do you mixdown you final bounced out tune

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Do you mean you have a compressor and/or limiter set up from the word go? How do you mean 'as I go along'? Smile
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Don Cherry Wrote:Every human is blessed in her or his life with one love (passion), no matter how long it may last. This Absolute love will last in one's heart and soul forever.
djfada Wrote:surely loads of compression ending up on things due to it being mastered twice (if you do self mastering before its sent away) is gonna spoil the warmth of the track

Yeah that and it just gives the mastering engineer fuckall to work with in terms of bringing certain elements out of the track
Macc Wrote:Do you mean you have a compressor and/or limiter set up from the word go? How do you mean 'as I go along'? Smile

Yeah i have a limiter on the stereo out channel.

I compress the individual sounds if required.

I only started working this way. About 4 tracks. These tracks are house/detroit techno influenced dnb tracks, with claps and such as snares rather than using breaks.
What limiter is it, and exactly what is it doing in terms of your mix - ie how much gain reduction?

Smile

I will stop asking questions in this thread and write something, at some point Teef
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Don Cherry Wrote:Every human is blessed in her or his life with one love (passion), no matter how long it may last. This Absolute love will last in one's heart and soul forever.
L2 and it does nothing but sit there.

Sort of like a brick wall i guess. It gives me the ability to increase the volume of the bass, snare, etc.. to a loudness that i'm happy with.

Let the slaughter begin...haha...
Quote:Let the slaughter begin...haha...

Twisted Teef


dionysus Wrote:L2 and it does nothing but sit there.

Sort of like a brick wall i guess.

Fair enough Smile But - assuming you aren't going mental with it - is it any more/better a brick wall than 0dB? Smile Even better, why not mix at levels where you aren't going to worry about ever crossing 'that' line? Why walk the tightrope?




Quote:It gives me the ability to increase the volume of the bass, snare, etc.. to a loudness that i'm happy with.

Yes, but at a cost. The problem here is, for example, that when limiting occurs your bass will cause your snare to be attenuated. One is affecting the other - nay, your whole mix, everything else in it.


[I'm sure peeps have seen my rants about distortion from limiters like this - NOTHING pisses me off more than a nicely-mixed tune that distorts every time the drums or bass hit cos it has been bludgeoned with a limiter Mad Mad Mad ]


Why not give each and every part the specialised treatment it requires? More control, less undesirable interaction between elements, less distortion on everything when say, the bass hits etc etc etc...

Interaction between mix elements isn't A Bad Thing. However, with a limiter a la L2, it only happens when limiting occurs - the interaction only happens at peak times. By using a (nice) compressor, preferably with a soft knee, in the right way, you get interaction at a much wider range of levels. This can help things to gel together in a much nicer, more organic and more musical way. This can bring extra life to a mix, while also allowing an increase in perceived level.

However, compression will - to some extent - change your mix. It takes very careful use of compression for this not to be the case, OR, it requires the compressor to be a part of the mix chain. You mix into the compressor, it is a part of the mix, and influences all mix decisions from the word go. It still requires care and attention of course, but it means your mix won't change when you apply some compression as it is already done. That's a simplistic way of putting it, but the point stands.


Which brings us to mastering. Don't underestimate the ability of a good ME to bring life back into a mix that appears fukt. It's a gross misjudgement, almost an insult, to assume that all ME's do - or that all they are able to do - is slap some compression and eq on a mix and there you go. It's true that in the vast majority of cases, eq and compression will be applied to bring the best out of a mix, get the level to somewhere reasonable for the music being dealt with etc etc. But that is only a part of the story. A good ME that gets given a mix that has been limited clipped and smashed beyond belief to destruction won't go slapping on compression 'cos that's what ME's do' - they will do what is necessary to bring the best out of a track. I wanted to clear that up straight away.


As for the multiplicative ratios, I'm quite serious when I say 'so what?'. As always again, to the point of being boring, what about ears?

