You've seen filters. But if you haven't seen Volcano, then you haven't seen what is truly possible with a filter. We'll explore some of the more creative possibilities behind this monster plug-in.

Presonus recently announced their new audio host, Studio One. We cut straight to the punch and sat down with Jim Odom, founder and president of Presonus, for an exclusive interview concerning Studio One.

PreSonus has packaged the ideal monitoring interface for the mixerless studio.  Central Station is a best-of-breed,  gotta-have-it piece of gear for the modern studio that wants to avoid big-footprint consoles without sacrifice.

The guys at VSL decided to dive into the world of plugin effects. Will it match the quality of their vast sample libraries? We'll take a look at the entire suite and see if it lives up to the VSL name.

Is traditional delay a little too boring for you? Feeling as if you need something a little(or a lot) different? FabFilter Timeless may just be right up your alley. Read on as we take a look into this delay powerhouse.

Running your own recording studio? Wanna compete? Then it's essential that you take certain precautions if you want to run a successful business. Here's a few tips to help you gain, and keep clients.

Non-traditional percussion can often be used with great success in film scores and soundtrack work. Tonehammer is out to show just how creative this work can be with this unique selection of instruments.

When reverb sounds right, it's wonderful. When it sucks, you know it. Breverb is designed to be at the top of the game. But how does it measure up? We'll find out if it bring sweet reflections or just makes your ears ring.

I’ve been a rabid Moog fan for 30 years.  So I was thrilled to get my hands on IK Multimedia’s new SampleMoog instrument.  With over 1700 sounds from 16 different Moogs, it promises to be the definitive Moog reproduction.  But does it deliver?

Pan Law is a term thrown around often, but not always understood. It can have an effect on your mix, and you may not even know it. So we'll uncover what Pan Law means, how important it really is, and how to decide when to use it.

If battles are your game, Drums Of War wants to be your library. But does it conquer the kingdom, or just fall at the gates? We'll take a look inside and see.

Bela D Media has decided to take on the "other" side of soundtrack creation with their Sampled Landscape. We check it out in in all it's creepy goodness.

Vocals are a crucial part of any song that includes them. Mess them up, and the entire song suffers. Here are a few tips to get the best vocal take possible.

We spend hundreds and even thousands filling our toolbox with the best effects money can buy. But what if you wanted to spend NO money? Reacomp may be your answer.

Sonar 8 is out, and it’s for real.  We pop the hood on the latest DAW offering from Cakewalk, and show you why we think Sonar 8 Producer Edition is the best Sonar, ever.

One of the most exciting avenues in sound design is that of soundtrack creation. Movies, television, you name it. Heavyocity Evolve is designed to give instant results. Does it succeed?

What could be in store for the Music Industry?

We've come a long way when it comes to recreating real instruments in the virtual world. But there have been some common limitations holding us back. The Trumpet sets out to raise that bar. We'll find out if there is a new bar, or if The Trumpet is just doing chin-ups.

Piano sample libraries are tipping the scales and weighing down the world's hard drive. But does it have to be this way? Modartt doesn't seem to think so. Will Pianoteq be the only piano you need? We'll find out as we journey through the virtual soundboard of Pianoteq.

Join Rip Rowan in a new installment of Point-to-Point, as we dissect a song from the new hit album by the Old 97's, Blame it on Gravity, and show how the song came together from pre-production through final mix.

Synful Orchestra exemplifies the word "potential".  If you are willing to work in an unconventional way in order to get the best sounds, you may be in for a treat.

The problem with control surfaces is that by the time there are enough controls on the surface to actually do the job, you've pretty much rebuilt a complete console.  But Dexter gives you near-total control in a tabletop-friendly format.

I have a problem.  I’m a sucker for cheap gear.  I can’t resist the low-price carrot.  This makes me do silly things -- buying the Alesis 3630 comes to mind, or picking up mics sight-unseen, sound-unheard.  Usually, this does little more than clutter my tiny studio, but now and then I luck out, as was the case with the KEL HM-1.

Just the thought of Linux conjures up many different variants of emotion. For some, there are thoughts of freedom; for others there are thoughts of horror as hours of lives have been lost trying to configure this beast. But Linux is a tremendous gift to the Pro Audio community and society as a whole.

A few months ago a friend of mine (who has a habit of buying anything cheap just to see what it will do) purchased a pair of Cascade Fat Head II mics.  Since I had no experience with ribbon mics at the time (and he was busy recording a live show) I picked them up to see what they sounded like.  As it turned out, they are great little mics.

Getting a good kick drum sound often seems more like luck than skill. It's all too common: a small, thuddy kick. Poor attack. No tone, or bad tone. The kick doesn't cut through... or, if it does, it sounds so bad, you wish it didn't.  Fortunately, there's new help for your limp, flaccid kick drum.

Recording an album without a record deal is a challenge, to say the least. It can put a strain on your finances, your relationships and your sanity. I am currently trying to finish my second album, and the experience has been almost as painful as my first album. However, I have learned a lot and I hope my next one will be a breeze. I am one of those “engineers” that doesn’t really think of himself as an engineer. I am first and foremost a songwriter. I play guitar, keyboards, bass and drums. I sing because I have never been able to find a singer that could sing my songs the way I wanted. I guess I live by the old adage “If you want something done right, you have to do it yourself.” It is easy to find talented people, but it is much more difficult to find talented people who share your taste and vision. Furthermore, even if you find people that are talented and share your vision, they rarely exhibit the level of commitment required in order to bring a project to fruition. It’s a “show me the money”...

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Dumbass - noun - A stupid person; these words are used to express a low opinion of someone's intelligence.

If you’re one of the many aspiring songwriters / musicians / engineers out there that is trying to record an album independently, you have two choices: Record the album yourself at home or go to a “professional” studio. Unless you have years of audio engineering experience, the latter choice will surely yield better results. If you want a CD that will be competitive with major label CD’s, you should hire professionals. If your sole goal is to become a professional audio engineer and you have some songs of your own that you want to record, you also have two choices: Record the album yourself at home or go to a “professional” studio. At this point, you might ask “Why should I go to a studio and have someone else record it for me when I have a degree in audio engineering?” Yes, you may have a degree and you may have recorded your friend’s band for your school project...

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I’ve spent most of the last decade involved in remote collaboration as a tech support engineer for ednet, whose primary business model is real-time, remote audio collaboration via ISDN & IP for the advertising, post / ADR, and music markets. It's a high-end, niche business that works very well for studios needing what we like to call "CD-quality phone calls". During this time, my project studio has also needed to collaborate with other studios over long distances. Typically, I address this by primitive (fedexing or mailing CDs/ DVDs), or mid-tech (emailing .mp3s, FTP) means.

Unfortunately, these solutions are not suited to a real-time collaborative experience. Mail and Fedex obviously won’t work. ISDN and IP come close, but coding and transmission delays are greater than acceptable for two studios playing music together live. MPEG layer 3 coding delays on dedicated hardware can be up to a third of a second, and even the fastest compression algorithm I have experience...

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