Ah yes, the part where I get to talk about my toys… That's always fun, but can I preach first? Before I talk about mixers, sequencers, and signal processors, let me state that no amount of technology can ever overcome poor source material. That is why I am such a big proponent of hiring real, living, feeling, passionate studio musicians to play as much music as I can possibly afford. There's nothing like capturing a brilliant performance of a red-hot musician - pouring their emotion into a fine acoustic instrument - to give you great source material to work with.
The QFG5
soundtrack is covered with it. I used a 32 piece orchestra, an 8 piece brass ensemble,
layers of vocalists, exotic wind instrument players, a harpist, a classical guitarist, and
even got into the microphone myself a few times.
All of the live recording was done on an ADAT-XT digital recording system. We used a Neumann M-149 microphone for the vocals, and all of the mono acoustic instruments. For stereo pairing, we inserted an AKG 414, or a couple of Audio Technicas. Tracking of the orchestra was done through a Soundcraft console, while individual overdubs were tracked on a Behringer console.
I mixed the entire project on the double O2R digital console set up in my studio. This offers up to 80 tracks of fully automated, digital mixdown. As if that wasn't enough, for the Quest For Glory V Overture I also brought in a Mackie 1604 in order to sub-mix certain support tracks. For signal processing, I used a pair of Lexicon PCM-90's and a pair of Lexicon PCM-80's. I also brought in an old Roland SRV-2000 reverb, and used some of the 02R's internal processors for early reflections, echoes, and doubling.
For the synthesized
portion of the recording, I used a Korg Trinity keyboard as a controller, with Cakewalk
Pro Audio as the sequencing program, on a Dell P-200. For sound generation, I use a
Kurzweil K2500R, three Roland JV-880's (2 orchestral expansion boards, 1 session expansion
board), a Korg Wavestation SR, a Roland TD-7 percussion module, a Roland D-70 keyboard, a
Korg 01/W keyboard, a Roland JX-10 keyboard, and the aforementioned Trinity.
I archive on a Panasonic SV-3800 DAT recorder. I do my digital editing in Sound Forge and
Cool Edit Pro on a Quantex P-200. And the whole studio is SMPTE synched through a JL
Cooper dataMaster.
You asked.