I regularly (as in, all the fucking time Grin ) stage compression. There's more to a compressor than just ratio. Set your compressor to 6:1. Set the threshold at maximum, listen. Set the threshold to minimum, listen. They sound pretty different, right? How the compressor is applying a given gain reduction is far far more than simply a function of ratio. How the ratios stack up, how they act and where they act on the signal results in a far more complex picture than simply 3:1 and 2:1 and 6:1 = 12:1. That isn't incorrect mathematically speaking, but it's a squillion times more complex than that.

That picture assumes unity gain at all stages, same attack/release settings, same compressor, all set with the same knee, the same threshold, blah blah - ie not particularly realistic. If you are setting your compressors all the same then you need to turn them all off, now Hahaha Teef When staging compressors correctly, the ratios do stack up, but in such a way that the overall result is of benefit to the signal, of benefit to the sound, to the level, etc etc etc. It results in a gentle smoothing of the 'overall compression curve' (if such a thing makes sense), not unlike the saturation/soft knee curve we all know and love.

To do this in a big arse mix without it all turning to mush and being very lifeles, is something that can only be done with time, practice, good ears, good equipment etc etc. But it can be done. Multiplying ratios can be a wonderful thing if you use it right and understand the way dynamics work on signals. And a good ME will know how to take that fat, punchy, powerful mix and give it even more juice, whether they use compression or whether they don't.


Smiley
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Don Cherry Wrote:Every human is blessed in her or his life with one love (passion), no matter how long it may last. This Absolute love will last in one's heart and soul forever.
.... teh oracle has spoken Teef
titanium Wrote:.... teh oracle has spoken Teef


Macc --------> [Image: 1005884849468a367d5b95e.gif] <------ titanium
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Don Cherry Wrote:Every human is blessed in her or his life with one love (passion), no matter how long it may last. This Absolute love will last in one's heart and soul forever.
Macc Wrote:Interaction between mix elements isn't A Bad Thing.

Opinnions on "Pumping"?
wow some in depth shit bob, kinda see why my ratios multiplying up thing is fairly irrelevant now Oops


Macc Wrote:Interaction between mix elements isn't A Bad Thing. However, with a limiter a la L2, it only happens when limiting occurs - the interaction only happens at peak times. By using a (nice) compressor,

what about a multiband comp for this say waves linmb, thats the only compression ive been doing on my mastering lately, usually just to control the lows a bit if anything, hopefully the highs are taken care of much early than that on their individual tracks in the mix
titanium Wrote:.... teh oracle has spoken Teef

Kinda feels like that sometimes. Its class. I love it. Gonna have to re-read that.

I'm going to try a compressor on the end though, instead of the L2. See what its like. Thanks.

Will definetly try Limiting the individual channels and mixing to 0db. Trying to work out in my head how this is going to change everthing. Not to sure....
Hahaha
Aim your mix for say, -2 or -3 dB, not 0dB. Then you need not worry about occasional peaks etc. There's really no need to 'walk the tightrope', to get the hottest possible signal without clipping these days - at least everything is done at minimum 24-bit resolution. Signal to noise ratio (when making stuff all in the box) is virtually a thing of the past, and when recording at 24-bit, convertors operate best at aroun -7 to -6 dB peak I seem to recall. So mixing roughly to a good ceiling like 0dB but not obsessing over making sure your peaks are at -0.1dB before limiting, is not going to cost you quality.

Plus you have then have headroom to spank the bastard in the mastering process Smile Grin


As for pumping, it all depends on the tune, the instruments involved the tempo, rhythm etc etc... One personal rule is that 'pumping' rhythm section = not a bad thing, pumping pads = very bad thing.
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Don Cherry Wrote:Every human is blessed in her or his life with one love (passion), no matter how long it may last. This Absolute love will last in one's heart and soul forever.
what is pumping? is that were you have the release long so it doesn't just compress the loud bit?
Kind of... it's where one instrument ducks others by causing the compressor to work. Generally 'a bad thing' but can work nicely in music with very regular rhythmic content by 'exaggerating' the beat.

