The Mixing Thread

Superchibisan · Post by **Superchibisan** » Thu Oct 23, 2008 4:18 pm

experiment. There are no rules.

just thought i'd pop in...

logic_user99 · Post by **logic_user99** » Fri Oct 24, 2008 10:23 am

I am SO glad I found this thread. Serious. Just a few of the simple EQ-ing tips I've picked up have immediately made some of my ambient 'jams' sound 100% better (high cutting at 10k, rolling off at 200hz etc etc).

Well please.

A quickie re: drum racks and mixing. How would you go about mixing your drum rack tracks, in line with the rest of your mix? Obviously there's no faders for each cell... do you go in and ballance them out in the simplers, or is it a case of careful programming and then overall compression/EQ/verb?

Chrz.

Tarekith · Post by **Tarekith** » Fri Oct 24, 2008 3:06 pm

There are faders for each cell actually, you can expand the rack in session view (up top) or use the volume controls for each chain in the rack.

logic_user99 · Post by **logic_user99** » Fri Oct 24, 2008 3:08 pm

Tarekith wrote:There are faders for each cell actually, you can expand the rack in session view (up top) or use the volume controls for each chain in the rack.

D'oh! I should have known that. Thanks, TarekIth!

Chang · Post by **Chang** » Sat Oct 25, 2008 7:53 pm

Angstrom wrote:With your 'panner', applying a short delay time to one side - there's something to watch out for : if you ever run that 'widened' audio back through a mono output it will sound like a stuck flanger and can be pretty annoying.

I have found is that every time I use this trick and say " ah well this will never be going to mono anyway", I soon find myself listening to that very thing in mono with a big stuck flange on it.

I still use that trick a lot, but never on anything important to the song and never on anything below about 250 hz either!
it's great to put on something that needs to be made present without being louder, rather than turning up the hi EQ I do that trick.

There is actually a trick that allows you to do the widened delay/phase spread and still keep the sound when in mono without flanging problems or disappearing altogether. Google - Mid/Side encoding decoding techniques. Heres how it works - http://emusician.com/mag/emusic_front_center/

Use your tricks to put things all over the place and when in mono, they will still be there. This will allow you to use phase spreads on even more important sounds in your songs and not just blips & bloops.

Voxengo makes a free plug for it. http://www.voxengo.com/product/msed/

M/S techniques can also be used on an entire mix during mastering to fix a song that has all kinds of stereo/mono phase problems.

Chang · Post by **Chang** » Sat Oct 25, 2008 10:25 pm

rbmonosylabik · Post by **rbmonosylabik** » Sun Oct 26, 2008 9:31 am

Chang wrote:
Angstrom wrote:With your 'panner', applying a short delay time to one side - there's something to watch out for : if you ever run that 'widened' audio back through a mono output it will sound like a stuck flanger and can be pretty annoying.

I have found is that every time I use this trick and say " ah well this will never be going to mono anyway", I soon find myself listening to that very thing in mono with a big stuck flange on it.

I still use that trick a lot, but never on anything important to the song and never on anything below about 250 hz either!
it's great to put on something that needs to be made present without being louder, rather than turning up the hi EQ I do that trick.

There is actually a trick that allows you to do the widened delay/phase spread and still keep the sound when in mono without flanging problems or disappearing altogether. Google - Mid/Side encoding decoding techniques. Heres how it works - http://emusician.com/mag/emusic_front_center/

Use your tricks to put things all over the place and when in mono, they will still be there. This will allow you to use phase spreads on even more important sounds in your songs and not just blips & bloops.

Voxengo makes a free plug for it. http://www.voxengo.com/product/msed/

M/S techniques can also be used on an entire mix during mastering to fix a song that has all kinds of stereo/mono phase problems.

Great post, been looking for this info for a while. Thanks a lot.

supamonsta · Post by **supamonsta** » Fri Oct 31, 2008 2:00 pm

hi,

me again, still workin on the final mixdown of my tracks.

I've got 2 questions:

1) about EQing :

I tried EQ 8 to cut the low ends below 30hz, but I can't manage it... Is it possible to have a great low or high CUT with it?
I don't get it, the shape is not straight whatever the params I tweak...
I guess I have to test it more and more?
any link to a good EQing tutorial with ableton live EQs would be appreciated,

2) advices about the mixdow of a track

here is a link to download a 320K mp3 track of mine, that I mixed doawn in an empty set from bounced tracks. No EQ, just a kick sidechained compression on the bassline, mono utility on the kick and bass tracks. A aux bus send to beef up the drums with saturator and autopan. And a precise levels adjustment.

Any advice and opinion will be greatly appreciated, should I EQ some tracks? Pan some others???? I know I have to experiment, that's what I do but I need other's people thoughts...

I use my ultralite, alesis m1 mk2 active monitoring speakers, and beyerdynamic DT770 pro headphones to do the job. The mix sounds great to my ears in th headphones, but not so good on my ipod, and flat on the hifi speakers...

Any comment?

link : http://www.mediafire.com/?dqwzy0yj2ju

thanks a lot for your good advices,

musically yours

djgroovy · Post by **djgroovy** » Sun Nov 02, 2008 2:34 pm

monstrejumo wrote: 1) about EQing :

I tried EQ 8 to cut the low ends below 30hz, but I can't manage it... Is it possible to have a great low or high CUT with it?
I don't get it, the shape is not straight whatever the params I tweak...

Add more bands with the same frequency and filter type, like 30hz high pass. As you add more bands, the cut will be deeper.

supamonsta · Post by **supamonsta** » Sun Nov 02, 2008 3:25 pm

thanks DjGroovy,

I'll try this tip soon

eggnchips · Post by **eggnchips** » Mon Nov 03, 2008 1:24 pm

Yeah, this thread has done wonders for my production.
I've only been making music for a year and through this thread and other forum advice, I feel like I ain't doing so bad when considering my level of experience.

Thanks.

ze2be · Post by **ze2be** » Thu Nov 06, 2008 6:44 am

Great thread!

supamonsta · Post by **supamonsta** » Fri Nov 07, 2008 3:25 pm

1) I see people have downloaded my track... any opinions?

2) I listen to my mixdowns on : ipod, beyer DT770pro, alesis m1mk2 active, car speakers, and hifi jamo speakers...

AND EVERYWHERE THE SOUND IS DIFFERENT!!!!!! the best is with my beyer headphones... and not so bad on the hifi... what should I do? (I know, work and work further more...)

best regards

blingstef · Post by **blingstef** » Fri Nov 07, 2008 6:54 pm

monstrejumo wrote:AND EVERYWHERE THE SOUND IS DIFFERENT!!!!!! the best is with my beyer headphones... and not so bad on the hifi... what should I do? (I know, work and work further more...)

it will NOT sound the same on different playback devices since different devices have different frequencies, impedances, prices, technologies, environnement (otherwise we will all be having the same speakers with the same room with the same acoustics etc...

there is a lot here ).

what you need to do first is to translate how your tracks behave with other audio system, to how it does with those you are using for your mixdown.

that's why buying new monitors is not the solution as you will have to learn how your tracks act with your new monitors (and this may be long).

after you're done with that, get back to your mixdown and eq if u have to, compress if you have to, boost if you have to, correct if you have to.

xherv · Post by **xherv** » Mon Nov 10, 2008 7:55 am

A rack that's just a utility plug with -6db or -3db -> 0db on a rack knob is pretty easy to manipulate but not destructive to fader settings, can be pretty handy to have easily accessible to throw on a track when touching up some final automations through passages.