McClear/Digital Recording and Post Production Studios
 |
|
In 1990, McClear acquired Pathé Film Post Production Studios and was renamed McClear Pathé to reflect the expanding film and post-production scene in Toronto. Soundtracks for The Wrong Guy, The Five Senses, Blues Brothers 2000 (featuring Aretha Franklin and B.B. King), and dozens more were done at McClear.
Loreena McKennitt's The Mask and Mirror and Jimmy Webb's Ten Easy Pieces were also done at McClear Place before its most recent evolution in 1999, when the facility purchased Digital Music + Post. This brought McClear/Digital to its current state of evolution.
According to McClear/Digital sales manager Mike Kelly, the Toronto post market isn't what it used to be it's more competitive today than ever. That's where Pro Tools|HD comes in.
Audio Over the Years: McClear/Digital
"The only constant is change," says Kelly, a veteran music and post engineer/producer
who has directed McClear/Digital's sales and marketing for the past
five years. McClear is well known as one of the premier audio facilities
in Canada, with features few other studios can match. For example,
says Kelly, "We are one of the few rooms left in Toronto still capable
of doing large ensemble and orchestral recordings."
Kelly explains that the highly competitive and dynamic music/post studio scene in Toronto has been rocked over the past few years by everything from 9/11 and SARS scares to sweeping economic changes. And with the Canadian dollar on the rise, foreign production crews booking in Toronto today don't see the savings they once did.
 |
|
At the same time, high-quality output houses like McClear are readjusting to what's good and not so good about the ever-increasing power of today's desktop studio. How does McClear stay atop the list of the best of what Toronto has to offer?
"We have 80 channels of Pro Tools|HD combined with a Studer Vista 7," says Kelly. "The sheer number of tracks, and the power of Pro Tools and all the plug-ins, make this a powerhouse studio second to none in the city. We're hearing a lot of buzz about people wanting to go 96 kHz. We are also starting to see a lot of interest in the re-archiving of major label products to Pro Tools|HD. But our real challenge is convincing the everyday studio client to spend that little bit extra that makes all the difference in the end."
"There are years of professional industry experience here, along with properly built rooms and great microphones, all of which greatly contribute to a project's end result," he adds. "But these days, some people seem to believe that if they have a good-sized desktop or laptop computer, they're suddenly a professional studio. Yes, I charge as much as $375 an hour, but also I get you in and out much faster, and with more gold and platinum experience on staff, than most bands will experience in a lifetime."
Kelly, a witty veteran of studio life in Canada, sums it all up in one sentence: "Ever wonder why barbershop dentistry never caught on? Expertise is required, you know."
Kids, Birds, Witches, Outer Space, and Mary Kay
Recent projects at McClear/Digital include the music for Court TV's Chasing
Freedom, CBS movies of the week Salem Witch Trials and Hell on Heels:
The Battle of Mary Kay, and a Canadian feature release called Rare
Birds. The McClear staff and studios produce a large number of television
commercial projects, and they're in their third year with the wildly
popular anime show Beyblade.
Kelly also notes that McClear engineer Michael Banton-Jones recently recorded and mixed the music for the IMAX film Space Station 3D in McClear's Toronto rooms. "When dealing with music for surround, there is great latitude for experimentation," he says. "But it's the years of our collective musical sensibilities that help bring the music to life here at McClear, not just doing sonic gymnastics."
 |
|
"The IMAX film Space Station was our first real test using the surround capabilities in Pro Tools," says McClear/Digital's Dustin Harris, "and the results were superb. Automating the panning moves was easy, as we've come to expect from Digidesign's products. Since IMAX has two center channels, the center and top center channels, we also got into creating our own custom paths in the Pro Tools I/O. To address the top center channel we created a path on the existing 5.1 setup using a seventh output. We quickly discovered that you can save some DSP this way, as well."
Pro Technique 1 —
Pro Tools|HD as the ultimate FX unit
McClear/Digital's 80-I/O Pro Tools|HD system works in tandem with a Studer
Vista 7 digital console in the studio's new Studio 3. With enough open
channels to drive a snowmobile through, engineer Dustin Harris instead
opts to dedicate anywhere from eight to 16 free channels in his massive
Pro Tools I/O configuration to his software FX units.
"Combine the availability of all those channels with the vastly increased plug-in capacity of the new Pro Tools|HD architecture, and you can effectively turn Pro Tools into a very high quality all-in-one effects unit while using it to record, edit, and mix your tracks," says Harris. "If the number of free I/O channels allow it — and with 80 inputs here at McClear they usually do we can send signals from our digital console's aux sends into aux input channels on Pro Tools and run eight, 16 or even more effects plug-ins if I/O allows. We run all sorts of things like reverbs, choruses, delays, and such in this way."
 |
|
Digidesign Reverb One |
Today's Pro Tools|HD and Pro Tools|HD Accel systems are making more input/output channels available to Pro Tools engineers than ever before, so simply having more available and knowing what to do with them is a Pro Techniques tip in itself. Having 80 or more available Pro Tools|HD channels gives Harris plenty of ideas about how to apportion all that extra CPU real estate to his average Pro Tools session these days, namely to his effects returns.
"We're seeing regular use of plug-ins like [Digidesign] Reverb One, or Waves TrueVerb and Renaissance Reverb, as dedicated effects units from our Studer console," he continues. "Our personal favorite, Digidesign's Lo-Fi is another effect we use a lot in this way. One huge advantage to this approach is that you can save all the plug-in settings with the session. This makes recalling effects settings a snap, so much so that our trusty Lexicon 480Ls and 300s are seeing less and less service."
Pro Technique 2 —
Using Pro Tools|HD as a master recorder for picture work
Harris offers the following major timesaver tip for anyone working with
Pro Tools to picture. He says McClear mixes its projects almost exclusively
back into Pro Tools|HD, for several reasons.
"Whether the gig is a music mix, TV mix, commercial, or anything else, we tend to always mix back to Pro Tools," says Harris. "There are two great advantages to this, especially if you're working with picture. First, when you mix back into Pro Tools, your mixes are automatically time-stamped. Using the playlist function, you can then do alternate mixes, like an instrumental version or bass and drums only, or do different music stems for a film mix."
Harris says he also likes mixing back to the same track without having to set up a new track or change his I/O setup every time he starts a new mixdown.
"The mixes are always at the proper place in time. When recording back into Pro Tools, either through I/O or through the Pro Tools busses, you can even combine my previous tip about the effects with the recorded mixes and send that through the plug-ins. For example, if you want to add any mix EQ or compression. All of the plug-in settings, of course, are automatically saved by the Pro Tools session. Personally, we like and often use the Waves L1, L2, and those nice Linear Phase EQs from the Waves Masters Bundle."
Click
here to read previous columns.