Home Studio on a Budget

 What to look into!

At some point or another, if you are looking into sound postproduction, you'll need a home studio. Now you may ask yourself, jeez that sounds expensive... And it is! But I've learned a few tricks to keep cost down but productivity and quality up!

Budgeting:

As you'll soon realize, this isn't a field without cost. So giving yourself a small budget is key. But first, in order to know how much you need to set aside, know what is absolutely necessary. Here, we will look at the minimum for price and ability to maintain a low-medium professional grade. 

What You Need!

Of course this is opinion based, but what I've ran into as essential is: one decent desk mic, a pair of good speakers, one pair of good studio grade headphones, and a computer capable of running mid-range softwares. (optional is an interface, a device used to connect mics and speakers to your computer that also allows for some quality control.)

For this, we will ignore the cost of softwares and assume we are using free ones. 

Why a Microphone?

A mic is useful for a multitude of reasons. Most of which do not actually contribute directly to the project. In my experience, having at least one mic can help with things like, meetings, audio tests, placeholder audio and sometimes ADR. Good quality desk mics have gotten a lot cheaper, at around 70-100$. 

Quick Tip!

Use websites that are known for quality. For mics I use Sweetwater or BnH!

Why Speakers?

Speakers are extremely important for postproduction audio. Headphones can lie to you about what you are hearing and using speakers, you may find issues you didn't know your audio has. I personally did not know this until a short film I worked on got played through a speaker, suddenly there were things that were fuzzy and low frequency that my headphones hid from me. 

Finding speakers is a bit of a grey zone. Used speakers can be risky since the magnet or innards can be worn and deceiving. In my experience, even low to mid range speakers tend to be 150$ each roughly. And choosing new is best for this purchase. 

Quick Tip!

Although some may be tempted to use bluetooth music speakers, you actually lose a lot of quality in that. Music speakers are good at higher end frequencies, 2-5k Hertz. Or around where humans hear best. Those roll-offs and high and low frequencies will be un-hearable, until it's played through a good speaker and suddenly there is a buzz during the whole film. Secondly, Bluetooth also creates a natural delay as it is not connected by cable. That delay can trick you into mistiming your sound editing and everything will appear off once exported. The same goes for bluetooth headphones, they are catered to that same 2-5k Hertz and also carry a delay when listening. All this is not noticeable for music, but very noticeable for a professional video edit. 

Yes, Headphones!

Headphones are the most important purchase you need. AirPods, Beats or Apple Earbuds don't cut it. Sure, depending on the quality of your headphone, you'll still miss some stuff in the mastering that is noticeable through a speaker, but you need headphones to get you to the mastering stage. With just Headphones and a computer, you can make a professional video and audio edit. The key thing is to understand what you are buying. 

Studio Monitoring Headphones are industry standard and some are in reasonable ranges. Before I make a suggestion, know something called a Frequency Response. When buying studio grade headphones, they will, or should, have a graph showing the frequencies that they cover. Typically the more expensive your headphones, the better the response is. In other words, it lies to you less. 

A good low to mid level headphone that I really like is the Sony MDR-7506. At around 100$, they work well and are professional grade. I would consider this the minimum. 

Your Computer!

I'm going to assume most people have a computer, and luckily, in my experience most postproduction softwares work well on MAC's. Though I can give some two sense about computer specs too. 

If you do not have an interface, your computer is supplying all the power. For speakers it does not matter because most require their own power cable. But your Mics and Headphones can become weaker without sufficient power. This is very common in Mics, where certain microphones need a chunky power source to create anything close to -12db audio levels. For example, SM-7B's are used for podcasting and streaming, but they require a TON of power to reach those audible levels without boosting the gain. 

A standard desk mic meant to be plugged into a computer may come with a USB-C or Mini-USB cable, which you may find creates a weak signal. I've had people ask me to turn myself up when done through those cables. Headphones aren't much different, depending on what your computer came with, luckily Mac's have this problem less, your headphones may sound super quiet, even at max volume. This can be a few things, poor connectors, cheap internal interface from the computer, or low amounts power being distributed. Those are a few things I ran into myself to look out for. 

Starting out, I suggest building over a few years. It sounds like a long time, but there can be endless issues with building a studio from as simple as a cable mismatch, to a hardware update. So taking time to research into it more is key. Start with a good pair of headphones and produce solid work on that front first. If you ignore that advice and decide to buy everything now, then the total I'd say to be comfortable is around 6-700$ on the high end, and 3-400$ on the low end. 

Quick Tip!

A very popular interface that is professional grade, and one that I like a lot, is the Focusrite Scarlet 2i2, or other models. They are specifically made to bridge the gap between studio gear and computers. They are great bought used for 100$, or new for 300$. 

Conclusion:

This experience is my own long build towards a working studio. Not necessarily for recording, but post production work. There are many things you'll find you need and they can be as simple as an SD card reader, or an SSD for storage. I hope my experience helps!