[thephatboi]

I agree about mixing through plugs you are pretty sure you are going to use on the 2 bus. I do bypass them occasionally to make sure they are doing what I want and not hurting the mix. Alot of plug ins affect the sound even if you are not processing much so I want to be mixing through the ones I am going to use otherwise it can be like starting over when you put them on if you were mixing without them. I personally don't like to leave everything up to the mastering engineer since you know what sort of sound you are going for and it is your baby. I am in favour of a fair bit of compression on the mix bus, the most important thing with compression to me is release time; make sure it is fast enough so it doesn't muddy up things or make it sound sluggish. I usually Iike a medium attack and fairly fast release depending on program. Also the comment about bringing two versions of a song to the mastering guy is valid ( one cleaner and another with the processing you think you want), sometimes it will save your ass or at least time. Compare alot with commercial cds in a similar genre to see how you are comparing to the norm and then you can decide if you want to process more or less than what others have done. Have fun and experiment.