AWS Provides Bridge Between Pro Tools® Capture and Analogue Recording and Mixing Techniques
SANTA BARBARA, CA—Playback Recording Studio, a stunning Chris Pelonis and RPG designed post production and music recording facility, recently installed a Solid State Logic AWS 900+ SuperAnalogue console as the centerpiece of the facility. The AWS was chosen for its capability to handle Playback’s wide client base of post production clients such as the Discovery Channel and MTV Japan, and music clients including Half Pint, Empire Isis, Smiff & Wessun, El Da Sensei & Tame-1 of the Artifacts, Adam Joseph and Broadway talent Kaitlin Hopkins.
“With the AWS 900+, SSL has a console that is not matched in the industry,” says Tucker Bodine, owner and chief engineer for Playback Recording Studio. “It can handle pretty much anything you throw at it, whether you’re working on a film project, or a music project. I need to be able to handle post production and 5.1 surround mixing as well as full music recording and mixing for a four to 16 piece band. The AWS allows me to attract business from both worlds giving the studio a solid client base.”
The handcrafted studio features a 500 square foot control room, servicing a large main studio room with four isolation booths. Each space offers a different acoustic footprint, expanding the sonic colors available through Playback’s extensive outboard gear and microphone collection, including a bank of SSL XLogic compressors in an X-Rack. The AWS brings all the sonic possibilities together, while providing control of Playback’s Pro Tools® HD|3 system.
“I have a lot of experience with large format consoles and Pro Tools from my engineering days in New York, where I found myself sitting at the sidebar running the computer as much as sitting in the sweet spot working on the sound,” explains Bodine. “The AWS offers perfect integration with the Pro Tools system, allowing me to focus on hearing the session with my ears and not with my eyes, so to speak. All the functionality is right on the console. We no longer need to control Pro Tools with a mouse because the transport control is right there for you on the AWS, as are the pre and post roll functions and everything you need to grab menus. All the capabilities of Pro Tools are at your fingertips, and that really helps speed up our workflow.”
The AWS 900+ offers up the legendary SSL SuperAnalogue™ sound quality and that is key for Bodine. “We are in the business of sound and the AWS delivers the transparent, crisp sound SSL is so famous for,” states Bodine. “For example, we love the way the console warms up a Les Paul guitar through a direct box straight into the console. We find the EQ on the AWS to be very precise and very flexible as the console offers both the G Series and E Series EQ curves. When you add high’s with an SSL EQ, it just gives you that nice, crisp tone that you can’t really get from any other EQ. The AWS is the perfect instrument to pull all the different needs of the studio together.”
Solid State Logic is the world’s leading manufacturer of analogue and digital audio consoles and provider of creative tools for music, broadcast and post production professionals. For more information about our award-winning products, please visit: www.solid-state-logic.com.
