x
Chrza 25 December 2011

Can someone please tell me (who is currently an engineer) what the hours of this job are like? I want to start doing this for money, rather than just recording my friends bands... but I don't want to go crazy working long hours and start hating it.

Comments

audiokid Sun, 12/25/2011 - 14:51

Long hours should not be why you wouldn't do something as a career. If you said this to me I would pass you off. People that choose this for a profession do it because they love it so much they would do it for free. Clock watcher kill spirit. There simply isn't ever enough hours in the day for me to get tired of this business. I love it to death.

The music/ entertainment industry is full of long or short hours that go with the flow. The last thing I would ever expect to hear from an engineer is what you just said.
Just being honest. This does NOT sound like a career move suited for you.

thatjeffguy Sun, 12/25/2011 - 15:38

I have to agree with audiokid. This job is as much art as it is science, and art stems from passion, not obligation. If you need to ask how many hours then I would say this is definitely not what you should choose for a career. But to give some sort of actual response to your question:"It depends!".
If an artist is facing a deadline because she's already booked and promoted her CD release party, and you have only three days to finish mixing 12 songs and get it to the mastering engineer so he can do his thing and send it off to the duplication house so they can get copies back in the artist's hands in time for her release party, are you going to tell her "Well, it's 5 PM, time to quit. I'll see you at 9 AM tomorrow" when you know you've got at least 4 days worth of work to do in three days? Believe me, this is a realistic scenario.
And I haven't even mentioned the fact that it will likely take you years of practice and study before you begin to get truly "Professional" results from your efforts. Most people don't like to pay for amateur results.
If you have a passion for something, long hours won't cause you to hate it, it will just deepen the love affair!

Hope this is helpful, I don't want to be harsh with you, just giving you a dose of reality!

Jeff

MadMax Sun, 12/25/2011 - 21:22

Chrza, post: 381291 wrote: Can someone please tell me (who is currently an engineer) what the hours of this job are like? I want to start doing this for money, rather than just recording my friends bands... but I don't want to go crazy working long hours and start hating it.

Lemme see... today is Christmas Day...

Like most days... it's gonna be 12-18 hours long just in keeping up with the work I have scheduled this week...

If you want a regular schedule, or can't handle 12-36 hour days... find something else to do... you'll be much happier.

Mo Facta Wed, 01/11/2012 - 22:05

I've never agreed with the whole notion that you gotta work a million hours a week if you want to be an AE. I don't know how you guys have families working 90+ hours a week. And Max, I love you buddy but working on Christmas day is just crazy. Sometimes you gotta take your own time in this business and learn how to say "I'm not available". My wife would kill me, for one.

Truth be told I'm not a millionaire but I do alright and I don't put in 90 hours a week. If I sit in front of that screen for more than 10 hours I start to bug out and become useless. I believe that burning the midnight oil can often do more damage than good. Do you really know what you're listening too at the end of a 16 hour day? I may as well be deaf.

Another thing is, I don't agree that "it's all for the love". I do this for money. I also happen to be obsessed about audio but never forget that my services cost money. I have bills to pay just like everyone else and "love" doesn't pay them. That being said, if I had a career that required me to work 90 hours a week just to pay the bills and support my lifestyle I would seriously consider a career change.

Cheers :)

Davedog Thu, 01/12/2012 - 02:30

Lets just say, for example, that you do only put in 10 hours "in front of the screen"....thats a reasonable time with a couple of breaks. The other part that you havent addressed is the total time setting up the session, taking down the session, backing up, filing, housekeeping, all the little things that are included with this job. They all take time, and most of the little things involving taking care of your room and keeping the organizational stuff within the sanity line are unbillable.

MadMax Thu, 01/12/2012 - 04:54

Working on Christmas Day is not a biggie... just talk to any farmer with livestock. Cattle don't care if it's a holiday or not. They have to be milked, fed and watered every day. Once the chores are done, you can do what you want to.

