Thoughtful post Vastman. Balance between excess and helping the smaller operations to survive.
 
And Larry, damn it. Some subliminal frequency still resonates plastic cards as much as I try to resist.
 
Really really appreciate your research and the heads ups.
 
John

A lot to think of for sure ... I had the exact same discussion yesturday with Ayan Zahev ( the sound designer) via skype in a visio conf. For my students and on the menu was advises on investements in gears ... He told me exactly what we all know and experienced : he have a lot of pkugins he don t use , he can t sell many because of how dirt cheap some are getting sold by manufacturers several time a year .... And he finished by telling me that he s slowly back to hardware because of at the end even if taking lonely it s no cheap , hw was less expensive , more inspiring , a better investement ( for resell) ...

Some other stuff to meditate on ....

All the interviews and discussions i had with pro s , one thing is key is limitation , and i experience this myself ....
The limitations forces the creativity while having stuff overhelping you and eillions of stuff is just gonna lead you in a no surprise land mostly.... I always warn my students about crack , only because of this at first ... They have too much and are lost most the time ...

But they be like "zo you tell to limit but you have zillion of plugins" .. And we re getting to the point i wanted to share here ...yes i have a lot of plugins but those are " options" , as some here might know , atvleast twice a years , i go in south of france or in the Alpes , no internet , no phone , healthy food and sport ,laptop , arturia minilab , and go producing , and during that , i rarelly use more than 3 plugins ( instruments) in my production ... In search of inspiration , all those components (limitation, technology deconnexion , nature reconnection ect) help me like crazy , i m super productive like 2 or 3 songs base a day !!! The fact also that i force myself during the year to do very few production is like a cure to be then super creative when i can ...

My plugins ( i m talking instruments here) are like sonic lands combinaison option , i have a lot but use few at the same time and projeçt to get a sonic coherence and for creativity ....

Some of this , i can apply it to FX , i like to go one land in a mix , another land in another .... At the end i hate repetetive , i hate stuff to easy ( i m not bashing stuff that let you go fast , easy and fast are not the same in my book ) so it skipp my creativity , and i m so creative that i hate spending to mutch time on a song and i want go to another ...

Sorry for the long post but this thread is real interesting and so are all the comments ...


So at the end , it a tuff one , but like a everything in life , exess is bad ...the key here is to find when from options you re starting to go in exess ....

Stay out of the loop. Avoid spending too much time around here. Don't subscribe to newsletters.
 
Oh - and don't invite CC Larry to your place! ;)
 
When I upgraded the studio computer, I decided that I'd keep it as clean as possible and would never perform any major upgrade. That was over 2 years ago. I have dozens of plug-ins which weren't even installed on the new machine. As of right now, I can no longer upgrade my DAW software (because I refuse to upgrade the OS) and I'm guessing that a lot of the plug-ins coming out won't run on my computer.
 
Not owning 20 different reverbs and not having access to 4 different mixing consoles never prevented me from writing and recording music when I was working with tape. If anything, all the opposite. One of the most creative periods of my life took place when I was working with a stereo Sony reel-to-reel machine, a Akai XR-10 drum machine, a little Marshall Valvestate practice amp, a cheap mic, a Fender Strat, a tube overdrive and a Flanger pedal. I focused on what I was trying to accomplish and not how to accomplish it. 
 
The quicker you run out of options, the quicker you move to the next thing. "This will have to do..."
 
Now I know my tools, I stick with them, and I know that yet another compressor or another synth would not make my music better. In fact, I barely use any 3rd party plug-ins.
 
At one point I also realized that a single set of hardware analog filters or a good preamp makes 100 times more difference than 40 software emulations. 
 
Nowadays, I'd rather spend money on books anyway.
 
 

I have solved the problem for myself by demo any plug-in first (and ignore everything I can not demo). Most of the time in 5 minutes I think "hm... I am not sufficiently professional to understand for what that can be good" or "everyone say it is perfect, but it sounds like a crap for me". By occasion the result is "eh... really nice", but than I strictly follow the rule "I will buy it during the next sale!"

All i can say and see ...is that we all agree that we have to know ourselves ...and to do so we have to give ourselve time (quality time) to do so .... Years help ...
 
Like my father always tell me "give time some time " 
 
I remeber when i bought the mercury , it was to minimise the brands i'm f...with ...and to be done ...this was the argument i said to my wife to justify the price !!!since , i cannot say i didn't any other plugin lol ..... but the good it's even harder for me since some give me NFR and i have EDU prices !! :( addd to this those crayz prices (i never paid a plugin it's full price" ...

Wanted to mark one of Zo's perspectives as helpful but no go from the dashboard.
Anyway Zo, helpful...
 
John
 
and yeah, like Rain said...

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