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Emergency Digico SD5 Optocore Procedures

By Nathan Lively

emergency-digico-sd5-optocore-procedures-mixing-board

UPDATE: This article appears in The Ultimate Guide to Creative Mixing on the Digico SD5.

sound-design-live-emergency-digico-sd5-optocore-proceduresThese emergency Optocore procedures could save your ass.

How did I learn all of this?

I recently started working as an Audio Supervisor on Ringling Bros. Circus’ new Out Of This World tour. Right before the very first rehearsal, all of my outputs from the Digico SD5 stopped working and I had 100 people waiting on me while I tried to fix it. I made it through that and several other minor emergencies and now I know the entire Digico tech support department by name. Here are the fixes they taught me.

To be clear, the SD5 is an amazing console and the company provides excellent support. Most of these fixes can be done in a matter of seconds and I’m really happy about that.

If you lose output at FOH and are unable to regain control of the outputs (yes, this has happened to me):

  1. At FOH: Setup -> Audio IO -> Setup Optocore -> Optocore Details -> Clear all outputs
  2. At Mon: Setup -> Audio IO -> Setup Optocore -> Optocore Details -> Broadcast only my ID
  3. At FOH:
    1. Reassign outputs in Audio IO (in my case Nanorack ports).
    2. Reassign Group outputs like Master and monitros.

If you are getting Optocore errors due to Snd/Rcv Console issues:

  1. Check all output cards to confirm you have correct ✔ or X.
  2. Setup Optocore -> Optocore Details -> Broadcast all output IDs

Other Emergency Procedures

If your startup session gets corrupted (this is also a good thing to practice once a month):

  1. Quit to Windows.
  2. Right click on startup menu -> Explore
  3. D:\SD5 and delete startup.ses and startup.mrdb
  4. Relaunch SD5

If you get an error about the sd5.exe file being corrupted:

  1. Try to load the SD5.exe in the d:\SD5\backup folder.
  2. If that works, move the backup SD5 folder to where the old one was and move the old one to backup.

If you loaded your session, but none of the Waves plugins loaded (this happens to me at least once a month):

  1. Open Waves
  2. Click Session -> Import session
  3. Import the last known good *.mrdb file.
  4. Your plugins should load. Sometimes you’ll need to go through a few files until you find one that works.

If Waves will not load and therefore you cannot save or load a session:

  1. Load Waves session manually.
  2. If you cannot open waves:
    1. Quit to Windows.
    2. Right click on startup menu -> Explore.
    3. D:\SD5 and delete startup.mrdb and Preferences folder.
    4. Relaunch SD5.

sound-design-live-emergency-digico-sd5-optocore-procedures-SIMImportant SD5 Notes

Here is a selection of some of the most important notes I have collected. Some you can find in the manual, but some I had to figure out on my own.

Startup Procedure

  1. Power up (or restart if already running).
  2. Load last known good session.

Shutdown Procedure

  1. Save session to internal and external drives.
  2. Shutdown from File menu.
  3. Power down both power supplies.

Optocore

  • Even-numbered Optocore IDs are for mirrored desks only.
  • System diagnostics on the SD5 to see errors.
  • Only one console can be in charge of an output module.
  • If you hear ticks and pops you may have a sync issue.
  • On the D-Rack and Nano-rack display, the tiny triangle under the “o” means that it is receiving timecode.
  • When one SD5 is loading a new session, the other will show a momentary Optocore error.

Surface

  • Option-all breaks a gang.
  • Option-all to turn everything up on a page. Hit channel LCD to exclude some.
  • Digico button affects rotary resolution.

Snapshots

  • If you keep all of your snapshots in a group, it can make updating all of them at once pretty easy:
    • Make sure Relative Groups is enabled.
    • Fire a snapshot that loads the setting that you want to change.
    • Change that setting.
    • Press Update Group.
    • At this point, you may want to take all snapshots out of the group, because if you accidentally press Update Group in the future…you’re hosed.
  • Input channel safe does not protect the input gain because that is a function of the rack.

