Having recorded my new CD Sacred Love with Grammy-award winners Will Ackerman (producer) and Corin Nelsen (recording and mix engineer), here are 6 sure-fire ways to make musical magical happen on your next recording session and take your CD to the next level.

1.            Make a Budget and Stick to It

Records cost lots of money to make. If you’re recording in your home studio, you’ve probably spent thousands of dollars for a computer, software, audio interfaces, speakers, microphones and musical instruments. Whether you’re recording your CD at home or working with a producer at independent studios, you want to make a budget and stick to it.

My budget included fees for producer, studio, travel, musicians, mastering, PR and radio promotion, duplication, and distribution. Make sure you know what you expect to spend and over how long, so that you can raise the money.

Producers get paid hourly or by the song, or a custom deal plus points on a song. If you are co-producing, you can split the points.

Musicians get paid different fees from free to sky’s the limit. The more famous and accomplished musicians get larger fees than your friend might – unless your friend is Sting.

Figure all the possible costs of your recording and put them into your budget. Then try to spend money according to the budget.

And even if you do, it’s more likely than not that you’ll go over budget. So add a 10 per cent contingency right now. Then when it comes time for you to professionally master, and design, duplicate and promote your CD, you can have the cash you need once the recording is finished.

2.            Surround Yourself with the Best

Whether you’re planning on a solo or group recording, bringing together neighborhood musicians, or recording with the best producers, musicians and production staff, you’re only as good as the company you keep. As an acoustic guitarist and a composer of conscious music, I approached the legendary producer and guitarist Will Ackerman who I felt had the experience and expertise to help me take my music to the next level. As the founder of Windham Hill Records, a gifted creator of acoustic guitar music, and producer of artists like George Winston, Michael Hedges, Alex DeGrassi, Shadowfax, and Jeff Oster, Will brought his vast expertise and a unique sensitivity to my recording project.

His own Imaginary Road Studios in Windham County, VT also features customized state-of-the-art microphones and preamps that helped make me sound my best.  Grammy Award-winning engineer Corin Nelsen is the resident recording and mixing engineer. At Imaginary Road I felt comfortable because the studio was situated in the Nature on 100 acres of spacious beautiful Vermont woodlands. So I was in a great place surrounded by accomplished production people, and I was able to focus on creating the music I needed to create for the recording.

3.            Prepare

Preparation in the studio means you’re making an efficient use of costly studio and staff time. If you’re working with a producer, get together before you get into the studio to discuss and agree on a gameplan for the recording. How much time do you need to spend per song, how many total days in the studio for recording and mixing, which musicians are you planning to add to your tracks, and when are you scheduling the sessions, etc.

If you are bringing together musicians to perform on your CD, write out lead sheets and chord charts beforehand. And practice your songs. Make sure your own performances are so tight that you can deliver your best in the studio the first take. I practiced the songs on my CD, and recorded them in my home studio, so that I could perform them well in a studio-like environment. It really helps to be prepared and you’ll likely save money as a result.

I was really impressed when my studio musicians contacted me before the sessions for copies of the lead sheets and recordings, so they could practice. Tony Levin played bass on five songs and he was totally prepared.

4.            Build Time Into the Process

Sometimes in recordings, you’re pressured to record and mix without a break. When that’s due to budget considerations, you have to go with it. I suggest building time into the recording process. Time is your friend.

I scheduled about 2 weeks between the recording of the guitars on Sacred Love, and layering of other instruments. That gave me time to familiarize myself with my own performances of the songs on “Sacred Love.”  From there both Will and I heard specific instruments playing melodies, leads and harmonies on the recordings, and we had time to line up the instrumentalists.

You can watch videos of my sessions for Sacred Love on YouTube.com/ShambhuMusic.

Building in time for reflection was necessary for ideas to form, crystallize and then emerge. We added violin, drums, cello, bass, sarod and other instruments, and we sought out the most sensitive musicians to create with us. These artists included Eugene Friesen on cello (Call to Spirit, Edge of Eternal, Revelation), Jill Haley on English horn (Edge of Eternal, Revelation), Premik Tubbs on windsynth (Together) and flute (Nirab Amare), Ravichandra Kulur on flute (Humility and Call to Spirit), Jeff Haynes (percussion), Celso Alberti (drums) and Todd Boston (sarod).

I also scheduled about two weeks between the final recording session and the mix session. And then two weeks between the final mixes and Mastering, and a few days before mastering, we did the ‘final’ final tweaks.

