4 Steps to Start Your Mix 1. Assign colors to tracks - "visually organize the session" 2.Gain Staging 3.Static Balance of Volume & Pan 4.Allow for plenty of headroom in Master Fader Thanks for the amazing help Mr. Cochrane!
i dont mean to be off topic but does any of you know a method to get back into an instagram account..? I stupidly lost the password. I would love any tricks you can offer me.
@Johan Israel Thanks for your reply. I got to the site thru google and im waiting for the hacking stuff now. Looks like it's gonna take a while so I will get back to you later when my account password hopefully is recovered.
Nice video! I would add an additional step of creating an arrangement track (I'm in Logic but I'm sure you can create arrangement markers in any DAW) so you can look up and easily see where all the parts of the song are.
Ethan Watts Music it’s ok, in the process of learning non its a waste, one day you wake up knowing a lote more and you start liking your own mixings that is really cool 😎
I've also notice you cut up the clips for an additional visual element - so you can 'see' the arrangement as well. I like that as well. Thanks so much!
Thank you so much. This is really a good starting point. Like you said in the video, it is so tempting to add right away EQs and comps to your tracks but the overall balance is way more important to start mixing! I will going to try this technic right away :)
Great tips! The visuals and location of a workflow are definitely important. These tips can be applied to sound design just as easy. The part where you dove into mixing yourself was pretty cool too.
Yeah! I like to follow the rainbow coloring Red all drums Orange all bass Yellow all keys pads synths Green guitsrs blue vocals purple - sound effects and noise sweeps Also mixing in another daw or exporting your multitrack into audio to mix it is a better mental separation than mixing in the same session as production
Following along with the record & release series. Brought me hear to figure out what to do with my too hot tracks. This was very helpful!! The song sounds like Samantha Fish.
Idk if you notice this but there is always a pop somewhere in these videos; this one is at the 17:00 ish mark. Love your tips, just killing me when listening on headphones or decent level on speakers.
Thanks Graham, useful and well explained as usual. I know that it has nothing to do with the usual mixing process, but I do electronic stuff, use few tracks (24) and always mix on the go. I multitrack all to disk in a finished state (just in case a remix is due), everything processed with compressors analog EQs and outboard effects, and the master (with analog master bus processing) goes to disk also. Any tip or advice for this mixing on-the-go, live style?
I use a lot of hardware. Even many software plugs emulate the gain staging of hardware counterparts. I always leave the original dynamic range alone until I hear the way the track jives with my tools. There's a big risk in losing that little pinch of magic. It might not be much, but a little magic off of a few tracks in a whole mix can add up fast. Hitting an input transformer, or tubes, with a wild, hot signal can tame transients and dynamic range while adding a new dimension of harmonic content. That color will dimish as you alter the dynamic range of the source.
I'd like to suggest a step 0 (or step 1, and then we can move everything up). And that is simply to put a (clean, "non-coloring") peak limiter on the master bus before I hit play. Not because I want to start compressing; I don't *want* it to do anything, and I don't *expect* it to do anything. This step is about protecting your ears and your monitors. Maybe something is set wrong in your rig, or the file is set super loud. Who knows. But by putting a limiter on the 2bus, you make sure that when you hit play you don't damage anything accidentally. If your DAW allows you to create templates, this is a nice thing to add to it. Again, you're not trying to affect the dynamics of the track. You're just trying to make sure that there's nothing weird going on that could hurt your ears or your speakers.
Just so I'm clear, what's the I/O look like going from his SubMix track, to his MIX BUSS, to his Master 1? I do a similar thing where I route all of my tracks out to a Submaster track (just an stereo aux input track) that then goes out to my main Master. Any master bus processing is done on my Submaster track and I never touch my main Master.
This was a super helpful reminder of some tools and steps necessary to make my mixing easier. Can you go over your signal flow with the submix, mix bus, and master bus and why you use them?
Marco Castellanos i understand that. I was just wondering what the benefit of splitting it up over three buses instead of just compressing or adding other effects on the Master
oh I get it... Well the benefits from routing your signal in three different subgroups is MORE CONTROL; in case you just want to process drums with saturation you go to your Sub-Drums bus and apply all sort of processing without affecting vocals and the rest of the band, or viceversa, you only need to apply global deesing to all your vocals, then you can set a deeser on your Sub-Vocals bus without afecting the rest of the band and drums; what you are looking for this way, is more control, but if you need to apply GLOBAL proccesing to everything on your mix you should do it on your MIX BUS, or Master Mix, or how ever you need to call it, hope this helps my friend; usually you can find other groups within the hall mix, like a group for all your electric guitars, I call this "E/Gtr Aux", or a group for all your keyboard parts: "Keys Aux", all your percussion elements: "Perc Aux", then I will send every percussion and drum element to the "SubDrums Bus", all vocals to a separate "SubVocals Bus", and finally all vocals to a "SubVocals Bus", and these three "Sub Buses" to the main "SUB MIX" channel; and if its needed send the SUB MIX to a MASTER FADER, where you can open plugins such as Meters or reference to other mixes like "AB Magic", or "REFERENCE" from Mastering the Mix... and it should work perfectly find! In Pro Tools this is my signal flow, I´m sure it most work on every daw the same way... or at least similar.
