The quarantine and social distancing guidelines for this pandemic have shifted many areas of life online. Many arts administrators, along with those in other career fields, are in their seventh month of working remotely and may be looking for ways to boost their home studio technology. This guide is meant to provide advice for improving the quality of experience for virtual work and social meetings and to provide creators and hobbyists with information to get started with or improve on their projects.
This article—focused on software—is the second in a series focused on informing our readers about home studio technology. You can read about home studio hardware here. The broad categories covered in this post—graphics and illustrations, audio, video, streaming, web services, and podcast services—detail the most popular tools and well-regarded alternatives. Although the products recommended may not fit everyone’s needs, they are based on recommendations from others in the fields that primarily use the technologies.
Graphics and Illustrations
Graphics and illustrations can improve most visual experiences. This section will cover some of the tools available and some ways to leverage them. It will also introduce some technical terms to help understand the differences in these programs.
Raster graphics are graphics or images made up of a grid of pixels with individual color values. Because they are made of pixels, you may notice blocky appearances and general quality loss when resizing raster images .
Vector graphics are determined by paths and points. Basing a graphic on these elements allows it to be scaled infinitely without a loss of quality. Generally, these types of graphics take a different skillset and a much larger time investment to create.
Adobe Creative Cloud includes multiple applications for manipulating and creating designs, including Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign. These tools are useful in conjunction with other Adobe products, but there are a few cheaper alternatives for those who are on a smaller budget or do not need the whole suite.
tools for Raster Graphics
Adobe Photoshop is the most popular raster graphics editor. It allows for photo manipulation, digital painting, animation, and graphic design.
Gimp is a free, open-source alternative to Photoshop. The learning curve is a bit steeper and it is not as robust as Photoshop, but it is a great starting point and can do more than most hobbyist or entry-level users will need.
Affinity Photo is Photoshop’s most direct competitor in terms of features and price. Some of the automation tools are lacking and the tutorials are more limited, especially for digital painting in the software. Some notable improvements in Affinity are better support for vector graphics, live brush previews, and cross session undo history.
Tools for Vector Graphics
Adobe Illustrator is the industry standard vector graphics software used for creating logos, icons, product packaging, and billboards.
Affinity Designer is a newer Affinity product that competes with Adobe’s offering in terms of features and has a better price. Affinity does lack some of Illustrator’s non-essential tools like the mesh tool, knife tool, and filters. Because it is a newer program, it still has a hefty development roadmap, which does include those previously mentioned tools.
Tools for digital publishing and layout
Adobe InDesign is another industry-standard software intended for layout and page designs. It can be used to create flyers, magazines, newspapers, presentations, books, e-books, and e-publications. E-publications, or e-pubs, are interactive stories or articles that can contain elements like video, branching decisions, and animations.
Affinity Publisher is another newer product of the “Affinity trinity” attempting to compete with Adobe. Unfortunately, this one has some noticeable Adobe options missing, such as e-pub exports.
Microsoft Publisher is a low-end entry point to the publishing tool space and is included in Office 365. It covers the functionality basics, but there is a large jump between it and Affinity’s software. Microsoft Publisher is a user-friendly solution for smaller businesses or for personal projects on a low budget.
Audio
Achieving high-quality audio can be a daunting task. This section will cover some software and workflow choices that allow for quick improvements.
Digital Audio Workstations
Digital audio workstations (DAWs) are generally on par with each other and provide the same tool sets. The differences are in what the interfaces and workflows make the easiest and the additional assets included in the bundles.
Apple Logic Pro X is considered the best mainstream audio production solution for Mac users and includes many virtual instrument sounds.
Adobe Audition is the Adobe audio production solution and is great for those who already subscribe to Adobe’s Creative Cloud or use other Adobe software. Importing assets from one Adobe product to another is usually simple and painless. Audition specializes in audio restoration, but lacks MIDI support and composition tools.
Audacity is a free and trusted cross-platform audio solution. It has a simple interface and can provide all the tools you need for simple and hobby-level productions. (I used this to record the audio for myself and guests for my podcasting work at AMT Lab before editing in Audition.)
Virtual Mixer
VoiceMeeter Banana is a free virtual mixing tool that allows the user to reroute audio for streaming and apply effects before outputting. Some particularly useful features include the ability to play audio streams through headphones, but not broadcast them; apply voice effects for live gimmicks; and apply audio gates to stop sounds below a certain threshold from being broadcast.
Video
Video formats are great for conveying messages, assisting with onboarding, and expressing ideas. The tools in this section will help refine the purpose of your video and keep the audience’s attention.
Video editing software
Adobe Premiere is, again, one of the categorical leaders as far as available features and adoption. When it comes to editing simple videos, users are fine in most video editing solutions, but Premiere is primarily marketed towards professionals and has a steeper learning curve
Apple Final Cut Pro X is a Mac-only competitor to Premiere and mirrors Premiere in feature set and adoption. The user interface is friendlier to those who are not as proficient in video editing, and it is a cheaper alternative to a Creative Cloud subscription.
