Thought that statement would get your attention! There are a plethora of free plugins out there, most of which are not worth the bytes they occupy. But every now and then a diamond is released to the world for a grand total of zero dollars. Memories of the free and quite amazing Blockfish compressor that came in very handy a good 8 (Or is it 18) years ago when it was released. There are a huge range of free plugins out there which is why I was immediately suspicious when I heard about a new free “virtual studio” room/monitor modelling plugin. “Bah” I though. Then I heard it has been developed and released by Beyer Dynamic. That got my attention. Read more »
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Hand held field recorders have become very popular over the last few years. With the DSLR video making community growing and with the influx of budget movie productions making the big time, the need for quality location sound recording has become necessity for any budding Spielberg. It has never been easier to obtain professional results with a modest budget. Zoom has been a big contender in the hand held recorder market recently, possibly due to their ability the make cheap and cheerful products that get the job done. Zoom’s good reputation in guitar effects processing died along time ago, with the Zoom 9000 from the mid 90′s. Tascam however has had a good reputation for making professional field recorders for quite some time. And although Read more »
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Tags: dslr, feild recorder, field recorder, location, location recorder, movie, portable, review, tascam dr-40
Gear, Review | Richard Harriman
June 3, 2013 | 
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Recently the famous FX plug-in producer WAVES ™ produced their 1st virtual instrument, a soft synth named Element ™. It is a 2 oscillator synthesizer which is a pretty standard approach considering Read more »
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There are some new additions here at the Cape Audio College. We have just completed fitting an additional five production studios to add to our already impressive facilities. The Beat factories (As we are calling them) are production specific studios fitted with the very latest in electronic music production hardware and software as well as acoustically treated recording booths and control rooms. Each beat factory has been equipped with the latest in Focusrite audio interfaces, brand new Apple Mac, Pro Tools 10 workstations, some pretty nice outboard processing from Lexicon and dbx, monitoring from JBL, as well as a Roland GAIA production synthasizers and Yamaha mixing consoles in every room. The new department is also home to some of the nicest synthasizers on the market today, which are available to students for their production assignments. The Cape Audio College now features 14 Read more »
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Tags: akai, Audio Engineering, audio sound engineering, beat making, Cape Audio College, college, dbx, focusrite, JBL, lexicon, make beatz, music, production, recording, roland, school, Sound, Studio, study
Gear, Music, News | Richard Harriman
March 27, 2013 |
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It took me quite some time to come the conclusion that the ART PRO VLA II would be a decent compressor to add to my audio arsenal. ART have in the past and for good reason been considered by most to be one of the worst brand names (Next to Behringer) on the planet. A reputation for cheap Chinese made processors that on a regular day should be avoided like the plague. I seem to remember owning an ART “Tube” preamp that was one of the noisiest devices I’ve ever heard. This experience successfully put me off ART for a very long time. Until recently my opinions of these processors was “pure chinese rubbish”! During some midnight internet adventures I discovered many Read more »
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Tags: affordable, art, art vla pro 2, art vla pro ii, Cape Audio College, la-2a, modifications, opinion, pro audio, pro vla ii, review, valve compressor, vla, vla ii, vla pro ii
Gear, Review | Richard Harriman
March 13, 2013 |
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Every year we ask our students what they want to see kitted into the studios. Popular production tools are extremely important in todays music market as using the same tools as top professionals is one of the best ways to develop abilities in the modern music production field. The Cape Audio College is now expanding their already world class facilities with an additional 5 new production studios featuring some of the coolest synthesizers on the market today, this will help tone hungry music producers in their quest for modern and EDM sounds. The new synths are ordered and Read more »
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Tags: access, arturia, Cape Audio College, filterbank, mini brute, minibrute, minitaur, moog, music, music production, new toys, novation, production school, sherman, sound college, supernova, synth, synthesizer, ultranova, virus
Gear, News | Richard Harriman
February 8, 2013 |
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Namm has brought us a whole bunch of new tech and innovation in almost every facet of the music industry but this is one thing I Never thought I’d see …. yes that is a kick drum inside a kick drum, Drumception has been realized in the year 2013, perhaps the Mayans were wrong and we are nearing the apocalypse only now ? I cant be sure but here’s what I do know… Read more »
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Tags: "NAMM 2013", Cape Audio College, Drum Within a Drum, drums, inovations, namm, new, recording, SJC Custom Drums, technology
Events, Gear | Devon
January 31, 2013 |
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The Focusrite RED series is no stranger to us. We have fitted these premium processors in 2 of our studios and have been using the focusrite RED range for well over 10 years. To be brief, they are nothing short of spectacular. But they come (Or rather used to come) at a serious 30k + price point. Until quite recently, Focusrite were known for producing only high end processors with the obvious legacy left behind by the ISA and RED range processors. A few years ago, Focusrite delved seriously Read more »
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Tags: 500, 500 series, focusrite, focusrite red range, microphone, pre amp, preamp, pro audio, red, RED 1 500
Gear, News | Richard Harriman
January 14, 2013 |
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A few days ago, the Cape Audio College sealed a deal with audio peripheral manufacturers AKAI professional. AKAI are the company behind the legendary MPC series of hardware samplers (Used extensively by just about everyone who has ever released a Hip Hop album) and the stella APC40 Ableton Live controller that is currently a preferred favorite by Ableton experts everywhere. Apart from that, AKAI also manufacture a range of extremely hard waring and high quality software controllers. The MPK series offers unparalleled functionality paired with the very best build quality, and should be seriously considered for those in the market for a decent controller keyboard. AKAI also manufacture a range of Read more »
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Tags: akai, akai endorsement, akai pro, akai professional, akai room, Audio, Cape Audio College, cape town, college, paul bothner, paul bothner music, Sound, study, study production
Gear, News, Review | Richard Harriman
December 5, 2012 |
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Last Friday, Kyle and Dave from Paul Bothner music in Plumstead popped in for a visit, and to show us some new synths that are coming out of the Roland stable. Roland have been a mammoth of a driving force behind the development of the synthesizer since the early 1970′s when they released their first synthesizer, the SH-1000. Over the years Roland have produced some of the most iconic analogue and digital synths ever to grace the planet. The Legendary Jupiter-8 which hit the stores way back in Read more »
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Tags: bothners, Cape Audio College, gaia, instruments, jupiter-50, jupiter-80, kyle petersen, music, paul bothner, paul bothner music, roland, sh-01, synth, synthesizers, v-synth GT, workstation
Events, Gear | Richard Harriman
November 15, 2012 |
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