Have you changed your production techniques in 2014?

[crimsonwarlock]

For me the main change this year was (finally) doing the acoustic treatment of my small studio. It completely changed how I work now, where previously I tended to think about FX in terms of the mix, now being able to hear much more detail in each separate instrument/vocal I tend to 'optimize' the individual sound first and during mix mainly focus on EQ to get rid of problems from overlapping spectra and add (a tiny bit) reverb to glue things.

[show-off mode]

Here's my current room
...

[/show-off mode]

[envy-mode]
Dude, I wish I had the space to even think about acoustic treatment
[/envy-mode]
But, the lava lamp, isn't that a bit too cliché?

edit: damn, did I really write "dude"???

Yep... 'dude' ... right there

As for the space, that room is actually too small to be called a studio, it's measuring just over 2 meters wide and 3 meters deep. Hence the acoustic treatment, without it it was impossible to mix in.

[funky lime]

hey, that looks like ragnarok on the screen!
(what is that thing on the desk to the left of your control surface?)

with regards to op:
yes. in keeping with what appears to be a theme here, i have to say "Less is More" when it comes to plugins. sometimes i'll open up an old project and bypass all the fx, and i'll realize it sounds better to me than the "overmixed" version.

i used to think every track needed eq/comp at the very least, but really, a lot of that stuff can be solved at the source. they put tone knobs on guitars for a reason!

i still usually hi-pass most stuff at around 30-60hz, but being more selective with my tones and sounds has really led to a lot easier mixing.

a nice little bonus related to this realization is that i've been able to get rid of a lot of plugins that were just cluttering up my VST folders.


my girlfriend, who works in the video/photography field, always stresses the importance of pre-production. she's got me thinking about how i should sketch out at least a basic plan for a session before i ever fire up my DAW. sure, it detracts a bit from the "off the cuff" feel sometimes, but it's crazy how having an organized to-do list can really make my studio time more efficient.

[sin night]

I've gone from itb to mostly hardware, so my approach is definitely changing. I'm somehow more direct, more interested in a strong and definite character than "perfection" and less worried by noise.
Not much improvements from a strictly technical point of view, though.

[V0RT3X]

I went from the "gotta have it all" attitude to the "less is more" attitude.

*Edited* I decided there isn't any need to write about my setup

[JJBiener]

I haven't produced anything in 2014 so I can't say my techniques have changed. In fact, I've barely touched my keyboards. The closest thing I've gotten to producing something was cobbling together a 12-bar-blues loop using some stock samples from Sonar X2 so I could do a little blues jam.

In my own defense, in the last year and a half I have had at least a dozen hospital stays in four different hospitals. October alone was spent in three different facilities. I am hoping that my health will improve enough in the coming months to seriously start making music again. I have no solid evidence on which to base optimism, but I remain optimistic still.

Back to the subject, I have no doubt that time I've spent away from music will affect my production. I will certainly come to it from a different perspective.

[crimsonwarlock]

hey, that looks like ragnarok on the screen!

It is It's the session for the OSC track I did with it.

(what is that thing on the desk to the left of your control surface?)

It's my small collection of 19inch rack stuff. Most is old/obsolete and not in use anymore, and will be replaced sometime in the future with stuff I can actually use. Like a big dedicated MIDI interface and a nice pre-amp/channelstrip for recording external signals. The D4, now not in use, is destined to become a MIDI-drum controller for the electronic drum pads I'm building (another long overdue project).

Or did you mean the lava lamp

In regard of the 'limiting options', I'm constantly in that process. My 'main synthesizer' list is down to 10 and I still think there are a few in there I can do without. I'm pretty sure that if I can get it down to six or some such, I can/will be much more productive in my studio. Too much time is still lost in contemplation to choose between two or three synths for a certain idea or part, and then waisting hours in playing around with those instead of working on a 'real' track

[enroe]

... sometimes i'll open up an old project and bypass all the fx, and i'll realize it sounds better to me than the "overmixed" version.

Haha, the same here!

For me the changes in 2014 can't be named easily. Because it's a slow evolution
in skills and in the way of listening to music, very difficult to describe.