i'm looking to put out a small run of cds (100 or under) of a yet to be recorded 2 song quasi concept piece that would be recorded mostly live. i don't want to spend a TON of money on them (probably because they will sell for $2).
i've seen lately that tapes are in fashion, but really the crowd we draw probably wouldn't be in to that. ideas? tips? tricks?
Tapes might not be a bad idea if you want to sell them cheap, and have something with professional looking packaging. You could just throw the songs on band camp and give people download codes with the tape to cover the people that want the songs but aren't into tapes.
if you're not worried about pro packaging you could always go with cdr's in a cardboard sleeve.
We've always just done CDRs and handmade sleeves. It's pretty cheap but time consuming as hell.
Quote from: LogicalFrank on June 09, 2011, 03:17:31 PM
We've always just done CDRs and handmade sleeves. It's pretty cheap but time consuming as hell.
that's what i think we are going to do. it's going to be called "the gelder EP" and i'm thinking for packaging it will be in a brown recycled cardboard sleeve with a horseshoe nail taped to it.
Discmakers has a small run special, about 215-220 bucks plus shipping (so about 240 - 250 total ) for 100 CDRs with a color printed label (in other words, the CDR face is printed) and a jewel case with single panel front (and the rear panel too) in full color. Or get a full color cardboard sleeve for about the same price, which I prefer actually, except there is no printing on the 'spine' (which sucks for filing your disc). You can opt for more panels, but it costs more. It's a CDR (which is burned) as compared to a CD (which is stamped from a glass master). You can't tell the difference by looking at them (I guess the blanks say CDR in fine print on the inner ring or whatever) and I don't think you can hear a difference. I don't know what the difference is - back in the day, some CD players might have trouble playing a CDR but I don't think it's true anymore. CDs might last longer, I don't know. It's probably ethical to tell people it's a CDR when you're selling it (and then price it accordingly -- not 10 dollars, but 5 dollars or whatever)
You can do things even cheaper if you're willing to do some home-brewing with the packaging, or know somebody with the CD-burning software (I'm not sure why you can't do it in Toast or iTunes, but there is probably a reason) or if you know somebody with disc-labeling (printing) machine.
discmakers.com
This place looks good for cassettes, about 120 bucks for 100 with a clear outer case, printed shell, and J card. The kids like cassettes, they're analog and cheap to make.
http://nationalaudiocompany.com/
Edit - 146 dollars for 100 tapes:
http://nationalaudiocompany.com/Duplicated-Imprinted-Boxed-with-Insert-and-wrapped-Cassette-Packages-W10C14001181.aspx
thanks for the links lump.
i thought it would be cheaper to put all the stuff together myself for the CD. apparently it isn't!
I've had nothing but great experience with Ultra Entertainment. http://www.ultraentertainment.com/ (http://www.ultraentertainment.com/) I don't think they do cassettes, but they are super at smal run (and large) cd duplication and replication. You can have them do just the discs or any amount of packaging you want. They are really cool to deal with and have competatively low prices.
Check them out and see what y'all think.
Quote from: black on June 09, 2011, 03:55:03 PM
I've had nothing but great experience with Ultra Entertainment. http://www.ultraentertainment.com/ (http://www.ultraentertainment.com/) I don't think they do cassettes, but they are super at smal run (and large) cd duplication and replication. You can have them do just the discs or any amount of packaging you want. They are really cool to deal with and have competatively low prices.
Check them out and see what y'all think.
Looks like good prices. Discmakers has options like Digipack, which I'm not interested in spending extra money on. The only option I really don't like is "slimline'" jewel cases.
To JustinHedrick - maybe you could get the plain recycled paper cover, and have a stamp made, and hand-stamp the covers. That could be cool. Or if you know somebody who can do screen printing, maybe silkscreen the covers. That could look pretty awesome.
Quote from: justinhedrick on June 09, 2011, 03:50:28 PM
thanks for the links lump.
i thought it would be cheaper to put all the stuff together myself for the CD. apparently it isn't!
actually it is..check out stumptown printers..you can get blank sleeves/gatefold cds sleeves..theres alot of options for not a lot of money..do your own art..get someone to copy you up a short run of cdrs. go to a local recording studio and see how much you can get cds copied for. most of them will do it with printing on the disc face for a dollar a cd , give or take..with no minimum orders.
two great tape labels..
http://www.905tapes.com/ (http://www.905tapes.com/)
http://2amtapes.com/home/ (http://2amtapes.com/home/)
(http://t1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRzpdvcshDlhJX0BStbX40R1Z1N8Ef4nmMSjIzZXjb5T1uuqgBg)
(http://t0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQmnDibt0g_XhjAYlr9hrJaxGKr6voI97Sa3-Ylc3c7VAkUx-iI)
(http://t2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQPfX1eUyWpEfwhSdbcZN6NIMAPTe4Lzm1aCKbpuIzrHmLmOaKD)
I suggest you to use cellophane tape.