'Ere you go;

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audio_level_compression

In there Smile Says basically what I just said. But better Hahaha
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Don Cherry Wrote:Every human is blessed in her or his life with one love (passion), no matter how long it may last. This Absolute love will last in one's heart and soul forever.
tyler Wrote:what is pumping? is that were you have the release long so it doesn't just compress the loud bit?

Mostly used in house because of the regular 4x4 beat.

You can hear it in alot of newer house.

Where the attack and release time are set to "pump" in time with the beat.

It is applied on groups or the whole mix so that when the KD comes through it pushes the whole mix over the threshhold lowering the other sound and when there is no KD there is a percieved raise in volume of the other sounds.

That cheesy "call on me" mersh house track is a good example, you can here the synths increase in volume between the Kicks.

hope that sort of explained it.
Isn't it similar to the sidechaiing effect?
Similar, yeah, but different Grin . Bit pushed for time at the mo though Neutral
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Don Cherry Wrote:Every human is blessed in her or his life with one love (passion), no matter how long it may last. This Absolute love will last in one's heart and soul forever.
Shiva Wrote:
tyler Wrote:what is pumping? is that were you have the release long so it doesn't just compress the loud bit?

Mostly used in house because of the regular 4x4 beat.

You can hear it in alot of newer house.

Where the attack and release time are set to "pump" in time with the beat.

It is applied on groups or the whole mix so that when the KD comes through it pushes the whole mix over the threshhold lowering the other sound and when there is no KD there is a percieved raise in volume of the other sounds.

That cheesy "call on me" mersh house track is a good example, you can here the synths increase in volume between the Kicks.

in the newer housetunes they use sidechaining, incredibly hip !

if you check my myspace @ http://www.myspace.com/titaniumbreakz u can hear 2 of my first atempts at sidechaining. the like paradise tune and the ascending tune. the first of these is WAYYYY over the top, the second one more subtile.
Shiva Wrote:
tyler Wrote:what is pumping? is that were you have the release long so it doesn't just compress the loud bit?

Mostly used in house because of the regular 4x4 beat.

You can hear it in alot of newer house.

Where the attack and release time are set to "pump" in time with the beat.

It is applied on groups or the whole mix so that when the KD comes through it pushes the whole mix over the threshhold lowering the other sound and when there is no KD there is a percieved raise in volume of the other sounds.

That cheesy "call on me" mersh house track is a good example, you can here the synths increase in volume between the Kicks.

hope that sort of explained it.

yeah thats the effect i was thinking of, except you can kinda do it with just the beat, where like the kick has a long release so it lowers the hats etc for a bit after.

you don't need sidechains for that though really do you? just compressing it all together would work
tyler Wrote:yeah thats the effect i was thinking of, except you can kinda do it with just the beat, where like the kick has a long release so it lowers the hats etc for a bit after.

you don't need sidechains for that though really do you? just compressing it all together would work

This is the difference between the two Smile One (straight up pumping) depends on the audio 'interaction' between the two sounds and the compressor - that is, two sounds have to be present. The other (sidechaining) depends on the key signal from one, controlling the compression of the other - the audio from the first part doesn't necessarily have to be audible (you could use a signal to make the sidechained track pump but not have the control signal as a part of your mix).
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Don Cherry Wrote:Every human is blessed in her or his life with one love (passion), no matter how long it may last. This Absolute love will last in one's heart and soul forever.
mind the "trigger" sound is affected in pumping as well, in sidechaining it can be a choice if its affected. if you wanna do techno you dont wanna have your kick (99% of the times your triggersound) affected. it's about freeing room in your mix for the kick so this can be booming without being blurred by other sounds
titanium Wrote:mind the "trigger" sound is affected in pumping as well, in sidechaining it can be a choice if its affected.

yeah i'd say thats the main difference! Xyxthumbs
good thread

cheers for master info,
Sidechain crew;

http://www.db-audioware.com/sidechaincom....htm#tryit

New one, apparently gives UAD 1176 a run for its money...
[Image: protabl3.gif]
Don Cherry Wrote:Every human is blessed in her or his life with one love (passion), no matter how long it may last. This Absolute love will last in one's heart and soul forever.

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