Considering the services that my company, Art Of Audio Productions, will offer in
the future, there are various professional associations that I could and
probably will eventually join. However, the very foundation of everything lies
in my expertise as an audio engineer, so investigating the Audio Engineering Society seemed to be my first logical
choice for professional affiliation.
This society
originated in the U.S. in 1948, and grew internationally to unite, not just audio
engineers, but also students, scientists, and creative artists, all over the
world. This is accomplished through providing and promoting new information,
education, and research about audio technology. AES currently has over 75 professional and 95 student sections
worldwide, and over 14,000 members, which offers numerous opportunities for
both personal development and networking. These sections host various
activities such as: demonstrations, forums with guest speakers, social
functions, technical tours, and other similar events.
What I really
like the most about AES, is the fact
that education is of great importance to them, and in more than one aspect.
Education is key to success in any field, and is especially important when one
is doing something that requires technical skill. First of all, AES serves the educational needs of
their members and the audio industry as a whole, through a wide spectrum of
publications, technical gatherings, and equipment demonstrations. Their
conventions are held annually in the U.S. and Europe, with additional ones
(plus regional summits), held regularly also in Latin America, Asia, North
America, and Europe. Secondly, the AES
presents many research papers at these conventions, which end up being
published in the Journal of the Audio
Engineering Society, which is peer-reviewed and available for members in
the AES E-Library for a small fee.
Additionally, other educational resources are available in this section as
well, such as tutorials and technical documents. The AES also has an educational foundation
that awards grants to graduate students who are studying audio or a related
field. Finally, the educational program that I find the most relative to the
goal of aoap, is the AES Student Recording Competition,
because it allows students to gain recognition and feedback for their audio
production work.
In this
particular competition, there are four different categories that allow students
to enter and showcase their work in basically every genre and technique of
recording, at the AES international
conventions. This is significant for the audio industry because these students
are the future audio engineer professionals of tomorrow, and mentoring them is
extremely important. With feedback and positive encouragement for their audio
production work, these students can be inspired to reach greater heights in
audio, and to achieve other awards, like a Grammy
or an Oscar! At the very least,
it should be the catalyst for student audio engineers to strive for greatness
with their audio work, and to continue building their audio network of
professional audio engineers. You can review the recap of the past winners of
this competition at the 134th
AES Convention here.
The AES is also involved in maintaining and
creating international standards in various areas of audio, such as digital/analog
audio engineering, media preservation, and acoustics, to name a few. Therefore,
AES serves a very important purpose
for the growth and development of the audio industry as a whole, and joining
either as a student or professional audio engineer, certainly has its merits.
Additionally, being an AES member should
also grow the personal and professional network of any audio engineer, as they
connect with the thousands of other AES members, either online, at meetings,
and/or at conferences.
This professional association easily gets thumbs up from
this audio engineer, and I cannot wait to become a member! Will you join me?
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