CD Duplication (http://www.gorilladiscs.co.uk/) | CD Printing (http://www.gorilladiscs.co.uk/)
I did a small run of DIY cd-rs not that long ago
Won't bother again. Plenty of places will do a small run for not a lot of $$. DIY is only cheaper if your time is worth absolutely nothing.
^^ true that. My time is currently worth $25-$50 an hour depending on the job. it' kinda like doing an oil change. I could easily do it myself, but why bother when I can easily afford to pay someone else to do it and it's reasonable?
Lazy shits, DIY or die ;)
We just did a 150 run of home made CD-R. For the sleeves, I just came up with a two sided cover concept and had it printed 3 to a sheet on 11x17 card stock. The printing was $16. Cut them out by hand with little flaps that we glued with UHU glue sticks. Glue and supplies cost $15. Went to the flea market and bought two spindles of printable, blank discs for $45. The kind that don't say Memorex or whatever on them, just plain blank. Our bass player did a 30 second rude cartoon in sharpie on each disc and we burned them ourselves. Cost about $76, and approximately 3 hours of time each. I did my share while I watched "River's Edge" on tv.
We're gonna sell them for a twoonie (which is $2 Canadian dollars in coin form) and realize about 150% profit. Otherwise known as $300. CD's ain't worth shit now adays, so those are the numbers that make sense. We'll blow the wad on the vinyl full length later this year.
I've been a shining example of DIY ethic. I often screen print my own gig posters by hand because they're way cooler than a photocopy that anyone can do at kinkos. I have also hand printed digipacks for a previous release, as well as my band merch and all that shit. I like DIY, but I don't like opening up some nice and raw looking handmade sleeve and finding a cheap ass looking CDR with sharpie lettering. That's fine for some kid with no job, but for a working professional who takes their music seriously, I much prefer to pay for pro duped CDRs. Still cheap, but looks more real. A lot of the time I'm playing for an older crowd that has money to spend on merch. Total DIY is fine for some bands, but for me it would look cheesy to not have a nice package for sale. I know, because I've gone that route before and was never totally happy with the results. Now my next release will be on a 7", and I'm still deciding what I'm going to do about the sleeve. Probably will screen print, as it's only going to black and white, but I might opt for pro printed just to save me the hassle. ;D
Seeing as there are printable disks, and CD labels freely available, you can still DIY. Not that I change my own oil ;D I was pleasantly surprised by CD labels, they seem to work just fine, and not peel off after a while, like I was worried they might.
I eschew vinyl and cassette releases as the bastion of poseurs and hipsters, unless your as dedicated as a buddy of mine, who did analog recording, to analog mastering, and made sure the pressing was all done from analog too. He's nuts, but a genuine nuts ;D Even he still does digital downloads too.
heh, I understand the hipster comment because, yeah, hipsters, scenesters and (EDIT) music fans who think a large record collection makes you somehow cool buy records. They bug me too, sometimes. I'm not a vinyl fanatic myself. I think I own half a dozen records, half of which were given to me or found, other than my sweet copy of doremi fasol latido which I bought on ebay. I am a fan, however and always wanted to do a vinyl release. Who doesn't?? So after getting pro grade recording practically free (actually in trade for some of my graphic services), I didn't mind spending a bit on pro mixing/mastering and I don't mind spending $500 some odd dollars to have some actual records pressed. It's just the top shelf medium, imo. I think my tunes are worthy of much more than a sharpie decorated printable CDR. Call me crazy. And cheers! Gimme your address Hemi and I'll send you one when they're ready.
I don't think vinyl is a hipster only medium by any means. Our bass player is an old prog rock nerd with 3000+ records who still swings a hammer for a living at 40. He's about as far away from a hipster as you can get, but having his music on vinyl is still his lifelong dream. That's the main reason we'll do it... aside from the fact that you need some physical medium to sell at shows, and I think its either vinyl at fair prices, or CD's at super cheap prices. I know what you guys are saying about opening up the package to get a sharpied CD... but that's why we're pricing them at $2. Just to have something to sell on the tour, until the record get's pressed this winter.
Quote from: Hemisaurus on August 18, 2011, 11:26:05 AM
Lazy shits, DIY or die ;)
Do you make your own CD-Rs before you burn them? How about the printer - assemble it yourself?
Quote from: mawso on August 19, 2011, 04:12:59 AM
Quote from: Hemisaurus on August 18, 2011, 11:26:05 AM
Lazy shits, DIY or die ;)
Do you make your own CD-Rs before you burn them? How about the printer - assemble it yourself?
