Massacre of the Megafauna!

Posted by Chris on December 6, 2009 – 22:57
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Howdy,

Yes I guess the title is a little bit strange but that’s the name of the band I’ve recently joined as a bass player. I’ll not go too much into detail at the moment regarding the band because we haven’t got the obligatory myspace or facebook pages yet.

Today we started recording a 3 track demo to put on this web wide world. Well I got the 3 W’s correct didn’t I? :-) First of all, as with most recording’s we rocked the drums. I haven’t had much chance in the last few years to do ‘band’ recording, so I was quite excited about getting stuck into this.

I guess it’s like riding a bike though, all the miking techniques and processes to get the recording going were stuck in a nice cupboard somewhere inside my brain. So all I had to do was get those little grey cells going. (To quote Poirot).

A couple of years ago I bought a Red 5 Audio drum kit box, it is what you would call ‘budget’ range. But to be fair I think it sounds pretty damn awesome for its price. You get a kick drum mic, 4 clip-ons and 2 overheads, although to day I elected to use a matched pair of SE1A’s as overheads and a Rode N1A position about 8ft from the kick drum. This was a little experiment but it does capture the sound of the kick’s bottom end really well.

I went pretty standard with the rest of the miking. SM57/58’s on the snare top and bottom, a PG58 2 inch from where the beater hits the kick drums skin and then the clip on mics were deployed on the toms.

So here are some pictures of the recording session.

We will be recording guitars on Wednesday and Thursday, and then I’m gonna have a go at doing my bass parts over next weekend I think. That’s a bit nerve-wracking really, I’ve not done any playing on a recording for a few years. Since my mate Dave and me recorded a song when our local football team had a chance at getting to the FA Cup Final.

Hopefully the guitars will be as painless as the drums and I can get the bass out of the way in a day or so.

Until then, fingers crossed!

New Enterprising Barnsley Video

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Posted by Chris on October 17, 2009 – 22:29
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My last blog advertised the video that I made for Enterprising Barnsley, well after watching a few times and getting some other people to watch the video, it was decided that it need to be made more natural and not as long.

So, that said the new idea was instead of question been asked, the interviewee would talk direct to camera in a more conversational style, in hope it would appear more natural. Plus we found a great spot for the lighting side of things in the Reception at the BBIC. Otherwise known as where Start Something are based.

The filming took place a week ago on Friday, and to be fair I was in no fit state for such a days work. Firstly I was seriously stressed for some bad car action and then on my way out of the door I cracked my head on the door and ended up sat on the floor next to sofa wanting to be sick. Anyways, thats by the by. I did the filming and starred in the video, I didn’t appear as good as the first video apparently though.

So here’s the finished article then….

The video is shorter than the previous one, but we still have the same ending, it’s just separate to first part. So now it is two short video, which I feel works better and so do the others involved. So here’s the second half…..

So there you go.

I won’t go into details as to how I’m currently doing. Family situations are much stressful indeed. However, I do have a new car. As I have been saying, the Megane is Megone. :)

Cheers!

Enterprising Barnsley

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Posted by Chris on October 2, 2009 – 14:12
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The end of another week and one more job finished. As I said in the last blog, I’d been doing some work for a company called Enterprising Barnsley. I’ll not go into what they do but if you really want to know then have a look at the site or watch the video below.

Basically, I put my name forward to produce them a small video advert. Video work is something that I would like to do more of, and getting to do something for a big local organization is probably a good starting point. So here is the video…..

I feel it’s turned out really well, the lighting could have been better for the interviews but really that’s all I can complain about. But I am a perfectionist and my own worst critic with my work. Hopefully I will be able to pull in a few jobs in October, I’m going to come up with a bit of a selling plan and see where I can go from there, and get my business plan sorted.

Following on from the work with the choir, I am going to be at the next National Choir Associations Conference in March, so that might get me some contacts and business.

