I have some nice poetry news. I've been nominated twice now for a 2015 Pushcart Prize, for 2 separate poems. A nomination is very nice - but not terribly impressive on resumes, as it's like saying, "Hey! Some person in a place of some power thought that I wrote a good poem once!" Two nominations was both surprising and double-nice. Now the Pushcart committee or whatever will go through all tens of thousands of the nominations, read all the poems, and select probably a short list which will be published in Real Book Format and available at Real Book Stores, and Real People Who Want To Know Modern Lit will read it. It'd be amazing if I got on that list, but I'm not holding my breath. However, there's also probably going to be another list, Honorable Mentions or something, which may be about as long as the short list in and of itself. Maybe I'm delusional, but I like to think I might be able to get that. The two poems are "A Great Grave," published by Starline (for those of you who bought a copy of The Taj Mahal,* there's a copy of that poem in the chap), and "My Loneliness Keeps Me Company." Unfortunately neither are on the web in print but I've posted them around on Hubski so if you're curious, I'll link ya or something. Alternatively, I've been recording my poems on Soundcloud, so you can listen to most of my published poems (not all yet, but working on it) here. Also, I sent out some poems over the weekend, including a set of four witch poems that I just had a feeling a certain press (which I love) would really like. They got back to me within a day, they are taking all four, and they are paying me $15 for the privilege!! That is absolutely the most amount of money I've made off poetry in a sitting. It has helped re-inspire me a little bit. I wrote a lot of witch poems but I haven't worked on them much, I am going to start doing that and see if maybe there's a book here or something. For those curious, the press is FLAPPERHOUSE , and the print version will go live on Dec 22, so if you want, you could order a copy. (Or just donate a little money to them!) However, they usually put up poems from each issue gradually, so I am pretty sure I will also be able to put up a OC post in the next few weeks and share them with you. So that's good news there. Maybe I just need to be having sex again in order to get back on writing poems.
Please and thank you :)The two poems are "A Great Grave," published by Starline (for those of you who bought a copy of The Taj Mahal,* there's a copy of that poem in the chap), and "My Loneliness Keeps Me Company." Unfortunately neither are on the web in print but I've posted them around on Hubski so if you're curious, I'll link ya or something.
here is my loneliness at the bottom of that long post-reply
There's no snow in New York, which irks me. I'm heading there in a week and a half, and at this point it looks certain I'll be hiking on microspikes and not snowshoes. I like snowshoes. The trails are so smooth and pleasant when all the bumps and jagged bits are buried under snow. I have the last week of the year off, so I may go back then in the hopes winter finally arrives. I took my winter pack hiking locally on Sunday, and it went well. Eleven miles and 1300' total ascent. My trip will have a 15 mile day with 4500' ascent, but this is a start. On Thanksgiving I also ran my fastest two mile run in ten years. 7:53/mile on a very flat route.
Seriously though, I'm kind of glad. I was terrified that I'd go home for Thanksgiving to 60° temperatures and come back--having lost all my cold tolerance--to 15° blizzards. (Do we have strikethrough capability? I only know how to block out.)Me too! It's my first winter not living in Southern California Texas and I want snow, dammit!!
You and caeli should just wait until January - mid March. That's been the real winter in those parts of NY the past few years. But who knows, maybe it's a mild year all around.
Thanks! I'm sure you'll see snow soon enough. The lake effect snow is bound to drop a few feet once the temperature drops another five degrees. Do you think you'll try any winter activities your first winter? The winter flies by for me when I stay active.
That's great! It makes me think I should do more organized runs. Looks like there's one here in town Saturday that has a cookie station, a mistletoe station and a candy cane station. Clearly nothing too serious, which probably makes it right for me. Do you run a lot of 5ks?
I have done five, which is about one a year since I started running. I have knocked about a minute off my time (not my pace, alas) in those years, showing my dedication to the slacker philosophy. Organized runs are a lot of fun, and I think there is a "bib effect" from the atmosphere, official timing, and permanent record that improves performance. I finished second in my age group on Thanksgiving, and for the first time took home a little prize in addition to my finisher's medal. You should sign up! I bet you can maintain an 8-minute pace for three miles, as long as you save the cookies and candy for the finish.
Well I did the 5k today! Thanks for encouraging me. I came in at 8:08/mile, and while I was hoping for a sub-8 minute pace, I'm still pretty content with it. I hiked 15 miles yesterday and am admittedly a little sore from that still, so all in all not bad. It was really nice doing the organized race. I may look for more of them and work my way up to a 10k and maybe a half marathon. I'm not the quickest, but I feel OK at my pace.
That's great! I bet it was the mistletoe station that held you up. It's always good to have a target for next time, and the with the 5K distance you can always tell yourself that with a little more push, you might have gotten down to the next whole minute. I might try to sneak onto a track tomorrow to make an effort for the Runkeeper Global 5K.