Someone missed the smilie indicating the super-ironic content. But yeah, I worked for Hewlett Packard for a number of years too ;D
haha, I saw the smiley. And no offense to anyone doing the cheapie thing with CDRs. It just ain't for me. Still, I'm a firm believer in the value of DIY. It's how I live, generally. Fuck, I just put the retro fit A/C kit on my van yesterday, changed a broken coolant temp. sensor that was a bitch to get to, and repaired a broken fan blower cage with a hand machined aluminum collar and some mighty jb weld. That shit would have cost me hundreds to have someone else do.
Quote from: Hemisaurus on August 19, 2011, 08:40:14 AM
Quote from: mawso on August 19, 2011, 04:12:59 AM
Quote from: Hemisaurus on August 18, 2011, 11:26:05 AM
Lazy shits, DIY or die ;)
Do you make your own CD-Rs before you burn them? How about the printer - assemble it yourself?
Someone missed the smilie indicating the super-ironic content. But yeah, I worked for Hewlett Packard for a number of years too ;D
ha, no. i saw you were being silly, so i went a little sillier
Mmm, missed the JB Weld comment, put the throttle bracket back on the tractor with that, after two tries of using 5 minute epoxy and having it fail after a year. Seems to be holding still, petrol resistant, heat resistant.
My thing with the CD-R's you can do it whilst you do other stuff, just have a DOS window up, and run cdrecord from the command line, it's simple, you can get through 50 or more in an afternoon whilst doing other stuff. So that's not even time wasted, that's time I'm paid for. The sleeves done at a buddies who borrowed her office guillotine for the night, so that's just hang out time, and did the labelling at the same time. You don't need to torture yourself to make it.
For me anyway, everything gets dumped into MP3 on the server as soon as I get it, and I appreciate the cheaper handmade CD-R's they have a bit of love and individuality in them.
Being rich bastards 8), or maybe because we bought the CD-R's at Aldi and got some CD labels to start us off for free, and used office stationery (not sayin' whose office) we just gave away 200 or so of the first Hemi EP, why not, long as you make sure people don't take handfuls like some greedy bastards try to. I even pinned some to the bulletin board of the local 'cool' sandwich shop.
I've used these guys for Duping stuff before (I'm based in the UK).
Small Run Cds
http://www.mobineko.com/ (http://www.mobineko.com/)
Cassettes
http://www.tapeline.info/ (http://www.tapeline.info/)
I've done things all ways in the past from burning CDRs one at a time in a PC, to 10 at a time in a work duplicator, cutting covers ourselves. Through to Whole package outsourced. So have def served my time in the 100% DIY route.
Have to say if I was doing a small run myself again I'd go back to someone like Mobineko and let them do the whole thing, I start to so a bit insane when I get past the first hundred CDs doing it myself!
For what it's worth I think people are buying small runs of Tapes over small runs of CDs at the moment.. We recently did a small run cassette split and used bandcamp to distribute a download code with every cassette bought.
Oh It's nice to be back, I missed stoner rock forum, had a daughter pop along so have been distracted the past 9 months or so, Hi everyone again.
Chris
Completely what you don't need, but have you looked at http://kunaki.com (http://kunaki.com) I'm looking and they've changed their pricing structure it used to be 10 and under was cheap, now it's 5 and under, so it would only be useful if you wanted to sell CD's from a website, and not have to be bothered about distribution yourself. You setup a release, and they burn, print, assemble and ship on demand. All you do is upload the artwork and the tracks. They even do the barcode for you.
Quote from: welshchris on August 24, 2011, 04:23:23 AM
I've used these guys for Duping stuff before (I'm based in the UK).
Small Run Cds
http://www.mobineko.com/ (http://www.mobineko.com/)
Cassettes
http://www.tapeline.info/ (http://www.tapeline.info/)
I've done things all ways in the past from burning CDRs one at a time in a PC, to 10 at a time in a work duplicator, cutting covers ourselves. Through to Whole package outsourced. So have def served my time in the 100% DIY route.
Have to say if I was doing a small run myself again I'd go back to someone like Mobineko and let them do the whole thing, I start to so a bit insane when I get past the first hundred CDs doing it myself!
For what it's worth I think people are buying small runs of Tapes over small runs of CDs at the moment.. We recently did a small run cassette split and used bandcamp to distribute a download code with every cassette bought.
Oh It's nice to be back, I missed stoner rock forum, had a daughter pop along so have been distracted the past 9 months or so, Hi everyone again.
