EQUIPMENT

At Virtual Vocals there is no compromise on our equipment which is amongst the very finest available in any studio. Our world class microphones and preamps will ensure you get the best possible sound quality on your tracks.

Microphones

• BLUE "Bottle" - Blue's flagship microphone featuring hand-built class A tube circuitry and interchangeable capsules for a variety of sounds and recording applications. One of the world's elite microphones with exceptional sound quality. We now have the following capsules for this microphone :

B0 : (based on the Telefunken 251) "The ultimate big vocal sound!" Airy top end, silky sonic signature.

B1 : (cardioid small diaphragm) "The accuracy plus capsule" - the ultimate for acoustic instruments such as nylon or steel string acoustic guitar.

B6 : (the Blue standard - modern presence vocal sound) “Larger than life”sound - enhanced lows and high frequency presence.

B7 : (based on the Neumann U47) "The classic vocal sound". Classic vintage detailed mids with airy presence.

• BLUE "Dragonfly"

• 2 by Audio Technica AT4033

• 2 by Rode NT55

• 2 by Shure SM57, 2 by SM58, Shure Beta 58.

Pre-amplifier

"Gavatron Audio" - a very special dual channel microphone pre-amplifier custom-designed and hand built by Gavin Pearce in Melbourne Australia, sound quality being the overriding design directive and cost no object! Based on a circuit originally designed by radiation physicists at MIT for nuclear research experiments in the 50's (!), it's key features include:

• pure Class A vintage valve circuitry throughout, the finest components and meticulous build quality, imparts a huge amount of sublime "tube" character to the sound.

• circuit specifically designed for ultra-wide bandwidth, ultra-low noise and extremely low phase shift all the way up to 100Khz for exceptional uncompromised sonic purity.

• variable input impedance including a unique "infinite" setting which creates a more "open" sound for microphones.

• unique input gain circuit also controls the "speed" of the preamp. Lower gain settings are ideal for strings and other instruments where you want to emphasise the delicacy and ‘sweetness’ while higher gain settings are great for percussive instruments where you want more front.

This preamp sounds amazing, definitely our "secret weapon"!

Other Hardware

• RME Hammerfall DSP multiface (high end audio interface), A/D convertors up to 24 bit/96KHz.

• Genelec 8040A professional studio monitors.

• 2.67 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo system, 4 GB RAM, 1.5 TB of hard drive space, Windows XP Pro SP2.

• 3 by Universal Audio UAD-1 cards with 41 amazing analog / vintage sounding plug-ins such as the Fairchild 670, LA-2A, LA-3A, 1176LN and Neve 33609 compressors, Pultec, Helios 69, Neve 1073 & 1081 EQ's, Neve 88RS channel strip, full "precision mastering" suite etc.

• TC Electronic Powercore running their superior range of high-end plug-ins .

Software

• Cubase 4.5 with a large selection of the very best plug-in effects and signal processors (also Cubase SX 3.1.1).

Outboard Effects Processors

• Lexicon MPX-1 reverb and multi-effects processor.

• Line6 Echo Pro delay modeller

Other

• 4 by Auralex MAX Wall 200 - large acoustic foam panels to eliminate ambient room noise in the recording booth.

• Plextor Plexwriter Premium 2 cd burner - incorporating Yamaha's "Audio Master Quality Recording" system for production of studio quality audio masters.

• Little Labs "RedEye" - high quality guitar / bass DI and re-amping box.

• A large selection of hardware and software plug-in synthesizers and samplers. The complete set of "Stylus RMX" expansion libraries containing literally thousands of great drum and percussion loops (pop, rock, funk, dance/club, hip-hop, world music etc).

• A collection of pro electric & acoustic guitars e.g. Fender Stratocaster, Gibson Les Paul, Tom Anderson "Grand Am" etc. Awesome sounding valve guitar amp (VHT Pitbull 100CLX), a selection of guitar amp modelling plug-ins and Line6 POD XT.

• 2 by Joemeek MQ3 preamps.