Waves

  • The Waves server wants to be networked to both the Waves port on the back of the SD5 and the network port. The Waves port is for audio processing. The network port handles the GUI. Careful with these CAT5 cables. They have a short life.
  • If the Waves server is not appearing in the Waves inventory table: hard reset on the back of the unit.
  • To recall safe a Waves rack: Right-click on the left of the rack and choose recall safe.
  • To switch between Setup and Show modes, go to the Master view->System tab->Security and switch between Setup and Live.

Connect a computer

  1. Connect both devices to router.
    1. Wireless adapter settings: Make sure Wifi is first in the list. Also it seems to like it better when you set the IP manually. So try that if it doesn’t work.
  2. Under Network – select your computer.
  3. Send session.
  4. Mirror from console.

emergency-digico-sd5-optocore-procedures-timeMisc

  • Don’t send channels to an aux and also a group because they will be out of time.
  • If your sessions are not saving with the correct time, you may have a mismatch between Windows and the SD5 software. To correct this: Reset the time zone and time in Windows to GMT, then set the time in the SD5 software to your local time.

Bonus Super Helpful Macro Instructions

In production meetings I sometimes get the note that a certain song “had the wrong mix.” I made a special button to fix that. 😉

What your parents never taught you about money

By Nathan Lively

sound-design-live-money-parents-magnifying-glassDo you wish you had more control over your money? (Yes!)

Do you wish you knew where all of your money was going? (Double yes!)

You Need A Budget (YNAB) is the smart software that lets me figure all of this out for myself. To make sure I was getting the most out of it, I talked to Todd Curtis, their Chief Knowledge Officer.

What is YNAB, exactly? I wrote about it in this article, The Minimalist Guide to Budgeting (for Sound Engineers). You don’t have to read the article to understand this interview; the first part is all about budgeting and applies to anyone and everyone. Then there’s a bit of fanboying at the end for the hard-core YNAB users out there (I love you guys!).

sound-design-live-nathan-lively-phone-moneyNATHAN LIVELY: Every time someone asks me if I like YNAB I give an enthusiastic “Yes!”, but then I always have to explain that there was a big learning curve that probably has more to do with the fact that I never learned to manage my money responsibly than the software being overly complex. Would you say that’s fairly common?

sound-design-live-money-ynab-todd-curtisTODD CURTIS: Absolutely. Almost anything significant that we learn new as adults has a learning curve. As adults, we’ve collected all these thoughts about the way things should be, and we have to unlearn those things as much as we need to learn new things.

On top of that, people’s financial lives are complicated. There are a lot of moving parts, and we have a lot of issues like security and personal goals wrapped up in money. That’s where the stress comes from, but keeping a budget can remove that stress. We like to think YNAB—both the method and the software—does that easily. It’s just easier if you can forget what you think you know!

Understanding how to use money is just as important as language in surviving modern life. Why is our personal knowledge so lacking?

I love that analogy to language. But language is something we learn naturally—our brains are actually wired for language acquisition! Managing our money isn’t something we’re surrounded by from birth. So we each kind of grope around and try to develop our own solutions, which is too bad because in the end, it isn’t especially difficult to learn some strategies that can make a real difference.

More than one person told me that they bought YNAB, got started, then at some point stopped entering transactions and gave up. I bet this happens fairly often and I’m curious if you have any good strategies for maintaining momentum?

I think a lot of people give up the first moment they discover what they actually spend turns out to be different than what they expected.

Because if people have learned anything about a budget, it is that it is a rigid system. Make your numbers or else! As though you get a grade at the end of the month. But that mode of thinking doesn’t recognize that life is unpredictable, even though we all know that it is. When your plans change, your budget – which is just a plan for your money – needs to change, too.

What do you wish your parents had taught you about money? Or, if you could leave behind a collection of values for your children, what would they be?

Be intentional about your money. Set (and change when necessary!) clear priorities and think about how money can help you reach them—or not.

sound-design-live-money-parents-dollar-honeyWhat are the most common mistakes you see people make with budgeting?

Forecasting—budgeting money that they don’t have yet. It’s easy to imagine any amount of future money when you do your budget, but then you don’t see the real need for change in your habits. You’ll go through the motions of what you think is budgeting without getting the positive benefits. Bottom line? Only work with the money you have now. The rest will come.

What are your responses to these two excuses? 1) I don’t make enough money to budget. 2) I make enough money to not worry about budgeting.