Chris
Someone else recommended Mobineko to me, so it's good to see confirmation here. They're based in the Philippines I think (?) I was told they do real CDs in short runs (not CDRs but a stamped CD with glass master) and are cheap. I would have used them recently but I needed some in a hurry, so I had CDRs made in my local area (discmakers.com). I think Mobineko includes shipping in their price (!)
The kids like cassette tapes, and they're the ones who seem to buy music and go to shows.
Congratulations on the baby!
Anyone remember that place online that would do 100 real CDs for $100?
DIY is so incredibly inefficient and pisses in the face of hundreds of years of economic theory. It also leads to pretty substandard results in most cases. A sharpied CDR...who would take that seriously? That's the type of thing I throw in the trashcan right after the guy desperately handed out for free or left on my car window when I was at a show.
That said, I do it too. It's about pride and experience for me. Also I'm not willing to spend a ton of money because I know I won't get it back. So I think you should figure out what your personal goals are. Are you just wanting a quick and easy way to get your music out of speakers? Then do digital downloads/streaming and print your CDRs and hand them out for free; put a tip jar beside the stack. If you are interested in making a cool package/product and want to get your hands dirty then take your time and find creative people to work with. You won't be happy with the product if you half ass it.
But if you're ultimately wanting to build buzz for your legitimate release I'm not sure why you'd give the few people that care about it a piss poor physical representation of the same music before the real one comes out. You think they're going to buy it again for the real CD when they probably haven't listened to their original copy more than once, if at all? I'm sure you're excited about your music and want it out as quickly as possible, but you're not going to make substantial money with a cheap release, it will undermine your real release, and it paints the picture that you're a "sharpie on a CDR" type of band. Seems like a bad promotional plan to me. I could think of worse positions for a band to be in than to have a group of people really wanting to buy a release from them and it's just not out yet. Have them pre-order that shit at a substantial discount in exchange for their e-mail address--you struck gold and don't want to lose track of those people!
There is a difference between doing it yourself and doing a really half-assed job of something yourself.
We are contemplating different options on this front. Having a physical product is good for shows, mail order, blogs, labels, etc but 'replication'(real CDs) seems to be about twice as expensive as CDRs('duplication') for a run of 100 which is quite a lot when you have no idea what kind of interest your ep or album will generate. Starting with Bandcamp 'pay what you want' and make as you need them sharpie CDRs in a sleeve with an art/album cover insert for friends and gigs for $2 or whatever seems sensible.
CD is a dying format, Vinyl with download code and download is the way really. This is my guy for CD making though: http://www.hificopies.com/html/glass_cd.html
Quote from: Mr. Foxen on October 29, 2013, 09:12:35 AM
CD is a dying format, Vinyl with download code and download is the way really. This is my guy for CD making though: http://www.hificopies.com/html/glass_cd.html
That website is a mess, can't see all the info.
Dying format or not it's still nice to be able to give or sell people a CD at gigs and what not.
Vinyl is great when you have a fan base that will buy it.
Scratch my sharpie idea. There are CDR label kits you can buy for home printers, not that I have a working home printer. A stamp could also work I would think.
We're doing download and tapes with free download for our ep. Bought 100 tapes and cases, matching the length of the ep, dubbing them as we need em. I got a decent tape deck and it sounds good to my ears. Gonna try engraving them and roll with that if it doesn't look too homemade. Just gotta get the covers printed.
Quote from: Ayek on October 29, 2013, 02:32:33 PM
We're doing download and tapes with free download for our ep. Bought 100 tapes and cases, matching the length of the ep, dubbing them as we need em. I got a decent tape deck and it sounds good to my ears. Gonna try engraving them and roll with that if it doesn't look too homemade. Just gotta get the covers printed.
I had a thought a bit earlier today about doing tapes. Even if only to excite a few locals, doing a hand numbered limited run of them could be worthwhile. Did you special order the tapes to be a certain length? My tape decks in the past were always part of cheap combo stereo systems which have all long since died but I've been meaning to procure a stand alone side by side unit.
when my mom was running her eBusiness, one of the things she sold was old world Slovak music on CD's. her folks were hilljacks from the tetra mountains heh.
so she kept open her hooks to the old country and got music to sell over here.
she burned copies on these special white faced cd's then printed them on an inkjet. photoreal. they look mint. then the CD art matches the case art if you want, and that looks pro as hell. I don't know the details, but those cd's looked pro and she sold a ton of them with very few returns. I can poke around in her office the next time I get a chance and see if I can see what the setup is.
Got them from National Audio Company. Postage was as much as the cost for the tapes (sent to New Zealand). They do a bunch of different lengths in assorted colours. They can also do the copying, and printing, for a nominal fee, might be worth checking out. I didn't on account of international hassle.
