Q&A - Production Equipment
Q: Daeun & A: Dr. Isoda
What instruments do you use/play?
- Piano
- Kurzweil K2700 as a master keyboard
- Sequential synthesizers (Prophet-10, Prophet-5 Module, etc.)
- Sadowsky guitars with Fender '65 Princeton Reverb
- My original motion instrument (RIAX)
- And a variety of percussion instruments (I especially love Cajon.)
What DAWs do you use/teach?
- Pro Tools Ultimate, Logic Pro (for tracking, composing, editing, and mixing)
- Wwise and Nuendo (for interactive audio creation)
- WaveLab Pro (for mastering)
What music notation software do you use?
- I primarily use Finale, but students may bring in Dorico, Sibelius or MuseScore files for composition lessons.
What virtual instruments do you use the most?
- Spitfire Audio BBC Symphony Orchestra Professional
- Spectrasonics Omnisphere
What plugins do you use the most?
- FabFilter Pro-L 2 / Pro-Q 3 / Pro-R 2, and Vintage Tube EQ in Logic Pro
What microphones do you use the most to record classical albums?
- Schoeps MK2’s for the main A-B stereo pair or Decca Tree
- Schoeps MK4’s for spot mics
I love the warm and sweet sound of Schoeps microphones.
- DPA 4006A’s for pianos
Beautiful clarity and details!
- Royer 122 mkII’s for brass instruments
- Neumann U87 Ai’s for voices and solo instruments
- AKG C12 VR for some solo instruments
What mic pre-amps/ADC do you use for recording?
- Prism Sound Atlas x4 (32 channels) with Antelope 10MX Rubidium Atomic Clock
I love the sound of Prism Sound pre-amps and ADC/DAC, especially with an external master clock.
Do you use any analogue gear for mastering?
- Manley Variable Mu Limiter/Compressor (Mastering Version)
- Manley Massive Passive Stereo EQ (Mastering Version)
Only if needed. In other words, mostly done with plugins.
What audio interfaces do you use in your studio?
- Prism Sound Atlas
- Dangerous Music CONVERT-AD+ when analogue processors are inserted
What monitor speakers do you use?
- ATC SCM45A Pro
- ATC SCM20ASL Pro mk2
- GENELEC 8010A
What headphones do you use?b
- beyerdynamic DT 770 Pro 80Ω (for tracking)
- Focal Clear MG Professional (for mixing)
Do you have any other favorite sound production equipment?
- Mogami cables
- Radial JDI Direct Box
- SSL UF1 Advanced DAW Controller (I’m a minimalist, and this control surface is very helpful.)
Now about video productions, what cameras do you use?
- It depends, but we use Panasonic Professional 4K camcorders and robotic remote cameras at our school. I personally use Nikon cameras with external video recorders.
What tripods do you use?
- At school, we use Sachtler heads with Flowtech tripods which are great, but I personally love Cartoni for video and Gitzo for photography.
What video editing and compositing software do you use/teach?
What other software do you regularly use?
- Arduino IDE
- Cura
- Cyberduck
- Excel, PowerPoint, Word with EndNote
- HeavyM Pro
- Illustrator, Photoshop, Acrobat DC
- KiCad
- MATLAB
- Max/MSP
- Processing
- QLab
- Rhino
- Sublime Text
- SuperCollider
- Zoom with Loopback