CREATING A CD DIY--Do It Yourself--is the best way to go when creating a CD. The plus side is that you have complete control, you will learn a bunch, and more money goes into your pocket. The negative side is it takes a lot of time and effort, you will probably have to set up a business, and you need to be able to supply money up front. Having done 2 CDs I'm going to tell you how to create your own CD--from WHERE to get things done to the COSTS involved. The two CDs I have worked on are not up to the commercial quality some might desire and the reason for this is that with QUALITY comes COST. It is a trade off--is the consumer going to pay more $$$ for a little more quality. Then, there is the task of finding the places that will help you reach this quality. GETTING STARTED Having an idea is a start. Say you want to create an AUDIO CD with your groups musicians. Lizardking and Kosmic have done it, Purple Motion will probably do it so why not hop on the bandwagon--its cheap enough. But, along with this AUDIO CD you also want to release a DATA CD which consist of all 650 megs of your groups stuff. And because it is all YOUR stuff you can charge what you want and make some pocket change. ART Because your group is so big you have enough artist from within to complete all the art. Using professional tools such as PhotoShop, Quark Xpress, Pagemaker, and Corel 5 are recommended. Escape was laid out with Corel 4 and Freedom has been laid out with Quark Express 3.3 (PC). Now, all one needs is a printer and possibly film maker. FILM I have used: Johnathan Vail Anvil Graphics (508) 772-5823 vail@world.std.com / vail@pps.com I met him over the internet when looking for a FILM/SCREEN person. He produced ALL the screens for ESCAPE. He will be doing the CD LABEL art for the FREEDOM CD. I paid Johnathan with CDs and many thanks. The cost of FILM for doing a CD--booklet, tray card, and label art--will run you somewhat over a $100 but less than $200 depending on the size of the film. PRINTING: For Escape I rushed everything--amazingly everything turned out pretty good. The FILM when directly from Johnathan to 3M where 3M contracted out the printing to a nearby printer. No COLOR PROOF was done (they cost about $100). Except for the CYAN being a little "weak" the art turned out as we had hoped. This time around I found a few companies that specialize in PRINTING CD art and their prices are very reasonable: Riddle Press, Inc. 4555 S.W. Main Beaverton, OR 97005 (503) 643-5751 (800) 536-5751 Contact: David Frackelton (E-mail: 74354.2734@CompuServe.Com) Price: $314 per 1000 Ross Ellis 1133 Broadway, Suite 825 New York, NY 10010 (212) 645-6110 (800) 223-6105 Price: $297 per 1000 C-CASE 822 Hillgrove Avenue Western Springs, IL 60558 (708) 246-7044 Contact: William Dobias Punks with Presses 1255 26th st. #A Oakland, CA 94607 (510) 763-9432 Price: $350 per 1000 E-mail: jux@netcom.com All pricing is based on the standard 4 page booklet with full color on one side and Black on the back as well as the same 4/1 for the tray card. Riddle Press did the printing and screens for this (Freedom) CD. Ross Ellis prints out of Montreal and REQUIRES "printed in Canada" to appear somewhere on each thing they print or else they will put it in themselves. C-CASE offers a good alternative to the plastic jewel box--using recycled paperboard with your printing on the packaging. It is an interesting alternative which greatly cuts down on shipping cost. Finally Punks with Presses prints books, stickers, flyers, and zines besides CD inserts. However, they have a larger turn time then most and their quality is not going to match a "Ross Ellis" printer. I've seen samples/products from all of the above and can recommend anyone of them. My suggestion is to use C- CASE if you don't want to use a JEWEL case because a cardboad CD holder is better than a viewpak. As for CD insert printer, call all three above, get a catalog/samples and make a choice. Keep this in mind--if you have a CD and it says "made in Canada" somewhere on the printed material then it probably came from Ross Ellis. STICKERS You have a couple options here. Make your own stickers, don't make any stickers or go with someone who specializes in stickers. Punks with Presses and the "Sticker Guy" do stickers. Punks with Press will print 1000 (3"x3" or 4"x2") stickers for $45! You get 3 colors for your stickers on glossy white paper. The down side is the stickers are PAPER (won't last that long) and the colors are Black and whatever Punks with Presses are using at the time (that is what I heard but you might want to call them). The Sticker Guy is more expensive but prints on VINAL and is more flexible. I decided to use the Sticker Guy for the Freedom stickers. STICKER GUY c/o Pete Menchetti P.O. BOX 204 Reno, NV 89504 702-324-3889 mench@cs.unr.edu AUDIO--DAT/CD-R To master your music you will likely use a DAT recorder--whether you master in a studio or at someones house. Christopher discovered his school had DAT machines so he mastered our very own ESCAPE CD at his college. Perhaps a studio would be the best because of the tricks you can use to make the sound quality better. Since I have never been in a studio I do not know how much better the recording can get. The sound quality is likely to depend more on the SAMPLES and limitation of the GUS than anything else. So, is a studio necessary--NO--would it help the CD sound better--probably. Studios do come at a cost ($$$) though. John E. (reaper@sefl.satelnet.org / johne@alpha.acast.nova.edu) did all the music