Stateofthelil update steve Hi Pub[ski]crawlers, it's 2:40 p.m. and the pub's been open for 6 hours and 51 statementsworth. I just "taught" my last graduate class in the program that I teach for this year. This has been the most awesome class so far. What fun. What work. Re marking: I'm 5 X 35 papers behind and 6 presentations behind. I could write bunches about the course, but this is a #stateofthelil report. I saw the soon-to-be-ex spousal unit last night. I don't exactly recognize him. All through our 22 years together he refused to listen to feedback or discuss "the relationships." Important topics were hinted at, if that. Suddenly, now that he's maybe rejigging his whole life, he has questions about what that was about? Sex, love, and rock 'n roll. But "it's too late baby, it's too late" as Carole King said I'm in another city on another computer. It's behaving badly. I'll try and post this and get back to my report much later on.
galen's love life since November 2015: a timeline. Nov 10 2015: Matched with an attractive lady on Tinder who seems pretty cool. Messaged. Nov 11: Hm, no message back. Nov 14: Hrm, still no reply. Nov 15: I give up. Nov 29: Fuckit, send another message. Nov 29, later: She replies! She meant to reply earlier but forgot! Conversation ensues, and lasts 3 hours. Woo! Nov 30: We exchange numbers. Further conversation, but intermittent: she's out of country and cell service is scarce. Dec 1: She's back stateside! We text for 5 hours. Dec 2, afternoon: We text even more. And yeah, some "<3" ing happens. Dec 2, early evening: On her Tumblr, I stumble upon a post about being asexual. Whaaaaaat Dec 2, late evening: Lots of researching asexuality, thinking. Talk to a few friends. Eventually reach the conclusion that not only am I okay with a relationship that's romantic but nonsexual, but I actually wasn't interested in a sexual relationship with her in the first place. I just sort of felt like I should have been. Dec 3, midnight: I call her. (Sidenote: ugh I love her voice.) We talk about nothing for a little, and I bring up the asexuality thing. Everything goes smoothly; she's glad that I brought it up and am ok with it. Eventually we both have to sleep. Dec 3, afternoon: I make a dumb joke and she gets pretend annoyed. I don't realize she was joking too and get a little freaked out. Dec 3, evening: I bring up this weird tension I'm feeling; she explains that she was also joking. We talk on the phone, and just hearing her voice, everything feels better. She is also 16, but a high school senior. She is an incredible musician and speaks French. She wants to be a professor someday maybe. She uses words like "radtastic" and "swagnanimous." And she is beautiful. She is from VT and goes to boarding school near Albany (2ish hours from Colgate), and isn't planning on going to school anywhere that's closer than that. So that pretty well sucks. But we can worry about whether doing long distance for 3-4 years or whatever is worth it later-- if that's ever even an issue. For now I just really like her. So that's what's up :)
I'm am doing too many things at once. I started my third oil painting. It's of a hotel in the UP of Michigan. The hotel has long only been a restaurant, and it isn't particularly attractive. However, I have been going there every summer for my entire life with family, so I feel a strong connection to it.
I love that you are doing this. The reasoning is sound. The idea that your descendants could continue to go to that bar/restaurant for generations and perhaps see you painting hanging there is awesome. I am keenly aware of how hard you are working, as I know you are aware of how hard I am working. Like you, I decided to throw fuel to the fire and start a new art project. I am officially writing a children's book of poetry. I grew up reading a Light in the Attic and Where the Sidewalk Ends all the time. I credit Shel Silverstein for instilling in me a love of lyric. My cousin Katie has agreed to illustrate it. The first one I wrote I posted: I have about 5 more in the works. They need some HARD CORE editing. Ahem... lil... :) It's fun though, I've been penning them on phone while in waiting rooms etc. It's amazing how much differently I hear things now. Earlier tonight my daughter told me that her Nanny's boyfriend was a real-life giant! His name is Jeff and he is probably 6'2. After she told me that I wrote down the sentence, "The giants wife was really nice." -Who knows where it will lead? The other day, cW was over and someone mentioned that balding people only have "side-hair," and I wrote that down too. The following poem was born of it: Grandpas Hair Why does grandpa only have hair on the side? How did all of his other hair die? Did he narrowly duck a dragons breath? Did a lawnmower go haywire up the back of his neck? Did he shave it on purpose? Is it all part of a plan? Is it there as a runway where small planes can land? Is it a beacon bringing ships safely to shore? Can his bald spot suffice as a fairies dance floor? Did they use his long hair to build a mighty rope Did it tie up giants and other bad folk? So I asked my grandpa, "I want to know, where did all of your top hair go?" "The dragon, the rope, a lawnmower astray?" "Yes, yes and yes" is all he would say
Don't you dare forget about the cigar that smoked a dog. You can have my last two lines, just call them yours.