Every single business owner I know works many "undocumented hours" as DD alluded to. There's everything from sweeping, dusting and washing dishes (daily), to cleaning the bathrooms, mopping (weekly), changing the air filters, repairing cables / gear, and bookkeeping, advertising, marketing (Monthly), filling the candy jars, mowing the yard, landscaping and even the management of eating, sleeping and family time. Not to mention keeping up with social media (grumble), forums and volunteer work in the community.

Every individual is different, just as almost every studio is different – in that with my room/monitor combination, I can easily work on a "routine" mix for 12-16 hours (with responsible ear rest) with no problem. I've also worked in a few rooms/situations where after 4 hours, I was done and knew I wasn't going to get any more productive time in. So, that's also a factor you should understand for individual situations.

I don't routinely put in 90 hour work weeks, but they aren't unknown to me either. My "average" work week at the console is less than 20 hours/week, but to maintain that 20 hours takes at least another 20 (and up to 40) hours of "undocumented"/non-billable hours... with the financial goal of minimizing that ratio.

Mo Facta Thu, 01/12/2012 - 22:14

Sure, I get it, but I guess my room just isn't as big you guys' as I can do all that stuff in a day! I run a small studio and as far as setup goes, most of the time the mics, etc are setup and just require positioning and/or plugging in. Not a biggie as far as time goes. Most of what I do is permanently patched so I can literally get to the session and start working as soon as possible.

Spring cleaning takes about 5 or 6 hours. Not too bad. Backing up can be done while I'm cleaning.

My usual session time (unless it's specifically a night session) is from 10am to 6pm, which is 8 hours. If the session needs more time I will most likely oblige because I don't wanna kill the vibe but generally an 8 hour session is fine for most producers/musicians/bands I know. Truth be told I've done those 16 hour sessions and worked on holidays but I really prefer not to unless it's absolutely necessary.

Maybe Africa is different but people here are pretty chilled and will often come late to a session and then leave early. Dis is Afrika, mon! I read an article in Mix once where the topic was something like, "how to balance being a producer [or engineer] with your personal life". The article really stuck with me all my career and the simple conclusion was that it was merely a choice. I like being with my family and I don't like draining my life away in a control room if I don't have to. I run my own audio business and I enjoy it immensely but not at the expense of my relationships.

Just my 2c (ZAR)

Cheers :)

Davedog Fri, 01/13/2012 - 01:10

I had a pretty big gap in my producing and engineering life while my kids were growing up. It was a conscious decision and one I dont regret. It also put a dent in my 'search for stardom'......LOLOLOL! Although there was a time when I could really play........(Now I'm great at faking whatever needs to be in a song).......I always stayed in touch with what was going on in the recording world....I even produced a few tapes and such ( TAPE?? WhUTS THAT DAD???!!!) while I didnt have my own facility but its not the same thing as pursuing it as a business and lifestyle.

Now I'm prepping for my retirement in a few short years. By the time I'm done with climbing ladders and making things safe electrically for families and businesses, my producing and engineering chops and clientele will be what I can make of it.

The great thing about it is this, all the things I learned as a kid havent gone out of style. No matter what technology brings us, mic techniques and choices, gain staging of input, listening with an open mind, making decisions and implementation of those, and other aspects of quality professional sound capturing havent changed much in all these years. Implementation changes as constantly as the gear available, but the basics still hold true to form. As long as the air surrounding the source is still full of the vibrations of the sound source, we still need engineers that understand the relationships between this and the pipelining of these noises into whatever device is currently in vogue.

As an owner of a room, it sometimes means 16 hour days even if its a hobby.

As a smart-ass aside to the OP.....Learn to spell engineer if ya wanna be one!

Theres an old joke about that........" Ya, wheen first ah come to dis country I canna spell e-gyn-eear and now I ar one...."

MadMax Fri, 01/13/2012 - 10:13

In some ways, I do envy some of the guys who have more compact facilities than this lil' shop of mine - for some of the very reasons Mo sites in his reply.

But that's not always the case here in my lil' corner of the world.

I might get a piano track on Monday evening, a full band in on Wed @ 9pm-1am, and a long-term multitrack client in on Sat afternoon. That being the case, my hours are pretty much all over the place.

