With clients including the BBC, Channel 4, ITV Carlton, Air Studios and Lipsync Post, as well as noted audio engineers such as Marcel Van Limbeek and Barry Sage, Alchemea has established itself as a leading audio engineering and music production college since opening in central London in 1992. Offering a range of study options from specialised short courses and workshops through to full time audio and post courses, Alchemea has a policy of using only the best equipment in its classrooms, and for that reason has equipped itself with DPA microphones.
“We chose DPA because we believe in giving our students the best mics available, so that when they go out into the real world they have realistic, high quality benchmarks to base their choices and opinions on,” says Alchemea lecturer and certified Pro Tools instructor Neil Pickles. “Put simply, you can’t tell if a microphone is good or not unless you’ve heard real quality first hand.”
The DPA 4006 omni
Alchemea’s first purchase from DPA’s UK distributor Sound Network was a pair of DPA 4006 omindirectional microphones. “I was looking to buy a reference quality pair of omnis for A/B miking technique and fortunately met Walter Samuels of Sound Network, who lent me a pair to evaluate,” continues Neil. “We had a shoot out between the 4006s and other well known quality brands using various acoustic sources, and on the basis of this we went for the DPAs. They have proved a huge success with the students and staff, typically as main drum overheads, as an ambient pair or a main pair for strings and solo acoustic instruments such as guitars, cellos, violins, etc..”
