With so many advances in computer and video technology, there are quite a few customization options when it comes to duplication today. Now, for example, you can easily create an informational DVD with shots of your classrooms and teachers, plus church facts and staff profiles to help newcomers and prospective members put faces with names. You can even record and duplicate your puppet ministry for children to take home and enjoy later!

But no matter how many new ideas arise, pastor sermons are still the most common use for duplication in churches. For a long time, cassettes have been the norm for a variety of reasons, the most important of which is affordability. Blank tapes are reasonably priced, and with all of the different lengths available, they offer churches plenty of recording options.

Cassette duplicators come in two basic formats, mono and stereo. With stereo duplication comes the risk of "cross-talk," so high-speed duplication is usually done in mono. (Note: Despite the "mono" theme, it can't make whoever is speaking come across less monotone or monotonous!)

The key to any great cassette duplication is a great master copy. When doing analog duplication, recorded information should saturate the tape, not overdrive it. Some people peg the meters and then wonder why their copies are distorted. More often than not, it is because the master is distorted as well.

When cassette recording, also make sure to clean the record heads frequently. Tape media is dragged very quickly across these heads, and some of it comes off and sticks to them, causing buildup over time. Use a cotton swab and denatured alcohol to clean it off, or consult your owner's manual for the appropriate solution.

Then along comes the CD...

Now that computers have the capability of burning CDs and cars are increasingly coming equipped with CD players, CD duplication has become quite popular for obvious reasons. As with cassettes, the quality of the finished product depends on your master copy. You can have the latest, greatest duplicating system available, but it won't perform any better than its master copies.

Analog cassettes distort when they are recorded too loud, but this is an "acceptable" distortion compared with digital distortion, which is just plain nasty. For this reason, I recommend adding an audio limiter/compressor to your digital recorder to help control the maximum sound level.

All of this might sound complicated, but a friend of mine in the recording business tells me anyone can make a CD; it just takes a little homework. To get you started, I tracked down a handful of interesting duplication suppliers.

The first is Primera Technology, maker of the Bravo automated CD/DVD disc publishing system. According to Primera reps, Bravo can truly be called "innovative" with its automatic, robotic-based CD or DVD duplication capability and full-color, 2400-dpi disc-printing function--all of which come in a compact desktop unit. The Bravo can produce up to 25 discs per job hands-free and unattended! It features a state-of-the-art 48x drive, so a full 650MB CD-R is done in only three minutes. As a combo unit, Primera's DVD Publisher produces DVD-Rs at 4x speed and CD-Rs at 16x speed. You can use 120mm CDs, DVDs and other formats, including business card-shaped and miniature CDs. According to the latest price sheet, you can pick up a CD Publisher for about $2,000 and a DVD Publisher for about $2,500.

Make the right media choice

Choosing compatible media is extremely important in any type of duplication, so remember that a CD-R is different than a CD+R, and the same is true for DVDs. Also be sure that your CDs and DVDs are manufactured for high-speed duplication.

This brings to mind another popular duplication supplier, Telex. During football season, we use Telex wireless mics here at the Indiana Convention Center (where I work full time) and intercoms for the NFL coaches. However, as I discovered in my research, Telex is also in the duplication business.

If you prefer cassette duplication, this company offers several machines as well as duplication towers in both CD and DVD format featuring built-in hard drives to store one or several master copies. This feature is especially useful if you plan to make copies of informational CDs for members or visitors but don't want to tie up the computer.

Telex also offers the PrintWise printer in both inkjet (60-disc capacity) and thermal (300-disc capacity) formats. Moreover, the company sells certified media, including DVD-R at 2x and CD-R at 40x. Just remember to specify whether you want thermal- or inkjet-printable surfaces.

Media quality is important--a fact Telex reiterates on its website. "Value" media can deteriorate over time and slow down production, experts warn, and my own experiences have taught me that this is true. Once when I used a batch of these blank 120-minute value cassettes for duplicating, some of the tapes snapped because they were too thin.

More things to think about

Other considerations include:

• Will you be duplicating voice or music? (Music requires higher-quality tapes than voice recordings.)
• Will you need to expand your duplication system in the future?
• About how many copies will you make on a weekly basis? (At first when the tapes are introduced, it might seem like business is booming. Things eventually settle down, however, and you might find that you really don't need the 1,000-units-per-hour machine like you thought.)
• It is illegal to copy copyrighted material. (This might include the music your praise band performs.)
• The more "live" microphones left on during recording, the more ambient noise will be picked up. This distracting noise makes recordings sound as if they were done from a distance because of room echoes. Experts at recording studios stop this from happening by covering the walls with sound-absorbing acoustic material. As such, don't blame your recorder if the master sounds bad. Blame the room acoustics.

Now is the time to embrace the future of duplication. Today, anyone can produce a CD or DVD. The technology is here to stay, and the sooner you get on the train, the sooner your duplication ministry can grow and bless people.

Just remember that even if you get the right technology to make a great tape, CD or DVD, it takes talent too. As someone once told me, anyone can gather the ingredients, but it takes a chef to make the perfect dish.

Floyd "Sunday Soundman" Paulsen is the author of the Sunday Soundman training series. He works full time as a sound technician at the Indiana Convention Center, where he has set up audio for various recording artists. Paulsen has toured with numerous artists, including Sandy Patty for almost 10 years and The Bill Gather Trio for seven. E-mail him at www.sundaysoundman.com.