Capt. Audio & the Flying Plug-Ins
 

Okay, my audio education continues apace. I've now put in an order for the Rode NT4 (with Rycote cover!), since I anticipate taping several live music presentations soon, and stereo seems the way to go. Meanwhile, UPS dropped off at my door Acid Pro. 4.0. I see on the box that it comes with Screenblast SoundForge. This program will be dovetailing with Vegas. Now, my question is--given that I'm now going to work with stereo, is there any advantage to, say, looking at the apparently well regarded Iztope software instead as a perhaps a more useful audio editing program, or does Vegas already provide enough? How does iZotope complement Vegas's renowned audio capabilities? Audio gets more fascinating the more I study it, so any insights would really help at this stage.

iZotope simply rocks. To do better, you have to jump to WAVES at a much higher price.
Ozone's toolset is far more advanced than what you'll find in Vegas. Their maximizing tool is amazing, and can be adjusted to tweak any max setting wanted. The compressor is a multiband, so it's easy to zone in on a specific frequency range and make it work smoothly. Vegas has this too, but it's no where near as smooth. The only thing I don't love on the Ozone is the verb. It's decent, better than Vegas, but it's no great shakes. I prefer the WAVES and UAD Realverb. The Ozone happens to be the sexiest plugin I've ever seen though. GREAT graphics and interface. Sounds wonderful. Can't rave about it enough. I've purchased all 3 versions over the years.

Thanks--it >does< look incredible, from what I've seen on the website. I'll definitely look into it.

Here's another question for microphiles--even when using a stereo mic such as the Rode NT4, is it of any consequence to supplement with a boom mic, such as the AT4073a or Oktava, for speech specific use during the same event? How many of you "mix 'n match" mics during an event? Or do you primarily concentrate on using one?

We do this as a matter of course. It's a safety issue, being sure we 'got' it.

Point taken. :)