I’m here with Dan Duffell from SSL, and there’s been quite a bit of buzz about a new product that he hopes just goes away. Dan?

Well, for the last two days we haven’t stopped explaining all about Pro-Convert. It’s a piece of software designed to try and make a big problem in the industry go away. We reckon that it makes no sense that in the audio industry you still can’t just open sessions from one DAW or audio application in a different system. Pro-Convert is a piece of simple and extremely efficient format conversion software. All you do is open up a session from a DAW, choose the application format you want to save it in and work your way through half a dozen simple dialogue boxes… at the other end you hit the ‘convert’ button and a few seconds later you have a session folder in the format of your choice.

Along the way you get to make choices about sample rates, bit depth, frame rame, offsets, automation data for volume and pan, markers, PQ data, clip and track volume re-scaling and a bunch of stuff about how to handle any missing audio files.

We feel that it would benefit the entire industry if we could all just be able to move our projects from one environment to another, and it is holding everybody up not being able to do it. In some ways we would be very happy if all Pro-Convert achieved was all DAW manufacturers working together to make it possible to open each others files and for this software to become unnecessary.

In the meantime, we felt it was about time somebody made life a hell of a lot easier.

And we also showed X-EQ, new X-Rack modules and a new free plug-in called X-ISM that you can download from the site. Good show all around, and the two TEC Awards didn’t hurt!

We’re here with Michel Henein who has a few things to say about a new process for 4-D audio…that’s right, it includes true 3-D audio with an elevation element, plus time. Michel, describe the AstoundSoundPro process to us…

Thanks, Tom. Last night was the beta release party which introduced the process to some of the greatest ears in the audio business. AstoundSoundPro is essentially a virtual binaural spatialization technology that allows a user to pan sound elements around in 360 degrees of space. What sets this technology apart is that it requires no special decoding hardware and can be used with any playback format in either stereo or surround, even over speakers! Check out GenAudio’s website at http://www.genaudioinc.com for more news to come.

OUTSTANDING TECHNICAL ACHIEVEMENT

ANCILLARY EQUIPMENT
Apogee Electronics Symphony

DIGITAL CONVERTER TECHNOLOGY
Apogee Electronics Ensemble

MIC PREAMPLIFIER TECHNOLOGY
SSL XLogic Alpha Channel

MIC TECHNOLOGY/SOUND REINFORCEMENT
Neumann KMS 104

MIC TECHNOLOGY//RECORDING
Royer R122-V

WIRELESS TECHNOLOGY
Sennheiser NET1

SOUND REINFORCEMENT LOUDSPEAKER TECHNOLOGY
JBL Professional VP Series

STUDIO MONITOR TECHNOLOGY
Genelec 8200/7200 DSP Series

MUSICAL INSTRUMENT TECHNOLOGY
Moog Little Phatty

SIGNAL PROCESSING TECHNOLOGY/HARDWARE
Focusrite Liquid Mix

SIGNAL PROCESSING TECHNOLOGY/SOFTWARE
Universal Audio Neve Classic Console Bundle

WORKSTATION TECHNOLOGY
Digidesign 003

RECORDING DEVICES
Tascam DV-RA1000HD

SOUND REINFORCEMENT CONSOLE TECHNOLOGY
Digidesign D-Show Profile

SMALL FORMAT CONSOLE TECHNOLOGY
Trident Series 8T-8

LARGE FORMAT CONSOLE TECHNOLOGY
SSL Duality

OUTSTANDING CREATIVE ACHIEVEMENT

TOUR SOUND PRODUCTION
John Mayer Continuum Tour

FOH Engineer: Chad Franscoviak

Monitor Engineer: Mike Adams

Tour Company: Clair Showco, Lititz, PA

REMOTE PRODUCTION/RECORDING OR BROADCAST
49th Annual Grammy Awards, CBS

Production Mixers: Thomas Holmes, Paul Sandweiss

Music Mixers: John Harris, Eric Schilling, Joel Singer

Remote Facility: XM Productions-Effanel Music, NYC

TELEVISION SOUND PRODUCTION
The Sopranos, HBO

Supervising Sound Editor: Jason George

Re-Recording Mixers: Kevin Burns, Todd Orr

Production Mixer: Matthew Price

Audio Post Facility: Todd-AO West, Santa Monica, CA

FILM SOUND PRODUCTION

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest, Jerry Bruckheimer, Walt Disney

Supervising Sound Editors: Christopher Boyes, George Watters II

Sound Designer: Christopher Boyes

Re-recording Mixers: Christopher Boyes, Paul Massey, James Bolt, Lora Hirschberg

Production Mixer: Lee Orloff

Score Mixer: Alan Meyerson

Recording Facilities: Air Lyndhurst; Skywalker Sound; Sony Picture Studios; 20th Century Fox Studios; Todd-AO Radford, Studio City, CA

