Free Audio Engineering 101: A Beginner's Guide To Music Production Ebooks To Download
Audio Engineering 101 is a real world guide for starting out in the recording industry. If you have the dream, the ideas, the music and the creativity but don't know where to start, then this book is for you! Filled with practical advice on how to navigate the recording world, from an author with first-hand, real-life experience, Audio Engineering 101 will help you succeed in the exciting, but tough and confusing, music industry. Covering all you need to know about the recording process, from the characteristics of sound to a guide to microphones to analog versus digital recording. Dittmar covers all the basics- equipment, studio acoustics, the principals of EQ/ compression, music examples to work from and when and how to use compression. FAQ's from professionals give you real insight into the reality of life on the industry.
Paperback: 256 pages
Publisher: Focal Press; 1 edition (December 5, 2011)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0240819152
ISBN-13: 978-0240819150
Product Dimensions: 0.5 x 7.2 x 9 inches
Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (47 customer reviews)
Best Sellers Rank: #149,414 in Books (See Top 100 in Books) #49 in Books > Engineering & Transportation > Engineering > Civil & Environmental > Acoustics #76 in Books > Science & Math > Physics > Acoustics & Sound #95 in Books > Arts & Photography > Music > Recording & Sound
DISCLAIMER: Although this was given to me through Vine to review, unlike other questionable "reviewers", I actually take the time to USE the product or READ the book. So whatever score/review the product gets, it's absolutely earned. At no time is a product given a particular review or rating simply because I fear loosing Vine status. That's not how the Vine program operates.Anyhoo, onto the review:Plainly put, this is a great book. Not only does the author take the time to explain, in detail, what how and why things work the way they do, he also provides illustrations for the layman. I read this cover to cover over a period of a week and honestly learned quite a bit. And I've been in audio production for years! You can definitely tell the author knows his stuff and has actually DONE what he writes about. In lieu of some authors who just compile information and later jam it all together into what barely passes as a book.I definitely applaud the author and highly recommend this book to those wishing to learn the basics, and to a point, the higher-level operation of sound reproduction.
By the title, Audio Engineering 101, you know that Timothy A. Dittmar's book is going to cover that basics of Audio Engineering. Anytime you see that 101, as any community college student knows, you know it is going to be a rudimentary primer. Kind of Audio Engineering for Dummies. Some of the stuff is pretty basic, and I just kind of skimmed over it. Advice for interns, like not to tell clients how awful they sound, and don't sit around texting while rolling your eyes, etc., etc., etc..But there is a lot of practical information and explanation of audio concepts like compression, noise gates, EQ, phlanging, and phase. I really like the microphone guide which shows various types and brands of microphones along with graphs of frequency response: Cascade Fat Head, Small-Diaphragm Condenser, Neumann U 87, or the ubiquitous Shure SM58. One chapter is a round table where questions are posed to a group of recording engineers like, what mic would you take with you on a desert island? There is a website where you can go and download audio clips that illustrate the concepts being discussed.All in all, this is a handy book with a lot of good information that would be of interest to anyone interested in home recording or a career in audio engineering.
As someone who has recorded in a studio, and who has a digital recording system of his own, I gave this a try to see how it might help guide me through the recording process. First off, this book is not just about the technical end of recording - it also gives some good hints into interning, marketing, client relations, how to conduct yourself in the studio, etc. THIS portion of the book, although I will never utilize it, is pretty interesting and opened my eyes to a different side of the recording business.The first 2/3 of the book, which actually cover recording techniques, is why I was interested in this book. Here, this book doesn't seem to know what it's target audience is. The title says "Beginner's Guide to Music Production", and some portions were actually geared to beginners - how to listen, how to place speakers, song structures, how to set up a recording room, place microphones, etc. But then some portions were exceedingly detailed - 23 pages of excruiating detail on the frequecy responses of different microphones. And the chapter on the basics of a mixing board, while covering basic information, seemed to presume an understanding of certain terminologies and processes that weren't defined (and this happened on a couple other occasions, as I remember). Maybe if the reader understood the chapter on signal flow (Chapter 8) before the chapter on mixing consoles (Chapter 6) it would help.There are also some very basic sound clips and videos available on the internet as a companion to this book - these were referenced in the text, although the only way I knew how to access these were because the web address was on the back cover.So, there is some good information here, but not all of it is geared toward the beginner as presumed by the title. This would be a good COMPANION reference for someone already familiar with basic recording techniques.
In the interest of full disclosure I took Tim's Audio Engineering 1 class at Austin Community College. He's a great professor and a great guy whose company I really enjoy. He's also incredibly clear and informative during his lectures.Lucky for you, you don't need to live in Austin to garner some of Tim's wisdom. Audio Engineering 101 is a great resource for basic audio engineering info. The topics in the book are set out in a straight forward and logical order. The illustrations, examples, and tips are all useful. The section in chapter 5 that summarizes dozens of microphones prices, frequency responses, and characteristics is especially useful for someone trying to add some mics to their ever expanding collection. The layout of each chapter is done very well. I never need to flip back and forth between different sections to get the information I want because everything pertinent to any given subject is in its logical location in the book.I know some people have been hating on the illustrations (which, I admit, are a little goofy.) But if you aren't willing to overlook some goofy cartoons to get some quality information do you really want to be an audio engineer? Honestly, that seems like a horrible reason to not like a book with as as much wisdom as this one.
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