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Valuing Your Worth and Getting Paid

Happy New Year, SoundGirls! Let me start by saying I hope you all have a fantastic year ahead of you. I hope you get that gig you’ve been working toward for years. I hope you learn lessons that make you a better engineer, and business owner. Most of all I hope you have fun! We engineer because we love music, we love the job, and because we all want to live exciting lives! So, I challenge you this year to do all of these things.

For my first blog post, I’m going to jump right into the nitty-gritty: payment. First of all, we as women and as creatives often sell ourselves short when it comes to how much we charge and how strict we are about receiving payment. We’ve all been there. You’re spending hours on a song, an EP, an album, and you haven’t even seen half of what you should’ve made yet. I know I have spent hours in front of Pro-Tools working on a mix only to do the math and realize I have made less than minimum wage for hours invested in a project. Why does it give so many of us anxiety to charge what we deserve? I mean this is how we make our living, isn’t it?

Now, I will clarify that I engineer for more than just the money. I feel so passionate about this work that I tear up sometimes – especially when I finish a project. I love helping people bring their music to life, hold their project in their hands and share it with the world. Engineering warms my soul. It gives me a strong sense of purpose. I imagine many of you feel similarly, and this is likely the reason we have anxiety about asking for what we deserve. It’s true; we are fortunate to have such a cool occupation – one that sometimes doesn’t even feel like “work.” We’ve all had those sessions we walk away from thinking, “I had that much fun, and I get paid for it?”

However, being paid fairly for our work is still essential. It’s taken practice, but I’m better at realizing my worth and charging appropriately. I’ve also learned to make sure I see half of it up front before beginning a project. I always ensure I get paid immediately at the end of a session. I also only take projects that excite me. I’ve stopped taking projects just for the money or because I feel like I have to say yes to everything that comes my way. I’m engineering because it makes me happy, so I choose to work on the music and with the artists that make me happy. I hope that is what all of you decide to do this year, too.

So, to bring this first blog post to a close; here are some key things to have ready to bring up the next time you are talking to a potential client about pricing:

An Underwater Recording Adventure

I recently began work on a new show, and luckily it has already presented tons of new challenges.  At Boom Box Post, we like to consider sound design challenges as creative opportunities. So, when I spotted an episode in which the characters travel via microscopic submarine through a human body, I was excited.  Each exterior shot of the submarine illustrated it moving through a viscous plasma-like liquid. I wanted to call upon the tried and true sounds of a submarine for the vehicle itself, but I wanted to do something unique for the sound of it moving through the plasma.  This was the perfect opportunity to get creative with some recording!

This presented an immediate challenge:  we do not own a hydrophone. I looked into buying one, but they are somewhat expensive, and our underwater recording needs are pretty slim.  It didn’t seem worth the investment. I considered using one of my current mics and wrapping it in a water-proof casing, but that struck me as pretty risky.  So, I settled on buying a couple of inexpensive contact mics, a pack of condoms to act as waterproofing, and some heavy duty duct tape to put it together.

About Contact Mics

If you’ve never used a contact microphone before, they are wonderful things.  Sometimes called piezo (pronounced pee-EH-zo) mics, they are what is used for the pickups on electric guitars.  You can buy them as a standalone version, and either tape them to the object you are recording or use the adhesive on the mic itself, thus turning any everyday object into an electric whatever (i.e., electric cello, electric rainstick–the possibilities are endless!)  But, keep in mind that they work differently than all of the other microphones in your mic locker. Normal microphones pick up subtle changes in air pressure as an audio wave passes the microphone. Conversely, contact mics pick up the vibrations of physical matter and transduce those vibrations into an electric signal which can be transduced again into audio.

Thus, contact microphones have no sensitivity to the audio waves passing through the air. This makes them very unique as recording devices (and sound designer tools!) because you don’t need to worry about ambient noise that must be removed later.  A great example of this is that if you were to, say, turn on an electric beard trimmer and skim it across the surface of a cymbal, a traditional microphone you would pick up not only the awesome sound of metal on metal but also the whir of the trimmer’s electric motor.  If you, instead placed a contact mic on the surface of the cymbal, you would only pick up the sound of the trimmer skimming the metal cymbal, because it does not transduce sound waves traveling through air, only those through the physical object itself.

