Home studios vary in concept and design. 'Studio Joe' started out as a composing and sound design environment and has grown into a full surround mixing room.
By Russ Belttary
In addition to building version 1.0 of Joe's studio at his last home, considerable thought and planning has gone into a complete redesign at his new house.
Besides scoring music and cues for the 'who's who'' in the horror film genre, creating sound effects that evoke intense responses from audiences has been the other mainstay for the creative side of Joe's brain.
Without doubt, designing and building an environment that is condusive to creativity was the most important objective in this studio.
Simplicity, cost effectiveness and flexibility all came from a series of conversations in which Joe described what we have heard so many times before: 'DON'T LET TECHNOLOGY HINDER MY CREATIVITY'.˜
During his speaker selection process, careful listening tests helped determine the crystal clear transparency of ADAM Audio's S-3A speakers as the perfect choice for the surround system which is channeled through an Audient ASP-510 Surround Controller and and Audient ASP-520 Bass Manager.
To continue the sonic enhancement phase, Joe has always preferred the tonality and quality of Apogee convertors. The look of sadness on his face when we were discussing the retirement of his Apogee AD-8000's during his transition from Pro Tools 'Mix' to HD was heart wrenching, only to be matched with the ear-to-ear smile on his face after listening to Apogee's AD-16 and DA-16 convertors. "These convertors are awesome!"
Joe has built up from his initial HD3 system to an HD5, complete with Digidesign's new PCIe to PCIe ultra quiet expansion chassis and mixes with his Digidesign D-Command
For the 'sound design department', Joe has selected what most would deem a synthesist's dream collection( Moog's, Prophet V, Roland, Arp, an interesting collection of esoteric gizmos that range from 'the Agonizer' to 'The Feedback Harp' and Harmonic Resonator and an RSPE custom GigaStudio. His favorite electric guitar, a Les Paul remains in the corner at 'the ready'.
I think that it is fair to say that without a doubt, Joe can sit in his favorite studio chair and create without having to think about anything with his right brain.
- Some of Mr. Bishara's credits include:
- John Carpenter's Ghosts of Mars
- Nine Inch Nails
- 'Repo! The Genetic Opera
- Marilyn Manson
- Mortal Kombat: Annihalation
- Danzig
- Violent Femmes
