Barefoot’s approach to reference monitor speaker design has always been to provide audio professionals with exemplary sound quality, wide dynamic range and bass extension at every stage of the audio production process, from recording through mixing to mastering. But not every project begins or ends in a high-end studio that offers Barefoot MicroMain or MasterStack monitors. The new Footprint01 model is Barefoot Sound’s response to evolving modern workflows, making the company’s ultra-high performance technologies available to audio professionals working in home-based facilities, smaller writing, editing or post production rooms, or on the road. Now, composers, songwriters, musicians, beat-makers, post production specialists and others can benefit from the Barefoot sound, whatever their work environment.

Barefoot Sound hit a sweet spot when it introduced the Footprint01, the first in a new line of active 3-way speakers designed specifically for today’s evolving production workflows. Recording engineers, producers, composers, musicians and beat-makers as well as post-production professionals quickly recognized that the Footprint01 offered the sonic character and design features of Barefoot Sound’s high-end studio monitors, but in a smaller package and at a more affordable price.

Now, the best 3-way monitor in its class has been joined by the Footprint02, a similar but smaller active nearfield speaker at an even more affordable price, offering the same uncompromising audio quality and design characteristics as the Footprint01. But these two models don’t just share each other’s looks and quality, it also the same Barefoot signature designs — Dual-Force™ technology opposing sub woofers, dual ring radiator tweeter and Multi-Emphasis Monitor Emulation™ or MEME — Technology first featured in their flagship MicroMain and MiniMain series.

Despite the advantages of high resolution monitors, Thomas Barefoot noticed that many engineers still use their NS10M’s and mix cubes as secondary references. These speakers have long traditions and people find them familiar and useful for focusing in on certain aspects of their mix. However, crowding one’s console with those extra boxes degrades the sound field of the primary reference monitors. Not to mention, they are no longer manufactured, they need amplifiers, cable runs, and they consume more studio space. The solution is to make the MM27 sound and translate like those speakers. With the turn of a knob one can switch from the MicroMain27’s brutally revealing "Flat" response to the warmer and sweeter "Hi-Fi" setting, generically emulating the sound of some high end consumer audio gear. More specifically the "Old School" setting closely emulates the sound of the NS10M nearfield, while the "Cube" setting emulates the mid-centric sound of classic mix cubes The idea is not to perfectly replicate every subtle quirk of these venerable old speakers. That would be impossible. But the MM27 Gen2 can capture the essence of how they behave and translate, modeling their frequency, phase and transient responses, dynamic compression and even specific distortion components. If you know how to work on these speakers you will feel very comfortable working on the new MM27’s emulation settings.