Audio Post Facility: Buena Vista Post Production Services

STUDIO DESIGN PROJECTRecord Plant/SSL 1, Hollywood, CA

Architects or Studio Designers: Vincent van Haaff, Jason Carson

Acoustician: Vincent van Haaff

Studio Owner: Rick Stevens

INTERACTIVE ENTERTAINMENT SOUND PRODUCTION
Tomb Raider: Legend, Eidos Interactive

Audio Director: Troels Folmann

Sound Designer: Mike Peaslee

Sound & Music Integrators: Gregg Stephens, Karl Gallagher

Audio Programmers: Gregg Stephens, Karl Gallagher

Re-recording Mixer: Mike Peaslee

Audio Post Facility: Crystal Dynamics Audio Studios

SURROUND SOUND PRODUCTION
Love, Beatles (DVD-A)

5.1 Mixing Engineer: Paul Hicks

Mastering Engineer: Tim Young

Producers: George Martin, Giles Martin

Mixing Facility: Abbey Road Studios, London, UK

Mastering Facility: Metropolis Mastering, London, UK

RECORD PRODUCTION/SINGLE OR TRACK
“Waiting On The World to Change,” Continuum, John Mayer

Recording Engineers: Chad Franscoviak, Dave O’Donnell

Mixing Engineer: Manny Marroquin

Mixing Facility: Larrabee Studios, Los Angeles, CA

Producers: Steve Jordan, John Mayer

Recording Studios: Avatar Studios, NYC; The Village, West Los Angeles, CA

Mastering Engineer: Greg Calbi

Mastering Facility: Sterling Sound, NYC

RECORD PRODUCTION/ALBUM
Continuum, John Mayer

Recording Engineers: Joe Ferla, Chad Franscoviak, Dave O’Donnell, John Alagia

Mixing Engineers: Michael H. Brauer, Manny Marroquin

Mixing Facilities: Quad Studios, NYC; Larrabee Studios, Los Angeles, CA

Producers: Steve Jordan, John Mayer

Recording Studios: Legacy Recording Studios, NYC; Royal Studios, Memphis, TN; The Village, West Los Angeles; Avatar Studios, NYC

Mastering Engineer: Greg Calbi

Mastering Facility: Sterling Sound, NYC

Check out the range, nuance and rhythm that comes from the mouth of Jasper Bailey performing at 45th and Broadway in New York City.

We’re here with Rick Stevens, owner of Record Plant in Hollywood, and they’re announcing their expansion into Miami — South Beach, and introducing a new concept: The Record Plant, South Beach is going to be an 8-studio complex, two of which are owned by Record Plant, with the other six studios being owned by…..Top Artists and Producers. They’re calling them, “stu-di-o-min-i-um.” Cool, huh?

Studiominimum is a world-class recording studio and related lounge/work space, side-by-side with Record Plant’s own studios– all in one location. Record Plant will take care of everything, from technical and engineering service, messenger, runner staff, health club, swimming pool — everything. Rose Mann-Cherney and Rick believe that this development represents the development of the future of the high-end recording industry. Sales are underway; actual opening of the studios is projected for winter season, 2009. Stay tuned for updates.

For more, www.recordplant.com.

here we are with Jason Miles…what’s your thoughts on the show thus far?

I’vebeen to about 20 AES shows.The NY show is always the best hang.People seem to always pick up on thr NY energy.It is always evident that things in our business change.It’s now about Multi media and software.A few cool companies have hung on and I hope they thrive.I will check back in a few days to see if anything in this show excited me enough to break out the credit card

Peace, Jason Miles

We’re kicking off the blog with Charles Dye, mixer/producer, who is here to tell us about a very important set of guidelines developed by the Producers & Engineers Wing of the Recording Academy, due out in a couple of weeks. Charles, what can you tell us?

DAW session/project files can contain a byzantine amount of info, and become easily disorganized. So, to address this the P&E Wing of NARAS has created the “DAW Guidelines for Music Production,” with two key goals. The 1st is to help DAW users, regardless of platform, to organize their projects/sessions in a way that can eliminate confusion for themselves or other operators, provide answers to anticipated questions, solve certain problems before they arise, and shorten the time between when an operator opens a session and when they are able to go to work. The 2nd is to make it easier for users to exchange projects/sessions from one platform to another.

Check the Grammy site in the next couple of weeks for the complete set.

Get ready for AES 2007 N.Y. with our special Mix, Electronic Musician and Remix site–where you’ll find our Survival Guide, Video, Podcasts, Newsletters, New Products and much more. Site is live (except New Products Guide, which goes live on October 1): September 21. Bookmark it now at mixonline.com/ms/aes2007!