I used to have a little 4 track Tascam portastudio. Great piece of kit but I always wanted a proper reel to reel
I also lusted after a Ferrograph - nice bit of valve kit - and in later life (and drunken eBay sessions) actually owned two of them. You realise within five minutes why they went out of fashion: they weigh a ton, and aren't actually that good. Back onto eBay they went...
my first sound editing lessons were cutting and splicing when cubase came along i gave up and favoured lighting design
See, if you gave Young People Today a splicing block and some tape, they wouldn't have a clue. Is this progress? I think not. <warming to subject> In my day, "cut and past" involved an Xacto knife, cow gum and Snopake to cover up the edges...
to be fair, i was always a lampy anyway but had to go through the noisy stuff too. once soundforge came about i healed the wounds of earlier sound editing
Still got my splicing block somewhere The most beautiful piece of location sound recording kit I used to use was a Nagra, wonderful machine and incredible sound quality - although I will admit to leaving the profession before digital took over so can't compare with that. As for 1/4" tape in the sound studio... my greatest fun was when we were producing the soundtrack for a short documentary project and I wanted to use the opening few bars of Pink Floyd's 'Money' - the cash sound effects part before singing, - but needed it to run longer than the actual opening of the song. So I had to make a loop. But at 15" per second, it was a rather long loop! In fact it required six of my friends with empty tape spools spinning on pencils, positioned around the studio with this massive loop of 1/4" tape held tight so that it would go through the tape heads at the correct pitch and speed, whilst I recorded it off onto another machine. I'm not sure today's Young Folk would really understand that at all! It sounded good too. And so much more fun that just digitally lifting a block of sound and pressing 'repeat' on a computer screen
You can still find Nagras for sale. They are the dogs. As a young lad, I considered joining the BBC as a sound recordist simply because you got a Nagra. I also considered becoming a postman, mind - I was fairly confused. 15 ips was a ridiculous - one slip, and you'd be showered with tape. Sold my Ferros mainly because trying to find decent new 1/4" tape just wasn't possible - nobody seems to make it any more.
Now you've got me looking at eBay https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/NAGRA-4-...h=item1a646e7172:g:o7oAAOSwaIpb4b9t:rk:1:pf:0
Beautiful! But a little beyond my price range even now.... and I’d have no use for it.... dammit sometimes I do wish I’d stuck with the film work though. With possible job loss / redundancy next year I did briefly consider seeing if I could call in a few contacts, but it’s been too long.... aw now I’m looking at eBay too!!!