mark skinner

I've gone into my studio twice this week and found the power button light blinking on my Lenovo tower. When I wiggle the mouse the windows log in screen pops up. It normally logs me in automatically. I always shut down the pc when I'm thru working. Anyone have a clue why it's booting up on its own ? Should I turn off my surge protector and could it be causing it .. Poltergeist ?? mark

I've gotten some pretty cool sounds playing body slapped acoustic guitar. Reverse it , add a long reverb , bounce it , reverse it again. Guitar and slaps are normal , all the reverb is reversed. Same for drum hit or percussion. Pretty cool effect... mark

That was one incredibly Genius arrangement. Fantastic creativity! Can't make my mind up on the bass either.. What did you us for the violin in the intro ? Thanks .. mark

Thanks Craig , another Fantastic article , so much clearer now. But , what if you are uploading a 24 or 32 bit file to a streaming service like Sound Cloud. If you add decent dithering is it retained by them or is it redundant if they apply their own dithering. Thanks .. mark

Smooth and excellent mix! I thought the intro was fine (time wise). I agree with Lynn about the mandolin I believe it would add a nice texture and could replace the guitars in a couple of spots.. Enjoyed this Very much .. mark

Very nice. I really liked the choice of reverb on the high percussive piano notes. Liked all the textures in the song and on your paint job... Keep them coming mark

Lynn , very good job . Kept my interest and enjoyed it to the end. As far as the lead panning , I normally pan a lead slightly to the right, always have and sounds normal to me. Nice guitar work , Enjoyed it .. mark

Mahavishnu , Incredible cover! I don't remember the song but I remember the feel. I was a huge fan of John Luc in the 70's. I always wished I could play a violin and he was Fantastic with finding notes and stirring emotions. I've only given up on bagpipes and violin. I'm looking hard at trying viola now. Anyway , very impressive job. No crits , No suggestions. Welcome to the forum Looking forward to hearing more from you. Thanks ... mark

I heard some really nice jazz like piano parts sneak in then hide again. Your playing skills are starting to scare me... mark

Mick , I used to absolutely Love that song and havn't thought of it in a lot of years. I think you have a very good voice with a lot of potential to be even better. I had some problems with the mix but really not with the tones of the instruments. I think the low instrument should come down quite a bit. The main thing was it was , just mechanical sounding , like quantize shouldn't have been used if it was .. mistakes or not. Anyway this is just my honest opinion . Thanks for posting this. mark

Fantastic suggestions so far. I agree with cutting the intro and getting it started sooner. I also thought the bass was low after listening more. It's There but not straying from the kick much and a little buried . It really gets lost when the vocals come in. This guy is really good about pulling a hook out of a simple song. Uses his own band to rerecord and uses pro demo singers before trying to shop the songs around. This may be another dead end , but he approached me about working with him. If it doesn't play out I'll redo it using everyone's suggestions and keep it for myself and give it away. All suggestions are welcomed and listened to. I only have 2 ears of my own. You guys are great. Thanks ... mark

Here's a real simple country ballad going to a writer in Nashville for collaboration. Song credits are going to be interesting. We have the Exact first middle and last names . any suggestions I will pass on. Thanks mark

Harrison , I don't have a fix for your problem , but I would suggest getting an Interface as soon as possible . Most people who record wear a mask and stay at least 6 ft away from Realtek.

I thought the vocals on this one were fantastic and the harmony mixed in perfect. I am assuming you built the harmony in melodyne , if so .. it was very convincing. Great job .. mark

I always make a Single click an a slight drag to the right to input a note. works flawlessly. If you have a sensitive mouse you can easily move it on the second click moving it to the next snap spot especially if you're not zoomed in very far on the timeline. You should be able to check it if you change your snap settings in prv to something like a half note and see if it still puts it a 1/16 off on your timeline. Good luck .. mark

Sven , my win7 i5 quad ssd , has always had extra processing time exporting anything as mp3. wav goes straight to exporting , unless I've done some time stretching on any tracks without bouncing it afterwards.

Go further down the page and check out upgrading to melodyne 5 by msmcloed

Raymond, If you know what the exact bpm is when you import it , it's easy to change using the stretch tool . I've found it better to do outside of your project. Open a new project, set the bpm in the project to what your audio file is. Import it at the very start of measure 1. Go to the end of the clip and slip edit the end so it stops on a line . Take note of exactly where it ends on the timeline. Now change the project bpm to what you want the clip to be. Now use the stretch tool and drag the end of the clip back or forward to the same spot where it ended before. Export the clip out. You'll notice some extra processing time when you export it. That's why I like to do it outside of my project. Right click the edit box to select the stretch tool , (same toolbar module where the smart tool is) don't forget to turn it back off .. mark

All the old Sonar programs I have had a "final mix" setting in the standard included compressors. I always assumed they went on the master buss for some gentle taming. I would imagine a mastering house would rather do it themselves but that has never been an option for me ..

Cool! Super nice funk. I think you covered all the bases on the guitars , I really liked the way you did the chimed parts. Killer bass as well. Another great one .. mark

Very good . I really liked the twists and turns this one took. The blurp was great. Enjoyed it .. mark

Here's a pretty frantic one . Not real polished , tried to get a live feel. https://soundcloud.com/user-810058643/kramer Comments , crits , and suggestions welcomed. Thanks .. mark

Tez, as soon as you click file/import audio the option will be on the very first page that pops up , it's just a check box. You may also have "auto save" enabled , saving it for you. Frank , a friend of mine just got the $199 package with all four advanced programs. Killer deal. mark

I've been using Ozone for a while and now consider it a must have tool. The eq suggestions are a great tool if you get too close to your mix and aren't making the right eq choices that are obvious to ozone. It's a great reference tool even if you don't use it. Tez , when I import a file to my dedicated Ozone project , I make sure "copy to audio folder" isn't checked during import. It may not work the same in 9 but it's something to try. mark

Reco , try clicking the input drop down arrow on your "midi" track and choose your PSR as the input. If it doesn't show up go to pref. and make sure it is chosen as a midi device. It should then feed the signal thru TTS.