mastering/recording for the FREEDOM CD. His recently purchased SONY DAT recorder ($700 retail) is what all the on the CD was recorded to. John also has a DSP, EQ, and other toys which were used to sweeten the sound on some songs. John likes the idea of becoming a sound engineer. Perhaps the FREEDOM CD will give him the edge he needs to break into this field. If you are doing a CD and would like John's help then drop him some electronic mail. Once you have your recording on DAT and a track list (list of songs and time) then you are ready to convert the DAT to CD-R or just send the DAT to the CD pressor hand have them convert it for you. Want someone to convert your DAT to CD-R instead of the CD pressor? Well, DEM will do it for you. CD companies usually charge about $250 for this service and may or may not throw in a check disk for this price. If this is the case for you DEM may be worth checking out. Frank charges $175 plus a couple bucks for postage to create a PMCD which is what you CD pressor needs. Frank created the CD-R for Freedom's audio CD from the DAT John produced. DEM - attention: Frank 1011 Woodland St. Nashville, TN 37206 (615) 834-5419 or (615) 262-2222 E-mail: DigMas@aol.com DATA--CD/R Once you have your DATA ready for pressing it is best to get a CD-R made. Otherwise you will be sending some QIC/HARD DRIVE to the CD company and be charged about $200 for pre-formatting and still need a CD-R check disc. There are a lot of people/places that do these "one offs." David Hughes did the Escape and Freedom CD one off. He charges less than $50 and has a turn around time of about a week. David A. Hughes P.O. Box 1661 Statesville, NC 28687 (704) 872-1560 CD ROM COMPANIES There are a lot of CD ROM/CD Audio companies out there. I have called many and dealt with only 1--3M. Below are some firms and estimated costs for 1000 CD's pending you send them all the ART and pre-formatted DATA. Tape Speciality Inc. (DISCTRONICS) Disctronics # (800) 224-7616 TSI # (818) 786-6111 Type: Audio Contact: Robin Lazarus Price: $1610 / 1000 3M Data Storage Optical Technology Division (800) 336-3636 Type: Data / Audio Contact: Gwen Brookey (#2337) Price: $2336 / 1000 Disc Manufacturing, Inc. (800) 433-DISC Type: Data / Audio JVC (310) 274-2221 Type: Data / Audio Nimbus (804) 985-1100 Type: Data / Audio Disc Makers (800) 468-9353 Type: Audio Dig through some magazines and I'm sure you will find more. Kosmic had their "Nothing is True" CD pressed by Disc Makers. This same company has done CDs for bands like: Hole, Rollins, Edie Brickell, Elasticia, and The Police. You can tell who pressed the CD by looking at the inner ring of the CD--DIDX = Disc Makers. The FREEDOM CD's were pressed by 3M. COSTS To produce an AUDIO or DATA CD expect to spend somewhere in the neighborhood of $2000-$3000 for 1000 CDs. This includes all the printing, pressing, CD-R, and such. So, your CD will cost you about $3 a piece. Mailing the CD in a good bubble mailer will tack on another 35 cents and postage is about $1.24. Play your cards right and your "at cost" per CD will be about $5 with everything above that pure profit. Course if you press more CD's your price per CD comes down and if you pressed 500 CD's your at cost is more like $7. Because these prices are so reasonable anyone with little money and a credit card can go out and press a CD. You just better be able to sell enough in those first few months to pay of the big credit debt if you go this route. It can be done. I sold 300 Escape CD's within two months--this would have paid off any credit debt, interest included. EVERYTHING ELSE I know of a few scene CD's--people who have done the above. I do not know if they have "succeeded" but they have all created something from nothing. Below are some AUDIO CD's coming out of the scene. TITLE: The Best of the Amiga Scene Description: Songs from some of the best Amiga musicians--composed on the Amiga. In fact, everything about the CD was done on an Amiga from art to mastering. It contains 18 songs--74:09 worth of music. Recording quality is good, price is a little high. Order: TBOTAS ATTN: Fredrik Elmqvist Gasverksgatan 21 46234 Venersborg Sweden E-mail: fredrik.elmqvist@p42.spray.ct.se Cost: Around $14 plus postage ($7 to US) TITLE: FTZ: Nothing is True Description: Dan Nicholson and Riku Nuottajarvi of Kosmic. Contains 12 songs (68 minutes). Contains B/W photocopied art. Great if you like techno. Recording quality is great. ORDER: Area 51 Records 553 Thoreau Terrace Union, NJ 07083-9044 (908) 687-3479 E-mail: moddan@ritz.mordor.com Cost: $15 ppd to US I think. TITLE: Physiology: Strange World Description: Lizardkings CD. Professionally done with cool art and Excellent recording quality. A must have for people who enjoy Gustav's music. Highly Recommended. ORDER: Gustav Grefberg Duvhoksv. 25 856 51 Sundsvall Sweden Cost: Less than $20 delivered. TITLE: Future Shock 2 Description: Have not seen CD yet. But contains 71 minutes of Audio. ORDER: Eric 'Sidewinder' Giesete 8611 Cape Valley San Antonio, TX 78227-2113 (800) 25-AMIGA = BCI E-mail: 1969chia@europa.com COST: $15 There are also scene related DATA CD's such as "Hot Sound and Vision," "Assembly 94," "Escape," and soon to be others--many others. If you have a scene CD and would like to trade let me know--I'm interested. As you can see, it CAN be done--especially if you have (or think you have) something people want. I bid you good luck with your CD venture if you decide to do such--at least now you have an advantage...INFORMATION. -Dan Wright (dmw@gate.net)