That's awesome lil, thank you! You have quite the memory! I look forward to the extended stateofthelil. Congrats on finishing the school year.
Anyone successfully quit coffee? If so, did you lose the energy that coffee gave you or did you 'stabilize' after a while? I think I need to turn down from 2, sometimes 3 cups a day to 1 cup before it's too late :D I tried to quit cold turkey while at a summer program at West Point, I made it 5 days, but broke during breakfast from the headache. Oh dear.
I got down to one cup after drinking 3 a day... by condensing three 8 oz cups into one 24 oz cup >_>
Hmm... Given your solution, you'd either be the best or the worst engineer in the industry.
Well it means I'm failing at being a bureaucrat... really I should be sticking with the 8 oz cups so I can get up and take more breaks...
That's the one I'm having a hard time with! I love coffee (especially black coffee) and I love brewing coffee, but soda is just so much easier to obtain right now at a cheaper price. It's definitely something I need to work on...right after I finish my Coke.
I have yet to find a compelling scientific reason to quit coffee. And I am surrounded by naturopathic doctors who think anything mainstream is bad for you, and they spend a lot of time looking for compelling scientific reasons. If we're counting by K-cups, as this vile hotel makes me do, I'll burn through three before I get in the goddamn shower.
For the second half of high school, and first half of college I drank disgusting amounts of coffee. Since then I have stopped and I drink it leisurely now. You can recover, but you are gonna need sleep and to drink more water. If you do both those things you will get better. A healthy diet never hurts.
DRINK MOAR! In all seriousness though, when I was in college I had a cup in my hand almost all day. I probably spent more on coffee and caffeine drinks than I did on food some days. If you slowly step down, you'll get used to less caffeine pretty quickly. Staying active and maintaining a good sleep schedule will help you stay awake without the aid off coffee.
I've never been a habitual coffee user, but I was definitely a regular coffee abuser during undergrad. 12-15 cups over an 8-9 hour period wasn't unusual in my library sessions. Now I've switched to cold brew. About half a cup a day, maybe every other day. With chocolate milk.
how did you get anything done while drinking that much of a diuretic? past a certain point, I realize I've messed up when I am taking more bathroom breaks than getting work done.
At one point I felt coffee was making me too tense. I'd drink about 4 or 5 cups a day. I made a game of cutting down (rather than stop.) I allowed myself one cup a week, and looked for the best cup of coffee I could find. I researched coffee shops with a good reputation within about 30 miles of my house and I'd spend a nice half hour driving to see where I could find the best coffee. Actually I'd have one espresso and one other coffee drink. All week I'd look forward to that one trip and after some weeks I didn't even feel like coffee during the week. Eventually I quit and that lasted about 5 or 6 years. Now there's no compulsion it's just a pleasant habit and I do enjoy my coffee.
I actually just did this a couple months ago! I usually would have one cup of coffee a day, in the morning. When I quit I just powered through the withdrawal headaches -- they were only bad for the first week or so. I actually haven't noticed much of a significant drop in energy since then! I drink herbal tea in the morning now, maybe I'm just getting a placebo effect from any hot drink...
So, the general population of Reddit users are kind of pissing me off lately for different reasons. I halfway started writing a rant here on Pubski to get it off my chest, but I don't want to go spreading around negative feelings today. I want today to be a good day. So I'll just say, no matter how tempting it is, don't feed wildlife. I can't believe that's something that still needs to be said in this day and age.
Reddit is bad place if you are looking for interesting discussion. Some of the subs that I'm on that are related to specific topics have become infuriating. I wrote out something really long about my disdain, but you are right no negativity from that place. ONLY HAPPINESS!
My recent reddit coping strategy is just try to remember what an idiot I was at 13 and assume most of the people on the site are that age. They are all angrily weighing in on issues with almost zero life experience, it's to be expected they get so much wrong. If you weren't a know it all kid like I was this might not be as helpful for you.
this is an important piece of information but i'm wondering what sparked your need to share :)
I've been working like a mo-fo. I feel like I'm serving four masters right now. I've been interviewing for what seems like forever for this job with BSC. It's down to me and one other candidate. I have my boss at my current job in town with me next week and I am far from prepared. I spend perhaps 60% of my time either working on or thinking about my startup business. The startup is going extremely well. If all goes well, we will launch in January. The biggest hurdles for us are regulatory and cost based. I tell you what... the more time I spend working on startups, the more sympathetic I become towards libertarianism. Ambiguous regulation and regulators who's job it is to give you a knee-jerk "no" stifle creativity and innovation. -This is real. Still, we have made some tremendous strides and we have an AMAZING team of people working on it. I'm pretty damn excited to share it with you all. I would like to wait till we are launched though. It's incredible how much work goes in to doing something like this. It's a kick ass concept that could have a very real impact on the world. Anyways, have a great rest of your week Hubski! -TNG
Orson Scott Card, in one of his rare moments of brilliance, observed that the greatest contribution the Romans ever made to the human race was bureaucracy. His point was that with a million petty bureaucrats between you and change, change requires killing a million petty bureaucrats... which is why the Roman Empire lasted through Caligula, Nero, and a dozen lesser fuck-ups while the Macedonians were effectively assed out the minute Alexander the Great kicked it. Surely by now you've learned the trick to regulators. It's called "ego stroking."
