After 30 years of running sound on simple analog systems, my new job has an A&H GLD80 and I'm attempting to teach myself to be a digital guy. I'm finding it to be a huge jump. Here's the problem I'm finding, there are a lot of features and ways of doing things that I have never had access to before. I had someone trying to explain a DCA to me saying it's just like a VCA, but I've never had a console with a VCA either. I'm used to a gain knob I turn up and down at the top of each channel, there are faders on the mixer, and a gain on the amp; that's where my experience with gain structure begins and ends. I've used a parametric EQ, but I've never had the option of changing the width of my sweep. I've had high pass filters, but mine was just a push button, not adjustable. "Tap tempo" is not a standard feature on a thousand dollar mixer, with a $300 reverb. You get the idea, I've spent decades making the best sound I could on simple systems. Now, I find myself having a hard time wrapping my brain around many of the features in the digital console, because I have nothing to relate them too in my low budget analog experience. I know I'm not alone, as digital consoles get cheaper, more and more of us us with experience using only simple tools are getting the chance to play with some serious big boy toys.
SO, I'm requesting, without getting too console specific, a discussion of big concepts and your best tips for making the change to digital mixing. If you've recently made the change to digital, what were the breakthrough moments of understanding for you? What was the hardest thing to wrap your head around and how did you overcome it? If you've been using digital mixers for a while, what are your three best tips? What concepts should I focus on mastering first? What is the key to converting to the digital world? If you want to address some of the specific example's I've thrown out great, but don't feel constrained to any one topic.
Perhaps a collaborative article on converting from analog to digital mixing would be better. Thanks! I look forward to any and all advice as I trudge through these online tutorials.
SO, I'm requesting, without getting too console specific, a discussion of big concepts and your best tips for making the change to digital mixing. If you've recently made the change to digital, what were the breakthrough moments of understanding for you? What was the hardest thing to wrap your head around and how did you overcome it? If you've been using digital mixers for a while, what are your three best tips? What concepts should I focus on mastering first? What is the key to converting to the digital world? If you want to address some of the specific example's I've thrown out great, but don't feel constrained to any one topic.
Perhaps a collaborative article on converting from analog to digital mixing would be better. Thanks! I look forward to any and all advice as I trudge through these online tutorials.
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