I have found that when you are being recorded as the artist, there are many things that are considered vital for your music to get from the Jam room to Platinum. The largest of these is budget. Recording in a high-class studio with the best equipment is almost impossible if you are just starting out, but a low or medium level studio might be the place you’re looking for. Assuming you’ve hired your own engineer, you might find yourself in a bit of a situation where all your money disappears. So, let me outline a few things that might help ya.
Studio Spaces and Personnel
The studio is one of the most important parts of recording. The very nature of a studio is to get the best sound (the desired sound) out of the instrument(s) your recording, but all of this comes at a cost. Assuming you’ve got everything sorted and you’ve got all the audio personnel and gear you need with you already; the studio is cheaper. The rough hourly rate for a lower end studio is around $25 whereas a midrange to high level studio will charge a flat rate of about $45. From here, the costs vary with what you chose to do. If you wanted audio personnel and gear; let’s say two engineers, the rate goes up to something like $350 and around. The rate for audio gear and one engineer will cost you about $250. These prices can vary depending on room size, the equipment that is being used and the personnel being used. These prices typically vary from studio to studio, but a common trend is that studio B is always cheaper than studio A.
Equipment
Assuming you’ve got your studio engineers and the space your recording in sorted, next you’ll need the equipment. Pop filters, microphones, music stands, sometimes even instruments, it all costs money. Quite often the quality of the equipment that your hiring is more important than the equipment your hiring itself, as you (the artist) wants quality. The recording studios know this and tend to charge extra for the quality of their equipment, especially microphones. The way studio’s charge this is by charging a flat rate on top of your already existing studio rate. Small studio’s roughly charge around $25/hr for their equipment in their studio whereas studios with high end equipment will charge a far more expensive $200/hr. This price can vary with the type of recording as well as the thing being recorded. For example, singers need less microphones than a whole band, so they can be charged less.
Mobile Recording
Sometimes artists prefer recording their music in the comfort of other space(s) they have picked out other than in the studio. In cases such as this, Mobile Recording is required to ensure that the recording sounds competent outside of a studio environment. This type of recording typically sits at a rough flat rate of $45 to $50/hr. In the example of Location Recordist Indecent Music, they charge this rate, with extras. Set-up, Teardown and the first hour of recording is around $200 with additional hours after this sitting at $75 for every hour after the first.
Mastering
This is a tricky one as some studio’s offer it in with a bundle and some do not. Ultimately it is up to the artist. At studio 301, the flat rate for mastering engineers varies from $100 to about $210 per song if the engineer is left unattended. However if the artist or producer wishes to sit in on the session, the rate goes up exponentially from $140/hr to $300/hr assuming the engineer does not have a cap off point. These prices can also differ assuming the platform the song or album is mastered to (eg: Vinyl, CD…). Granted these rates are for high-end quality mastering, with more novice mastering engineers obviously charging less.
I personally have never had to pay for studio use as of yet through some very valuable contacts that I have as well as the fact that I use the studios of SAE Brisbane, the uni I study at.
Yeah.
Wyatt Nicholls
Novice Audio Engineer
Student at SAE
References:
http://openmediafoundation.org/studiorates
https://www.thumbtack.com/p/recording-studio-prices
https://studios301.com/online-mastering/about/pricing-contact/
[Image] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Studio_1_of_Studios_301
[Image] http://openmediafoundation.org/studiorates
[Image] https://studios301.com/online-mastering/about/pricing-contact/
Wyatt Nicholls 