No way. Oregon is rad. So is Washington. And the rest of the Northwest. Welcome back! kleinbl00 is right. We're creating a big ole gang up here.
Big big changes coming up in my life... School is over in a week and I have to figure out where I'm going with my life. I have enough saved up to go on an Asia trip for 4 months (can"t waiiit), but that's just dragging out time before I have to decide. Now I've pretty much established this summer that I'm incompetent for pretty much any entry level job I can get with my degree. It's not that I have low self esteem or anything, it's just that the things that are important in office marketing jobs are pretty much the opposite of what I'm good at. So I decided I don't really feel like being miserable and attempt to "work on my flaws" when I can try to leverage my strengths instead. What gives me hope is that the little beard care venture has blown up in the past month (yay christmas!). My dad has entrusted me with the managing of one of his 6plexes because my brother bailed to Russia (ugh, long story but he's an idiot). My friend's mom has been hinting they need someone to manage their site and social media for their furniture store. It's all side hustle and not nearly enough to make a living, but it has given me drive to try my best to never have to get a job. I have no kids, no car and no mortgage so my goal is to manage to somehow make 3k/month by the end of next year. At that point, I'll have plenty to live comfortably. Many ideas and many avenues to explore, but in the end, if I fail I'll be back where I am right now with plenty of experience to talk about. Big hopes for the year to come :)
Have fun in asia, I fully expect some bad-ass photography. Speaking of which, check out the #decemberphotochallenge. Glad to hear about all this good stuff coming your way!my goal is to manage to somehow make 3k/month by the end of next year
You can do it! You have a lot going for you elizabeth. Many people would chide you for saying you have weaknesses etc. but I think its awesome that you are self-aware enough to know what you are good at and what you are not. Moreover, you know what you enjoy working on and what you do not. You should hit up insomniasexx for any free-lance tips. My advice to you would be the same I gave her. Do this. Start a business and get too much work. When you have too much work bring on an employee. Then get too much work again and bring on another, then another and eventually, you have a business that you founded that is successful. Million dollar companies start out with $36k a year revenue goals for one person.
Thanks :) I've seen the challenge, I'll participate for sure. I have been busier than expected this christmas season. Photography and videography are planned for Asia. The best part about traveling is sharing the experience! I'll keep the Ski' updated.
Three more weeks. 18 more days. If I get through them, I've secured my family's ability to eat through 2016 at least, by which point, according to the projections, the birth center will have been profitable for three months (and that includes my wife's salary as an expense). We've settled into a routine that involves very little work for me, which is fine. Things are still chaotic enough that I had to un-mic and re-mic and un-mic and re-mic and un-mic and re-mic four people in the space of ten minutes yesterday because those who decide can't decide worth a shit. None of our cast has left in an ambulance for about a week now so that's nice. I'm ready to start thinking beyond. Like, I'm bloody well decking out the garage. There will be pegboard. There will be better lighting. There will be a chipper, there will be a pressure washer, there will be a hedge trimmer. I have earned these things. I am eager to return my home to some semblance of presentable, having been rode hard and put away wet by seven years of tenants. Theoretically, I have also sold my last, great, thermonuclear Todd-Soundelux prize, the fully-loaded Lantana System 6000. I say theoretically because while I accepted the guy's offer and sent him an invoice, he has yet to cough up the cash. This is good as I need to build a new rig to mix a feature I have on deck for the new year. Right now, it's looking like I'm going back to PC for the first time since 2002. PC nerds, tell me how much of a premium I'm paying for one of these. They're built by someone I know from the Pro Tools beta and I'll probably go that way just to get my feet wet since I haven't much fucked with PC since XPSP3. I'm off this mountain the evening of the 22nd. The afternoon of the 23rd I have an hour and a half massage booked. Think I may also go for a salt scrub and a righteous dinner. I know that there will be a very nice bottle of scotch at the end of the rainbow.
We had a little debate in class today. What specifically happened was this: A group of students were teaching the class how to use objective criteria in a negotiation. For this presentation they dramatized a company trying to choose between two guys to be the next creative director. Both candidates came with a long list of personal and professional characteristics. ROB was nice and everyone liked him and had no client complaints, while TODD had some loyal followers, tended to have many complaints from HR, but few complaints from clients. Their styles of work were quite different. The presenters wanted to see how the criteria people use to make decisions is often not objective. At one point, I said, "Todd, there's a sign above your desk that says, "NEVER HALF-ASS ANYTHING." What does it mean to you? Rob said he disagreed and that it is okay to half-ass some things when creating digital products for clients. A debate ensued. Thanks kb.
