We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Ryan Dowden. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Ryan below.
Ryan, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. It’s easy to look at a business or industry as an outsider and assume it’s super profitable – but we’ve seen over and over again in our conversation with folks that most industries have factors that make profitability a challenge. What’s biggest challenge to profitability in your industry?
Over the last 10-15 years, amateur recording equipment has come so far. I remember being in high school in the early 2000s and recording music into my family’s home computer using an 8-channel mixer and plugging into the microphone input of the computer. Everything going into that computer had to be pre-mixed, already eqed to sound the way you wanted it, level balanced, etc. Now, you can get an eight input recording interface for a fraction of what I paid for that analog mixer 20 years ago and have complete control over individual sources of audio after you have recorded them. Plus, anyone with an Apple computer has access to GarageBand for free. When I got started doing this, your options were basically Pro Tools or Cubase which were both very expensive pieces of software. Even outside of free resources like GarageBand, most manufacturers of recording software make some sort of limited version that is either really inexpensive or comes for free with the purchase of their hardware. I’ve been doing this for over 20 years now and the biggest competition is bands who have enough tech savvy to operate the equipment and record and mix themselves using inexpensive software and oftentimes just presets that will get the sound sounding good enough that they are confident in putting it out into the world.
Ryan, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
I recorded my first band when I was 14 in our practice space. We had one microphone that we draped over the rafters in our drummers basement where we rehearsed. We recorded into a TalkBoy tape recorder, a literal toy from the Home Alone movies. We did our initial recording, everything completely live, and when we listened back we noticed that it didn’t sound very good, not surprising given the circumstances. However, even though we knew we would never get a sound like what we heard on the radio using one microphone in a basement, we felt that at very least the individual instruments could have been more balanced in terms of volume, so at every band practice, I would set up this tape recorder and put the microphone in a different place in the room to see how that changed the balance. I really enjoyed this and really, audio engineering is just problem solving. Your kick drum and your bass guitar are competing for the same sonic space, and now you have to figure out what to do to create a balance. Not everyone has the patience to figure that out.
Can you tell us about what’s worked well for you in terms of growing your clientele?
In just about any creative space, word of mouth is always going to be the best way to market yourself and grow your clientele. I could post a sample of some music I have recorded or video I have filmed everyday onto social media and it would likely do nothing for me. But if a band or artist is looking to record their music and asks their friend who has released some music of their own where the best place to record would be or who the best person to record and mix your music is in the area, just having your name mentioned in the conversation one time is exponentially more influential then tooting your own horn through advertising or social media posts.
We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?
As a creative, we’re always talked to about rules. In photography/cinematography, it may be the exposure triangle or the rule of thirds. In audio mixing, it might be that a compressor should ALWAYS go before/after EQ(Ive heard both), or that you should only use EQ to cut frequencies, but never boost. When creating visual art, it might be that you should never use contrasting colors in the same art piece. In today’s society, everything is so accessible. I could go on YouTube right now and look up tutorials for something like “how to get the best/pro sound for your vocals” and you’ll find hundreds of videos ranging from bedroom producers who often want to overcomplicate things, to sponsored videos from companies that make hardware or software telling you that their product is the one you need to get the best sound, to old school producers and engineers who tell you that you need expensive vintage analog equipment to get the best sound. When in reality, the truth is that there are no rules when it comes to being creative. So clear your mind and shut out the noise. If you want the highlights in your photo or video to be blown out, then blow out your highlights. If you want to make an extreme EQ boost to your audio source, crank that EQ. And if you want to use every color in the spectrum in your visual art, then taste the rainbow. As long as you are happy or your client is happy with the outcome, it doesn’t really matter how you got there.
Contact Info:
- Website: Www.shellshockmultimedia.com
- Instagram: @shellshockmultimedia
- Youtube: YouTube.com/shellshockmultimedia
Image Credits
Photo by Kayla Haidle