Quote from: jibberish on October 30, 2013, 01:43:13 AM
when my mom was running her eBusiness, one of the things she sold was old world Slovak music on CD's. her folks were hilljacks from the tetra mountains heh.
so she kept open her hooks to the old country and got music to sell over here.
she burned copies on these special white faced cd's then printed them on an inkjet. photoreal. they look mint. then the CD art matches the case art if you want, and that looks pro as hell. I don't know the details, but those cd's looked pro and she sold a ton of them with very few returns. I can poke around in her office the next time I get a chance and see if I can see what the setup is.
Was she printing directly on the CDs or to sticker labels which she would then adhere to the CDs?
One problem for me in particular is that my printer is basically at this point garbage. I saw a kit or two at a store a few months back with software and sticker labels for CDs and remember it being pretty pricey.
Might be worth it just to pay $75-100 for like 50 or so with on disc printing.
hey chief, those CD's had white faces ready to print. if I find one from her stock still left, i'll send it to you to look at. I know she played with "lightscribe" too.. maybe that's the same thing or not..idk, I have to look.
--------------------------------
unrelated: why don't you bail Wisconsin and check out clevo. the weather and climate up there is brutal, sub-arctic if you ask me. buffalo is on the business end of lake erie.
SW side of clevo is actually mild. and we are south enough not to have those nasty ass biting flies in the short arctic summer.
they even passed a law downtown after some old indigent sax player/busker got hassled too much and they said he is part of the flavor of the city and people can play music and put out a jar..SO open season on flipping open a guitar case heh. next year ima be a tailgate band somehow. drunk people throw money if you make them laugh. or something that includes my little generator.
it's a real place with civilization even. that being said. I need to talk to my nephew who just spent his first summer in Washington working as a chef for the park service somewhere around st Helens and see how he likes the "new" laws and shooting across the Oregon border to buy stuff heh.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
back to our regularly scheduled topic.
has anyone tried horsing around with painting a CD? latex acrylic or other solvent-less types of paint wont hurt cd plastic. actually a layer of paint makes the cd tougher, like painting the back of a mirror.
i see all these awesome colors of spray paint these days. day-glo's textures, metal effects..crazy. my buddy, the body repair dude, horses around painting other stuff and he has done amazing things with masking tape and stencils and layers of spray paint
if you have some boilerplate stuff you want on the CD, get a rubber stamp made if you need text, or carve one yourself in a piece of that art stuff made for carving stamps if you want some logo or crude text. i dont know..i think if you went total homemade , it could be way awesome with some imagination.
Quote from: jibberish on October 30, 2013, 11:03:06 PM
hey chief, those CD's had white faces ready to print. if I find one from her stock still left, i'll send it to you to look at. I know she played with "lightscribe" too.. maybe that's the same thing or not..idk, I have to look.
So she had a special printer to put the CDs into then, no? No need to send a CD, I'm just wondering how the process works.
Quote from: jibberish on October 30, 2013, 11:03:06 PM
--------------------------------
unrelated: why don't you bail Wisconsin and check out clevo. the weather and climate up there is brutal, sub-arctic if you ask me. buffalo is on the business end of lake erie.
SW side of clevo is actually mild. and we are south enough not to have those nasty ass biting flies in the short arctic summer.
they even passed a law downtown after some old indigent sax player/busker got hassled too much and they said he is part of the flavor of the city and people can play music and put out a jar..SO open season on flipping open a guitar case heh. next year ima be a tailgate band somehow. drunk people throw money if you make them laugh. or something that includes my little generator.
it's a real place with civilization even. that being said. I need to talk to my nephew who just spent his first summer in Washington working as a chef for the park service somewhere around st Helens and see how he likes the "new" laws and shooting across the Oregon border to buy stuff heh.
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I can't imagine Cleveland being that much milder than southern WI. I'm mostly interested in the west coast. I think I'm going to stay here another year while I work on a plan, don't want to move to Portland or wherever only to be "lucky" to get hired at a Costco or something and then work my ass off and be miserable again like I was working in warehouses for printer parts companies here.
Quote from: jibberish on October 30, 2013, 11:03:06 PM
back to our regularly scheduled topic.
has anyone tried horsing around with painting a CD? latex acrylic or other solvent-less types of paint wont hurt cd plastic. actually a layer of paint makes the cd tougher, like painting the back of a mirror.
i see all these awesome colors of spray paint these days. day-glo's textures, metal effects..crazy. my buddy, the body repair dude, horses around painting other stuff and he has done amazing things with masking tape and stencils and layers of spray paint
if you have some boilerplate stuff you want on the CD, get a rubber stamp made if you need text, or carve one yourself in a piece of that art stuff made for carving stamps if you want some logo or crude text. i dont know..i think if you went total homemade , it could be way awesome with some imagination.