Now, would this particular technology lend itself to recording underwater?  That was a tough call. Would the pressure differences in the water as the mic moved through it be extreme enough for the contact mic to pick up the physical change?  I acquired all of the necessary parts: contact mic, tape, condom (for waterproofing), recorder, and headphones, and then filled a small metal tub with water to find out.

The Trial Run

I learned a lot from this initial experiment.  Dragging the submerged contact mic through the water did not result in any audio.  However, turning on the faucet and letting the water hit the contact mic did. Unfortunately, that audio did not have the sound that I was looking for.  It was crackly (think: rain drops landing with hard splats on a plastic surface), not watery. From there, I tried submerging the microphone near the point of entry of the running water and found that I got a great bubbly sound.  The water pressure was changing constantly as the faucet poured into the basin, but I wasn’t getting the hard hits of the water slamming against the mic itself. I brought those sounds into Pro Tools, and while they were definitely in the vein of what I wanted, the size just wasn’t there.  They sounded too small.

The Final Record Session

So, I took the recorder home and did my final session in my home bathtub.  I submerged the mic and recorded steadies at the point of entry of the water, and then ran the mic back and forth over that area for the submarine bys.  The contact mic, being that it records physical vibrations, picked up fabulously unique splatty sounds for these–just what I was looking for!

Editing the Material

I brought everything into ProTools again and then was faced with an additional technical issue inherent to almost all contact mics.  Because they consist of small capacitors in series, they function at a much higher impedance than a regular microphone. When connected to a typical line input, this creates a high pass filter, thus cutting out any low end from your recordings.  I was aware of this issue and had set up my session with this in mind. I separated the files I wanted to work with, then ran them through a low-pass filter EQ, pitched them down an octave, and also applied both tactics to each file to see which approach brought the sounds closest to what I was looking for.  In the end, I bounced some of each. Here are a few samples:

The Sounds

You can hear the final product here

Kate’s Gear Recommendations

Sony PCM-M10 Portable Linear PCM Voice Recorder with Electret Condenser Stereo Microphones, 96 kHz/24-bit, 4GB Memory & USB High-Speed Port

Neewer Piezo Contact Microphone Pickup for Guitar Violin Banjo OUD Ukulele Mandolin and More

Gorilla Tape, Black Tough & Wide Duct Tape, 2.88″ x 30 yd, Black

Trojan Non-Lub Latex Condoms, Enz 12 ct – 4pk

This Blog originally appeared in Boom Box Post Blogs

 

Things we learn in a year

As December is approaching us, another year is gone. Time flew by, and I swear it was just January!

A year ago I could’ve never imagined that I would’ve learned the things that I’ve learned and worked with some amazingly talented artists, some whose music I have grown up with. I would’ve never thought I’d work on big events, having to plan and prepare for the Brits Awards after-party in February, our first birthday party in May with the amazing Gabrielle on stage, and last week we had Sophie Ellis Bextor doing a surprise performance. I mean, what a year!

With big events comes great responsibilities but also great learning opportunities. When you continuously challenge yourself and learn from your mistakes you are always improving!

Here are a few things that I’ve learnt this year that I thought I’d like to share:

Power – It started with the Brits Awards after-party. The production we had in was insane, with extra everything! Extra lighting, extra sound system, LED screens, etc. All these extra things needed extra power, which we at the time did not have. Luckily we have some great electricians on site that helped me with getting all the extra power installed, with very short notice! Spending time with electricians is always useful as you learn so much from them, and without their knowledge, we wouldn’t be able to have such an extravagant show!

Brit Awards After Show

Brit Awards After Show

Network – Audio via network and Dante is great when it’s working. Not so much when it’s not, it is tough to troubleshoot where the issue might be. Our whole audio system stopped communicating the night after the Brits Awards after-party. I was about to cry after having worked an insane amount of hours. It took over a week to fix, and the basic explanation of the issue was the power to the switch inside our stage was powered off, which meant that it lost all the IP addresses, so it did not know where to send the audio! I’d like for that to never happen again!