No matter how much money you do or don’t have, you have priorities. You’ll be happier and experience less stress if your money is aligned with them. That’s a budget.

How does YNAB compare to Quicken? Sometimes the best way to describe something can be through contrast.

The biggest difference, for me, is that other systems are retrospective. They look backward and give you reams of data. But sometimes, as one of our YNAB teachers likes to say, it’s just a glorious record of your overspending. A YNAB budget looks forward. It says, here’s how much money I have right now. What do I want it to do for me today? Next week? Next month? YNAB’s strategy aligns your money with your future aspirations rather than looking back.

For more information, YNAB has an entire article on the subject you can read here.

YNAB vs Mint? The great thing about Mint is that it’s free and it will connect to all of your accounts and automatically track transactions. The bad thing is that they have ads and you are not as in touch with your spending as when you have to put each item into YNAB. The whole idea is to get you to consult your budget before spending, and if transactions are recorded automatically you might never do that.

We’re really excited about a development we have just around the corner that will allow YNAB to connect directly with your bank. We shied away from this a bit in the past because we do believe, as you said, in being in close touch with your money. We never wanted automation to go so far that it put you out of touch with decision making. But by helping you stay organized with your transactions, we can keep you focused more on decision making. What do these dollars need to do for me right now? That’s an active process you need to be a part of. It’s what reduces your stress and allows you to take total control of your money.

sound-design-live-money-parents-minionMany sound engineers are independent contractors with irregular income. YNAB can work well for them because it has you wait until you have income before you budget any dollars, but what about the future? How much money should I have saved (buffered) so that I can take advantage of things like automatic transfers into my retirement account and automatic bill payments?

That is a decision that depends a lot on variables specific to your business. I mean, we tend to say that you should have at least a month’s worth of expenses in reserve. But what’s your risk tolerance? How even or uneven is your cash flow? How much do the cash needs of your business tend to vary? A lot of business owners would look at this and decide they need three, four, even six months of expenses saved.

What are some successful methods you have seen people use for budgeting with shared expenses? Colleagues, partners, spouses? Expenses that you don’t have complete control over (eg: you split grocery shopping with your girlfriend, but you do all of the shopping)?

I’d love to say there are tricks that will make it easy, but it really comes down to communication. Whether it is a business partner or a life partner, you’ve got to be clear about both your individual priorities and your shared priorities, especially at the places where they overlap or diverge. Have regular conversations about it. Have a budget date.

The other important thing in a shared budget is to leave some space for some autonomy. Hey, here’s money that is just for you or just for me, and we don’t have to report back to each other about it. That really helps things work smoothly.

TECHNICAL

How important is reconciliation? I haven’t done it, ever. Every day I spend about ten minutes checking all of my accounts for new transactions to make sure there was nothing I missed or entered wrong. Then once a month I “Adjust Balance” on each account because it is usually off a few dollars.

Reconciliation is important because you want to make sure the dollars in your budget truly exist in your accounts! If you don’t have an accurate record of transactions, you may be budgeting money you don’t have anymore. Having said that, making that adjustments you describe does the same job. You know you’re up to date.

I made some scary rookie mistakes when I first started using YNAB that I want to share with everyone. If you have any corrections or comments, that would be great.

TIP #1: It took me a while to wrap my brain around YNAB and credit cards (pre-YNAB I used debit cards only). For the first five months that I used it, I was budgeting all of my credit card expenses, but then I was also budgeting money to pay the credit card bill. That means I was budgeting twice as much as necessary and really stressing about the bill. When I finally realized what was happening I went back, corrected the problem, and realized that I had about $6,000 I had saved…on accident.

TIP #2: Since no one really taught me how to use a budget, traditional thinking told me that I should estimate my spending into categories for the coming month. It turns out Mark Butler calls that budgeting with Monopoly money. The way YNAB works is that you never budget a penny until you actually have it. So when you get paid, you apply those dollars to your budget. This is more like the envelope method that you may have heard about. One way to estimate into the future, which I have been using, is to use next month’s budget. So if we are in January, then you can go ahead and play with the budget in February and look at the summary at the top to see how much you have available.

