The DJing always starts as a hobby first and there’s not many better things in life than when your hobby or passion turns into your main job and gives you enough income to maintain your living standards – the dream of many of us.
This can also over the time become a routine and ruin what used to be your favourite activity so be careful😉
It is not that difficult to start with Djing, but it’s far more difficult to distinguish yourself from others and be different as there are too many DJs everywhere. So what are the steps to fulfil that dream of becoming a real DJ?
At first it is important to decide what sort of a DJ you want to be and what’s your goal. This may and probably will change many times during your career but it’s good to have some sort of clue of what you want to achieve. There’s plenty of different types of DJs there, such as club DJs, wedding DJs, radio DJs, mobile DJs and so on. Every one of these work in different style, with different music and equipment.
(Kvant cooperates with many different DJs from various fields of industry because their laser display systems such as Clubmax lasers are suitable for most of them.)
The next big question you should ask yourself before commencing your DJ career should be “Why do I want to become a DJ?”.
Is it the fame, money or just acknowledgement of your friends? Or is it because you love to entertain people and enjoy being one of those who drives the crowd insane?
Let’s be clear – if it’s the money and/or fame, you are about to start very twisted and complicated journey. Not impossible, but hard and also, among many other factors, luck dependant.
So once all above is decided and you can see your path, let’s try to dip the finger into that DJ cake and taste it to find out if it is something you can do and want to do. Download a trial version of pro-level DJing software and start playing with it and learning. Learn, practice, learn more and practice more.
Although todays technology allows you to beat-sync tracks without any knowledge, beam-sync is the most basic skill you should master before going any further. Once you can do that, you can learn all the usual stuff such as transitions, equalization, using all the FXs etc. And if after all this you still feel the same about the idea becoming a full on DJ, it’s about time to invest into a proper equipment.
There’re hundreds of DJ “toys” you could go for, but only about dozen of those that can be considered to be professional equipment. Go for those if you can and if the budget allows, but try them before you buy so once you get it, it is actually what you wanted.
Now it’s time to learn, practice, learn more and practice more. Get together a reasonable collection of music you want to play and do your first mix-tape (or rather HDD recording) and listen, evaluate, learn and make it better. And when you feel that first tiny bit of confidence, play for someone! No matter if it’s your parents, family, friends or partner. As soon as you start playing in front of someone, you will get better – or find out it is not for you at all 😀
Over the years we found that many DJs started to utilise other means of entertainment within their DJ performance such as laser displays. For example, some DJs synchronise the laser effects to music and automatise the lasers so they are triggered automatically when they play their tracks and sound cues – this of course becomes even more interesting for the audience and promoters.
Nowadays many special effects (SFX) including lasers are quite pocket friendly and controlling them is fun and can be incorporated into DJ setup quite easily. A great example of such equipment is the Clubmax laser display system that is manufactured by Kvant Lasers over in Slovakia, Europe.