Knowledge – If you do not know how something is working, then learn it! Due to some changes in one of our weekly nights we needed to be able to control our lights more in-depth. The issue was that none of us actually knew how to use the lighting desk properly. So I reached out and arranged for a full day of training for my team and me in how to use the Zero 88 Jester 24 lighting desk! It was a lot of fun, and it’s great to be able to incorporate out lighting rig into our shows. There’s not much room for us being able to be creative, but hey some colour here and there makes a huge difference!

Being a manager – Make sure to triple-check that everyone is doing what they’re supposed to do. That is to check in on everyone you’re working with and getting regular updates on what they’re doing. Sometimes people just need a reminder, but this is so important to make sure everything is running on time. On the day of a big event, you do not want to find out that someone hasn’t dealt with a particular thing, which can cause a lot of stress and issues on the day. You do not need that in your life.

Inequality – It’s frustrating when people treat you differently because of your gender or other reasons, however, try and not let it affect you. Just do your job and do it great. This is forever a reminder to myself to just let it go and focus on what I’m supposed to do, my job.

Back up – Back everything up. Thrice. On different USBs and laptops.

Learn from your mistakes – Admit when you messed it up and deal with it. Don’t repeat your mistakes!

Looking back at this year it’s been insane and went way too quickly. However, having taken the time to reflect, I realise now how far I’ve come and how much I’ve learned. Now it’s all about the new year and to continue advancing within the audio industry. Who knows where we will be this time next year?

 

Arica Rust: In Love with Live Sound Technology

Arica Rust works for Sound on Stage in San Francisco as a staff engineer. Sound on Stage is a sound system rental company based in the San Francisco Bay Area, providing systems for a wide range of events ranging from high-profile corporate entertainment to rock festivals like Outside Lands and Treasure Island Music Festival. Arica has been with SOS for the last six years, which means she wears many hats and works as an engineer for FOH and Monitors, stage patch, and whatever else they might throw at her. Her favorite position is as a FOH systems engineer. She enjoys being on the road and recently completed the North American leg of the Ben Howard Tour as the PA Systems Tech.

Arica has been working in live sound for the last nine years and came to it as many do, with a love of music. Her initial dream was to work in a recording studio. Her journey into live sound started when she went to City College of San Francisco to study studio recording and found herself in the live sound classes as well.

City College of San Francisco offers an excellent audio program, providing several different certificate programs and is headed up by SoundGirl Dana Labrecque. (Dana runs the Bay Area SoundGirls Chapter and is a Co-Director or SoundGirls). After attending the live sound classes and her first internship, that was it; Arica knew live sound was where she wanted to be. When she was a teenager, Arica says, “ I spent all my lunch money buying records and going to concerts with my friends. I originally went to college in upstate New York out of high school to study avant-garde Electronic Music and Creative Writing at Bard College”.

“I want to be able to make people experience music the way that I do with that same feeling where it lights your brain on fire. I figured the best way to shape people’s experience was to be on the technical side of the stage”.

Arica and her friend Tiffani used to throw underground electronic music events in the Bay Area and would use her friends’ rental company Word of Mouth Sound. When she was looking for her first internship while at City College of San Francisco, she contacted them and ended up working behind the scenes at the events she used to attend. She completed her trade certificates in Live Sound and Recording Arts at CCSF before transferring to San Francisco State University.

Realizing that she wanted to work in live sound on the technical side set Arica on her way. She went on to study at San Francisco State University and earned a Bachelor’s Degree in Broadcasting and Electronic Media Arts with a focus in Audio Production. Professor John Barsotti taught the audio program in the broadcasting department and introduced Arica to Sound on Stage.

Arica continues to immerse herself in ongoing education and training, receiving certification in Rational Acoustics’ SMAART, L-Acoustics Levels 1 and 2, and attends various AES related conventions and events. “I value the importance of education and feel that no matter how much one thinks they know, there is always something new to discover. I try to learn from a variety of sources whether it is from the war stories of other engineers or diversifying my training from different manufacturers”.

