How I am going to benchmark my work is an important aspect to my research. I aim to compare my music to contemporary pop music (which I have listed previously in posts) and when submitting a track blog about the track I have compared it to stylistically and production wise (LO4 and A&O 2&4)

Throughout working at University of Lincoln I have used Pro Tools for 99% of my work and used Logic Pro X in my spare time at home. I purchased it before starting at University primarily because it’s relatively cheap and has a lot of functions with VSTs. I will be using Logic Pro X for this project simply because I believe it to be a better program for a project such as this, and has more creative scope than Pro Tools due to the sheer amount of VSTs, presets that are available to alter and the quality of the virtual instruments. I’m am not to argue that Logic is a better program than Pro Tools, just has a different use. I prefer Pro Tools as a multi-tracking software, but as for creating sounds and using midi etc, Logic Pro X wins it for me.

Within Logic I will be using Ultrabeat and Alchemy. Ultrabeat is a drum programming plug in; as I am a terrible drummer (and all round rough rhythmically) having a strong and simple to use plug in to print my ideas is a necessity. Ultrabeat has 80 preset kits that are a good starting point to modify and use to compare to my benchmark material. This should hopefully enable me to create a stronger “rhythmic” sound. Alchemy is also a fantastic plug in synth instrument, the vast amount of sounds, layers and options within the plug in allow for a massive sonic pallet to work from; the ability to alter existing sounds in such a simple way allows for creativity to flow without being bogged down in the production all the time. A lot of the work I will be doing will be a mixture of production and writing cohesively, but being stuck in one are for too long will be unproductive. Alchemy is fantastic for allowing me to creatively work and also give the options to manipulate sounds to be comparable to songs that are contemporary pop.

To improve my skills within Logic Pro X I will be using YouTube tutorials to get the best out of the program and deepen my understanding using VSTs of mixing within another DAW (LO 2&4) Such as ones listed below. YouTube videos are great to get an understanding of a plug in and learn about it.