can anyone give me some advice on mixing out the box on an analog desk, ive came across a lot of threads talking about itb gain structuring and how to get your mixes ready for master, but ive not came across any threads talking about how to mix your tracks before sending to a mastering engineer if your working completely otb, the reason im asking is im going to be otb shortly, hopefully tomorrow!
my understanding is its okay to run channels hot with analog, so long as the pre-master has enough headroom for the mastering engineering? also should u mix at unity and just use the gain/trim dials and get the source signal from your drum machine/synth etc correct?
i wished there was a bit more info out there regarding mixing correctly on a desk as i cant seem to find any and i know a few folk on here are mixing otb, ive searched the forums and there was a really nice thread linked from a dubstep forum talking about gainstaging, i read that entire thread which took ages but it never really got into how to mix otb.
hopefully some folk can share how they go about generally getting there track correct mixing in the analog domain.
cheers! (apoligies if this has been discussed before and ive not found the thread)
otb gain structuring
with analog mixing you can push some stuff (mostly drums) into the red. it depends on the mixer though. some cheap mixers sound rubbish if you go into the red and some cheap mixers are just sh!t. i hope your spent a bit of money on a mixer. it's a myth that cheap analog mixers sound better than ITB.
set the gains so you have a nice signal coming through and then mix with the faders. you probably don't want to be clipping the master bus but it depends on the mixer. when your recording you mix back into the computer leave plenty of headroom.
set the gains so you have a nice signal coming through and then mix with the faders. you probably don't want to be clipping the master bus but it depends on the mixer. when your recording you mix back into the computer leave plenty of headroom.
thanks man so generally speaking there aint any rules so long as you still leave headroom for the master.
yeah itb mixing is great too, its more the ease for me, im not using ableton or anything, as my soundcard doesnt have 8 inputs and i can only record 2 channels at a time, and since im producing on an mpc 60 its a pain in the arse! so id much rather run my 8 channels from mpc into a mixer and eq on that. then just record my final mix to tape or the computer. (cant afford a real nice soundcard like a rme fireface or id do my mixing itb.)
yeah itb mixing is great too, its more the ease for me, im not using ableton or anything, as my soundcard doesnt have 8 inputs and i can only record 2 channels at a time, and since im producing on an mpc 60 its a pain in the arse! so id much rather run my 8 channels from mpc into a mixer and eq on that. then just record my final mix to tape or the computer. (cant afford a real nice soundcard like a rme fireface or id do my mixing itb.)
i was reading some stuff before where a mix engineer advised an average of -18Dbfs, this would be the 'meat' of your signal with any peak activity at no more than -6Dbfs.
Presumably he's talking about acoustic stuff though because a synth can have its velocity and envelopes shaped to not have the occasional spike avoiding truncated peaks?
But then in 24 bit theres no real need to be recording hot anyway, in fact a summed mix of 'hot' tracks has no bearing on its ultimate rms levels so no need. Id imagine the mix might even sound thin, harsh and lacking in depth. If you record at levels the preamp is designed to work at, surely this equates to the best possible recording?
Presumably he's talking about acoustic stuff though because a synth can have its velocity and envelopes shaped to not have the occasional spike avoiding truncated peaks?
But then in 24 bit theres no real need to be recording hot anyway, in fact a summed mix of 'hot' tracks has no bearing on its ultimate rms levels so no need. Id imagine the mix might even sound thin, harsh and lacking in depth. If you record at levels the preamp is designed to work at, surely this equates to the best possible recording?
this is all relevant for digital recording. in the analog you get saturation if you on into the red.AK wrote:i was reading some stuff before where a mix engineer advised an average of -18Dbfs, this would be the 'meat' of your signal with any peak activity at no more than -6Dbfs.
Presumably he's talking about acoustic stuff though because a synth can have its velocity and envelopes shaped to not have the occasional spike avoiding truncated peaks?
But then in 24 bit theres no real need to be recording hot anyway, in fact a summed mix of 'hot' tracks has no bearing on its ultimate rms levels so no need. Id imagine the mix might even sound thin, harsh and lacking in depth. If you record at levels the preamp is designed to work at, surely this equates to the best possible recording?