I get around $2,400 to build something close to their default configuration. That 5960x alone is around $1000.Right now, it's looking like I'm going back to PC for the first time since 2002. PC nerds, tell me how much of a premium I'm paying for one of these.
Appreciate that. They've got a 14-core but that looks like about a $3000 chip. Stupid thing is I'm going to have to do most of my SoundMiner curation on Mac, then hit it via PC over network. By the time I'm up and running there will be a 24-port managed switch, an 8-port managed switch, two 8-port unmanaged switches and two Airports in my house. It's ridiculous.
I googled SoundMiner, and has to be the least informative marketing copy I've ever read.What is Soundminer? It is an advanced search engine for both Macintosh and Windows users, a highly advanced batch conversion engine, an integrated metadata management tool, an advanced sound design tool, a DSP processing host, a scalable server for multiple users, a web publishing vehicle, and a tracking and metrics system, and it is a companion product designed to work directly with the most popular production tools in the industry.
'k. So let's say you need to put a tire squeal in your video. Here's the cheap way: 1) Open iTunes 2) Type in "tire squeal" 3) Demo sounds until you find the one you like 4) "reveal in Finder" 5) Switch to Pro Tools 6) Import Audio 7) Drill down to finder window 8) Import file into bin 9) Find file in bin 10) Drag it to where you want it to be 11) Trim to fit 12) Perform gajillions of audiosuite edits Here's the Soundminer way: 1) Enter "tire squeal" into Soundminer 2) Fuck with the speed to get what you want, build a VST stack to process it the way you want, set in and out points 3) Switch to Pro Tools and highlight the slug you want on the track you want 4) Switch back to Soundminer and hit "S"
Ok now that I'm home I can look at the hardware. My ballpark is about $500 - $1000 overpriced (not bad if you're in the "just throw money at it" phase). My concern with this rig wouldn't be the cost, it would be the quality of the build. He doesn't mention any aftermarket cooling, for example, which if you're running long intensive rendering sessions you really need at least a few extra case fans and ideally a beast of a CPU cooler. I'm concerned about the RAM too - while I understand audio is CPU bound if you get too stingy with memory its going to quickly become your new bottleneck. I wouldn't be concerned with size of RAM, more just speed so it can feed that lovely CPU. It would be good to find out if he's leaving you room for upgrades, like free RAM slots and a PCI express slot if you decide to give your eyes a break from that graphics card. Do you need a fancy sound card? I assume sound people have fancy audio jack requirements I know nothing about. Last thing - Eh? Is that a VM, dual boot, or just antivirus? I don't like people installing stuff for me but YMMV.PC nerds, tell me how much of a premium I'm paying for one of these.
Safesurf. Specially created safe internet browsing zone to keep all junk, cookies, viruses, and malware-spyware off your main Pro Tools operating system.
The ad copy allays most of your fears. Besides, I know both of these guys. Water cooling is essential. They also go up to 64GB of RAM. It's also a mammer-jammer server board so expansion room doesn't worry me. My fancy sound cards speak formats you haven't even heard of. 
I made a decent rack mount box including ssd for the OS and raided 2TB performance hard drives for about 1850 and change. You'd need to add a sound card for about 200 bux extra. Mine would be better than what they offer, and with the 1K for the software you are looking close to what they are charging. let me know if you want the parts list. That is in the ballpark, not too much of a premium IMO.
Good move on the massage, I always forget to treat myself when I'm overworked. Makes a big difference. If you haven't checked it out I highly recommend little red day spa in the old Ranier brewery building. Grab the wife and a bottle of champagne, they do amazing couples massages and it's great for recharging together.
Comparing the spec sheet to Newegg, you're paying around a grand more if you buy that package. Is there a reason Pro Tools works good with an $1100 CPU and a $35 GPU? The processor is a beast but it is not 3 times as good as a $300 4790K, especially not if you overclock it.
Audio processing, according to an architect at Logic and an architect at Avid, is all about physical cores times clock speed. This is why my 8-year-old 3.2gHz 8-core is so much quicker than anything new. Unfortunately, the rest of the computing world is not so constrained. As such, architecture has shifted away from optimal from an audio standpoint.
If you didn't have the real time constraint you could benefit from using the GPU, but it would be really hard to do that and do the processing in real time because you'd have to send large buffers to the GPU and fetch them back to get any benefit. Not impossible, probably, but hard.