If we still had little-ones in the house, it would be a lot different than what it is now... e.g. Empty Nester's. Which actually works well with our lifestyle and the after effects of the lightning.

RemyRAD Fri, 01/13/2012 - 10:55

You ought to try on location recording with a giganto Remote Truck. 3-5 hours of setup time required. And almost as long for the strike. Then there's all that time in between that for the performance or a full evening at a nightclub. On the average over 13 hours per gig. And that doesn't include any remixing nor overdubbing sessions. And for network television productions, you set up two days before the production. You have the rehearsal the day after setup. You have the production the day after rehearsal. Then there is nearly the day it takes to strike everything. And all for a single 1.5 hour long show. I mean since you're doing this in your bedroom, do you even bother to change out of your pajamas? I mean how many gigantic archival and restoration jobs have you attempted? Those can represent weeks even months of 12 hour days and/or nights. But of course with the studio & local bands coming in to knock out a fast and dirty demo, one only needs a few hours. So you're producing McDonald's like products/projects. And we are even talking about the complexity of a Big Mac. That's slightly easier than producing a bouillabaisse of delightful seafood along with a scratch built scratch built birthday cake and the prerequisite run to the seafood store, food store, liquor store. Dammit now I'm starving! Lunchtime!

Tacos for sure today
Mx. Remy Ann David

MadMax Fri, 01/13/2012 - 12:37

Oh jeeeze, yeah, Remy... remotes are a WHOLE 'nother ballgame!

Prep for a week before, making sure everything's jotted, noted and planned out. When you're 200 miles from home, there ain't no way to run to the mic locker for a 57 or a 4038 that (ooops) missed everyone's list... not to mention everything you have to take care of on the home front, while you're gone... plus the drive there and the drive back - always looking forward to the piles of stuff waiting on you that arrived while you were gone.

RemyRAD Fri, 01/13/2012 - 13:15

LMAO, back around 1987, before my Remote Truck, I went down to record a Jazz band in Georgetown, Washington, DC. So I'm virtually all set up in the Chevy van with my Soundtracs, 16-8-16. But where's my power supply?!?! Thanks to 62-year-old mom, she was able to go to my house and retrieve it for me. OMG! That was my biggest equipment faux pas ever! Geez! I was almost too embarrassed to post this here. Never made that mistake again. Nothing like forgetting the most important item for a remote recording. Thank God it wasn't NYC. Of course that belies the incident when, for a job down in Rocky Mount North Carolina, my Mercedes-Benz 1117 transmission failed. OMG, heart attack time. I had to yank out as much equipment as possible and stuff it all in my Chevy van. What a nightmare! But I made it. That was 1992 when I was still working full time for NBC-TV and trying to take jobs on the side. And there ain't much you can do about an act of God or an equivalent failure of a Mercedes 1117.

Only $4000 back then for transmission rebuild on that truck. Those were the days my friends.
Mx. Remy Ann David

RemyRAD Sat, 01/14/2012 - 21:37

Well at least you were pooping into a microphone back then and not in your pants anymore. With some of the remotes I've done, it was almost too easy to be pooping in my pants again! On one of my most difficult gigs back in 1995, my primary assistant engineer, didn't feel good, had to sit down, almost had a heart attack. And he worked at Aberdeen proving grounds where he daily has a big blast... to record and photograph in high-speed. Some of my friends that came with me from NBC couldn't believe how hard I and they had to work on these large rock 'n roll festival recordings. They thought running around with the camera on their shoulder was a big deal. They now know why they are video guys and I'm an audio guy.

It's not getting any easier at 56
Mx. Remy Ann David

Chrza Sun, 01/15/2012 - 22:12

Davedog, post: 382599 wrote:

...As a smart-ass aside to the OP.....Learn to spell engineer if ya wanna be one!

Theres an old joke about that........" Ya, wheen first ah come to dis country I canna spell e-gyn-eear and now I ar one...."

Wow you old ****, why dont you go write up another really long post with a bunch of shitty jokes, and write up a whole bunch of shit no one cares about. We're on the internet, not english class, no need for you to search and point out every grammatical error you see, professor.

