Enjoying the Spire Studio

[raysachs]

Originally Posted by Acousticado

Ahhh, thanks for that! The Spire does have some idiosyncrasies. I’m going to have to mess around like you suggest because my uploaded recording did not retain the enhancement.

The other detail I guess I didn't mention. The enhancement lives in the Spire, not in the app. If you disconnect from the Spire, you can still mix and THEN it's easy enough to upload to Soundcloud right from the app, but you can't enhance if you're not connected. So if you disconnect from / turn off he Spire, the enhancement it gone. When you close that song, the enhancement is gone. When you exit out of that enhance/export/rename page back to the record/mix page, the enhancement is gone. It's only in that ONE place and temporarily, just until you export and then leave that page, or don't export and leave that page. It has to build the enhancement again each time you go to that page.

It's really sort of a primitive device in a lot of ways - the payoff being ease of use in some ways, but some real confusion in others.

-Ray

[Acousticado]

Originally Posted by raysachs

The other detail I guess I didn't mention. The enhancement lives in the Spire, not in the app. If you disconnect from the Spire, you can still mix and THEN it's easy enough to upload to Soundcloud right from the app, but you can't enhance if you're not connected. So if you disconnect from / turn off he Spire, the enhancement it gone. When you close that song, the enhancement is gone. When you exit out of that enhance/export/rename page back to the record/mix page, the enhancement is gone. It's only in that ONE place and temporarily, just until you export and then leave that page, or don't export and leave that page. It has to build the enhancement again each time you go to that page.

It's really sort of a primitive device in a lot of ways - the payoff being ease of use in some ways, but some real confusion in others.

-Ray

Thanks, I didn’t know that the enhance resides in the Spire itself. Unless you figure out another way to make it stick as you have done, it’s rather pointless the way it is. While I was trying to enhance and upload but couldn’t without changing wifi selection, I was hoping that the Spire, would automatically handle the wifi switch to retain the enhancement. Hopefully, that may become an upgrade.

Thanks again, Ray!

[Mike Mandel]

Originally Posted by raysachs

The other detail I guess I didn't mention. The enhancement lives in the Spire, not in the app. If you disconnect from the Spire, you can still mix and THEN it's easy enough to upload to Soundcloud right from the app, but you can't enhance if you're not connected. So if you disconnect from / turn off he Spire, the enhancement it gone. When you close that song, the enhancement is gone. When you exit out of that enhance/export/rename page back to the record/mix page, the enhancement is gone. It's only in that ONE place and temporarily, just until you export and then leave that page, or don't export and leave that page. It has to build the enhancement again each time you go to that page.

It's really sort of a primitive device in a lot of ways - the payoff being ease of use in some ways, but some real confusion in others.

-Ray

Thanks for this, but now confused. How do you get a file that has been enhanced off your spire and uploaded somewhere else?

Every time I try and move an enhanced file by uploading to Soundcloud, or texting it, it times out because my phone is no longer connected to WIFI.

Feel like an idiot asking this, sorry

[Acousticado]

Originally Posted by Mike Mandel

Thanks for this, but now confused. How do you get a file that has been enhanced off your spire and uploaded somewhere else?

Every time I try and move an enhanced file by uploading to Soundcloud, or texting it, it times out because my phone is no longer connected to WIFI.

Feel like an idiot asking this, sorry

Hi Mike. This is what I have experienced as well which Ray responded to when I inquired in an earlier post. Not to speak for him, in case you missed it, here’s an excerpt of what he responded to my post. I haven’t yet tried it, including not sure how he saved the enhanced file to Memos app.

Originally Posted by raysachs

<snip>In terms of getting it to Soundcloud, that is a funny thing and a flaw with connecting to your phone or tablet using wi-fi - you can't be on both the Spire's wifi and your home wifi at the same time. So what I've been doing is just saving the enhanced song to my Memos app on the iPhone (which is what I use as the controller - it's got the most memory of my IOS devices). And, once I'm back on my home wifi system after I shut the Spire down, THEN I can upload to Soundcloud or do whatever. Since my Memos app shares data between all of my devices on iCloud, by the time I get over to my desktop Mac, the track is generally available there too and I find it easier to upload to Soundcloud from my Mac than from my iPhone if it's not going through the Spire app...

-Ray

[Mike Mandel]

Originally Posted by Acousticado

Hi Mike. This is what I have experienced as well which Ray responded to when I inquired in an earlier post. Not to speak for him, in case you missed it, here’s an excerpt of what he responded to my post. I haven’t yet tried it, including not sure how he saved the enhanced file to Memos app.

Very much thanks to both of you!

[UncleJesse]

I was wondering if anyone thinks this could be used as an audio interface for a Zoom call? I was wondering if you'd be able to run the headphone out jack into the mic in jack on a laptop and use it as an external microphone for a zoom conference?

I was wanting to have better audio on a zoom open mic I'm a part of.

[raysachs]

Originally Posted by UncleJesse

I was wondering if anyone thinks this could be used as an audio interface for a Zoom call? I was wondering if you'd be able to run the headphone out jack into the mic in jack on a laptop and use it as an external microphone for a zoom conference?

I was wanting to have better audio on a zoom open mic I'm a part of.

it might work - it seems the default mode when you turn it on is for the mic to be engaged, so a line from the headphone to an aux input on a laptop or tablet SHOULD do the trick. Of course, that doesn't do much for what you're gonna HEAR, but I suppose that's an easy enough other issue to solve with a decent set of computer speakers.... Maybe you could even run the "soundcheck" to get the mic level set right? Worth a shot anyway...