Cast #3 is on the arm, everything is sore and I am ready to be over this foolishness. For the first time in about 5 years, I have purchased an expensive tangible, physical good that required planning, research and contact with salespeople. There are roughly 12 cars in the "small 5-door hatchback that get 30+ MPG" market segment. I drove all of them. The Hondas were nice cars but way too small for me. The two Kias I drove were, mediocre is the closest word I have. The Hundai I drove was great, but to get AWD like the Subaru made the car too expensive for what it is. And my first choice going in, the Mazda 3 wagon, was too small to effectively hold my gear (the telescope mirror cell would not fit into the car due to curves and wasted space. (Mazda 3 interior and ride however were the best of all the cars IMO, and it was sad to see them not fit my stuff.) The VW Golf, oh man I almost bought that car, but I'd never afford all the tickets I'd get. Man, that Golf is a joy to drive. The fords drove well; the Focus and the C-Max are nice enough cars, but wow the interior is pure shit. I ended up with a Subaru. This is where the story gets amusing in a not-funny way. August was the best month Subaru ever had. September was even better... So was October. November is going to dip due to them running out of cars. The car I ended up with the Crosstrek, hit the top of all the lists and sold out everywhere. Being in the middle of the country, you get middle of the country cars, something like this one you have to normally order and wait 6-8 weeks for delivery. I did not have 6 weeks, I did not even have 2 weeks. Fortunately, the sales guy was a nerd, good with a computer inventory system and worked his ass off to get me a car. My requirements are dark interior, not white, not red, load that dog up with options. Sales guy thought that was funny. There was a hybrid which did not get all that great reviews; I liked it when I drove it. I was ready to negotiate that down when I got the car I ended up buying. So yay. I think this is the first time I've dealt with a scarce good in years. The whole process reminded me that there is still a whole world that the internet has not really disrupted yet.
Finally bit the bullet and made a bunch of music related purchases (kleinbl00)... Audio Interface Mic and such Anyone have some free/cheap VST recommendations / should I get a MIDI controller while I'm at it too? Tempted to buy a pedal or two on top of this. I'm going to use Reaper as a DAW because I really, really don't need much more than that and if I watch enough tutorials I'm sure I can figure out some cool stuff with it. Extremely excited to start recording music, the only bummer is the interface doesn't ship for about 3 weeks. But come January, oh boy. Between that and starting to DJ again...but maybe it means I haven't ever really grown up or something? I don't know. Music is fun and a passion and that's what matters. Also I'm being published in a zine this month so that's fun.
I have Sennheiser HD 280s, not a world changing pair but very good for my purposes. And comfortable.
Yeah...but for $40? Worst case is I buy it, hate it, and start trawling Craigslist with a better idea of what to go for after having played with an interface. This is just the start.
No, worst case is you gave $25 to a company that spends more on industrial espionage than engineering and $15 to a company that operates largely through the Walmart "crush them then jack prices" model instead of buying something real to begin with. https://hubski.com/addcomment?id=81698 Behringer literally rolled into NAMM '97 with a Mackie 8-bus they'd scraped the paint off of and repainted as a Behringer. Mackie sued them - and Sam Ash, their parent - and settled because apparently you can't copyright circuit diagrams. Behringer responded by opening up a US office two blocks from Mackie - and Mackie's in Woodinville, surrounded by pasture. My cousin used to land hot air balloons around them. Prior to Mackie suing and winning, DBX, Aphex, JBL and Allen & Heath had all sued and won. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behringer#Legal_cases Behringer is beyond bad - they're evil. 'sokay. Now you know. Next time, ask. I used to bill out at $125 an hour for recommending gear. I'm good at it.
I digress slightly, but I'm currently a predicament where you advice would be useful. I'm using Logic 9 but it's on a late 2009 Macbook Pro which is less that desirable. I was looking to upgrade but I don't think the latest Apple hardware is worth the price. Of course, that means if I were to switch back to PC (I originally started on FL Studio) I'd have to learn a new DAW. What would be your recommendation if I were to switch? I'm considering FL, but good audio recording capabilities are important to me and I remember them being terrible in FL when I used to use it. I've tried Ableton before but its workflow wasn't for me and I find its GUI horrendous. Or do you think that I should stay in the Apple ecosystem, regardless of the lacking hardware? Seeming that I've been using Logic for 5+ years now and do love it as a piece of software. I know most of this could be answered with Google and some consideration on my part, which I am doing. But I am also interested to hear your thoughts, if you feel inclined to add any input.
1) Try Reaper. Everybody loves Reaper. It costs nothing and it gets updated like twice a day. Reaper is the cheap punter's swiss army knife. Pretty sure it'll run on damn near anything. What you do on OS X will translate not poorly to Win. BUT 2) If recording matters, it's the big boy, bitch. Muffukkin' Pro Tools. There is no one serious doing anything serious in anything other than PT. It's ugly, it's expensive, it sucks at MIDI, it uses its own proprietary plugin format, and it absolutely owns the professional market. Here's the castrated version. fuck around. It's the same Mac or PC. Logic has its charms (Maaan, I luuuuv Structure) but it has its issues as well. It's far, far easier to accomplish something decent-sounding in Pro Tools these days because Logic pretty much insists on the Smile EQ on everything you do out of the box - "oh, what's that? You want a 'guitar' track? Here's 15 plugins including an EQ with 9dB of boost!" - but you have to come from a position of knowing less is more, keep it simple stupid, slow and steady wins the race. You can get decent shit out of Logic but you kind of have to de-fang it and keep it from doing anything stupid. 'cuz it so wants to do stupid shit.