Chrza Sun, 01/15/2012 - 22:19

audiokid, post: 381295 wrote: Long hours should not be why you wouldn't do something as a career. If you said this to me I would pass you off. People that choose this for a profession do it because they love it so much they would do it for free. Clock watcher kill spirit. There simply isn't ever enough hours in the day for me to get tired of this business. I love it to death.

The music/ entertainment industry is full of long or short hours that go with the flow. The last thing I would ever expect to hear from an engineer is what you just said.
Just being honest. This does NOT sound like a career move suited for you.

I don't believe you have to jerk off to consoles and monitors to do work in this field like it sounds you do. Not everyone is the same person as you are, so think about that before you tell somebody what's right & not right for them if you don't even know them. Glad to hear you live a mundane existence of working all the time and never enjoy other aspects of life.

BobRogers Mon, 01/16/2012 - 04:01

I think you will find that there are many careers where the supply of people willing to do them far outstrips the demand. When that happens, employers can hire people who are pretty fanatical. Most of those jobs offer money (big law firms and investment banks), *** (show biz), or power (politics). Somehow recording manages to be a big draw with none of the above. There are lots of jobs out there that fit a lot of life styles. Recording does not seem to fit yours. You asked. You got told. You got really pissed off and nasty about the answer. Better go look for a job where people blow sunshine up your butt all day.

Davedog Mon, 01/16/2012 - 11:49

MadMax, post: 382853 wrote: You know... it never fails to impress me at how well received the realities of life come to those who have no concept of what the majority of the those living that reality agree upon what it is, that this reality is.

I'm keeping this one, Max. A plaque on the wall with embroidery and everything....right next to the golf trophys and the 18 year old scotch containers. (They make really fine percussion instruments!)

To the OP. I meant mine as a funny aside but you didnt get it. Oh well, since you aren't in my particular 'peer group' it makes no difference. Thanks for the "professor" reference, I do deserve it!

Also. I thought you had purported yourself quite well until your last childish outburst. This, in itself, is proof-positive that you have neither the intestinal fortitude nor the maturity to enter this business in any way. Your response to the rather GENTLE chiding these completely PROFESSIONAL people have answered you in the way they have, tells the story completely. You really are UNFIT for this business. But then again, ANY business is going to have aspects that arent about coddling the emotionally stunted. Take care and good luck. I mean that sincerely. I explain this because you wont 'get that' either.

audiokid Mon, 01/16/2012 - 13:30

RemyRAD, post: 381317 wrote: I've been working on this for +41 years and I still haven't gone to sleep. What's that tell you? It tells you that we love this more than anything else in the world. Time? Time has no meaning here I mean hear.

Drive through open 24 hour recordings
Mx. Remy Ann David

ROTF
This one tops it for me. Remy, I love you! hehe.

Le Vab Wed, 01/18/2012 - 13:39

Engineering is True Art. Let your ears be your guide. Listen a lot to great recordings. I do that every night 1 hour before going to sleep. All kinds of genres.
Engineering has nothing to do with wasting hours. I love this work and I have only 1 lifetime and 24 hours a day. I bow deeply for great recordings because I know a lot
about the secrets behind. Enjoy every second and keep fighting for the engineering job. In the Netherlands quality is not important anymore and I keep fighting every day
on loudness wars, clean mixes with great dynamics. I help people for free. That takes me hours and hours and it brings me not even 1 Euro. But the great thing is that
I can motivate new music engineers who don't care about the time they have to spend to learn and join this great aspect of music.

RemyRAD Sun, 01/22/2012 - 02:15

I know you know what you know like I know. Besides, I loved my Philips 12 x 4 all germanium transistor console I had back in the early 1980s. It had 4, ferrite core inductor equalizers on a 12 x 4 switching matrix. So you can assign any of the four to any of the 12 inputs. I supplemented mine with 8 API original 550's (which I later ended up selling to Paul Wolff when he first acquired API and asked me for my help). Without the 550's and acquiring a 16 track machine, I had to get rid of the Philips console. Life wasn't the same for many years thereafter.

I still want to visit Amsterdam for you know why...
Mx. Remy Ann David

x

User login