making the cd's

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\The CD Manufacturing Process
Current mood: drained

These CDs are not easy to make! Unfortunately, I manufacture them myself due to financial reasons. I enjoy what I do and this process is only temporary. I’m not going to let stupid money reasons stop me from desperately wanting to share my music with everyone. Granted the CDs may not be of superior quality but I have to work with what I have. The most important thing to look for (which I hope you’ll find) is the “song quality”. The sound quality and the outward appearance of the CDs will continue to change as my budget increases but the life of the music comes only from the song.

My long term goal is to sell 1,500 copies. I currently manufacture and try to sell around 30 CDs a week. I’ll eventually have the budget to move on up to a bigger and better recording studio but for right now I fallow these 5 steps to get the CDs out to you.

Step One:

The CDs are burned at a slower speed for optimum quality on a SonicStage burning program with the help of a spankin’ new Sony VAIO desktop.

Step Two:

The CDs are inserted on a tray into an Epson (Stylus PHOTO R200) 6 inkjet printer. The print job can take between 4 to 5 minutes depending on the design. Plan Be takes a bit longer because it uses a lot more ink.

Step Three:

The CDs are laid out to dry over night or for 24 hours.

Step Four:

The CDs are sprayed with KRYOLON Workable Fixatif because the ink tends to smudge. I put a “WARNING!” notice on the CD so that it is not handled with wet hands.

The Fixatif emits a strong mist that enters into my eyes, ears and nose. When I spray, I open a window in the downstairs room, close the door so the smell won’t go into the house and I wear a mask with a plastic bag stapled around it so I can inhale less fumes. Once I use up all the oxygen in the bag and start feeling dizzy, I take a break and breathe fresh air outside of the room. One spray out of the can is bad enough but each CD needs a total of 6 coats. I do about 20 CDs at a time and spray them with 3 coats. I come back in about 15 to 30 minutes and spray 3 more coats.

Once the CDs are dry the smudging problem is solved unless someone decides to touch the surface of the CD with soaking wet hands or leaves it out in the rain. What are the chances of that?

Step Five:

The CDs are separated by album and are put into white CD envelopes that I take to shows and sell online.

Although there is definitely a lot of work put into manufacturing these CDs with limited budget and equipment, they are all tested and inspected. Some CDs (rarely) may have some minor cosmetic imperfections but it doesn’t effect the way the CD plays or sounds. I’m proud of what I have to offer and I hope you can see the effort and value put into it too. Please feel free to ask any questions or leave comments.