How to Record on a Budget
If you’re venturing into recording a project for the first time I’m sure you’re overwhelmed with the many options of how to accomplish the task and the cost involved to get there. The good news is there are many budget friendly ways to record an audio project now days. If you’re planning on recording a full album of songs or just looking to record and publish a podcast, we’ll go over some options and different ways to tackle these projects below.
DIY
The first option of tackling your project is to go the DIY route. This will definitely save you the cost of a recording studio and engineer/producer, but you will have to invest some money into gear and the time to learn how to use the gear, as well as learning the art of recording, editing, and mixing/mastering. The skills to use the gear and learning the recording and mixing techniques can be learned fairly easily by the help of Youtube. There is a mass of great tutorials and how-to videos on Youtube explaining everything from the very basic of hooking up a recording interface to more advanced mixing/mastering techniques. As far as gear goes, of course you’re most likely going to need a computer, which most people already have, and a recording interface. For simple music recordings and podcasts a 2 to 4 channel interface should be plenty. These can be very affordable usually in the $200-$500 range. Brands like Focusrite, UAD, and Audient make great interfaces in this price range. Next up would be the appropriate microphones. Microphones can easily get expensive, but there are plenty of great options in the less than $500 range. Dynamic mics are great for louder sound sources like drums and also make a great option for podcast recordings. Condenser mics are great at picking up lots of detail and are great for singing vocals and acoustic instruments. Ribbon mics are more sensitive and are great at picking up a very natural sound of the recorded source. Mics like the Shure SM57 and SM7 are great dynamic mics. The Audio Technica AT series of large diaphragm condenser mics are a great choice. And Cascade and Golden Age Project make really great affordable ribbon mics. Now once you get these pieces of gear setup in a decent sounding space, you’re ready to start making your project come to life!
Booking a Recording Studio
Another option of making your audio project dreams come to life on a budget is booking a studio. Now at first glance this may seem like it’s not a budget option, but it can be with good planning and intentionality. The great thing about booking a studio is that your most likely booking a place that has already invested in great gear and has a facility that is going to sound great. Also, most of the time when you book a studio you are usually also booking a highly skilled audio engineer/producer. In this scenario you would want to spend plenty of time before your booking making sure that your project is ready to go. You don’t want to waste your booked time working out lyrics and song arrangement or the flow of your podcast episode. The more prepared you are before your booking the easier it will be to keep the project on budget. Another great perk to this option is that you are typically working with an audio engineer or producer that may deliver a higher quality final product and much quicker than if you were DIYing.
The Hybrid Approach
The final option that we’ll cover is what we call the hybrid approach. It may be that you want to tackle part of the project yourself, but then at some point have another collaborator touch up some things. If you have the setup and skills to record your own music or podcast but are less confident on the mixing and mastering side, it’s easy to find a studio or mixing/mastering engineer that would take on the final stages of the project. This is a great way to save on booking a recording studio for the sometimes long drawn out recoding days, but still get a great professional sounding mix/master as the final product.
Conclusion
Hopefully these three options will give you some insight on the different ways you can tackle your audio project and which one will best fit your budget. DIYing can sound less expensive in the beginning, but sometimes the investment of the gear and the lack of skill can lead to a less than ideal final product. Booking a studio may sound daunting and expensive in the beginning, but most of the time you get professional help leading to a higher quality final product. Often times the hybrid approach offers a way to keep the budget down but still get the high quality final product that a recording studio can offer.