Audio Engineering 101

Tim Dittmar is a musician, recording and live sound engineer, producer, songwriter, and professor. Tim began his professional recording career in 1987 at Cedar Creek Recording studio in Austin, Texas. Before locating to Austin, Tim received an Associate in Arts in Radio/TV Production from Del Mar Junior College. He then spent much of the nineties touring with a punk group, recording bands, and running live sound on the infamous 6th street at various venues. He was hired in 2000 as a professor and full-time faculty member at Austin Community College where he currently teaches Audio Engineering I, Audio Engineering IV, and the Special Projects class. Tim heads up the Technical side of Commercial Music Management at the college. He has also been a returning lecturer at the University of Texas teaching Audio Production and Audio for Picture. Tim has worked in numerous studios in Austin, Los Angeles and Chicago, compiling over 300 album credits. Recording such artists as the Old 97's, Voxtrot, Dynamite Boy, King Missile and the Murdocks. In 2008 he was invited to moderate a panel at the Tape Op Conference in New Orleans where he spoke on "The State of Audio Education”. At present, he owns and operates Las Olas Recording in Georgetown, Texas. He currently tours and records with his wife in the group Annabella and can also be seen drumming with The Hearts & The Minds, Kristi Rae, and Everything's Gone Green.

Introduction


Chapter 1 What is sound? Seven Important Characteristics
Chapter 2 How to Listen, Remember When Your Parents Told You to Listen? Well, You Should Have Listened!
Chapter 3 EQ Points of Interest. Frequencies Made Easy.
Chapter 4 People skills. Recording Isn't All Technical!
Chapter 5 Microphone Guides and Their Uses. Hey, Is This Thing On?
Chapter 6 Mixing Consoles. So Many Knobs, So Little Time.
Chapter 7 Signal Processors. Toys You Could Play with for Days!
Chapter 8 Signal Flow. The Keys to Directing Audio Traffic.
Chapter 9 Studio Session Procedures: How a Recording Session Happens and in What Order.
Chapter 10 Basic Acoustics... How to Make Your Recording Space Sound Better.
Chapter 11 The History of Audio: It Helps to Know Where You Came From.
Chapter 12 Now That I Am Dangerous, Should I get an internship?
Chapter13 Jobs. What Can I Do With These Skills?
Chapter 14 FAQs. Hear it from the Pros.