Here at Nyquist, we always strive to offer you a reasonable project estimate. We are primarily concerned with getting the best possible results, thus your complete satisfaction. The rest comes in as secondary.

Please call us so we may discuss your timetable, sonic requirements and expectations. We’re also quite flexible with terms, we can arrange whatever suits you best. So don’t worry too much!

Tracking and Mix Projects

For ALL recording (i.e., tracking and mixing) projects, we charge TWO things:

• studio time, charged on a per-hour or per-day rate
• engineer’s fee, charged on a per-hour or per-day rate

Note: You can make special pre-arrangements with our engineers, for instance, for lengthy, extended, major projects.

Why a separate engineer’s fee you may ask? Well, here are several reasons:

• This is how it’s done in all major facilities everywhere else in the world.
• Our engineers have different skill levels, and one may be better (and hence work faster) than another in one area. You may also be familiar with one of our engineers and we want to give you this flexibility.
• Not that it’s the fastest or most efficient way to work, but you may actually bring in your own engineer if you wish, and just let him/her coordinate with our in-house technician (Allan).
• You may actually take out your project midway (to another studio, for some reason) but (again, for some reason) keep our engineer’s services there. (Yeah we know it sounds stupid, but WTF!)

We can “lock-out” the Studio at your request, i.e., the Studio will book no other session a certain time period before and after your own. Experienced recording artists well appreciate the benefits of a studio that is exclusively locked-out for them. For instance, you can leave all your stuff inside without worrying that anybody might touch it. Our engineers can also leave all mic placement anywhere on the drum kit and the guitar amps.

Alternatively, we can also charge studio time on a per-day basis. We consider a “day” as a good number of hours in which you or your band, and our engineers, feel comfortable working. Sessions of this type usually start around noontime and continue until that day’s work is done (or everybody gets tired). We don’t mind if you use less than a day’s worth of studio time, but we highly discourage sessions which run close to 12 hours, simply because it starts to become counter-productive. We do this for your convenience of course, so that you don’t need to watch the clock all the time.

Mastering and Post-Production Projects

For mastering projects, there is no fee on studio time. We only charge you on a per-minute-of-audio basis. This means that the amount you pay depends solely on the total length of audio that you want us to master. Say you have an album that is 45 minutes and 30 seconds long. We charge you this number of minutes multiplied by a certain rate. You pay a fixed price regardless of how long it takes us to do it, even if it takes us 100 hours to finish! Post-production projects (e.g., audio for video) follow a similar scheme.

Other Services

For MIDI construction, composition, sequencing, and programming, we either charge on a per-song or per-track scheme. Please call us for an estimate.

For audio restoration, we charge on a per-minute-of-audio basis, similar to mastering.

For general audio editing work, including time compression and expansion, and pitch and time editing, we charge on a per-hour rate, similar to tracking and mixing.

For album artwork and graphics design rates, we refer you to our sister company Infinite Creations. We can invite their concept/graphic artist over to the Studio so you can personally discuss with them your ideas. They will then provide you a cost estimate of the design, depending on the number of pages, colors, and complexity.

Our Current Rates

Tracking (studio time): Php600 per hour. Excludes engineer’s fee.

Mixing (studio time): Php600 per hour. Includes general audio editing, MIDI sequencing and orchestration, and pitch/time editing. Excludes musician’s fee (in case of MIDI arrangement). Excludes engineer’s fee.

Per-day rate (studio time): Php6,000. For both tracking and mixing sessions. Excludes engineer’s fee.

Mastering: Php200 to Php2,000 per minute of audio. The rate is variable, depending primarily on the desired quality of the master. Includes general audio restoration, noise reduction, and PQ programming. Stem mastering (which is essentially a mixing task) is not covered by this rate, but rather by the standard mixing rate. Includes mastering engineer’s fee.

Multichannel (surround) projects (e.g., for Dolby AC-3, DTS, or DVD-A) are all double the standard rates as specified above, meaning, Php1,200 per hour for tracking and mixing (or Php12,000 per day), and anywhere from Php400 to Php4,000 per minute of audio for mastering.

Suggested minimum engineering rates are as follows:

• Aji: Php300 per hour, or Php3,000 per day
• Myko: Php250 per hour, or Php2,500 per day
• Meong: Php200 per hour, or Php2,000 per day
• Niko: Php150 per hour, or Php1,500 per day

The Studio reserves the right to purge all dormant projects not claimed within three (3) months after the last session. (Note: We don’t do it obligato, but it’s a real possibility!)

Our rates are subject to review by Management at every end-of-year.

Our Guarantee

We guarantee you a world-class, state-of-the-art product that sonically compares and competes with ANY of today’s top commercial international releases. We are always committed to exceeding your expectations.

We work hard for you and strive to do the best job we are capable of because we know your project deserves it. Your success is also our success, that’s why we want your music to sound to its fullest potential. And remember, we are musicians too!