Wellspring Sound Information for Clients
Welcome! We're looking forward to working with you, and offer this short primer to help make your experience as fun and efficient as possible. Please read this over , and feel free to contact us with any questions at (978) 263-9246 from 10AM to 11PM.
Directions | Costs | Payment Policies | House Rules
Wellspring's address is 3 Eastern Road, Acton, MA 01720
Here's how to get here:
From Boston/Cambridge: Take Rt. 2 west from Memorial Drive and Alewife Station in Cambridge, cross Rt. 128, go another 8 miles to the rotary in Concord next to the prison (roughly 3 miles beyond the Walden Pond exit). Go 1/3 of the way around the rotary, get on Rt. 2A and 119, and go another 3 miles to Rt. 27. Take a right on Rt. 27 and go 1.3 miles to Eastern Road. Left on Eastern Road, we´re the second building on the right, a new green metal building. Go around back, we´re the first door on the right.
From NH/Maine: Take Rt 3, Route 95, or Route 93 South to Route 495 South Take 495 South to exit 34 ( 1.3 miles after the Lowell Connector exit) Get off at Rt 4/110 Chelmsford Lowell exit Bear right off ramp onto Rt 4/110 South Go 9/10 mile to Chelmsford Center, bear right onto Rt. 27 south Go 6.3 miles south on 27 to Eastern Road in Acton ( at 4.9 miles go through a light at Rt 225 intersection) Right onto Eastern Road, 2nd building on right, follow directions above.
From Worcester/CT: Take I-290 east to Rt. 495. Go north on 495 to Rt. 2, take Rt. 2 inbound about 4 1/2 miles to Rt. 27. Get on 27 north for about 4 miles till you see Eastern Road on left, then follow directions above.
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Studio Time:
- 24 hr. lockout days in Studio A: $450 (doesn't include engineer)
- 24 hr. lockout days in Studio B: $325 (doesn't include engineer)
- 10 hr. long days in Studio B: $300 (doesn't include engineer)
- The studio A room rate is $60-75 an hour depending on the engineer; less than 8 hours is $65, more than 8 hours is $60/hour
- The studio B room rate is $55-60/hr an hour with an engineer $35 an hour without an engineer
- Mastering ( with engineer) $55 per hour
- Freelance engineer rates ( the rate you pay when you bring your own engineer) are $35 an hour for studio B, and $40-45 an hour for studio A
- The corporate/institutional rate is $75 an hour for the studio A and $65 for studio B
- When you schedule or cancel a session, please be sure you have either a phone call directly to Eric or an email that's responded to before you assume the session is on. Sometimes emails get lost or caught in spam blockers, and cell phone voice mails can have problems, so please don't assume we got your message unless you you hear a response from us.
- When Wellspring engineers assist lockout sessions they are paid $20-25 an hour depending on the situation. Interns are also often available to help with setup and strike as needed.
- When large sessions involving more than 6-8 mics finish up, clients are no longer charged for studio time, but they need to pay the engineer to strike mics cables, or plan to assist in the effort. Often strike time can be reduced/eliminated by doing it during rough mixes at the end of sessions.
Tape: ADAT digital 8-track tape (42 minutes)-$18; 2-track 1/4" tape (16-33 minutes) -$28, 2-track 1/2" tape-$50; DAT tapes are $10 for 60 minutes, $15 for 120 minutes, 2 inch 24-track tape is $175.00. Sony or Maxell premium cassettes are $3.50 each.
Update August 2003: After a couple years of messing with media costs for Radar, here's a formula we've come up with that seems fair to everyone: Media cost for projects lasting a month or more- $3 per gig ( negotiable down for larger projects). Cost if you only need your stuff on the drive for a week- $2/gigabyte. Cost if you need to store it overnight-$1/gigabyte. Cost if you dump it down at the end of the session-free. DVD s costs are $13 for 4.7 Maxell media and $18 for 9.4 Gig carttridges.
We still charge $25/hour to backup projects and our machines can back up about 4 gigs per hour. We require all extended projects to be backed up at least twice over the course of the recording, and will assume no resposibility for projects that are not backed up. Again, nothing bad has ever happened, but we want you to know we take this backing up stuff really seriously. After all, it's your dreams ( and our reputations) riding on those little bytes....Thanks!
Wellspring's entry into the world of hard drive recording presents new challenges in storing audio. In the past we sold clients ADAT tape and analog tape to record and mix their projects on. At the end of the project people took the tapes home, where they became paperweights or useless boxes in closets, and some folks would use the tapes again on future projects. The cost for a project's worth of tape depended on the format chosen, and typically ranged between $100 and $700.
