Number of Aux tracks?

[Scorpio253]

What's up,

Before I begin my mixing session I insert two aux tracks. One aux for the lead vocals & another for backgrounds & chorus. Is this a correct way of mixing? I'm starting to think it's a waste of CPU based on the fact that the EQ & compression are barely different.

Also, I put Rverb on the same aux track (Eq, Comp, Delay, Reverb - order) - I know I should'nt but for some reason any effect I put on an aux (alone) and insert it onto a track - it sounds weird (hollow-like). Any idea? Thanks in advance.

[Murt]

Originally Posted by Scorpio253

What's up,

Before I begin my mixing session I insert two aux tracks. One aux for the lead vocals & another for backgrounds & chorus. Is this a correct way of mixing? I'm starting to think it's a waste of CPU based on the fact that the EQ & compression are barely different.

Also, I put Rverb on the same aux track (Eq, Comp, Delay, Reverb - order) - I know I should'nt but for some reason any effect I put on an aux (alone) and insert it onto a track - it sounds weird (hollow-like). Any idea? Thanks in advance.

Everyone has their own preferences when mixing but there are some common techniques.
Ideally you would insert one effect on each Aux track e.g
Insert a Reverb on one Aux, Delay on another and so on. Then send your vocal to each one in turn. You could set up another Aux with a different Reverb setting for the Bacground Vocals and send the BVs to that. For example: Create an Aux track, Insert a Reverb on the Aux, Set the input of the Aux to an available bus and make sure the Aux fader is set at '0'. Then on your vocal track click on one of the sends in the Mix window and find the same 'bus' that you have the Aux track input set to (it's a good idea to rename your buses on the Aux. You can right click on the input and choose 'Rename' or you can do it from the I/O Setup window (e.g change the Bus name to VoxReverb/VoxDelay etc or whatever makes sense to you, this makes it much easier to find the bus from your 'sends'. The beauty of this system is that you can control the amount of the effect via your 'send' fader. This saves cpu/dsp by not having to insert a reverb/delay on each vocal track/drum track or whatever.
EQ and Compression are generally inserted on the actual track you want to effect and not the Aux track.
It's a big subject so hopefully you'll get lots more feedback.

[albee1952]

Well said. For me, delay and reverb effects always go on aux tracks and I use aux sends to feed audio to them. Compressor and EQ always get inserted on the audio tracks. There are exceptions, such as sending all the drum tracks to a stereo aux track and inserting a compressor on the aux. This allows you to hit the drums really hard with compression, but mix it WITH the uncompressed drums so you retain the attack.

[musicalavtech]

Originally Posted by Scorpio253

I'm starting to think it's a waste of CPU based on the fact that the EQ & compression are barely different.

Also, you can use audiosuite to "print" the effects individually to save cpu. Copy the settings from the rtas to audiosuite, making new tracks.

[Scorpio253]

Originally Posted by musicalavtech

Also, you can use audiosuite to "print" the effects individually to save cpu. Copy the settings from the rtas to audiosuite, making new tracks.

What if I wanted to change or take the printed effect off? Is there a way I could go back to the previous take?

[Scorpio253]

Originally Posted by albee1952

There are exceptions, such as sending all the drum tracks to a stereo aux track and inserting a compressor on the aux.

Yea this is what I do but for vocals. I do sing Pop/R&B so I'd like to compress EVERY vocal track, it seems it would be impossible for me to put compression on EACH vocal track -

[Murt]

Originally Posted by Scorpio253

Yea this is what I do but for vocals. I do sing Pop/R&B so I'd like to compress EVERY vocal track, it seems it would be impossible for me to put compression on EACH vocal track -

I don't know about impossible - difficult to manage maybe, with all those compressors (depending on how many tracks) but I use a mixture of the Massey CT4, the Digi compressor and various freeware vst compressors inserted on individual tracks, whether it be vocals, drums, guitars or anything else, and I've never had a cpu problem because of it yet.

[musicalavtech]

Originally Posted by Scorpio253

What if I wanted to change or take the printed effect off? Is there a way I could go back to the previous take?

I apologize in that I meant making new regions, but new tracks will work too. Using audiosuite means you've already made rtas decisions of how you want the effect to sound like, permanently combined with the dry region. Maybe this is not the best way to go if you might be changing it up. Don't delete the original dry track/region.

[albee1952]

Originally Posted by Scorpio253

Yea this is what I do but for vocals. I do sing Pop/R&B so I'd like to compress EVERY vocal track, it seems it would be impossible for me to put compression on EACH vocal track -

Not impossible at all. The compressor plugins are some of the most cpu-friendly plugins and I run anywhere from 6 to 14 on any given session. Busing all the BGV's to a stereo aux and inserting 1 compressor can certainly work, but if any one BGV happens to hit hard, it will modulate all the others. I always gently compress each vocal track(lead vocals often get 2). Almost always insert a Pultec after the compressor to add some sparkle(8-10K at +3). Always EQ the BGV's with a dip around 350HZ and highpass at 100 or so. Never print the reverb. Sometimes I will print echo if its just for a certain phrase or word(or guitar/key part)but usually I just automate the send to the delay(on an aux track). Any verb or echo that needs to be reversed will get printed so I can use AudioSuite on it.

Back to vocals, before mixing, I will spend some time evening out the track with the AudioSuite GAIN plugin(knock down any huge peaks and bring up any regions that are way softer than the average).

[Scorpio253]

Originally Posted by albee1952

Not impossible at all. The compressor plugins are some of the most cpu-friendly plugins and I run anywhere from 6 to 14 on any given session. Busing all the BGV's to a stereo aux and inserting 1 compressor can certainly work, but if any one BGV happens to hit hard, it will modulate all the others. I always gently compress each vocal track(lead vocals often get 2). Almost always insert a Pultec after the compressor to add some sparkle(8-10K at +3). Always EQ the BGV's with a dip around 350HZ and highpass at 100 or so. Never print the reverb. Sometimes I will print echo if its just for a certain phrase or word(or guitar/key part)but usually I just automate the send to the delay(on an aux track). Any verb or echo that needs to be reversed will get printed so I can use AudioSuite on it.

Back to vocals, before mixing, I will spend some time evening out the track with the AudioSuite GAIN plugin(knock down any huge peaks and bring up any regions that are way softer than the average).

Okay thanks a lot. I'll give that a try.