Arica’s long-term goals have changed since she started on her audio path: “It’s funny how your goals change over time as you learn more. I went to school imagining myself mixing albums for bands, but now I am way more interested in the science of sound and designing, deploying, and tuning systems for different clients”. She also loves teaching and getting people excited about science.

What if any obstacles or barriers have you faced?

The biggest obstacles I have had to face have always been the ones I create for myself. I think I will forever be plagued with Imposter Syndrome: the feeling that I am not good enough, smart enough, know enough, etc. to be where I am. No matter how much I try to prove myself there is always that feeling in the back of my head of self-doubt, but then I’ll have those magical moments where the show starts and maybe it’s music I’ve heard before or, even better, a band I’m unfamiliar with that just blows me away, and I feel like I’m right where I need to be doing what I love.

How have you dealt with them?

I just keep telling myself over and over that “I got this” when I start doubting myself. I stay focused on doing the best I possibly can. I try not to let my demons in my head get the best of me and put 110% in everything I do. It’s easy to get jaded, but even if this time you don’t get acknowledgment for your efforts, eventually hard work shows and people respect that. I do things to help me relax and get in a confident headspace. For example, I have a playlist that I sometimes listen to before going into work to get myself ready to go.

The advice you have for women and non-binary people who wish to enter the field?

I wish we lived in a world where people do not change the way they interact with you based on what they perceive to be your gender, but sadly that is not the reality yet. Things are getting better slowly but surely, but my best advice is to have a tough skin and be the bigger person. People should not be allowed to get away with unprofessional behavior, but you have to counter these situations with professionalism. If you work hard and show everyone your value, then it should not matter who you are. I want to be seen for my skills as an engineer not what people perceive to be my gender.

Must have skills?

I joke that this industry is 20% technical knowledge and 80% customer service skills. You can teach anyone how to operate a board, but not everyone can learn the people skills to interact with artists and clients. A good attitude and a willingness to work will get you farther at first than knowing how to mix. Also always be open to exploring new things and learning from others. I am continually learning and re-evaluating my current knowledge because technology is ever changing and I respect the wisdom of people who share their experience with me.

Favorite gear?

My favorite rig is L-Acoustics K2 with KS28 subs, Kara Outfill, and Arc Wide front fill. I don’t think I could leave home without my laptop running SMAART v8 and the modeling software of the manufacturer whose PA I am working with, my ISEMCON EMX-7150 measurement mic, my multimeter, and my disto. I have Roland Octa-capture and Focusrite Scarlett 2i2 USB interfaces in my A and B rigs as well as a soldering iron to fix problems on the job.

What is your favorite day off activity?

I enjoy spending time and catching up with my friends when I am not working. The industry demands you to sacrifice a lot of your social life, but it is essential to make an effort to keep in touch with your loved ones when you can. Your real friends understand when you are busy because they want to see you doing what you love to do. I also am passionate about my dance practice and reading anything from comic books to technical white papers.

Anything else you would like to leave us with?

I would like to stress the importance of self-care. I think there is a lot of taboo around taking care of your self because everyone works hard and plays hard. I’ve failed, many times, to eat enough, sleep enough, drink enough water while working long hours and paid the consequences on my body and mind sooner or later. It’s important to take time to decompress and reset your brain, even just for a minute that you get to step away. This is a stressful job, but it is also a labor of love. Please feel free to reach out to me! I enjoy geeking out. You can contact Arica at aricarust@gmail.com

Learn more about Arica:

Find More Profiles on The Five Percent:

Profiles of Women in Audio

Seven Ways To Make the Most of the Quiet Season

Last year I put together a list of activities to make the most of the end-of-year quiet season. Ten Ways to Make the Most of the Quiet Season

With another one fast approaching, here are a few more suggestions.

Make time for family and friends

Touring schedules and unsociable working hours means that many of us let family commitments and get-togethers with friends slide a bit during the year. Quiet seasons are a great time to reconnect with your nearest and dearest. If it’s cold in your part of the world, wrap up warm and grab an appropriate hot beverage. If it’s warm, enjoy a natter over a few cold ones in the sunshine.

Get healthy Part 1 – revamp your diet

If you’re coming off the back of a hectic year, chances are you’ll be run-down and more susceptible to viruses. Being ill over the holiday season is no fun, so ward off the bugs by increasing your intake of fresh fruit and vegetables and staying hydrated.

