Calling all singers, musicians, engineers......

[anotherwhiner]

I have a singer in one location and a band in another half way around the world. Any reliable way to have them rehearse together in real time from their separate locations?

[VideoRipper]

I don't know of a solution, but I can predict one major problem

in advance: "Latency"

To explain this problem: have you ever phoned someone (your mum,

dad, whoever) at the other site of the world and did you notice

the delay between you and that other party?

OR

Did you watch the news on TV, where one correspondent talks to

the news-host and it took some time before the correspondent

replies to a question from the host?

This delay is inevitable with long distance communication-lines;

with digital connections this delay is even worse (upto several

seconds depending on the used codec).

So to answer your question: it will not be usable, I'm afraid.

But hey: what stops you (or your friends) from buying an airline-

ticket every once in a while?

Greetz,

Peter.

[CoffeeFiend]

I don't know of a solution, but I can predict one major problem

in advance: "Latency"

Latency is often a problem, and so is echo cancellation.

A telephone conference call (not using VOIP but POTS lines) with a phone designed for conference room usage is better with regards to that, but the sound quality isn't exactly great (and you incur the long distance costs too)

[flyingonempty]

I have a singer in one location and a band in another half way around the world. Any reliable way to have them rehearse together in real time from their separate locations?

Try tracking the band and send a wave file to the singer! or fly all the band to Chicago to rehearse at 35thst.com

[anotherwhiner]

OK.....So I guess given the feedback...... technology isn't there yet, eh? Just thought maybe in this high tech age of conferencing, etc. that there might be something out there I wasn't aware of. Obviously latency and echo would be unacceptable. Oh well.

Edited July 19, 2010 by anotherwhiner

[cluberti]

Teleconferencing is still designed for the people who pay for it's use, and that's businessmen and women talking across the miles. Latency isn't a real problem when you're just talking, only more of a minor annoyance (and really cannot be avoided given the design of the protocols and networks it runs on top of).

[Ponch]

I've seen that done last week on the news ! I can't remember what artist that was nor what song they recorded but he was high profile, I'm getting old. Did anybody see that ???

[VideoRipper]

technology isn't there yet, eh?

And will never get there (unless Einstein was wrong)

Given electrons travel at the speed of light (~300,000km/s) we will

always have the delay-factor, which will get worse when some form of

digital encoding is used (which is common nowadays).

And maybe our planet is "Only" 40,000km in circumference, almost all

long distance communication travels over satellite, adding a "Few"

kilometres to an actual direct-line distance.

With the last FIFA World-cup a couple of weeks ago, this phenomenon

became a real "Issue" over here in Holland: people watching the match

on a good old analog television-set knew when a goal was scored about

4 seconds prior to those with a digital (DVB) receiver.

So while the "Digital" people had full HD-picture quality, they were

always 4 seconds late

It's just a problem we'll all have to "Suffer" in this digital age of

electronics.

Greetz,

Peter.

[anotherwhiner]

Thanks all for the input. I wasn't holding much hope for such a thing being possible. But then again, I'm not up on everything. That's why I post in forums like this. Many thanks.

[VideoRipper]

I think the suggestion made by flyingonempty has the best potential.

Let all the bandmembers record their own track and trade it with each other over

e-mail, IM or ... and mix them up at the end.

This technique is sometimes used by bands for recording purposes, when they're

not able to be in the same studio at the same time.

For rehearsals, this wouldn't be a real solution however, since you all want to

interact with each other at the same time, specially with new material.

Greetz,

Peter.

[anotherwhiner]

I think the suggestion made by flyingonempty has the best potential.

For rehearsals, this wouldn't be a real solution however, since you all want to

interact with each other at the same time, specially with new material.

Right you are VideoRipper, as this is what we need it for. Oh well.....As long as there isn't something out there that I'm missing out on.