What's your favorite mixing tip? 🤔 ▼▼▼TIMESTAMPZ:▼▼▼ 0:00 Intro 0:35 Today's Topic 1:00 Important Disclaimer 1:24 Science Time with Cameron 2:51 Track Before Mixing 3:52 Adding a Noise Reference 4:03 Adding a Meter Tool 4:16 Setting Reference Levels 4:33 Mono Summing 4:43 Setting the Noise Level 4:56 Project Setup 5:14 How Loud to Listen 5:24 Noise Mixing Example 6:06 After the Mix 6:27 Perfect Low End 7:00 Final Result 7:48 Closing Thoughts
Great video and a good idea to show this trick to the people. There are few other videos out there on the topic but I haven't found a single ultimate one (not that noise mixing is some kind of huge topic. There are, however, few things worth mentioning when using this technique). I'll allow myself to list here a few things that helped me out at the beginning of my journey with music production when I used pink noise pretty much all the time for balancing purposes. Btw. Even now, when I trust my ears much more than when I was starting out, I still use pink noise in cases of a busy mix or particularly annoying one. Here are the things worth remembering: 1. Ideally, the gain level of pink noise should be set to 80dB(SPL). Mixing in open headphones this would mean: "Pretty loud, enough to barely hear (I'd say more 'perceive' than hear) if somebody was standing next to me talking.". The reason for this is that our hearing is the most 'neutral' or 'linear' in this range out of all other possibilities. If you crank up the volume too high, you will hear the bass and high frequencies better (which can result in mids being recessed and so-called 'laid back' sound), if you set it too low, the opposite will happen and your track might sound bass-shy and missing sparkle (which if overcompensated leads to U or V-shaped spectral image). 80dB is the holy grail of mixing on headphones! 2. Remember that mixing with pink noise (if done correctly) will make the sound spectrum of your track follow +/- a diagonal line with the highest amplitude in the bass region and lowest in the air range. This means a few things: One - it's not gonna be ideal for all genres! People who love bassy music (most of Venus Theory audience, including myself) will find it a great starting point but say, somebody who listens to mostly acoustic music will find the bass to be too prominent. Two - Depending on the instrumentation of your particular track, it might cause the mix to sound too muddy or boomy - in this case equalisation comes in like a superman! 3. Prior to adjusting your tracks to the noise, make sure you do a preliminary EQ! (IMPORTANT) This is to avoid clutter and excessive muddiness, so high-passing and low-passing tracks is great to be done before and also, remember the balancing with the noise is a STARTING point and doesn't mean it should stay this way because even though your track is balanced, it will still miss ear-candies and stuff that stands out and gives the tune a character. 4. Don't bother with adjusting to the noise things like risers, one-time samples, ambiences etc. - this is NOT something that should be adjusted to the noise! Pink noise should be used to set the levels of the most important, core elements of the tune like drums, synths, bass, etc. - in other words, things that are present all the time or most of the time (things in the foreground and maybe middle ground, don't bother with background elements). Elements that should be sitting back in the mix, if adjusted to the noise, will be cutting through the mix too much and you'll end up having to readjust them afterwards. And that's all I can think of now, hope it saves somebody time and frustration! :) Cheers!
I agree with the words of Aider Ka, very helpful...both...however, is there an easy way to measure the SPL coming out of your headphones? thankful for any ideas...merci !!!
Thank you! I was going crazy with "how should desing the pink noise?". I went all around internet looking for any tutorial to obtain a "high quality" pink noise, and you gave me the solution. Melda prod
There's a lot of controversy around this trick, and yeah I get it, no generator replaces ears and artistic decisions... but, the real strength of this is when you've been tweaking some damn bass patch for hours, or any sound for that matter, there's no way you can tell if it's too loud or not in context. It really helps to get it in some sort of semi-ballpark for a decent starting point when the ears have gone home for the day. That's my experience, at least. Nice demonstration.
Howdy! That's 7 new things I learned from you this week. Thank you! This is interesting. I'm off to write something new to try this with. Have a great weekend everyone!
This looks like a great technique for getting your mix into the right ball park. I don't have a wonderful room to mix in, and I'm 57 so my hearing isn't perfect... I think I might try using this technique and then getting other people to give me feedback on the results. Thanks a lot for the tip!
More for the mixing guide. I always struggle with mixing becuase I can't trust my ear. That's when mixing techniques come to help. I really appreciate this tip because whenever I mix, the low ends always be on top of the mix. Anyway, thank you so much for creating this video.