Absolutely. That’s the sort of conventional wisdom about what a budget is – a plan based on what you think might happen if all your account balances follow a perfect path that happens to match exactly the last six or twelve months. But that is far less powerful than intentionally giving a job to every dollar you have right now. Want to look into the future? Set aside money for those future ambitions right now. When you have next month’s studio rental fee already set aside, there’s no need to forecast. You know you’re doing well.

Mixing the most difficult musical on Broadway: Rock of Ages

By Nathan Lively

sound-design-live-podcast-mixing-musical-broadway-rock-of-ages-daryl-bornstein-featured

Subscribe on iTunes, SoundCloud, or Stitcher.

Support Sound Design Live on Patreon.

In this episode of the Sound Design Live podcast, I talk with Daryl Bornstein about Rock of Ages, the most difficult play he has ever mixed. We discuss:

  • How he first got work on Broadway.
  • How he got the gig with Rock of Ages.
  • The complicated setup procedure before every show.
  • The sound system design and tuning.
  • How to visualize sound in a room.
  • What it takes to learn an intense Broadway musical.
  • The moment of panic on every show.

People want to work with somebody who is a team player, who is going to do what they need to do to make sure their work isn’t compromised, but understands the big picture and approaches problems as a challenge as opposed to an annoyance.

Show notes:

  1. All music in this episode from Rock Of Ages (Original Broadway Cast Recording)
  2. Hardware/software: Avid Profile, LCS, Galileo, Sennheiser 5212 and HSP2 and MKE1, Ultimate Ears
  3. Quotes
    1. Think of it as light. How is it going to reflect off of walls and other surfaces?
    2. Rock of Ages is the most difficult show I’ve ever had to mix.
    3. It’s unlike any other show I’ve ever done, because you cannot make a mistake.
    4. The single most important decision I ever made was to approach a producer and lobby to be the production sound engineer on a musical…
    5. The only criteria [for hiring crew] was, “Is this somebody that you want to sit across from at dinner and have a fun time?” You want to be around people that you enjoy being around. And that’s probably what makes for success, aside from skills.
    6. This particular [Digidesign Profile] has more plugins on it than any other Profile in the world.

sound-design-live-podcast-mixing-musical-broadway-rock-of-ages-daryl-bornstein-set

Use Automation to Build Relationships with a Free CRM

By Nathan Lively

sound-design-live-how-to-build-relationships-crm-contactually-streak

[iframe src=”https://player.vimeo.com/video/121795536?portrait=0″ width=”740″ height=”481″ frameborder=”0″ webkitallowfullscreen mozallowfullscreen allowfullscreen]

I was surprised to discover that the most popular topic we have discussed in Pro Audio Business Blueprint so far has been how to maintain great relationships with current and past clients. In fact, this is such an important part of running a service-based business that I want you to know about it, too.

Getting booked solid doesn’t happen by accident. It happens because you hustle for it.

In this video I walk you through the initial steps of using a paid app, Contactually, and a free app, Streak, to automate your hustle.

The Minimalist Guide to Budgeting (for Sound Engineers)

By Nathan Lively

sound-design-live-minimalist-guide-budgeting-piggy-bank

how-i-stopped-going-broke-budgeting-sound-engineers-see-no-evilI used to go broke every year. To stay out of the red, I had to stop ignoring money.

Being a sound engineer or a freelancer of any kind can make budgeting difficult. Fortunately, difficult does not mean impossible! I’ve learned several powerful strategies in the last year that have completely changed my game.

The Big Shift

In March of last year I attended the Big Shift Experience seminar. It was my first real business seminar and I was struggling to keep up with all of the new ideas. They had us perform some great exercises, and one of my favorites targeted our relationships with money. I’ll describe it for you so that you can try it with a friend:

  1. sound-design-live-minimalist-guide-budgeting-hello-moneyPretend that your friend is money, in the flesh. Talk to them! What do you appreciate about Money? What has been been challenging for you? What do you want for the future? Take five minutes to get everything off of your chest.
  2. Next, let Money take five minutes to respond (using their imagination) about how they feel about you and the things you just said. They might explain the status quo and make some suggestions for the future, or they might try to help clarify the things you said to them. They don’t need to give you the secrets to success; the power is in hearing your words and intentions reflected back to you.

This may sound a little woo, but here’s what I discovered:

  • I had been mostly ignoring money my entire life. I only gave it attention when I was upset about my finances and forced to confront the situation.
  • To build a strong relationship, Money and I needed to hang out more regularly.