Oh yeah, I forgot about Reaper, which is dumb of me seeing as though I used it a couple of times during my studies. I'll definitely give the demo of that a proper go. And I know Pro Tools is the industry standard big daddy when it comes to all things recording/mixing/ect. I always strayed away from it because I heard nothing but people telling me it was hard to use. I didn't know there was a free version to play around in however, so I'll check that. Ha! I agree with you assessment of Logic. I never let it use any of its own project templates or channel configurations because, like you say, it's the express lane to getting a whole load of crap flying on to the channel. I mostly just used the blank template or one I created myself with some pre-configured instrument and effect busses. I'll definitely miss its bundled plugins though if I do switch. Especially as Logic X has Alchemy now. Oh well, maybe I'll buy Omnisphere 2. Thanks for the input!
Native Instruments has the worst customer support on the planet yet they get a couple hundred bucks from me every year, minimum. Omnisphere is nothing but a big dumb sample player. You're experimental. The fact that you aren't dominant in Reaktor is curious indeed. Especially now that they've settled on a decent control protocol. Go that way.
I've used other people's instruments/ensembles on Reaktor but never delved into it myself. I was going to get Reaktor 6 along with my new system, which is why that's been delayed. First impressions of Reaper: Seems like a great too with a lot of potentially great features. However, some things are already a barrier for me. For example, creating automation is inefficient and messy when compared to Logic. Most baffling for me so far is that the sliders (and in turn automation points) on its built in high pass/low pass filter do not have the capability to fully high pass or low pass a channel. That's simply dumb.
Logic sucks at automation. Reaper? I never even tried. If automation matters to you, go PTHD sooner rather than later. Most of the post guys I know just hot-automate everything as touch, then grab shit as they go, and don't even fucking worry about it. I myself have written like fifteen parameters at once, on the fly, with no problems whatsoever. Logic writes automation as MIDI. That means it will bonk, because MIDI is limited to 9600 baud, 128 steps. I used to hate the shit out of Pro Tools. Then I had to mix a movie in Logic, and then I went PT. Logic certainly has its charms, but when it comes to "holy fuck I need 230 tracks to make this work" pro tools can't be beat.
Well that's something I never knew about Logic. I can't say it's ever been too much of a problem for me but it does explain some weird behaviour I experience occasionally. I'll definitely get on to testing Pro Tools out over the coming weeks. I've also got the Bitwig demo because I am ultimately looking for something to compose in and it looks to have some interesting features. On a somewhat related note, this just popped up on my newsfeed. Maybe it's something that'd interest you, though I wouldn't be surprised if it's already on your radar.
Yeah. If you run into automation problems, it's because Logic sort of "auto-thins" by ignoring anything over 9600. FUN TO NOTE: that includes pan and fader moves. That link is... interesting. Thing is, it's pretty much granular synthesis, which Reaktor will do the shit out of, in a pan field, which anything will do the shit out of. And it's $300, and it isn't a plugin, and one of the guys who endorses it works with this guy and Justin... well, Justin's the shit. And it's AAX, which is all I really care about.
To be fair, that discussion is one I had missed. What would you have recommended then for something =< $100? Also I've heard a ton of good about Komplete from a friend of mine who is super into producing electronic music, compounding references are a real thing. Reverberate is cheaper than I was expecting based on your description.
Drums and synths / maybe an organ? Reverb is a priority as far as effects.
Native Instruments Komplete. There's no reason to do anything else. Especially as they've now opened their parameter world such that anybody can plug into Kontrol. I may ditch my long-beloved K2500XS to get their 88-key controller. The best bang for buck in 'verb is Liquidsonics Reverberate. It'll read IRs from Waves or Avid; I have a bunch of nice IRs from a company that's quite dead that I can give you. For 'verb that sounds like nothing else and is super-stupid cool, you can't beat Eventide Blackhole, which costs a bit, but a lot less than Altiverb XL. Full disclosure - I beta-test for Liquidsonics and Eventide, but there's a reason for that. If you want realism, you need a convolution reverb and Reverberate is the cheapest and best. If you want crazyness, there has never been a company that could beat Eventide. I say this owning Altiverb XL, and having owned 2 480Ls, a System 6000, a KSP-8, an MPX-1 and a half-dozen PCM-81s.