Pallbearer's demo had some spray painted art on it, still smelled when I got my copy through the mail from them. I don't want to put that much work into it.
I do like the rubber stamp idea assuming they are cheap.
no problem, just slinging mud at the walls. more ideas=more ideas to choose from. all but one are fail, heh.
I'm still very curious about those printable discs, specifically if one needs a special printer which they are inserted into.
Quote from: liquidsmoke on October 31, 2013, 11:37:34 PM
I'm still very curious about those printable discs, specifically if one needs a special printer which they are inserted into.
I have to look at what she has. I can just take a picture of a printed one actually. so, ya, hang on a bit here until I can look through her stuff for the answers because I really only saw the results and only picked up on bits of the rundown on what she was doing. she was doing so much different stuff there was no way to be up to speed on all of it. I usually only had to help out with crap like networking a new printer or other computer related tech crap that was confusing to her and she had better stuff to do than learn that.
I cant even guess.
I read a bunch tonight about printing CD label stickers and on disc printing. There are special printers that can print directly on certain types of CDRs which sounds like what she was doing. Not cheap. Even the label stickers for regular printers are pricey. I also read about a printer type thing that can do screen printed looking text on CDs. I'm not going to buy any sort of printer though, they break down, clog up, and can be a messy money pit plus stickers on CDs that spin? CD players aren't built to handle that. I like the custom rubber stamp idea or small batch all out duplication service with on disc art/text and cases or sleeves but that's like $3+ per disc for 50. Still would have to get art inserts printed in the rubber stamp scenario.
Just remembered, check out this in the Mobineko showcase: http://blog.mobineko.com/2011/07/01/caricatures-fire-in-the-womb-acp001/
I did that printable CD thing at work for a while. The blank discs with a white printable surface cost a lot more until I bought 400 at once which made them pretty cheap. The printer was a custom one that also burned the discs and it cost nearly a grand and ate ink cartridges which of course were unique and expensive. This made full colour high res printing a waste of time. The ink would run out too fast to make it consistent across multiple discs.
The idea was to save money by paying a dime for blanks and do the printing in house rather than paying a dollar per disc to farm it out but in the long run it didn't pay off. We might have broken even on the deal.
For DIY I'd get those white discs because they look way better than regular blank cdrs and then I'd get a big rubber stamp made and ink stamp the discs. Then get black paper sleeves and stamp those with gold or silver. Should be able to keep the production costs down to under a dollar.
^ thanks for sharing that. I'm not surprised at all about the DIY print them yourself costs. Ink jet printers are almost worthless. Color laser jet is the way to go but they cost a lot more.
For the stamp idea I'm thinking of the opposite colors- black discs with a white ink stamp if the right white ink could be found.
I think the more you put into something, the more value it holds, so whatever format you choose, try to go all out on the packaging as much as you can, try to have a few panels with more artwork/lyrics/band photo, make a point of it being a limited run, hand numbered etc, try to do something a bit different that makes it unique. People love it when its something special, even if its just a rough demo make it special because as afore mentioned people don't tend to be interested in what looks like quickly thrown together demo cd's (if you were gonna do that you'd be better saving your time and money and just doing a digital download because it'd pretty much be of equal value anyway) there's something about cd's, they need really good packaging these days, maybe because people buy blanks and make their own burns, or the fact that a cd in a thin sleeve is just small and flat and easily lost among stuff + there's nowhere good to put them (tapes can be lined up, put on a shelf, you can see the spines), or something to do with it being a dieing format I dunno but cd's seem to need all the help they can get these days. I don't know about the US but tapes are doing really well in the UK right now, our demo tape sold out really quickly and I have a couple of friends who run tape labels and their tapes sell out really quickly, people seem to get really excited over them, I think they're awesome too, cheap for bands to make and cheap for people to buy, I also love how they sound...
^ this. I even hate those thinline CD cases. I WANNA SEE SPINES N MORE SPINES. I love cd's tapes, albums, IDC! as long as it has a spine and I can arrange them.
even burns bother me. I have waiting for the sun on a burn and it bothers me to no end because I want the real CD. also, then I have the complete doors.
ok, I saw a generic looking Epson printer that has a CD printing accessory thing. I think we are talking a $100 printer here. those white CD's are nothing special. I saw several brands.
I know my mom priced her CD's to pay for the costs and that was the materials, the colored case to match the CD art theme and the CD and print cost. they look pretty nice.
to the above person who got raked for a grand. that sucks.