Great video and great tips. Thanks Graham. I have a question. Why use a submix master fader to lower the master volume instead of turning down the initial master fader? Is there any acoustic and sonic difference?
Just so I can understand the signal flow here - It looks like you have the individual track outputs set to the "SubMIX," then the output of the "SubMIX" is set to the "Mix BUSS." From the "Mix "BUSS," that's routed to the Master. Is that right?
Usually Graham uses only three sub buses: one for drums, one for vocals and one for the rest of the band, and all of them sent to the Submix, hope this helps
But that's not what appears to be going on in this video example, hence my initial question. I will preface this with the fact that I'm a Logic Pro user and ProTools confuses and scares me, but looking at the I/O assignments in the video above, it appears that the audio is routed as I described in my original question. My assumption is that he did it that way just for this tutorial. I would expect in a real-world situation the routing would be more as you described, though.
you are correct Jimmie, seems like you said in the video, but I´ve been Graham student for almost five or more years and not only on his RU-vid channel but I have bought many of his courses, and I also was a Dueling Mixes member for almost two years (Dueling Mixes is a Joe Gilder and Graham mixing site) and I can tell you he always goes for a signal flow like I said, if he doesn´t show it that way here is because he is in the initial phase of mixing wich is the Static Mix phase; but for sure he will do that later, we are only watching a little portion of his procces for mixing a song; Pro Tools is not that difficult, think about it this way: every "bus" is an "auxiliary track" and you can route signal through them in any order you need as long as you have a "purpose to do it" wich shold be setting different levels of proccesing like the one I mentioned on my first comment, but if you think is not neccesary, you can send all your audio tracks directly to just ONE submix auxiliary track....
Hey Graham, I signed up for your workshop on mixing & recording, I was wondering if there will be a way to save the workshop after it’s aired so I can come back to it and if so, how? Thanks
Hey Graham, I'm interested in learning EQ, and compression and all that kind of stuff, do you have a class or a school. I cant afford 10 grand to go to school but something cheaper i can do. Please help..... Steve
Cool! How would you organize tracks with other instruments? Like when you have a combination of a few, but for example no vocals. And, is there any way you could put this extended color scheme into some PDF? (I've now 30-second cut and paste it into Paint, but that sucks quite a bit and I'm looking for a proper way to organize stuff.)
Jerry McKenzie Because master faders are pre-insert, making it impossible to do rides, gain changes or fade outs on the master fader without affecting the levels being sent through plugins inserted on the master bus, altering the sound of the mix.
I had to edit my response after thinking about it for more than 5 seconds: Would the Submix fader not also be pre-insert (in effect) to the master fader, giving the same net effect?
But.. If you change the volume on the submix fader (going to the master fader), the master fader out will then be changed the same way... Or am I not getting something... :-o
HEMERASH Music the submix would go to the master fader in and from there out to your monitors so no it will not. I don’t even bother using a master fader, just a submix and print my mix from there.
When you are mixing a electric blues harmonica do you treat it like an elec. guitar or like a voice? there is not much info on mixing that instrument. Grettings!
Nick Antone you can use the trim plugin that comes with PT or PT's eq plugin and turn down the output control at the top without using the eq portion of the plugin . Or any other plugin that gas this ability.
Can someone explain why there's two master faders? If there's no sonic difference by changing the volume, why not just have the one fader, and pull it down if it's peaking?
I have a question for anyone who would like to chime in and It's about panning the drums: I've noticed that most people pan toms and cymbals from the drummer's perspective. (assuming the drummer is right-handed) Hi Hat left, snare and bass middle, floor tom, ride cymbal right, etc. In fact it seems that almost everyone does this. I have always panned drums from the audience perspective, in other words, the exact opposite. Does anyone have any thoughts on this? I have a tendency to want to hear it as if you were sitting a few rows back and center stage.
Im the exact same way. I know if you listen to a lot old jazz albums as well, they pan in out so if you were to close your eyes facing the speakers, you would the hearing exactly what you would be seeing. in most instances the piano to the left, drum and bass to the right/middle and main instrument in middle unless two instruments. I think it really just depends on the genre but i always like to hear it the way i would actually see the performance.
I used to do drummer’s perspective because, as a drummer, I enjoyed hearing the drums panned out how I played them. These days, though, I like to do audience perspective so it feels more “live”.
Hi Graham, or maybe someone who uses Pro Tools 12 else could help here... How much RAM do you use Pro Tools with? The official system requirements on avid.com say 16GB RAM (32GB or more recommended). Even 16 GB seem quite much to me. My laptop has 8 gigs. I'm going to give avid a call about that here but I wonder what your experience is. Thanks
So, quick question. Why do you use a subMix and a Mix bus? I get why you'd have a Mix Bus before the master fader but why do you need an additional master fader? can't you do what you just did with a trim plugin on the master fader or mix bus?
Was about to ask the same question, plus, if it already clips on one of the pre master bus, what is the benefit of having them since the signal is already clipping ?
In essence that master fader acts like a clip plugin - but I need it to SEE if that buss is clipping before the plugins. I might now know otherwise because the plugins could be turning down the gain but it could be clipping before them.
Most times I record in our rehearsal room using an old Yamaha 02Rv2. Since we are playig all together, there is no way around editing. I would love to see recordingrevolution to make a video about this.