Out pretty early today, but that's cool. It's been so quiet recently for me. I haven't been as active in terms of my socializing, but that only stems from the fact that I have like two weeks left of this semester. This post might be a bit brief. In school I'm currently writing a short script for a 5 minute scene where a best man is going to deliver his toast nearly drunk. I actually saved up enough money to be able to purchase a class ring which is pretty neat. I didn't involve myself with too much in my school, so this is a nice token of my time here. I got my school pictures taken, and they came out pretty good. Honestly, I'm a bit nervous with my graduation so close, but I can't escape this feeling of absolute excitement. This Friday I'm going to see Spring Awakening in NYC, and I'm excited about that because it will be a nice break from the whole school thing. I don't know much about the musical, and I'm trying to keep it that way. I'm in the process of recording a Christmas song with a friend (When I get some free time this weekend). Beyond that my social life has been otherwise pretty quiet. Hope everyone is having an awesome week, and just keep moving forward.
Well Hubski, I haven't been able to post in awhile and I decided now was the time to stop that! I'm currently taking a break from studying calculus, and just wanted to give a huge shoutout to lelibertaire for doing an awesome job running the new movie club! I haven't been able to watch that many with you guys, but I really enjoy the atmosphere when I do get to. I finally got to come home from school during this Thanksgiving, and it was so nice getting to see my family again. The weather down south was also quite a shocking change of pace from the (albeit milder than usual) Ohio fall. I really hope I can start regularly perusing Hubski again, and I wanted to give a brief update of my life. Cheers! I hope everyone has a nice week!
Thanks! It's nice knowing people are appreciating the movie club and enjoying themselves. Glad to hear you had a nice Thanksgiving and I hope you can join us at the theater one of these weeks
My father has asked for a copy of Drudkh's Microcosmos for Christmas, having heard it in my car when I was driving him somewhere months ago. My father, whose tastes run towards gospel and county music recorded before the mid 80s, has developed an interest in black metal. I am going to enjoy this.
I random bought Stella a pirate costume last night after seeing this amazing video: I get 10% cash back on Amazon purchases until the end of the year so...it's totally worth it. I also noticed a piece of fantastic design. Remember kids, design isn't all about making shit pretty. It's making shit that makes the person's life easier. Amazon now has this line on all items: Arrives before Christmas. See that shit. Fucking fantastic. I typically want to know when it will arrive by, but Amazon's right. I just want to know if it'll arrive by Christmas these days. In other news, work has slowed down a bit for the holidays. We're finally getting a new portfolio together with new branding and a ton of other amazing stuff. I haven't updated my portfolio since January of 2014 -- almost two full years! I also have accidentally deleted the CSS when FTPing so many times that my old portfolio is broken more often than it's not. Oh well.In Stock.
The first of December was the second time I've ever spent my birthday in another city, as well as the second time I've spent it with a sole another person who's not a relative (both were, coincidentally or not, girls). It wasn't the best birthday for me, but it let me figure some important things out, which always makes for a good day. I feel like this is a start of a quite a few life lessons for me, as well, and I'm excited to learn. I don't know quite what I feel about it. I don't have any good friends (what Russians call simply "friends") to spend time with, nor do I have any special activities for the day. In all aspects, it's an ordinary day for me since I don't have any high feelings associated with it (every birthday of mine barring the last two was merely my extended family's reason to drink and talk their rubbish talks), hence me growing dull to the event. Even then, I didn't want to spend it ordinarily, because I believe that a birthday's supposed to be good and it's the bad circumstances that rob us of the feeling. Whether the latter is true, I've allowed myself to spend the birthweek pretty well. I've made a great bowl of one salad I enjoy for myself and am going to make another later today. I'm not inviting anyone because, like I said, I don't have any friends, and receiving forced compliments is like scratching on my soul. I'm not celebrating in a traditional sense, though I wish I could. For now, I'm just having fun with what I have. Oddly enough, somehow, my uni group has figured out that it was my birthday. Nobody know even how old I was (I hid the fact earlier when meeting them), so this was surprising and, particularly, surprisingly thoughtful of them. Things... happen.
Man where to begin! Two new patients in my research study this week, enrolled the first one this morning with absolutely no hiccups, which is an astonishing first. I had a conference call today and had people with more than a few years of experience in my line of work asking me for advice on best practice for ensuring pill compliance and patient engagement, which felt really good. Not to get a big head about it, but my imposter syndrome is fading fast. We had our first full Choir, full Orchestra rehearsal of the Messiah tonight with soloists. I'm feeling a lot more confident in the music AND I have it all on my tablet, which weighs less than my score! The future is weird. We have one more rehearsal on Friday night then the saturday evening and Sunday matinee shows. I can't remember being this enthusiastic about christmas music. On the mental health front.... I need to meditate more. Breathe deeply more. Things are manageable, but not comfortably. I have to expend a non-negligible mental energy to keep myself pleasantly functional and it's definitely not sustainable. We'll see.