5.            When You’re Done Recording, Then there is Post-Production

Congratulations…the recording is finished. Now you need to think about mastering, design of the cover, duplication, copyrights, digital rights management, etc.

Mastering adds the simonize to ’shine’ the recording. A good mastering engineer can match the volumes and tone of the various tracks so your tracks soundåßß like they belong on the same album. I was fortunate to work with Adam Ayan, mastering Engineer at Gateway Mastering in Portland, ME, and Corin Nelsen was on hand to make sure we got the sound just right.  Most major duplicators offer mastering services for 10-20 per cent of the cost of a Gateway. If you can afford the best, you’ll definitely get your money’s worth.

CD duplicators can deliver 1000 CDs to you in a few weeks. You get to design the cover and can work with your duplicator on all aspects of the recording. This includes design of cover and CD art, writing of a booklet or insert and inside and outside sleeves, and they can also help set up electronic distribution to iTunes, Amazon and other online retailers.

Copyright your sound recording with the U.S Patent and Trade Mark Office.

Set up your publishing with BMI or ASCAP. And if you’re expecting to get radio play, sign up with Sound Exchange.

6.            CD is Done? You’re at the Beginning.

When you have your finished CDs in hand then you’re at the staring line again. Now comes the challenge of promoting it and engaging with listeners and buyers. And you might want some help. There are people who specialize in radio promo, public relations outreach, social media and retail distribution. If you have the cash and budgeted for experts, hire them now. And if you want to get your songs into major chain stores, work with a music distributor who can help.

Sacred Love features Shambhu on guitar with:

Will Ackerman – guitar

Tony Levin – bass

Michael Manring – bass

Jeff Haynes – percussion

Eugene Friesen – cello

Jill Haley – English horn

George Brooks  – sax

Ravichandra Kulur – flutes

Todd Boston – sarod

Premik Russell Tubbs – wind synth and flute

Celso Alberti – drums

Charlie Bisharat – violin

Jeff Oster – flugelhorn

Rocky Fretz – piano

Claytoven Richardson and Noah Wilding – vocals

• ISBN13: 9780823023493
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.

Product Description
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Creating Characters with Personality: For Film, TV, Animation, Video Games, and Graphic Novels

There are many budget design options out there for people who are trying to create their own company business cards.  They range from the completely ‘homespun’ method of doing-it-yourself on your inkjet printer, to paying for a freelance designer or budget online logo company to create your business card for you. You may want to consider using the business card template resources that can be easily found online.

As a designer and marketing manager with over a decade of industry experience (working for large corporations, print companies, as well as freelancing for small business clients) I feel qualified enough to offer you my own insight into creating your business card using business card templates that you can find on almost all online print sites.

Your cheapest-of –the-cheap business card template option is to design and print business cards yourself using those perforated Avery business card sheets that you can buy at Staples for $16.00. Don’t do it!!! I mean, there’s doing it yourself, and then there’s trying to feed cardstock through a printer and making a complete inky mess!

Here’s a rundown of the problems you’ll encounter when ‘shoe stringing’ your business cards with an Avery busines card template and an Inkjet Printer:

You’re going to have to create your business card design in Microsoft Word, Open Office, or other such office program that was clearly never meant for designing and printing business cards!

Those Microsoft Word templates are unbelievably frustrating to work with. As an experienced designer, even I find it difficult to try to create a half-decent business card layout.  The biggest problem with Avery templates (hidden somewhere in the bowels of the ‘envelope’ menu in the ‘tools’ header) is that you have to create a whole page of business cards at once. The business card template is populated by two columns of business card ‘cells’ (that roughly match your perforated print sheets) in which you are required to individually ‘cut and paste’ your design elements. During this tedious cut and paste process, hitting the wrong key, or pressing return where you’re not supposed to will result in a jumbled series of business card design cells with all the text, shapes, objects, lines, or images in bizarre alignments. 

Using plain text to create your business card design will probably work out fine, but just try to insert any pictures from an outside file or include shapes or images from your picture menu and you’re asking for trouble – trying to align them inside a cell just doesn’t work!

From a graphic design point-of-view, using the design elements in Word is not advisable. The autoshapes and clip art available from the insert menu have barely changed since the 90’s. They represent a garish and fluorescent mix of random images that I last saw being used to  ‘spruce up’ my schoolteacher’s handouts! It would also be ill advised to use any text effects from the Word Art menu.  The choice of bubblegum-style, gradient-heavy effects on offer will make your business card look like you gave it to a high-school cheerleader to design!

