39 - just turned 40) and I finally opened my very own mastering room with equipment & a setup worthy of the task (seriously need to get this updated website finally finished so I can show it off to everybody!).

Best regards,
Steve Berson

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JGriffin
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Post by JGriffin » Tue Jan 16, 2007 3:33 pm

Cellotron wrote:I think a lot of people don't realize how far we've come in just 10 years in terms of affordability and availability of decent studio equipment!
Steve, this is the most dead-on true thing I've read on here in weeks. Amen.
"Jeweller, you've failed. Jeweller."

"Lots of people are nostalgic for analog. I suspect they're people who never had to work with it." ? Brian Eno

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Post by numberrr » Tue Jan 16, 2007 3:55 pm

been recording in various ways since i was 13 and discovered the mic built into my cassette boombox.

first started charging bands to record in my home studio when i was 19, i believe. had a dedicated studio location when i was 22. turn 24 next month

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JohnDavisNYC
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Post by JohnDavisNYC » Tue Jan 16, 2007 4:04 pm

started recording with a Tascam 234 that I found in a closet (and promptly confiscated to my bedroom) at the high school my parents teach at when I was 12. Had saved up and bought a Tascam 238 by the time I was 16 and borrowed my dad's Mackie 1402 and did a TON of recordings on it, a CD with a band, and some wierd electronic stuff with shit... by 18 was doing live sound and location recordings for some big name jazz guys and had engineered and mixed a CD in a 'state of the art' 16 track ADAT/Mackie 8buss studio. moved to NYC at 18 and started collecting weird synths and stuff, played lots of music, recorded lots of people on a laptop with an 828, and this summer, at 25, I opened my first real studio with a friend from music school who is also an engineer/musician.

so 25, but almost 13 years in the making to get here... and those were 13 years of obsessive/compulsive recording, mixing, playing, and experimenting.

john
i like to make music with music and stuff and things.

http://www.thebunkerstudio.com/

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Post by @?,*???&? » Tue Jan 16, 2007 9:17 pm

39.

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8th_note
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Post by 8th_note » Thu Jan 18, 2007 1:14 pm

How old were you when you started your first "official" studio?
I'll bet I win the geriatric price. 47.

I really can't call it an "official" studio, though. I started recording a couple of local bands on a 2 track reel-to-reel through a Peavey mixer and some cheap mics. Sounded better than I thought it would. Got hooked. Bought a computer program called n-Track Studio, got a Mackie mixer, a Delta sound card, and a few more cheap mics. Sounded better. Got hooked more. Started lurking on TapeOp. Attended Larry Crane's first recording workshop. Gained knowledge and felt the first tinglings of gear lust in my scrotal extremities. Bought preamps and better mics. Sounded better yet. A music publication favorably reviewed a CD I recorded. Really got hooked. Still recording and still hooked.

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Post by JASIII » Thu Jan 18, 2007 2:00 pm

I first began charging other people for recordings made in my home studio last year when I was 32.

I do not own a "real studio" but hope to own one at the age of 39.

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Kilroy
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Post by Kilroy » Fri Jan 19, 2007 11:15 am

been recording people at my home studio since around 2003 or 2004. Im 20 almost 21 right now. I was 17 or 18 when i had my first clients. I realy dont remember. But its how ive been making what little money i have throughout college, which im still going to, so my space is in my folk's basement. I really hope to get my own space and open up a studio, but we will see what happens. Still got plenty of time to do that 8)

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Post by leftofthedial » Fri Jan 19, 2007 11:23 am

I started recording bands I played in when I was 25. People started paying me to record them when I was 28. I opened my first home studio when I was 30, my second when I was 33. My first commercial studio opened when I was 36. Now 40, I just closed the commercial studio but have plans to be an investor in a budget style home studio where the building is a house, but nobody actually lives there....
They mostly come at night..... Mostly.

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mikeyc
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Post by mikeyc » Fri Jan 19, 2007 12:33 pm

I bought a 1450 sq. ft. building in 2000 at the ripe old age of 24 and turned it into a studio filled with all the sweet stuff of the mid-late 90's-- 2 ADATs, a Behringer 8-bus console (which actually sounded pretty good- I think it was made before they gassed their QC dept), a Fostex DAT machine, and a load of fair-to-middling mics.
I closed the studio at age 26. Now I'm 31 and I running a remote recording service that by no means pays the bills, but it does help support my gear addiction. :wink:

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Post by cgarges » Fri Jan 19, 2007 12:52 pm

leftofthedial wrote:Now 40, I just closed the commercial studio but have plans to be an investor in a budget style home studio where the building is a house, but nobody actually lives there....
Hey Rob,

Did you just bow out of your place or did it actually close?

Chris Garges
Charlotte, NC

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TheStevens
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Post by TheStevens » Fri Jan 19, 2007 2:14 pm

numberrr wrote:been recording in various ways since i was 13 and discovered the mic built into my cassette boombox.

first started charging bands to record in my home studio when i was 19, i believe. had a dedicated studio location when i was 22. turn 24 next month
That pretty much exactly describes my story as well, except I'm still in the home studio phase. I'm curious, can you describe your "dedicated studio location" and why/how you moved there?

And another two questions for all of you:

1. How many of you own a studio in a building separate from your place of residence?

2. Where do we draw the line between "home studio" and "real studio"?

Is it:
-when a room is constructed, or reconstructed for studio use, as opposed to moving studio gear into an already existing room?
-when you have a control room with a window?
-depending on the gear you're using

Or can there never exist a "real studio" in the same building in which one lives, even though you wouldn't be able to tell from pictures, quality of work, equipment, etc. ?

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Post by stereopathetic_banjo » Fri Jan 19, 2007 4:13 pm

There's such a blurred line nowadays, with so many people with pretty incredible gear in their spare bedrooms, etc- churning out great recordings. I guess in my mind, a 'real' studio would allow me to basically record a full record without having to go elsewhere if I didn't want to. I went thru the entire phase this past year, finally deciding on basically stripping my place down to a bedroom and bathroom, and making the rest recording space with a 'real' control room (double pane window and 10" thick double stud walls, etc). Of course, I'm single and own my place, so I can do what I want, and I decided that I really wanted a nice little space I could do projects in. I'll be up and running very shortly, but my angle isn't a competitive one. I have a day job, and a handful of bands that want to record as soon as I'm ready, and I really think that I'll get some good use of my space. Call it a 'real' studio or not? I dunno. It's not a money making venture, more of a personal goal at this point, but we'll see. Btw, I'm 30, and have been doing the recording thing (bedroom style) since I got my Akai 12-track at 18. It's a pretty exciting time! Keep the stories coming.
-Travis

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