what are your most common speed bumps while mixing?

[pk_hat]

here's to my first Roy Howell style thread! [img]images/icons/wink.gif[/img]

addressed to beginners and pros alike, I would only assume that once in a while, no matter how hard you try to have a part sit tightly in the mix, it tends to bend you backwards with frustration. The light at the end of tunnel would always be to tweak, experiment, give your ears a break and finally, accept it all as a learning process which becomes more natural with time and practice.

For example, in my case I sometimes have a difficult time to get Rhodes and Wurly parts to sit well in the mix. A combination of panning experiments and mid-range eq cuts often help (400hz area), but when all is playing at once, I'm still faced with a cluttered mix.

Hi-hats also - as simple as they may seem to 'get right' - can prove difficult to eq properly without making them too gritty or so clean and crisp they take on a 'metallic' sound.

So there you have it (for now), it would be great to hear all your stories, good and bad experiences, tips and tricks, advice, favorite compressors for certain sounds, etc.

For all the pros and semi-pros out there, perhaps there was a time when you accidentally pulled up a plugin or patched in an external processor and thought "Ahh, finally.....had I known this earlier, all my older mixes would have had much better rhythm parts!", y'know, figuring out that important steo that made you 'move up the ranks' so to speak, that kind of shop talk.

I love all this stuff, and happy recording! [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

pk

[Mr_Seven]

Pk, this thread might be better suited for the Protools host tips and techniques section.

http://duc.digidesign.com/cgi-bin/ub...f=46&submit=Go

[Roy Howell]

Actually, it's fine right here. Most of us never check out that section anyway.

So pk,
I'm really getting comfortable mixing in PT. Having a smaller PC for over a year helped me learn to be economical with my tracks/plugins, and I've learned quite a bit.
One thing that can be hard to make 'click' for me though is the toms. I've always loved a good snare/tom/kick groove (a jungle thang if you will), and it can be hard to make it really work well, level wise. I got a pretty good one on 'Springtime Girls', I think, but could not make it happen on a different type of piece I did. If something isn't working, it's gone.
These things said though, everytime I finish a mix, I realize that a better engineer could show me something to improve it. So I'm still learning.

~Roy

[Mark_Knecht]

pk,
I think the one I've constantly been bumping up against is that I tend to start off mixing everything too hot. I seem to get drums and bass going, and my natural inclination is to want to turn them up pretty high.

After that, when I start adding in the other instruments, I'll come closer to or start clipping. This drives me to add a compressor, and then the compressor starts taking over and by the time I get to the end it's a big compressed mess with everything loud and nothing really standing out.

I dealt with that all weekend, but think I got past that today and got a mix that seems to have some air in it. I feel good about that. (We'll have to see if I feel the same way tomorrow.)

Of course, this is also the first mix I did on monitors instead of headphones, so I'm really sure that had a lot to do with how much I'm hearing.

I'd be really interested to hear how people more experienced than I go about this process. How loud are your bass and drums when only played together as a group? Obviously this is source material dependant. Rap ain't jazz quintets. Maybe this is the wrong question and someone can help me frame it better, but that's what I'm learning about right now.

Thanks,
Mark

[N-G-NEER]

I start with the hi hat Kick and snare then ad the Bass tracks if that isn't together you'll never get a mix to happen. Most begginers tend to try to mix everything to the same level and although this is a natural tendecy it's wrong certain instruments should be felt more than heard that is were you skills of observation, taste and experience come into play. Do a mix, come back the next day, listen from different points in the room on different speakers when your getting close burn a cd and listen in your car on your girlfriends stereo. Then come back and try what you think are the appropriate changes. Remember there is no ending to what can be done. To Quote Q. Post mixing is like cleaning a 747 with a toothbrush.

[End Time Omega]

Originally posted by N-G-NEER:
Most begginers tend to try to mix everything to the same level and although this is a natural tendecy it's wrong

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Really? It's "wrong?" Do you have some sort of Ancient Book of Engineering Truths? If so, please share so we too can mix the "right" way.

[STUDIO-DE-ARIEL]