Action

So, what was the best way to integrate Money into my life? Slowly and steadily. I started simply, by taking ten minutes every day to review my finances.

  1. Check all accounts to record/confirm new income and expenses.
  2. Make budget adjustments as necessary. (The nice thing about checking in every day is that you see the small transactions and habits that can lead to bigger problems and catch them before they grow.)

Results

Super simple, but just that little action can make a big change in your finances. What you give attention to grows.

I was ignoring money because I didn’t want it to run my life. The result was that it ran my life. I’m not a millionaire (yet) but I know where my money is going and I no longer budget on faith, because I know:

  • How much my lifestyle costs.
  • How much money I need to make to maintain my lifestyle.
  • How much I need to charge for my services.
  • How much I can save for my future.
  • When I will be able to stop working for money (more on this in a future post!).
  • How much I can spend on food, travel, and lap dances.

Why You Need a Budget

Here are some common excuses people use to avoid writing a budget:

  • I don’t make enough money to use a budget.
  • Budgets don’t work.
  • I check my account balance before every purchase.

sound-design-live-minimalist-guide-budgeting-piggy-bankHow well have those worked for you? Have you gone broke?

I have. Many times.

If you are going to participate in modern society, you are going to spend money (or Bitcoin). Stop pretending like you can run it all from your head and write those numbers down.

NOTE: It’s not all about limiting spending. It’s about exercising control, and creating goals and a strategy for success.

The Solution

Create a budget. Update it daily with current information.

I recommend You Need A Budget (YNAB) software, but you can read their four-step method for free right now. Here’s a quick overview:

  1. Give every dollar a job: This is similar to the envelope technique, if you’ve ever tried that. One big mistake that I made over and over while trying to make a budget is that I would use “Monopoly money” (that is, fake money that I didn’t have yet). I would project into the future and try to guess the entire month, then be surprised when I came up short. A more realistic approach is to only budget money when you have it, and then use that real money only for the next most urgent items in your budget.
  2. Save for a rainy day: Last month I had to spend $500 to repair my car. Surprise! It sucked, but honestly, I can expect that happen at least once a year. As soon as I realized that, I created a Car Maintenance budget category where I save $42/month ($500/12months). Next time my car breaks down, I’ll be ready.
  3. Roll with the punches: Surprise expenses are a big problem that I struggle with when I’m budgeting. There are a few ways you can make them easier on yourself. Last month I needed a piece of software I had not budgeted for. It was fairly simple to move some money out of my Buffer and Marketing category and into the Software category. What’s a buffer?
  4. Live on last month’s income: A buffer is a safety net equal to at least one month’s income. Once you have a buffer saved, you can budget out an entire month in advance and be more flexible with surprise expenses.

If you don’t want to buy YNAB ($54, normally $60), you can still get started today with a simple spreadsheet.

* * *

Was it hard to change?

A friend wrote me with this question:

How hard was it for you to start using the software? Not in terms of learning the interface, but in terms of actually managing your money? I go through periods of ignoring it (like you described) because it gives me anxiety. Did this help change that mindset for you?

Yes, it was hard. Yes, using the software was helpful.

Since I had never really learned how to use a budget before, it was pretty tough to get started managing my money. One important point is that I work on it for about 10 minutes every morning. Some people work on it once a week, but I like to just do a little every day. That way I can see trends develop and fix problems before they get out of control.

It was also emotionally challenging. I had been lying to myself for a long time about how much money I spend and how much money I need to earn to pay the bills. I used to think it was $1,900/month. Turns out, it’s $2,800 minimum, usually a little more.

Years ago, after reading my first business book, I opened a bunch of different accounts because I thought that’s what you do in business. This ended up being really challenging because I wasn’t making much money and it was all spread out. It was a constant juggling act.

The YNAB approach works much better for me because almost all of my money is in my checking account, where the action is. I only move it out to go into my investment account at Vanguard. I’m a lot more flexible now. If a big expense comes up I can quickly move numbers around without making a bunch of bank transfers. Also, all of my numbers are backed up by real money now, which is a huge change for me. I’m not estimating my spending any more. I only budget money when I have it.

There is a big learning curve, but I am biased because I started from very little experience.

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