New to Protools
 

I am new to Protools. I must say, I am loving this experience so far. I have about 100 Reel to Reels from dance clubs like Studio 54 that I am converting to 96 kHz WAV files. My question is rather simple.

I think the work flow to record in Protools is to just create a track and record from the Reel to Reel through the DAC (Focusrite 4PRE) and After the recording is finished, apply Compressors, Limiters and EQ? after that Bounce the finished result.

Is there anyway to add EQ and FX while it is recording or is this not how it works or how I should be doing it.

Thanks everyone.

Re: New to Protools
 

Are you adding eq, compression and fx for a particular reason or do you feel that's something you should do to preserve better the sound? If you are trying to save those recordings just transfer them to PT and save them to a track using the same audio settings of the session, you can add fx later without destroying the originals.
If you still want to use fx you can create an auxiliary track where you will insert the fx, then route the output to an audio track that would be recording the audio with the all the processing. Cheers

Re: New to Protools
 

Thanks I appreciate you teaching me how to use Pro-tools. It makes sense that I should record them first exactly as they are on the Reel. Sometimes because they are so old the highs are diminished and is sounds awful (especially scotch tapes) But I understand now that regardless of the original I should just record them as they are and apply FX later since its non destructive. Thank you.

I also notice that even with the Playback engine buffer set to 1024 I often hear some cracking. It does not appear to show in the recording but only during playback and monitoring. I am using a Thundebolt 3 to 2 converter since Focusrite does not yet support Thunderbolt 3 officially yet and the windows thunderbolt driver is beta. Perhaps I just need to wait for the final gold code driver to be released.

Thanks for all the help as I learn this amazing new program.

Re: New to Protools
 

So the crackling is in different places each playback for sure?

You certainly don't want to do a bunch of transfers if there's something going on that will render them useless.

Might want to try recording an input with nothing connected to it for 30min or so and then Clip Gain it up a bunch and make sure there are no clicks or pops in the file.

Re: New to Protools
 

OP may want to do the old bake the tapes in an oven trick.

http://audio-restoration.com/baking.php

Re: New to Protools
 

Yes some of these Reel to Reels are 40 Years old. Most are in very good shape but I have noticed a trend -- Scotch and Ampex tapes are absolutely the worst.

Re: New to Protools
 

Yes Jack, I heard about this if the tapes shed a great deal. So far I have been lucky and this has not happened yet. They say a food dehydrator works great. I found a few youtube videos on this process. Sure hope I dont need to do that.

Thanks for your post.