Bounced File Sounds Terrible

[csherby]

Is there a major step I missing in bouncing a session to a file that can be burnt to CD?
Is there something I should be paying attention to in the dialogue ? It just seems like it should be pretty strait forward to take your work and convert it into something usable, but the file created sounds distand and faint ... I can't even tell if stereo is working or not.

[dubhausdisco1]

Dear csherby,

yes there is something you are missing: it is called mastering. The final step in the cd creation process. Everyone starting out is plagued by the feeling that the mix sounds "distant" or whatever.. The best thing to do in this case is make friend with a mastering engineer (provided you send him or her work in the future!)... They will be able to give you invaluable info on creating a well balanced mix.

Until then, I would advise to just turn up the volume on whatever you are listening on... if you were to get into heavy buss limiting etc now, it may mess with your perspective as a mixer...
Make sense?

[Rail Jon Rogut]

Which Digi hardware are you using? If you're using an MBox make sure the MIX knob is all the way on Playback while mixing. Make sure LLM is not enabled while mixing. Make sure you're monitoring the same stereo buss that you're "printing"

Rail

[csherby]

I have the session mixed and it sounds terrific when playing in Pro tools LE.
Then I "Bounce to Disk"... saving it as a windows media file (I've tried others, not sure what would be the best for creating a CD-friendly file)... saving it on the hard drive... Then I open that file to play it, and it is an extremely distant and faint sound.

I am dumbfounded if you cannot simply take a perfectly good sounding collection of files in protools, and convet it into one file that sounds equally as good. I thought that was sort of the point????

Is there any other advice, please?

[csherby]

I am using a digi 002 rack.

[Ryan Taylor]

Save to .WAV at 44.1/16 for CD creation. Use 'best' compression, or tweak head if you have some spare time. Stereo Interleaved.
Don't forget dither on your master bus when bouncing down.

[dubhausdisco1]

Before everyone starts looking for technical reasons why this 'problem' is occurring, we can't rule out that dude is used to monitoring loud on mixdown, and not compensating during playback....

This happens to everyone at first....

[Joseph Hanna]

Just as an experiment.....

Bounce to disk/multi mono/aiff/import after bounce.

Drag the bounce (which is now in your region bin) onto a new stereo track.

Audio Suite/Normalize that new stereo track

Export or bounce that file as a 16 bit/44.1 to whatever cd burning/listening package you use.

Does it appear "less distent"???

[dubhausdisco1]

csherby, you just need to research the topic a little bit more.. This is a common problem with people just starting out... No need to get frustrated... Once you get things in order your mixes will start sounding better and better!

[dubhausdisco1]

Oh, and please don't go down the road of "just maximize or normalize your track to hell... "
That's not good advice if you want to get this mixing thing right. Good Luck!