Meeting Topic: Guest Speakers Craig Hanson and Nicholas LaPenn from iZotope!
Moderator Name: Jamie Tagg
Speaker Name: Craig Hanson and Nicholas LaPenn from iZotope
Meeting Location: Durgin 209
This week we had a presentation from iZotope representatives Craig Hanson and Nicholas LaPenn. Craig Hanson joined iZotope, Inc in 2009 and is now the Lead Software Engineer for the Technology Licensing Division. Craig explained his responsibilities for managing the licensing engineering team as well as designing, developing and integrating iZotope technologies in third party applications. Client relationships as well as programming are the two main components of his work.
Craig and Nick took us on a tour of the new Iris synthesis software. This program allows users to take any sound sample, import it, view the frequency content vs. time/intensity graph, highlight any portion of that spectrum over time, and play back or manipulate the selection. This sample can then be stored and used on any note as a new sample.
We also saw a demonstration of the amazing restoration abilities of RX2. This program allows users to have control over wanted/unwanted harmonic content in the source audio, and by using several powerful and smart selection tools, choose offending sections of the audio and remove, reduce, or manipulate its audibility. This program also allows entire sections of missing audio to be artificially regenerated, using pattern recognition and complex synthesis techniques. The feature set of this program is very deep, and offers several different levels of user control.
This was a particularly applicable meeting for students soon to graduate because Craig and Nick are both alumni of UMass Lowell. Craig also holds a Master's degree from the Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics at Stanford University, as well as being an active producer of electronic and electro-acoustic music.
While both Craig and Nick discussed their journey into the professional world from graduation on, Nick spent some time fielding questions about audio for video games, professional networking and the importance of attending conferences, as well as how to get started in that field. Nick spent several years in California working with video game sound before working for iZotope.
Many thanks to Craig and Nick for a fantastic session, and giving their time for extensive Q&A at the end, as well as staying after the meeting to hang with a few additionally curious and enthusiastic students! It made for a late night, but was really enjoyable all around.
Written By: Jamie Tagg and Doug Iszlai