He is right because

The mix adds and if you add two or signals there would be an increase in the over all level. If you are mixing at -3db there is the danger that you can go over riding the edge even if the meters say no clip. Because they only respond so fast thats why led peak indicating meters are used for digital recording. You add two distinctly similar signals you got distortion even if your meters say no. Only so much headroom. Also the Engineers say that it is not uncommon to build holes in the mix at certain frequencys so you can fill those holes kind of evening out the spectrum across 20 cycles to whatever I hear that some of the neve consoles went out to 100k I guess no one mixes beyond the 22k filter in the group but the new systems allow for theoretical signals in beyond the 44.1khz theoreticaly impossible for CD to show since its rolled of at about 22k with an ant-alising? filter. Any way one way around that is to dither the signal as its converted from 24bit to 16bit the standby in the industry was the Appogee uv22 dont know what the new system will be. I guess the only thing that would show this is a really super fast meter or an oscilloscope or a spectrum analizer. Some pros mix up to 6 db down although -3db is recomended.
Any way here is one you probably wont face. My engineer (Full time non payed even at 3:00 somtimes) [img]images/icons/smile.gif[/img] He said they were mixing on a Neumann console and cutting a disk on the Neumann lathe they had the sound level so hot that they thought they had the best mix for the radio. "they were sure they had the best mix" took it in the next room and the record would not track. The stylus zipped across the record like it had skates on wouldn't stay in the grove unless you put a nickel on the tone arm, and then it sounded badly distorted. Hovever when examined under the lathes' microscope the groves looked perfect . Then they went back and cut the levels by 3db and added some limiting and got the mix that worked. He said that in 1969 dollars the studio was worth 4.5 million Dollars. It was state of the art for the time. Thought you might like to hear that.
Sighning off

BAE S-D-A USA

[Phil O'Keefe]

Originally posted by Mark_Knecht:
pk,
I think the one I've constantly been bumping up against is that I tend to start off mixing everything too hot. I seem to get drums and bass going, and my natural inclination is to want to turn them up pretty high.

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Here's an old trick - unfortunately, there's no calibration on the meters in PT that I'm aware of... [img]images/icons/frown.gif[/img]

Insert a master stereo output fader and route everything to that. Now mute everything but the drums. Adjust the individual drum fader(s) until the level sits at around the -7 db area on the master faders. Got it? Okay, now mute the drums. Do the same thing with the bass guitar, at the same level. Now mute that. Guitar tracks - same thing except set them to about -10 dB. Lead Vocals at about -5 dB. Now unmute everything and take a listen... it might not be the PERFECT balance, but it should give you a good starting point, and you'll most likely be under "clipping". Of course, any EQ boosting and panning stuff can change things.... This isn't meant as a way to "mix" just as a starting point. Give it a try and let me know if it helps.

[soundsurfr]

Originally posted by N-G-NEER:
I start with the hi hat Kick and snare then ad the Bass tracks if that isn't together you'll never get a mix to happen.

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">I recently read an interview with Bob Clearmountain who says that although 90% of audio engineers do it this way, he starts with the vocal and adds everything else in reverse, making sure that the vocal remains the focal point and the overall master level stays below redline. The advantage is if you add an instrument and the master levels get hot, you have to start subracting, and you leave the vocal where it is. This naturally leaves you with a cleaner mix. I haven't tried it yet, but it seems like an interesting approach. If I can find the article (I think it was EM), I'll post a reference.

Your other comment, that our common tendency is to bring everything up to the same level is absolutely right on. I know I have to fight that urge all the time when I mix. What gets me, is that when I'm mixing my stuff, I HAVE to put that cool guitar lick or keyboard flourish out front, just because it's cool and everybody HAS to hear it. But when I'm listening to a really well done mix from someone else's album, I'm most impressed by the cool part that is mixed way back. You hear it way back there and you say to yourself, "whoah, that is slick". You think I'd learn, and the next time I'm behind the console nudging the fader up to the top of it's slide track I'd pull it way back instead, but Nooooooo.

It takes a lot of self-discipline to mix like that, in my opinion.

[Mark_Knecht]

Phil,
This is exactly the sort of info I was looking for. Thanks!

I think I'll take the mix I did yesterday, and then go backwards. I sort of like the levels I ended up with, so I'll mute everything out except the drums and see what sort of level I have, and the horns, and the piano, etc. and then keep a record of that over time. It would be interesting to see how my mix changes as I learn more.

It may be total overkill, but I guess I could actually bounce the drums, or bass, or horns, as individal wave files and then look at them in Sound Forge where I can do more analysis. Would be a bunch of work, but that's what it might mean to go to this school I suppose! [img]images/icons/wink.gif[/img]

Thanks very, very much for sharing that!

Cheers,
Mark

[quote]Originally posted by Phil O'Keefe:

Here's an old trick - unfortunately, there's no calibration on the meters in PT that I'm aware of... [img]images/icons/frown.gif[/img]

Insert a master stereo output fader and route everything to that. Now mute everything but the drums. Adjust the individual drum fader(s) until the level sits at around the -7 db area on the master faders. Got it? Okay, now mute the drums. Do the same thing with the bass guitar, at the same level. Now mute that. Guitar tracks - same thing except set them to about -10 dB. Lead Vocals at about -5 dB. Now unmute everything and take a listen... it might not be the PERFECT balance, but it should give you a good starting point, and you'll most likely be under "clipping". Of course, any EQ boosting and panning stuff can change things.... This isn't meant as a way to "mix" just as a starting point. Give it a try and let me know if it helps.

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">