<p>I'm interested in becoming an audio engineer. Ultimately, I'd like to work in a recording studio. What are the pros and cons of this field?</p>
<p>The pros and cons depend a lot on what you like. From where I stand, the pros are that there are usually a fair number of jobs available in the field and the work is fast-paced and frequently interesting. The cons are that most of the jobs don't pay all that well, the available jobs may not be where you want to live, many of them involve shift work at odd hours and people tend to burn out after a few years in the field.</p>
<p>Do recording engineers usually have to supplement their financial income with some other side job?</p>
<p>The ones I know generally have to either work a second part-time job or put in a lot of overtime, particularly early in their careers.</p>
<p>My S finished a BS degree in audio tech at IU Music School last spring. It is difficult to make a living starting out. He is working in NYC at Sony Studios - top of his profession, etc. His job is entry level (general assistant) and he makes minimum wage and works the night shift from midnight to 8 AM where everyone there must start. He works overtime to supplement his meager funds (we still pay his rent) and he looks for extra work in all kinds of places. He loves what he's doing and considers himself very lucky to be in NY and at Sony. He has friends all over the country and generally they don't earn much in the first couple of years. Despite their superb training at IU, they are in a sort of apprenticeship capacity where they work. He had much more direct recording experience at IU than he does at Sony where he does a lot of mic placement and wiring. I believe he has only one fellow graduate who is already self-supporting and working as a full engineer - that person was both very good and uniquely well connected to the music business in Los Angeles through his father. Would he do it again? In a heartbeat. We look forward to the day when our S can pay his rent and health insurance!!</p>
<p>Here is a dream story for you. H went to Ball State in Muncie, Indiana. So we get the alum magazine. About a year ago is a story about their music technology degree and a girl who graduated with that got her first job at the Banff, Canada summer music festival. While working there she meets somebody with the Lord of the Rings movie who hires her to do some stuff in preproduction, then they move her to New Zeeland with the rest of the crew and she spends two years down there doing the music while they film all three movies. When its over she moves to LA and works on archiving the entire sound track (whatever that means). That's what she was finishing up when they interviewed her. Pretty sweet, right?</p>
<p>Wow, wish something similar would happen to me.</p>
<p>And another question: would music engineering be difficult for me if I'm not music and science inclined?</p>
<p>Exactly what do you mean when you say you are not music and science inclined? If it means that you don't like doing a lot of higher math and you are not a good singer or instrumentalist yourself, then you may still be alright. If it means you do not like doing hands-on stuff with electrical equipment and you can't hear subtle differences in musical performances, then you should start looking for a different field.</p>
<p>Woops, I meant to say math and science inclined. The music part I've got covered.</p>
<p>OK, the math part should not be too bad. You are not going to need calculus or trig or stuff like that unless you get into some of the more specialized areas like component design, studio acoustics and so forth. If you are more into recording, editing, mastering and that sort of thing, the math involved is mostly addition, subtraction, multiplication and division (although you will have to learn to add and subtract in odd units like minutes hours and seconds, and video frames, and how to convert back and forth.)</p>
<p>The science part could still be a problem. You need to be able to work with equipment, diagnose problems, understand the basics of how things work, know your way around a computer and stuff like that. You are not going to have to memorize a lot of formulas. What is it about science that you do not like? Have you had physics yet? Did you like the lab part of that course better than the lectures? Did you like physics lab better than biology or chemistry lab?</p>
<p>I've had physics; I liked learning about waves because I knew it was related to music engineering. Other than that, however, I prefer chemistry.</p>
<p>The key question is whether or not you enjoy working with your hands around electrical equipment. A lot of the work is going to revolve around the use and maintenance of stuff like microphones, preamps, mixers, amplifiers, speakers, various signal processing gear, and oscilloscopes and spectrum analyzers when doing maintenance. You will need to know a bit about cables, in particular which ones to use for a given application. You will need to know a fair amount about the use and maintenance of computers. Knowing how to strip wires and solder them to a connector will come in handy. If this kind of thing turns you on, then you will probably enjoy working in a recording studio environment. If you were the one who volunteered to take notes in physics lab because you could never get the equipment set up right or just did not understand what was going on, then music tech may not be the best option.</p>