I just saw the biggest box of blank cassette tapes. holy shit. hundreds of TDK D-60's hehehe SCORE!
lightscribe is a special CD that can be laserprinted, but only in one color. there was some of that stuff too.
ok I just burned, and went to the place of ideas(sorry my autistic side takes over now and then)
WHAT IF.......heh
you put your CD on a spindle. let's say a drill mounted in a vise with something chucked to hold a CD like a turntable holds an album.
this particular drill has a locking trigger so it can be set to some ideal speed, hands off. you plug drill into a switchable power strip.
I saw an artist who exploded balloons full of paint onto canvas or w/e. what if you spun crazy colors, like that sick dayglo stuff from spencer's gifts or idk, some coagulated mess of who knows...
THEN black stamped the text over these 1-of-a-kind crazy spun colored disks and definitely hand number each CD in the dead ring.
..slinging more mud..ideas are free and so is doing all your fucking up on paper.
If you were a god, you would take your flat black painted blanks and spray silver paint onto garden spider orb webs and put the CD through those. it would take diligence, dedication and forethought, but goddamn, you would fucking win the prize for ultimate cd of ever.
btw, I would never use any kind of stickers. time and handling is not kind to stickers, and next to a superglue explosion inside your CD player, the last thing you want is a piece of crap with nasty stickum all stuck in there.
Quote from: jibberish on November 02, 2013, 10:13:01 PM
you put your CD on a spindle. let's say a drill mounted in a vise with something chucked to hold a CD like a turntable holds an album.
this particular drill has a locking trigger so it can be set to some ideal speed, hands off. you plug drill into a switchable power strip.
Hard part would be keeping the paint on the right side of the CD. Guess prepare for losses.
awww, have faith in centripetal force. I see no reason paint would get underneath when it is heading in an outward direction, but I haven't thought it through obviously.
regardless, this would have to be tried firt before pooh poohing it. use old AOL spam disks to perfect your methods 8D.
also, CD's burn from the inside outward, so usually there is a huge dead ring in the outer printable area in case of a slight creep over the edge
I wonder if you can clear-coat real thin stuff onto a CD, like a pot leaf , or maybe some like gold foil or some pretty metallic idk...I still want to cast a nasty spider in clear resin , the size of a humbucker and side light it with LED's and a hearing aid battery.
edit: haha, clearcoat a fucking rolling paper onto the CD
Another issue is playing 65 beats per minute clean vocal doom metal for crowds who have maybe heard an album or two by Candlemass or Pentagram or Trouble or Saint Vitus or Crowbar or Cathedral but mostly like Metallica, Motorhead, Misfits, Social Distortion, Turbo Negro, whatever and wonder why you are paying so slow.
I fully agree on CDs needing help these days and that they should look as special/unique/pro/etc as possible and that having music available for digital download is essential.
Every city, even small cities, have those weirdo dudes who are obsessed with sounds that very few of the locals are into though. You've just got to own it and follow your passion even when you clear half the room by your second song most gigs.
I'm thinking out loud half drunk.
I was thinking about all the things to do to CD's and then it dawned....
I could grab a stack of blanks and mess a few up in the name of science, and who doesn't love an excuse to spray paint shit.
this crap is already bought so all R&D is free.
black spray paint is number one experiment. i'll try various types on both plain cdr's and also some of those pre-white coated ones.
I found cheap ass primer, flat rustoleum, gloss rustoleum and krylon. and some bbq hi temp haha. wtf..if it has pressure(old looking can) i'll give it a whirl.
I will be looking for issues regarding finish/will-paint-stick-to-CD-integrity, and whether it fucks up the CD's performance.
experiment #2 is with a can of spray clear I found. I am going to try and lay down a coat and stick something super thin on the tacky coat, then bury it under a couple more coats.
I have felt some commercial CD's that have such thick ink/paint on them, they have some texture to them. I don't believe the CD player cares up to a certain thickness(which I kind of think I need to know that spec but I don't at this time)
I don't have any pretty colors of liquid right now to try the spinning crap. I think hand lettering in silver ink would be boss on a flat black background. I want to look into stencil concepts, like maybe carefully make pinhole words like how old school street construction arrows or lite-brite used to work heh. then spray paint through those or maybe brush through them idk.
if you ever built models, decals would work like a champ, then spray clear over them. Nazi warplane decals=doom
also, I want to try scratching through a top-coat/base-coat setup using a pin or something as a writing stylus. then no ink or itsy pieces parts to dick with.
cut out magazine letters are about as creepy as clowns are. maybe raid a white pages or a bible for that text on onion skin type paper haha.
so, if anything happens it will be black paint since that seems like it would be important to be able to have that as a stable base to decorate further.