Today has been very much money based. Firstly I had to have a group meeting is some group called the South Yorkshire Investment Fund and this afternoon I’ve done my accounts. Oh the Joy!

Anyways, I’m off now!

So Tired!

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Posted by Chris on September 28, 2009 – 11:29
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Morning Imaginary People Who I Think Read This (especially the spam robots that think they can leave rubbish on here)

I’m so tired this morning it really is unreal. In fact, everything seems a little unreal. I can’t get my desk chair to be comfy, I haven’t got any bottles of water in my office and I’m boiling, to quote the mighty Limp Bizkit “It’s just one of the days where you don’t wanna wake up”.

This week involves some video editing. It’s not something that I really studied at any point up until the last year of uni, when I decided to go head first into making a DVD as part of a multimedia project. That turned out ok for a first attempt and I’ve dabbled in editing since then. In fact the video posted on this blog is one I made recently for fun.

The principles of video editing a pretty much the same as audio anyways. It is all liniar and the functions are the same. I remember the first bit of video editing I tried on Microsoft Movie Maker (or something). It was set to the A-Team theme tune and involved lots of studio footage from college.

It is quite amazing how much video and audio editing has come along in practically the last 15 years. I remember trying out an early Cubase that didn’t even have audio on it, just midi. You could do quite mad if you stood back for 10 minutes and tried to take it all in. When I start to use Pro-Tools it had just shifted to Pro-Tools 5, and that was like fantastic to me. Chopping, Cropping, EQ’ing, Compressing and Reverbing all in software was a far cry for the first recording I did at school with a 4-Track tape recorder.

Now Pro-Tools 8 has moved on so much from 5. You only have to look at the more modern layout, the amount of tracks and plug-ins you can use, which back in the day would have had your computer holding up the white flag. But now you can time stretch audio and keep in the same pitch, you can run 7 band EQs and multi-band compressors without worrying too much what your computer will say to you.

Who knows what we will do in 5 years time. It will be interesting.

The First Release!

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Posted by Chris on September 25, 2009 – 09:58
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It’s finally here, the very first album I’ve recorded and mixed and organized the manufacture. It was all geting a bit tense at times, making sure that things were ready on time, getting the artwork sent to me, getting monies, getting the CD’s delivered.

But its all done and I can breathe a sigh of relief. Here’s an iPhone picture of the album.

 Anston Male Voice Choir

 So at last the CD is finished and I can move onto the next project, which happens to be something I haven’t done too much. I am producing a video for a company called Enterprising Barnsley, advertising thier office space services.

And this morning I have a thing with the HSBC. I say thing, because I don’t really want to know what I am doing in this here meeting.

Anyways, here we go.

Tubeday!

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Posted by Chris on September 15, 2009 – 11:23
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Morning,

Very early starts on Tuesday and Wednesday’s at the moment. But in some respects it is a good thing, this morning I’ve printed off about 20 targeted mailers to send out for a pre-Christmas offer. (Yes, Christmas. We all know that once the kids are back at school the advertising world then targets Christmas). So fingers crossed that Start Something can get a decent amount of work in before Christmas, then hope the New Year will be profitable, I guess.

Patrick Swayze died today. I see there are a lot of people jumping on the bandwagon that follows a celeb death, however I can pretty much say that I have never watched one of his movies from start to finish. It’s a sad time for his family, but we also found out this morning that the great Keith Floyd has passed on too, and really I’ve seen more of Keith than I have of Patrick.

Aside from the mailer, today I’m going to try and do a flash animation for my website, trawl through a fair amount of ‘copyright free’ music and I’ve already tidied my desk this morning so that is a bonus. I’m desperately awaiting the launch of the new Pro-Tools that will compatible with  Apple OSX 10.6 Snow Leopard. If your an Apple user then you’ll know the score. But I have to wait for the the guys at Digidesign to come up with the Upgrade, it’s a nightmare because Digidesign’s software seems to react badly with Apple updates, more so than any other software I use. So come on Digidesign, Pull Your Finger Out!