Get healthy Part 2 – personal system overhaul

Make time to do a full checkup of the kit you carry to every job: your body. You only get one, so it’s worth putting in the time and effort for regular maintenance. Book in with your GP, dentist, optometrist, audiologist, whoever you need to get your system back up and running.

Financial spring-clean

Boring but necessary! Get your accounts in order and your tax return ready. If numbers aren’t your thing, it’s also a great time to look for an accountant.

Get certified

If you’re anything like me, you have a list of new tools that you keep meaning to learn and certifications that you know you need to look into. With so much training and certification programmes available online, as long as you have a decent internet connection, there’s really no excuse not to get stuck in over a quiet period.

Get some rest

Your body needs it! Sleep, switch off, and rejuvenate.

This will be my last blog for Soundgirls for the foreseeable future. Thanks for reading, and I wish you a relaxing holiday break, wherever you are in the world.

SoundGirls note – We will miss Kirsty writing for us and we appreciate all the years and dedication she has dedicated to writing her blog.

When it stops running like clockwork – troubleshooting the basics

Live Digital Audio Part 4

What can you do when it goes wrong? Each live set up will vary, but there are a few fundamentals you can check before having to call tech support.

Snap, crackle, and pop – how to recognise digital issues

What does a sampling or word clock issue even sound like? Unfortunately, they can sound like all sorts of weird noises. As mentioned in previous posts, if your word clock starts to slip out of sync it will just sound a bit off. You may notice the stereo image doesn’t feel as big, or it sounds a little dull, or phasey. More disconcerting problems manifest themselves as strange periodical pops or clicks, or even like someone twanging a rubber band. Think of the 1s and 0s – if the information isn’t transmitted correctly there isn’t any intermediate value, there is no 0.5 in binary. The bit is either there, or it isn’t. Devices then try to read the empty (or partially empty, in the case of slight mistiming) slot and it may result in random noise. If we go back to our video analogy if you’re watching an analogue transmission and the reception goes bad, it will go fuzzy around the edges, but it’ll still be watchable. If a digital transmission does the same, the entire image tends to freeze, become pixelated, or fill with weird patterns and colours.

Don’t overcomplicate it

So what can you do about it? The number one step should be to make sure it is actually a digital issue. Don’t hear hooves and presume zebras. If something is crackling, make sure it isn’t a bad stage cable or piece of backline, etc. If there’s a weird noise, is it over the entire system or is it just on one or two channels? If it isn’t global, it’s more likely to be something like a broken input or analogue transmission line. If it’s over several channels, it could be crosstalk in a multipin cable or something in one area of the room that several mics are picking up.

If you’re certain it’s a sampling or word clock problem, think through the signal path methodically, like you would with any other fault. Make sure everything is still set to the correct sample rate, master clock, and IP address. Check your cables are seated correctly – this is especially important for BNC connectors. Due to the central pin being so small, if they aren’t in the socket completely straight, or are taking a lot of strain, they can lose too much of their connecting surface area and stop passing signal. Optimally (I always try to secure cables in such a way that the weight is taken off the connections for this reason. It also keeps the cable in good condition for longer). Double-check that you haven’t connected cables of differing impedance. Work from one end of the signal path to the other, swapping out cables or bypassing devices one at a time. Take it down to the simplest setup you can, removing things like effects units or even the desk. If your amps have the capability, playing music or pink noise directly into them can take a big chunk of your setup out of the equation. If you are still experiencing problems, check that everything’s firmware is up to date, or at least the same version as other devices of the same type (e.g., all the amps, or desk stage boxes).

Have you tried turning it off and on again?

If this is all in order, it’s time to turn things off and on again! I know it sounds like a cop-out, but power cycling devices (using that term in front of clients makes you sound more professional than saying you’re turning it off and on again) can force them to reset to the right settings, or do their boot-up checklist, where they do a sweep of the network and see other devices that they might have lost contact with for whatever reason. It might not be enough to just switch it off; completely unplugging the device from its power source and leaving it for half a minute can sometimes make it forget any bad information it had stored and start again. Of course, be sure to save anything you need, like your show file, before trying this step!