With the rise of hard disk recorders, there's no tape anymore! Our RADAR recorders use pricey, battle-tested removeable disk drives that are guaranteed by their manufacturers not to fail, and cost us about $30 per roughly the amount of storage needed on a 5 minute long 24 track song) to buy. The songs themselves are also backed up on rewriteable DVD's which cost around $6 per gigabyte and take roughly 10 minutes per gigabyte to record when you're backing up a project. So here's the rub-- should studios require clients to buy the hard drives and the DVD's, and pay full studio rates to back up their projects?
Here's what we've come up with as a "working draft" policy: We feel strongly that every project , every song, should be stored in at least 2 places-- the original drive and the DVD backup. Clients are welcome to buy the drives if they like, or they can rent space on one of our drives (we have about 100 gigs of Radar storage available) for one month for $5 per gigabyte. After one month, we'll figure how much extra time is needed and work something out. We'll never erase anyone's project without their permission and without first backing it up to DVD. We'll do backups during breaks or setups for free, but will charge $25/hr to backup projects outside of session time.
Clients who want to supply their own drives and DVD's are welcome to, BUT (and it's a big but folks) we will not guarantee these drives. In other words, if your drive crashes and you lose your data... we know places to send it where odds are good for recovery, but this is a nightmare scenario we all want to avoid. That's why we stand by the drives we use; they've never crashed, we've never lost anything, and (so far) no client has ever insisted we use their bargain basement closeout deal 9 gig SCSI drive to do their project on. If we transfer audio from a Wellspring drive to your hard drive we will wait 30 days to allow you to fully review and backup the audio before deleting it from our drives. After 30 days, we'll delete it without calling you when we need drive space, so don't forget to review your files when you get home !
With this policy, you can expect to spend roughly $100-200 (including DVD's ) for material costs on an album- length project, so the cost of doing a RADAR-based project is just slightly higher than a comparable ADAT project. And when you hear the difference, and see what the new system can do, we think you'll make the jump.
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Payment Policies: Since we run on a tight margin and want to avoid any misunderstandings, all sessions at Wellspring observe the following guidelines:
1. Payment for tape and time is due at the end of each session, unless a different arrangement is agreed to by Eric. Checks are made out to Wellspring Sound, and we take paypal with a 3% surcharge( that's what they charge us)
2. Payment for the session begins when the session was booked to start, not when you arrive, unless the engineer is late. Usually engineers are at the studio 10 minutes before starting time if you want to set up. Set-up time, ie. the choice and positioning of mics, setting levels, etc, is an essential bit of work that Wellspring is paid for at our regular hourly rate. At the end of the session, the engineer spends time putting away equipment for 15 minutes without cost to you. After that you should expect to pay for the engineer's time ( usually at $20 per hour), but not for Wellspring time.
3. You're responsible for 75% of the time you booked. Thus, if you book a ten hour session, you need to work at least 7 1/2 hours or pay us the difference.
4. Studio time is not booked without a minimum 1/3 deposit, based on the estimated total hours of session time involved. Large blocks of time( more than two consecutive days) require longer advance notice if you have to cancel. We need a week's notice of cancellation for each day booked, so if you book 3 consecutive days, we need three weeks notice if you have to change your plans. If you can't stick to this, you'll lose 1/2 your deposit; less than 4 days in advance, and you'll lose the whole deposit, unless we can find someone to take the time. Allowances are made for acts of God and medical emergencies, and we're not unreasonable, but we need you to take studio time commitments very seriously. We aren't like a doctor's office or an airline that can plug in new clients at a moment's notice; when we book your session we never double book another client for the same time.
5. No master tapes in any form (digital, cassette, or reel) will be released unless payment is received, and no future sessions will be booked without advance approval from Eric.
6. Our Yamaha C-7's are great sounding pianos, especially when they've just been tuned. If you book a session where the piano is needed, we may recommend that it be tuned just prior to the your start time. The pianos holds their tunings fairly well, but Wellspring is not responsible for out-of-tune piano notes if you've chosen not to pay for tuning ($85) before your session. Incidentally we have an excellent tuner, Fred Mudge, who will tweak the piano action to your specifications, so come in before your session to check the action if you like.