Once you have your design ready to go to print then you will encounter a whole new set of jamming and ink running problems. These are the same inkjet printer problems that that you’ve probably encountered every day, but intensified due to the difficulties of using thicker paper and the need for exact print alignment. You are almost guaranteed to end up with an ink-splattered and poorly aligned set of business cards (text running off-center, and out of square, and you can forget about creating any kind of image bleed!)

If you’ve managed to get to the stage where you have printed sheets of business cards without smashing your printer or throwing your monitor out of the window, then you can begin the fun of bending and tearing the perforated business cards. This is not easy. Not only is it fiddly and time consuming, but you’re certain to ruin a few business cards that won’t tear properly down the perforations!

The quality of your card stock and the ‘inkjet-fuzzy’ look and feel of your cards will be a dead-giveaway that you’ve made them on your office or home printer. Cards created on inkjet printers scream of ‘bad quality’ and tell customers that you don’t really care, or haven’t enough faith in your business to create a worthwhile business card.

If you are lucky enough to have a laser printer, it’s still not worth going down the Avery business card template route.  There may be a slight improvement in quality, but your business cards will nonetheless look like you made them at home (which you probably did)

Without the gloss or matte finishes that print companies can provide nowadays, your business card is not going to look professional. Also, it’s not that much more of an expense to create a business card using the business card templates from the majority of online print companies.  Inkjet cartridges and laser print ink is EXPENSIVE!!! Trying to print out reams of business cards at your home or office will suck up all your ink and end up costing you more than you probably think!

Unless you are prepared to shell out money to get your business card designed and printed by a professional designer, your only other option is to look online to design your business card.  It might be interesting to know that many designers will use budget online print resources to print your product- utilizing the ‘upload your own design’ option that’s provided by the majority of print sites to send your design to print! Pay a freelance designer to create your card and they may well be using the very same online company that you were also thinking of using (even if they say that they’re getting your cards printed at ‘cost-a-lot-fancy-print-boutique’.) Some of the low-cost print sites are pretty good quality. Without expert design or print knowledge, it is hard to tell the difference between a budget printer and a high-end print shop.

It’s not difficult to cut out the middleman and create a really great quality business card. Even if you don’t possess any design skills, there are plenty of online companies (some good, some bad) that provide some really great business card design templates that you can add your business information to. In many cases, the end result won’t be that different to a business card designed by a graphic design professional.

Now I have to admit to being slightly biased in recommending a site for you to design your business card at. I have created quite a few design templates for the online print industry. In particular, I have produced some excellent work for OvernightPrints.com. Of the many budget online print companies, I think they have some of the best business card templates to choose from. They also have two different online design template programs – one for more expert designers and the other for design beginners.

What you’ll often get at sites like Overnight Prints.com is a chance to design something really quickly without having to have any real design expertise. In most cases, all the layout and font choices are all done for you.  Here’s a quick rundown of the process:

Start your design by navigating to one of the sites online design programs and choose a design template. It’s usually just a question of picking a general business card design template, or a business card template that relates to your industry, i.e., Real Estate, Construction, or Health and Beauty.

Once you’ve chosen your template, you will be presented with a series of information boxes in which you can enter your business information, i.e., address, name title, contact.

In most cases, it’s just a question of typing in your details and sending your design off to print. The whole process is usually done in about 3 minutes!

Everything’s done in a virtual onscreen world where you only have to design ONE business card  – as opposed to Avery design templates where you’re required to design a whole ‘print page’ of actual business cards.  It’s certainly a lot less messy, a heck of a lot quicker, and a whole lot less frustrating experience!

Once you have approved your design you can checkout your design online. Costs can vary for business card from site-to-site and you’ll ALWAYS have to pay for shipping – even though some online print companies claim to supply ‘completely FREE business cards’.

Shipping will usually take around 3 days, so if you need your cards for a special event, conference, or meeting, it’s best to order at least a week in advance to ensure that you get your business cards on time.

People have been successfully creating cheap marketing materials using these business card templates as well as templates for postcards and letterheads, etc., for years! If you’re new to the business world and you were wondering how to create low-cost business cards and marketing materials, then it’s merely a question of knowing where the best sites are to create your promotions.

Cost-wise, you’ll probably pay around $40 to $50 for 500 business cards, which is not a lot of money to shell out for a real business card product. It certainly beats all the mess and hassle of trying to create them on-the-cheap with an inkjet printer. It’s a small price to pay to create that essential first impression and most important of all marketing materials- the business card.