Make the call

If none of this helps, I’m sorry to say it’s time to call tech support. But here’s the secret to most tech’s tech support: it’s other techs. Nearly everyone in this industry has friends who know more than them about certain topics, which they can phone when they’re stuck.  If nothing else, they might know the solution just because they’ve had the same thing happen to them before. Yet another reason to be (genuinely) nice to everyone; we’re all part of a hive mind of knowledge, and nearly all of us are more than happy to help a colleague out of a bind. On top of this, audio equipment manufacturers are invested in making sure you don’t have bad experiences with their gear, and their support people are often ex-techs themselves, so they will definitely want to sort you out! There’s no shame in tapping into that knowledge if it gets the gig back up and running, and soon enough you’ll be the one who receives the panicked phone call half an hour before doors. Just remember that the more problems you experience, the more you can help others in the future.

Finding the Right Companies to Freelance With

Freelancing is a standard part of our industry and the way many organizations find their labor for various kinds of shows. As freelancers, people often worry about where their paycheck is going to come from; including how they are going to cover things such as insurance, taxes, and the grocery bill. However, there are other aspects to freelancing that need consideration as well. Yes, freelancing is about the paycheck just like most work, but it is also about being your own boss, in which you get to pick and choose who you work for and what you do each day. As you are choosing companies to partner with I think there are a few things that can help quality companies stand out.

As I’ve mentioned in many blogs before communication is essential, make sure you are getting the information you need to do the job and to succeed at the event. You are partnering with the company that has hired you while also representing them onsite. Everyone needs to be on the same page to make sure the entire team succeeds. This means there must be good communication involving all of those contributing to the event.

A freelancer needs to be able to trust the company they are working for. Trusting that the company will follow through on their commitments, provide the tools needed, and pay your invoices within a timely manner. Make sure the company holds their full-time employees accountable. A lack of accountability could result in tough events, missed content, and terrible communication. Also, as a freelancer, the company also needs to trust you. Trust that you know your craft and will remain flexible as the client will change their mind, and to be prepared for what the event needs.

Trust also brings understanding; any company you would be willing to work for must understand that you are a freelance employee. You will be working for other people and taking on different events and projects. Your schedule will be full at times when the company calls; they need to be ok with you saying no, and still be willing to call you next time. You are not obligated to work for the same company all the time, that would be a full-time job, but if the company doesn’t recognize that or gets angry if you’re not available it might not be a good fit.

The overall culture and feel of the company are essential too. We all know the stereotypical angry techie. If the whole company is like that, it might not be a great environment to work in. Look for a positive working group that builds teamwork, communication, and is prepared for their events. The long days can get tough, especially when things don’t go according to plan. Working with a negative crew will only make it worse when you reach hour 16 of that supposed to be 10-hour event. Freelancing is an excellent opportunity to work a variety of events with many different people and partnering with the right companies can make the experience that much better.

Mixing with a Toddler

Being an Audio Parent is a challenge but also incredibly rewarding. Managing pregnancy in the audio industry is a lot about self-care. Managing an infant and working in the audio industry is about mental and physical exhaustion. But then everything starts getting easier, you catch up on sleep, and you start feeling like yourself again. At the same time, this little personality is starting to emerge – they talk, say words, and have lots of preferences (Including music. It’s fascinating what my son likes and doesn’t.)

The biggest challenge we’ve faced with a young toddler (for my husband and me since we both work in audio) is balancing the things we each want to do – especially gigs or projects that involve our free time – with what everyone else wants to do. Who takes priority and when? How do you balance and keep everyone happy?

The hard stuff

Basic life tasks are more complicated. The analogy I use is taking a cat in public. Can you imagine going out to dinner with a loose cat and try not to disrupt anyone else? How about waiting in a long check-out line with a cat? Or being an airplane? It gives a new appreciation for a working parent who can show up on time, do their job without making mistakes, and can stay level-headed and cordial throughout.