6. Our instruments are maintained regularly, but if you want to make sure that a particular guitar is going to sound its best, bring along your favorite set of strings. ( We have some strings on hand that we sell at wholesale rates.) When stringing up some of our older acoustics, please check with Eric before stringing them with medium gauge or heavier strings- they may not be able to handle it. If you want to bring in your own drum skins for our drums that's fine, but you'll need to either leave the heads on the drums when the session's over or else restore the original skins to the drums and set them up properly for the next person.
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2.Please don't litter outside or inside; we're sloppy enough as it is! And dudes, do your dishes!
3.You can bring you own food, but it needs to stay away from microphones and gear. You're welcome to use our small refrigerator and microwave oven.
4.Guests are welcome, but we encourage you to invite only those people who might really be useful to your project or your personal sanity. Too many people in the control room is distracting to us and to you.
5. We're happy to store your tapes during and after your project (for up to 3 months). However, recorded tapes are the client's (i.e., your) responsibility. We're not able to absolutely guarantee, and are not responsible for the storage and safety of recorded tapes, CD's, hard drives, etc. Nothing bad has ever happened , but this is the age of lawyers...
6. January 2010- In our first 24 years of operation, we have never had any problems with studio gear being taken by our clients. However, in the last 6 months we've had over $1000 of instruments and microphones stolen, which we attribute in large part to the bad economy. This is extremely troubling to us, because we've always kept instruments out where our clients can use them. It also forces us to keep an eye on things in ways that distract us from our main purpose of recording great music. We have now instituted stricter instrument inventory controls, and want to remind our clients that honorable treatment of Wellspring gear is in their own best interest, and keeps the stuff around for future clients to use.
Wellspring Sound Policy on Digital Backups:
In the past, when clients paid $165 for 16-32 minutes of recording time on a reel of 2” tape, there was never any doubt about the cost of recording media. Nowadays, with digital, the costs are far cheaper, but the potential for sloppy ( and potentially disastrous) archiving practices is far greater. There’s also a general vague impression out there that digital audio storage is somehow “free”, since modern multi-gig hard drives are so cheap. Well folks, digital is really CHEAP compared to analog, but it’s really EXPENSIVE when you lose your only copy of something you forgot to back up. Don’t let this happen to you!Here’s the rules at Wellspring :
1. Digital audio that is not in at least 2 ( TWO) places does not really exist. Let me repeat this: DIGITAL AUDIO THAT IS NOT IN TWO PLACES DOES NOT REALLY EXIST !! Until you have backed up the session to another hard drive, CD, DVD, ADAT or other storage medium, the session is not saved, and the audio is therefore subject to damage and loss. The Artist ( that’s you!) needs to own, or pay for, a means to back up their projects at Wellspring. This means you need to buy/bring a hard drive to the studio with you, or else expect us to to make hard copy CD’s or DVD’s of your audio at the conclusion of each session.
Wellspring now has 3 new 120 Gig Quantegy Firewire drives dedicated to quick backups of projects. Transfer stuff during breaks, playbacks or whenever, but make sure it gets done!
2. Backups take time and cost money. If you bring your own Firewire drive to the session, we will gladly take the time at the end of your session to transfer the audio to your drive.
3. Any failures, data/audio loss or other problems resulting from ignoring these guidelines are not Wellspring’s responsibility.
4. Wellspring frequently records projects onto RADAR and RADAR drives initially, and then backs them up to ProTools or as .wave, aka "broadcast wave" files. Sometimes clients will then choose to take the audio files home to work with them on their own. If we do this for you, it is with the understanding that once the audio leaves Wellspring, it's "your audio", not "our audio". We will allow 30 days without charge for you to review the transfers we did for you, and to give you time to check for any problems, do your own hard copy backups, mixdown, etc. If you need more than 30 days, you should specify this at the time of the backup, and make a specific arrangement in writing that is agreed to( email is fine) by Eric. After 30 days, if we haven't heard from you, we will erase, or record over your files as we need drive space.
If your intent in taking files home is to return to Wellspring to finish the project, we are more open to saving your original files on our drives. We used to be more laid back about older projects, but we have had clients wait months or even years with projects on our drives without any clear communication about what they're doing, all the while expecting Wellspring to archive their sessions with no hard-copy backups. It's a lose-lose situation for us, and it's something we want to minimize in the future.
We strongly urge clients who are leaving with audio files to mix down their project on a real analog or professional digital mixing desk, and not " in the box". Even if you don't mix with us ( and we think you should!), we want your project to sound as great as it can, and if you mix inside your computer, to state it plainly, it won't. We've had clients tell us that the rough mixes we did for them at the tracking session sounded better than what they were able to do " in the box" on their home PC.
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