Great stuff! I've played with this technique a few times and I really like the concept of mixing into a pink noise threshold. Its also great for balancing studio monitors as well.
For sure! Can't say this technique has ever failed me - it's also definitely saved a few mixes I wasn't happy with by just zeroing them out and redoing it with this!
I came here to see what Venus Theory says about mixing. I learned today that it’s not the same as “mastering”, even though the tools (Izotope Neutron vs. Ozone) have similar features like EQ. Venus Theory, aka “Top V”, can you talk about the basics of mixing sometime? 🥺🙏
Million thanks for this. I mix hard rock music and this immediately put me in a great starting point that allowed me to make minor taste choices and changes. Cheers and thanks again!
super thanks for the video , i watched some other videos with pink noise they even gave the pink noise but my mix was coming out horrible n i knew some thing is some where deep shit is going on so i tryed ur video n mix coming like super smooth super thanks once again
I've always heard about Pink Noise mixing but never fully understood it myself. Thanks for this! I'd love more mixing tutorials if you have more tips to share.
I've never been a fan of this technique as it doesn't account for front to back depth in a mix, which is a creative and orchestrative decision. That being said, it gets around deficiencies in your room acoustics and can potentially reveal tonal problems with elements in your mix (e.g. if after the pink noise mix your kick seems too quiet, it might be too boomy in the low end and need the transient click portion to stick out more)
Hey! Thanks for the tip! Maybe the description could link to your mixing course? That said when I look at the overview of what the different subscription tiers on your website contain, I'm not sure which tier includes the courses? Have you considered also making it possible to buy permanent access to the courses outright, besides the subscription option?
Listening to that pink noise was a good example of how compression can mess with your audio. I think choosing anything other than kick drum (or bass) might have been better for the example track, as many users will be watching on their phones. Interesting video, though.
I don't have any tips, I'm still practising compression. Training my ears to hear dynamic changes and groove movement and it's a long road. The pros seem to agree it's 3-5 years to get really good.
Is there anyway to automate this process, or just do it without having to listen to noise. Seems like a great starting point to work from maybe even if you do top down mixing
I am looking at getting into the sound design industry and I have a few questions: How does selling a sample pack work? Do you make a pack and try to sell it as a product to a distributor? Do they commission types of packs they want from you? Do they pay you up front or do you take royalties or both? How do you know if you’re being ripped off? Is there legal jargon because I know with beats, you don’t sell the beat, you lease it so that you still have the rights to it? I know you have a couple of videos on this sort of topic in your sound design series but you didn’t touch on the specifics that I asked. If you decide to do a video on this, thank you.
This is great, but I have a question: you say do this with every channel, what about the processing ones? Reverbs/delays etc...? Or are you talking about just a static mix?
Yo! For effects channels and other 'ear candy' channels I usually blend those in to taste once the main channels are mixed with this method. The only time I really use the noise technique with those things is if they are an integral part of the core sound of the mix.
Hey Cameron, one thing is unclear after watching this: did you make your EQ decisions before leveling with pink noise, or would EQ etc be done afterard? Or before and after? What about extreme examples, like say a Vital or Razor bass patch where you've got a lot of high end and a lot of low end? Seems like if you adjust for one, it may not balance at the other end of the spectrum
new to mixing and wanting to try this. Downloaded a pink noise sample. When viewing the signal through SPAN the frequencies slope upward instead of downward. Is this correct? If not what am I doing wrong?
If I do a mashup of different songs On Logic Pro x shall I compress each song and use a Limiter on each track first then use pink noise ? I can not find any information on this.
In order for that technique to work, you need tracks that have the thinner spectrum possible, right? How do you do if one of your tracks has a wider spectrum (say for example low bass and high treble, when putting it just above the pink noise, you'll lose all the bass, right?)
Yo! The main difference would really just be perceived volume and some psychoacoustic stuff. In my experience, it's better to use the actual noise to listen against as you're listening for the core character of the sound that you want to poke through. For example, in the case of a kick drum I maybe want more of that sub feeling than I do the top 'click' so the sub may come out of the noise only when the kick is fairly boosted. So, the noise curve method wouldn't really account for that.
In short, you'd mix using the pink noise to set your general levels by isolating each track against the noise and then mute the pink noise so you can refine the mix/levels.