Mom’s guilt gets worse. One of the most difficult things a working parent faces is not being there when your child needs you. It’s gut-wrenching when your child doesn’t want you to leave when you’re trying to get out of the house. Missing out (on activities or milestones) is a huge source of mom guilt. While I love seeing videos – like my son bowling for the first time while I’m at work – I’d rather be taking him myself.

Work guilt gets worse. In the past couple of years, I’ve seen some of my friends (without kids) make huge leaps in their careers. I’m genuinely happy for them but it’s also a reminder that my foot isn’t on the gas pedal. It’s a tough place because you’re totally capable of doing the work. It stinks to turn down a gig you want cause you can’t find a babysitter or you can’t be on call 24-7 (which is what is expected on some gigs). I’m constantly evaluating: Is this opportunity good for everyone (family, client, and me) or just for me? Am I going to come out of this gig feeling positive and fulfilled or just wiped out? Before the question was just, “Is this going to help my career or not?”

A toddler becomes your most demanding client. A toddler is a bit like an artistic genius with poor social skills. Every day they say or do something amazing or new but then they have a tantrum or 5 out of nowhere. You can’t use logic with a toddler who’s melting down because they want to wear clothes in the bath. The level of patience it takes on a daily basis can wear you thin some days. It’s affected my choice of work at times (very similar to morning sickness during pregnancy.)

Working nights is getting more complicated. Working swing shift wasn’t that big of a deal with an infant (it worked pretty nicely, actually). It’s harder when toddler activities tend to be in the morning (things like classes, playdates, preschool, etc).

The good stuff

Moms are more productive at work. Studies show women with children are more productive at work than women without children or men (whether they have kids or not!)

Working can be healthy for your kids, too. A Harvard Business School study shows kids who have an employed mom are just as happy as kids with an at-home mom. Daughters who had a working mom tend to do better in their careers, too.

Having a toddler enables you to connect with a wider variety of people at work. Talking about kids is an easy way to relate and to break the ice with some people who are reserved or private otherwise. I’ve gotten some great parenting advice through work, too.

You zero in on what’s important. When you have a lot of interests (or ambitions) and don’t have a lot of free time, it forces you to prioritize what’s most important. You don’t realize how much time you can lose by having too many interests (I think this is common in audio where we want to learn a lot of different skills, software or gear, types of work, etc). It may help you achieve goals faster to put energy into one or two things at a time.

You feel closer to the community, not further away. When you’re spending time at places like parks, play gyms, and playdates, you connect with more people in “normal” jobs than when you’re fully immersed in the audio industry. It’s a reminder we can relate and support each other in a way others can’t. (LA is a quirky outlier, though. Our preschool asked if either parent worked on-set as part of their emergency questions.)

For me, having a toddler has motivated me to start something new: a blog about kids and sound called Sound Is Fun. There’s a lot of interesting research about sound relating to kids that I had never heard before in the audio industry. For example, did you know children under the age of 5 are more at risk of hearing damage than adults? Since their ear canals are shorter, the sound pressure level is actually 10 dB higher. Background noise affects test scores and learning for kids and teens and it affects how toddlers learn language (tip: toddlers need dialog and vocals much clearer than an adult would for intelligibility). There is a lot to be explored in this area and I’m looking forward to learning more about it.

 

Understanding AD / DA converters

Generally, an analog-digital converter is an electronic device that converts an analog voltage input to a digital number. The digital output can use different coding schemes, such as binary, although some non-electrical or partially electrical devices can be considered as analog-digital converters.

The resolution of a converter indicates the number of discrete values ​​it can produce over a range of voltage values. It is usually expressed in bits.
For example, a converter that encodes an analog input of 1 to 256 discrete values ​​(0..255) has a resolution of 8 bits: that is, 2 raised to 8. The resolution can also be defined electrically and expressed in volts.

 

ANALOG SYSTEM AND DIGITAL SYSTEM

Electronic circuits can be divided into two broad categories: digital and analog. Digital electronics use magnitudes with discrete values, while analog electronics use magnitudes with continuous values.

A digital system is any device intended for the generation, transmission, processing or storage of digital signals. Thus, the digital system is a combination of devices designed to manipulate physical quantities or information that are represented in digital form; that is, they can only take discrete values.

