Recording to Analog to Digital to Analog to Digital etc.?

[JonathanRay]

Am I correct in thinking that most pro studios use both Analog and Digital recording to achieve a warmer, full sound? How could I do this in my home? What is used to do analog recording? How do they move between analog and digital? Thanks!

 

[ez_willis]

What is used to do analog recording?

Analog recorders use a magnetic tape based recording medium.

How do they move between analog and digital?

With analog to digital, then digital to analog(AD/DA) converters. Do a google search for AD/DA converters for many products to look at.

 

[Dani Pace]

Line out to line in. Going from a PC to a tape machine is easy, when you go from tape to digital chances are that you will need to align the tracks to sync. Basically it is the same process as hooking any two recorders together.

 

[Blue Bear Sound]

Am I correct in thinking that most pro studios use both Analog and Digital recording to achieve a warmer, full sound?

Not really... pro studios will use whichever format is most appropriate for the project. Sometimes one or the other, or some combination of both.

The difference between the pro studio and the home will be the calibre of gear -- quality of both digital and analog formats will be considerably higher than what is typically used in a home environment (ie - hi-end digital converters, and high-end analog -- most home users have never heard high-end digital, and also can't afford high-end analog!)

You're not really going to get that "analog sound" by running digital tracks into a portastudio or a cassette deck!

 

[acorec]

Am I correct in thinking that most pro studios use both Analog and Digital recording to achieve a warmer, full sound? How could I do this in my home? What is used to do analog recording? How do they move between analog and digital? Thanks!

Some use digital. some use analog for bed tracks, dump to digital and keep track'n. Most pro studios use whatever they accepted as their weapons of choice. You go to a pro studio and you get a pro sound (which is what they are paid for). The analog or digital thing is not really relevant. If you want to use a studio to make a record, you listen to examples of the studio's work. That is the sound you will get. Describe the sound and please come up with at least a different set of words instead of "creamy, warm, harsh, cold, tape compression etc.)


However the engineer gets the sound, if they are real pro's then they have it down, you just have to decide if their "sound" is one that you like or dislike and work from there.

Dumping from a digital rig to a 2 track analog deck for "warmth" is pretty useless in my opinion. How are you really gonna "correct" a sound through an analog deck with, at best, a 68db S/N ratio?

If the sound in digital is not right then the best thing to do is to stop and fix the problem.