#silverclassic

April stated off loud to say the least with rock / punk / metal drummer Robin Guy let loose in the cove with his kit. We’ve been test driving some desks for Presonus, mainly testing the RM32Ai mixer and audio interface. Both as a stand alone device and with its companion mixer control surface the CS18Ai

We wanted to properly put them through their paces in real world situations so we’ll be using them to record a number of sessions. With Rupert’s experience of recording in large ambient rooms such as Abbey Road and Air Studios we thought we would test them to the max in the 10mx 10m infinity Cove here at Gun Hill Studios’ base camp.

More Presonus updates in later blogs, we may even dedicate one to the desks but we’ve discovered from this session that you can’t leave a drummer alone for a second...Robin was up on the deck between takes customising our in house drum kit with a hack saw...

A last minute phone call from photographer Tom Gidden saw RM Sotheby’s back in the studio with a full film crew and a stunning Ferrari 275. There’s a show in production looking at the internal workings of the auction houses and RM Sotheby’s in particular. They spent most of the day at the studio capturing the car and looking at how the images for the catalogues are captured. Rupert got his trumpet out and treated them to some Ferrari inspired horn too.

The Syd Arthur Band spent a couple of days filming videos for their latest album. The theme was very bright orange and it looked great against the stark white of the cove. Looking forward to seeing more from them and of course seeing the completed videos!

Rupert and Emma took a trip up to Pinewood for Creative England’s networking event and thought it would be rude to go all that way without dropping in on Mike’s Muscle Cars and Evanta. Mark treated us to some excellent pizzas in the office and we had a tour round the workshop checking out all the enormous American cars. 

We also found Mike Brewer’s beautiful blue Porsche nonchalantly hanging out with the big boys!  

Andrea took on some particularly difficult industrial technology for Inspection Technologies. Anyone who has ever been involved in industrial photography will know just how much time it takes to set up each shot and what attention to detail is required. Needless to say the client was extremely pleased with the outcome. We filmed an instructional video too for Inspection Technologies and put the vocal booth to work for the voiceover. 

We popped over to World Aero to take a few pictures for their press releases on some exciting developments. Never one to do anything by half, Andrea got everyone fully involved with some fun pictures of the team!

The very lovely James Mann brought a couple of stunning vehicles into the cove to shoot towards the end of last month and we look forward to having him back in. We enjoyed watching him capture images for his next book before he shot off for Italy for his next engagement.

Another Mustang from Drive Wild Horses graced the cove with the blue Mustang due in for its close-ups in May. It has been a real pleasure to bring these Mustangs into the cove with Niall and to help him create the public image for his thriving business. 

Media Day at Silverstone in preparation for the Silverstone Classic proved to be a big success with Freddie Hunt in attendance ahead for the James Hunt exhibition at the Classic in July. The team were all over the racing action as you can imagine!

Started writing this a while back then as usual got way too busy to post, but as Silverstone Classic races towards us I thought I should finish this little write up and get it up there ;-)

Today I find myself confessing once again to my inability to not pull out all the stops on anything we get involved in. It’s like that saying " how many motorbikes are enough ? " Answer . . . " one more ". After a very enjoyable day at Silverstone’s media day for the warm up to this, the 25th Anniversary of The Silverstone Classic, I sat down to edit a few little prequels together for Gun Hill Studios the visual arm of our groovy not so evil empire. Yes folks we have a visual arm and an audio arm keeping our ears free to listen and our eyes free to look but making carrying things a little awkward at times. You will tell me when I deviate won’t you? They tell me to stay to the path but there are sparkly things in the less trodden.

So I’m thinking I’ll just spend an afternoon going through my footage and make a little minute and a half prequel of a selection of the vehicles. Why do I even try and kid myself it’s ever going to be that simple? Slowly I’m seduced by the different tones of the vehicles roaring past my camera and as the edit starts to assemble itself the sonic dictates an underscore for the exhausts to dance upon. Time to strap on a guitar and delve into the subconscious and see what's there. Kinda wants to be a simple hook that doesn't detract from picture or the sound of these engines. 

Cut to a couple of hours later and I have a little theme to cut picture to and back to Final Cut Pro for some more editing. The plan was to divide the footage into a few little tasters ahead of the Silverstone Classic to whet the appetite of all concerned. For the main event we will be doing stills, motion and interviews in our humble attempt to get the whole vibe in the can. Anyway, so there I sat editing and as the 4k footage comes into focus the thought crossed my mind “ who can I get on drums to give this the drive it needs? ” excuse the pun. Well a few weeks back we were recording Robin Guy for Corin Hardy’s film The Hallow and he had some serious welly so a few texts later he’s booked. I start off thinking I’ll just set up four mics and keep it simple. Then as usual my brain goes into "why do things by halves?" Ok ribbon room mics, condenser over heads, top and bottom snare, 1176 compressors on the room mics, Avalon 737 on the Kick blah blah blah. It’s a minute and a half track for jellies sake ha ha. Protools or Logic? Always a tough call on this occasion I’ll go with Logic because I’d written the theme in that and it saves me the stem journey to tools. Anyway I’m trying to balance the right level of geekness in this little blog, not sure of my audience and trying to keep everyone awake. So drums down and a few extra takes for different vibes. Maybe I’ll expand the theme later ;-) Tracks sounding so much better now it has some real muscle to it. Ok so that should do right?

The following monday I’m working with Guy Pratt, bass player extraordinaire. “Hey Guy, mind playing a little bass on my Silverstone track?” “Sure, if you can get Amazon Prime working on my telly” “I’m a trumpet player not I.T. oh ok then" Ok so track’s really coming together now and making the edit far more fluid. I’m following the pitch of some of the highly tuned engines with my guitar but always letting the engines lead. Couple of days later I’m in Paul Carrack’s studio with Peter Van Hooke putting down some percussion. “Hey Pete, I’m doing this Silverstone track could you pop a little percussion on it?” he he job done ;-) Ok a little bit of trumpet horn section doubling up the lead guitar. I record all this stuff then put it at a level where the cars still take glorious precedence. Guys walk into a theme tune, why the long edit? Well when you think of the blood, sweat, tears and passion that has been put into the vehicles that race at Silverstone, it’s only respectful to take the same care when humbly trying to represent them.

Anyway here’s the video I’ll try and get another one up prior to Silverstone but we are stupidly busy.

Did I mention we are building a new bigger infinity cove with dual turntables but that’s another blog for another day. Thanks again to Guy Pratt, Robin Guy and Peter Van Hooke for bringing their own edge to the proceedings.