-Ray

[raysachs]

Originally Posted by Acousticado

I haven’t yet tried it, including not sure how he saved the enhanced file to Memos app.

When you're in the "share" screen - the same place where you see the option to set to enhance or not, you can "save" the file (with or without enhancements - your choice) to text/email, Highest Quality, or Social Media. When you do that, it creates a shareable file of whatever quality you chose, and then a screen comes up allowing you to choose from several options of where to save it to. On my iPhone, I get options for airdrop, messages, notes, Gmail, OneDrive, Google Drive, etc. The "Notes" app is what I meant - I think I said memos, but it's called notes. And if you select that it'll set up a new note with the saved sound file in it. This doesn't require anything to leave the internal ecosystem of your phone (or tablet), so the wifi status is irrelevant. It just saves it to a "notes" page on your phone. I'm sure once you're back on wifi, you can then upload it to wherever right from your phone. For me, it's easiest to just open the Notes app on my Mac, drag the file to the desktop and then upload it to SoundCloud or wherever from there. But I'm sure there are a million ways to do it.

[rogueacoustic]

For a standard 3-4 track recording of around 4 minutes, how big are these files? If I were to use an iPad for the interface, would it behoove me to have a lot of memory or is it not necessary if I’m transferring the files to an external anyway?

[raysachs]

Originally Posted by rogueacoustic

For a standard 3-4 track recording of around 4 minutes, how big are these files? If I were to use an iPad for the interface, would it behoove me to have a lot of memory or is it not necessary if I’m transferring the files to an external anyway?

They're not all that big. I have about 35 active songs in my Spire app on my iPhone and it appears that grand TOTAL, they take up about 5.5 GB. I'd say most of them are 2-4 tracks and in the 3-5 minute range. So no one or two of them is gonna break the bank. I have them on my iPhone because the larger interface of an iPad doesn't seem to matter and I've just got gobs of storage on my phone and not much at all on my iPad. And I always have my iPhone in my pocket, so if I just feel like recording something, it's always handy.

-Ray

[rogueacoustic]

Awesome. Perfect. Thanks so much, Ray. I appreciate the quick response. Enjoying this thread a lot. My SS should be here today.

[Acousticado]

Originally Posted by raysachs

When you're in the "share" screen - the same place where you see the option to set to enhance or not, you can "save" the file (with or without enhancements - your choice) to text/email, Highest Quality, or Social Media. When you do that, it creates a shareable file of whatever quality you chose, and then a screen comes up allowing you to choose from several options of where to save it to. On my iPhone, I get options for airdrop, messages, notes, Gmail, OneDrive, Google Drive, etc. The "Notes" app is what I meant - I think I said memos, but it's called notes. And if you select that it'll set up a new note with the saved sound file in it. This doesn't require anything to leave the internal ecosystem of your phone (or tablet), so the wifi status is irrelevant. It just saves it to a "notes" page on your phone. I'm sure once you're back on wifi, you can then upload it to wherever right from your phone. For me, it's easiest to just open the Notes app on my Mac, drag the file to the desktop and then upload it to SoundCloud or wherever from there. But I'm sure there are a million ways to do it.

Ray, I just want to acknowledge that “enhancing” the song file while connected to the Spire wifi, then saving to “Notes”, then changing the wifi connection to home in the iPad/iPhones settings, then uploading to Dropbox, then importing to SoundCloud...worked.

Obviously, the sound is much better when retaining the Spire’s final “enhance” step. Kinda silly that it’s designed not to be able to retain it, so it seems that all recordings will need to follow these steps for best output.

[tadol]

Realize I’m a little late to the party, but recently picked up a Spire, and solved my first issue with it - I used my 3d printer to print a holder for it, and ordered a couple ⅜” mic stand mount pieces. So now I can thread my holder onto a basic mic stand, and slip the Spire into the holder -

If anyone would like the .STL file, lemme know -

[Boondock Brian]

So, I'm pretty new to all this recording shtuff, and am not the most tech savvy guy. I received my Spire this week, and it's working fine, and I understand most of it, it's pretty simple. Hooking it up to a Boss V8 presents issues, though. I was going to use the Boss for vocal harmonies mostly, and while I was at it I would use some of the acoustic guitar effects. Has anyone tried that? I'm getting odd artifacts in the guitar section, it seems like the vocal effects are bleeding through into the guitar through my headphones. I'm not that thrilled with the V8 harmonies anyway, I may just multitrack the vocals. Just wondering if anyone else has tried using another interface with the Spire?

[Captain Jim]

Originally Posted by Boondock Brian

So, I'm pretty new to all this recording shtuff, and am not the most tech savvy guy. I received my Spire this week, and it's working fine, and I understand most of it, it's pretty simple. Hooking it up to a Boss V8 presents issues, though. I was going to use the Boss for vocal harmonies mostly, and while I was at it I would use some of the acoustic guitar effects. Has anyone tried that? I'm getting odd artifacts in the guitar section, it seems like the vocal effects are bleeding through into the guitar through my headphones. I'm not that thrilled with the V8 harmonies anyway, I may just multitrack the vocals. Just wondering if anyone else has tried using another interface with the Spire?

I have used a TCH Play Acoustic many times with the Spire - works fine with vocal harmonies. The Play Acoustic has separate lines out that work good in the Spire's preamps. I have also run a line out from a Bose S1 (the Play Acoustic run into each of the S1's channels) to the Spire. Acoustic guitar into the Spire's onboard condenser mic. Electric guitar, bass, and electronic drums into the preamp. The Spire just works, and it is easy.