CyberLink PowerDirector is a highly reviewed entry-level video editing software. CyberLink has competitive pricing and is generally user-friendly, but is lacking in customer service. Other negatives include the lack of support for H.264 format videos on some platforms and the less robust audio capabilities for those who want an all-in-one solution.
Streaming
Content streaming is a great way to share content with an audience, gauge public opinion, or attempt fundraising. XSplit and Open Broadcast Software are the primary tools used by streamers, but they have different specialties. There is also a bit of terminology to understand when using this type of software.
Resolution and bitrate refer to quality of the stream. Resolution refers to the video output’s dimensions and bitrate refers to the rate at which data is sent out. Higher bitrates and resolutions generally mean a higher quality stream.
Scenes are the different canvases that contain different elements that are sent out in the broadcast. These canvases can contain various media elements and layer them. Static media can be overlaid on top of video, local videos can be played for the stream, and live video content can be added to the streams through window, desktop, and camera capture.
Simulcast refers to simultaneously sending the broadcast to multiple locations, for example streaming to YouTube and Twitch simultaneously.
Streaming Software
OBS is a free piece of software available for Windows, Mac, and Linux. This software allows for an unlimited number of scenes and is able to record these scenes in a wide array of formats. Because the software is open source, it allows developers to create and distribute plugins for other content creators. Unfortunately, OBS has an intimidating interface and steeper learning curve when compared to XSplit.
XSplit has both a free and paid version available for Windows. The software is fairly user friendly and has some unique features such as 3D positions of scene elements. The premium version supports unlimited scenes, has built in scene transitions, and can simulcast. Plugins are also available in XSplit through software, but they are developed by an internal team. Resolution and bitrate are limited in Xsplit, unlike in OBS, which can stream at higher qualities.
Most capture devices also come with software and allow for basic streaming with a lower learning curve. It is recommended to upgrade to XSplit or OBS from the included software after learning the basics.
Web Services
There are many avenues of distributing and hosting content, and this section will focus on some of the more popular hosting and supplementary services.
Amazon Web Services (AWS) is a versatile option for productivity improvements. Some of the notable out-of-the-box tools allow for remote rendering, data storage and analysis, video streaming, and document collaboration. AWS can also be manipulated to do all manner of things, but requires some technical expertise and won’t always be the cheapest option. One example of a custom solution is podcast hosting and analytics.
Squarespace is the premium service for website building and hosting. It contains templates and tools to host a variety of site types, including but not limited to store fronts, promotional pages, blogs, portfolios, and commercial sites. Analytics and SEO tools are built into every website to allow for audience insights and more efficient marketing. Plugins and extensions are available to easily increase site functionality. Some examples include automatically pushing content to social media or embedding media from YouTube.
WordPress is a popular freemium competitor to Squarespace. Many of the tools to begin building a website are available for free, but to leverage the full array of options, there is a subscription price. It supports many of the same tools as Squarespace under the premium and above plans, and it is also an open-source solution allowing for easy extension for more technical users. The community is larger for WordPress so there are a lot of public resources, even though it is generally a more complex tool to use.
Podcast services
Podcasts are a great option for disseminating information. Below are some software solutions for podcast production, transcription, and distribution.
Descript is a premium multi-purpose tool for podcast and video production. It contains tools for collaborative recording, editing, mixing, and transcribing. Primarily I have used this tool for transcribing, but it does streamline the editing process and allows for exporting to other software for a final edit. It does have some interesting options for transcription to include or remove filler words and seems to work well with content that starts production on the platform. I noticed some issues with transcription quality when bringing in prerecorded content. Descript does have a generous free trial to explore the tool.
Otter.AI is another premium transcription tool. This is the tool we primarily used in the past for our baseline transcription. There are still generally edits that need to be made after the transcription, as with any automated transcription service, but it has been a reliable, low-cost solution. The free trial for this service is, however, a bit short.
Libsyn is a tool for podcast hosting, distribution, monetization, and data aggregation. This is the tool we have been using for the AMT podcasts. The scheduling feature allows for a few different methods of distribution that can be easily applied to all platforms or customized per platform by restricting access to content, including setting expiration dates for content. The robust stats page allows you to see demographic data at a glance and can break down the information to the per episode level. Their monetization tool allows for a subscription option to access new or archived shows.
Closing
There are constant innovations in technology and within the current climate I would expect these technologies in particular to receive more attention. This post and our hardware article will hopefully be useful reference tools for making informed decisions about tech solutions that better fit our reader’s needs. If there are any other categories or tools you would like to share or see us cover in-depth, leave us a comment below!
Read part one of this series about home studio hardware solutions here.