New in ProTools World

So....first off, let me say, J I know this took way to long to come up with, but I hope it's up to par.  I know you doing ya thing out in vegas...just like my dude here:



To everyone else, what's really good....this is Miles Walker.  I'm also an engineer based out Atlanta, GA.  I'm a self proclaimed gear head and full on studio rat too, and have been given the opportunity to share on my biggest homie's blog, so I hope I do it all justice.  For those that don't know me, I think an ichat convo between me and my homie AJ pretty much describe how J and I are linked in the universe...



I've felt the key to a good blog is to keep it short and sweet, and have a lot of pics.  I hope I can meet those requirements....

It took a while to come up with a topic I wanted to hit the mean streets of gridlock with, but it's something that will undoubtedly become a part of all our daily engineering and production lives.  The newest version of ProTools...version 8.   Most all studios have not yet upgraded to this version, while I only know of a few comrades that have upgrade the LE rig.  I decided to NOT go my usual route on this one and get all the facts in and go ahead and upgrade to PT HD 8 for my personal rig.  There is a lot to be said about this update.  The most obvious is the HUGE interface  update.  The visual is completely different than older versions and takes a good deal of getting used to.  Things off hand that jump out are the change of pan sliders to pan knobs, additional 5 mix insert points (10 plugins per track, not 5), and improved audiosuite/disk performance.  Here's Killface holding a channel strip:

Some things that don't jump right out, but are also nice changes include: DRAMATICALLY faster session load times, backwards compatibility without saving as a different session type (you do lose a few features however), as well as the option to load a session without plugins (for quick references), Some really nice bus and I/O listing options (as in, when you use a bus it is now color coded and easy to see) New included AIR effects plugins ( all kinds of distortion, modulation, filter, verb, etc), as well as AIR synths (piano, organ, drum mods, etc).  I think these upgrades are in direct competition with Logic, as the MIDI tracks and sequencing is also improved.  I'm not going to delve into that faction too much on this post, but trust....for a producer looking to use a software sequencer, I would have never recommend ProTools 7...but the more time I spend with 8, i'd consider it. 

Well...i'm going to cut it short there for my first big outting...but if you guys have any particular questions about PT 8...just hit me on my beeper