For the implementation of digital circuits, logic gates (AND, OR and NOT) and transistors are used. These doors follow the behavior of some functions.

A system is analog when the magnitudes of the signal are represented by continuous variables, this is analogous to the magnitudes that give rise to the generation of this signal. An analog system contains devices that manipulate physical quantities represented in analog form. In a system of this type, quantities vary over a continuous range of values.
Thus, an analog magnitude is one that takes continuous values. A digital quantity is one that takes a set of discrete values.

An analog signal is a voltage or current that varies smoothly and continuously. A sine wave is a single frequency analog signal. The voltages of voice and video are analog signals that vary according to the sound or variations of the light that corresponds to the information being transmitted.

Digital signals, in contrast to analog signals, do not vary continuously but change in steps or in discrete increments.

Advantages of Digital Circuits

• Reproducibility of results – Proof
• Ease of design –
• Flexibility and functionality
• Programmability
• Speed
• Economy
• Constant technological progress

The method of digital signal processing also enables the implementation of more sophisticated signal processing algorithms. It is usually very difficult to perform precise mathematical operations on signals in analog format, but these same operations can be carried out routinely on a digital computer using the software.

The ADC converter (Analog-to-Digital Converter – Digital Analog Converter) has to carry out the following processes:

1.- Sampling of the analog signal.
2.- Quantization of the signal itself
3.- Coding of the result of the quantization, in binary code.


The sampling of an analog signal

The graphic representation of half positive cycle (+), corresponding to an analog electrical sound signal, with its corresponding harmonics. As can be seen, the voltage or voltage variation values ​​in this sinusoid can vary on a scale.

To convert an analog signal into digital, the first step is to perform a sampling (sampling) of it, or what is the same, take different samples of voltages or voltages at different points of the sine wave. The frequency at which the sampling is done is called ratio, rate or also sampling frequency and is measured in kilohertz (kHz). In the case of digital audio recording, the greater the number of samples taken, the higher the quality and fidelity of the resulting digital signal.


During the sampling process, numerical values ​​equivalent to the voltage or voltage existing in different points of the sinusoid are assigned, with the purpose of carrying out the quantization process.

The most commonly used sampling rates or frequencies for digital audio are the following:

• 24,000 samples per second (24 kHz)
• 30,000 samples per second (30 kHz)
• 44 100 samples per second (44.1 kHz) (CD quality)
• 48,000 samples per second (48 kHz)

 

To sample an analog electrical signal and then convert it to digital, the first step is to take discrete voltage or voltage values ​​at regular intervals at different points on the sine wave.

Therefore, a signal whose sampling is performed at 24 kHz, will have less quality and fidelity than another made at 48 kHz. However, the greater the number of samples taken, the greater the bandwidth needed to transmit a digital signal, also requiring a much larger space to store it.

Quantization of the analog signal

The quantization represents the sampling component of the variations of values ​​of voltages or voltages taken in different points of the sine wave, which allows to measure them and assign them their corresponding values ​​in the decimal number system, before converting those values ​​into a binary numerical system.


 Coding of the signal in binary code

After the quantization has been carried out, the values ​​of the voltage taps are represented numerically by previously established codes and standards. The most common is to encode the digital signal in binary code.

An example of an analog electronic system is the speaker, which is used to amplify the sound so that it is heard by a large audience. Sound waves that are analog at their source are captured by a microphone and converted into a small analog voltage variation called an audio signal. This voltage varies continuously as the volume and frequency of the sound change and is applied to the input of a linear amplifier.
The output of the amplifier, which is the amplified input voltage, is fed into the loudspeaker. It converts, again, the amplified audio signal into sound waves with a much higher volume than the original sound picked up by the microphone.

There are systems that use digital and analog methods, one of them is the compact disc player (CD). Music in digital form is stored on the CD. An optical laser diode system reads the digital data from the disk when it rotates and transfers them to the digital-to-analog converter (DAC, digital-to-analog converter). The DAC transforms the digital data into an analog signal that is the electrical reproduction of the original music. This signal is amplified and sent to the speaker. When the music was recorded on the CD, a process was used which, essentially, was the inverse of the one described, and which uses an analog-to-digital converter (ADC).

 

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