Zoom-in Online

A weekly roundup of hot topics and buzz-worthy conversation from the Logic Studio community:

First off…

Lot’s of great news coming out of San Francisco last weekend as the 125th AES Convention roared in and out of the bay area leaving literally hundreds of new product announcements in its wake. Harmony Central has a great page set up with a ridiculously long list of press releases on many of the newest product announcements.

ASK Video has dropped part 2 of its ongoing 4-part tutorial series on Logic Pro 8. Continuing where part one left off, the tutorial contains information on MIDI creation and editing as well as some sample editing and recording techniques. Parts one and two are both shipping now and are available for purchase from Ask Video’s website.

Focusrite turned some heads at AES with the release of the Saffire Pro 40, which they are calling the “best sounding interface in its class.” I assume that class is with the Presonus FP-10 and M-Audio’s new ProFire 2626. This 1U rack unit with 8 Mic Pres and a multitude of other standard ins and outs does feature a few bells and whistles that should raise an eyebrow including a DSP package of plug-ins and two internal “loop back” channels for rerouting internal program audio…Mainstage routed into Logic anyone?

One of my favorite microphone companies, Blue Microphones, also took AES to announce two new additions to its premier Bottle line of mics. The Bottle Rockets, Stage One and Stage Two are sibling pairs of modifications to the classic Blue Bottle. Stage One features transformerless solid-state circuitry while Stage Two contains transformerless tube circuitry. Both mics are compatible with Blue’s Bottle Caps and are held to the highest of quality standards, but at a fraction of the original Bottle’s price tag. While this “mic cabinet in one mic” has seen a pretty drastic price reduction, still expect to spend $899/$1999 (MSRP) for the Stage One and Two respectively with the standard B8 capsule. Additional capsules still cost extra of course.

And Finally…

When it comes to answering that age old question, “What is missing from my mix?!” there is almost always one answer that applies… “Did you have it mastered?” Over and over and over again, mastering rears its head as the magic bullet bridging the gap between that weekend project and that sought-after sound. I say, pay a professional to do it for you. But understanding that that isn’t always an option, sometimes you just have to make a pass at it yourself. Well, you better have the right tools, and if budget is you issue in the first place, those tools need to function, and yet still not break the bank. iZotope has updated their Ozone mastering suite of plug-ins to Ozone 4. With iZotope’s reputation for high quality and top level tools, the new version is sure to not disappoint and the $250 price tag should make any project studio engineer rest a little softer knowing that that radio friendly sound won’t break the bank.

Enjoy this week’s Logical Links and as always if you have a tip on a hot story, drop me an email at logicallinks@magnetmediafilms.com