And finally, Mick at Computer Coders Providings is driving me mad talking about cars, if anyone knows where he can find a car with the safety NCAP rating of a French Car, has an economical 1.1 engine, rear wheel drive, about the size of an Astra estate and the reliability of a german car that’s as cheap as a Japanese Car then please get in touch.

Rightio, I’m off to do some real work now.

Monday Monday!

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Posted by Chris on September 14, 2009 – 14:45
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Well its Monday, and I guess nobody read this anyways but hey, thats all good with me.

Wearing new jeans today, going for a less baggy style to make me look older and more like I run a business. haha! Yes, say goodbye to the Nu-Metal Years and Hello to a post Nu-Metal me. Not really, I will never leave the Nu-Metal days behind. Infact, today arrived my Slipknot 10th Anniversary Edition.

Now I admit when I first heard Slipknot back in 2000 I was a little like ‘What the……??’. But seriously, I would now put them in my top 5 favourite bands of all time. From a geek point of view, if you break down their music to instrument level, there couldn’t be a more a technically interesting band. There is so much going on in a Slipknot song that I can only compare it to an orchestra. (I’m sure they will love that comparison). But since I first got into them I must say that I have been a massive fan of their music, I even like Iowa.

I haven’t been there from the start, I’ve seen them on every tour since 2002 and witnessed them destroy the main stage at Download Festival as Headline Act this summer. It was truely one of the best show I have seen in a long time.

Anyways, I’m getting all emotional about my Nu-Metal love, where was I? Jeans? We’ll leave them.

I had a enquiry call this morning. Which cheered up my those Monday blues no end. It’s always daunting giving out quotes and price ideas. I don’t want to rip people off, but then I’ve got to make money. So it’s a nightmare. I think I’m fair in my pricings though. Hint Hint!

Anyways, Have a good week if anyone reads this.
Chris!

Fridays!

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Posted by Chris on September 11, 2009 – 14:48
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It’s Friday, and its all about winding down, or winding up. Poor Carphone Warehouse and Phones4u.

This morning was spent listening to a talk on sales with Tony Pearson (Sales Operation UK Ltd (SOUL)). It was a very interesting, and Tony knows his onions. (his quote not mine) So I’d better start thinking ’sell sell sell’.

Although I do figure that what I’m doing here is a pretty hard thing to sell, most people who use services like location and ambient recording are more likely to use someone they have gone with before. That’s understandable really, recording is a pretty personal thing, your trusting your money and your music with someone who could produce the best quality that captures the essence of your performance, or someone who could make you sound like a tin can dropped in a church hall.

So today, I’ve re-done a mail shot that I sent out a few months back, this time with a bit more target towards a direct offer, and this will be sent out next week sometime, so fingers crossed about getting a return on that.

Have a great weekend.

Chris!

Hello!

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Posted by Chris on September 10, 2009 – 15:03
Filed under Start Something Blog

Hello, and welcome to this newly installed Start Something Blog.

Its taken a few days to get this thing installed and running. I’ll learn not to use MS Sever Technology again. But that’s not important right now is it? :)

So here is a little background and update on what we here at Start Something Ltd are upto at the minute. Firstly we have just finished up a recording with the Anston Male Voice Choir. We have produced their new album, ……With One Accord. That is now off being manufactured by Riviera Media based in Barnlsey.

We have also worked with Voluntary Action Barnsley on producing a their promotional DVD, the voice over for this was recorded by Start Something. With several jobs now in the pile line, we are hoping to grow as a business and gain a more experience along with getting a substantial following in the region.

This blog will contain updates and what Start Something are upto, as well as case studies into our work and some other bits and bobs. Plus I might just ramble about what I’m upto in day to day things.

Well, I shall sign off for today.

Chris!

Youtube Test!

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Posted by Chris on September 10, 2009 – 15:00
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Just a little test using a video I edited.