I'm pretty sure my copy of Pallbearer's demo still plays and it was a custom spray painted job so it can be done but it's a fumey mess. I just have zero interest in that approach at this point. I'm thinking labels(if someone will print them cheap for us although I'm not huge on the idea), a rubber stamp, or go pro.
wait a minute. how many CD's would you be making? 100? 1000? 25?
i'll spray paint a pile of CD's for you, I don't give a shit. I love spray painting. if I can just paint unburnt blanks, heh no problem. we are getting a 65 degree blast here soon. ez2 paint. I don't spray paint or mess with solvents in the house. I breathe that air and also marine life really does not appreciate alien chemistry in its water
also, I really don't recommend labels/stickers. those are good for labeling data backups on data tapes and CDR's. they do not last well through constant handling. a little stint in the crazy temp humidity swings in a car can shorten adhesive's life. a loose sticker inside a CD player isn't pretty. think back to homemade cassette days. those stickers never lasted all that long, especially when the tapes were used in the car.
I suggest to get back to the important thing: the CD art design. fuck all these details. where there's a will, there's a way.
OH. BTW! I keep mentioning the spider clear cast in resin as a rreplacement for a missing humbucker, well I may have an alternative to a spider , which is a really random occurrence. But fuck if I didn't waste the last 2 mambo wolf spiders that showed up in the house so this getting a spider business isn't going well.
I was over talking to my neighbor, and he says "check this out". up in a tulip tree about 12ft above the driveway is a big hornet's nest. except these are some kind of massive Asian mutant hornets. tres badass looking. I can take a bee sting but I don't know about those. and hornets/wasps can just keep jabbing you semi automatic style. those are big = big poison reservoir..... SO he is going to take it down this winter. this means he will have a nest full of mint condition frozen mambo hornets for me to cast in clear resin.
then I was thinking, a yellow LED would make those things just pop with color. the yellow is very bright on them.
I am also going to run the concept of custom art on limited run music media past my sister(the sharp business owner one who is a freelance artist by trade). she and my mom were more in cahoots and between them I believe they have seen about every art media in existence. FURTHERMORE, my niece's husband was the mgr of an art supply store in cowtown before they moved to madjohnshaftland. those two will have a lot of answers, and I plan on going to their little TG dinner so I will see them both at the same time.
true art industry people will have way better big picture than music dorks do(that would be us)
what if we invented a whole package/art system for usb memory sticks or who knows until you start putting heads together and slinging mud at the walls. or some combo media like an android app and a memory stick and rollup poster..hahaha. now there's some album art. memory sticks are 3D. whole nother world of 3D art doodads opens up. watch fob/keychain art on stick itself or wallet chain "charms" <--jared the fagmo jeweler runs these dumb women into a feeding frenzy because they HAVE to get the whole blahblah charm collection. starter chain with 1 charm ONLY $199 hurry while supplies last. " right here buddy: ..|., but I am more that willing to steal your ideas.
also, if you just want me to stfu and butt out. I can do that too. heh.
We were talking about doing maybe 40-50 to start off. Thanks for the offer to help spray paint but I think we'll probably go the stamp route unless we get some help with labels although like you said the sticker label idea isn't the best.
That memory stick idea is all yours, go for it man.
haha. i'm not releasing any albums. just brainstorming. this is free fun for me. 99% ends up on the cutting room floor, but I walk away with an idea I will do next year: silver sprayed orb web that I put a flat black CD through. already envisioning a rig to hold the CD like on a stick.
also, I have watched spiders in operation. they will diligently rebuild their web every night. so you could have a crew that you just make the rounds on and steal their webs at first light every morning.
of course murphy lays down the law by making sure the spiders are done for the season 1 week before I come up with the idea.
spray painted orb webs put onto velvet for regular wall art is spectacular. a banana spider web from florida on a huge velvet canvas would be the shit. those damn webs have enough tensile strength to catch a runaway jet on an aircraft carrier..i still shudder thinking about when I walked through one....fuck....
edit: hey sunno, what if you tried taking an old t shirt and stretching it out on a rack-like device so you can hit a spray painted web nice and flat. I don't want to wait until next summer to try this waaaah.
I bet a brown shirt with a gold web would be outstanding. especially displayed next to the black one with the silver and the midnight blue one with the copper.....
sunno has a special income potential: tourists.
what if you could make a spider web t-shirt then for the royal icing on the cake, have a banana spider cast in resin necklace chain thing ( of course a chain that matches the web paint color)
or even better would be a small black widow cast in clear resin, then sewed into the shirt.
any spider people would bust you immediately since widows are not orb web weavers, but 99.99% of everyone wouldn't make the connection heh. black widows just reek of "bad muther fucker" their shape, their jet blackness, like suck the shit right back out of a black hole blackness. oh yeah.