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[VOLiTiAN]

Aside from the pretentious nature of your 2nd post there seems to be a couple of issues….

Firstly it depends what sort of “era” of mix you’re looking for? Listening to “Quintessence of Fire” At the moment and it sounds like early testament, so early 90’s thrash. The drums and vox both need to be dried out and brought more upfront, i would also say the vox need some more compression, after than the snare could do with being more upfront aswell, and a bit more bottom end on the mix wouldn’t go amiss…

Guitars are a bit too loud for the mix and a bit to fizzy for my taste, each to their own, the playing is nice and solid but to me, the tone sounds really “DI’d” rather than a nice cab pumping out some SPL’s, also the bass guitar seems to be lacking in the mix.

So in summary, on the guitars prolly roll off a bit of 4k and bring up maybe a bit of 1k and 2.5k (depends how your signal chain runs), add a nice healthy dose of 50-60 hz to the whole mix, (BBE maximisers are good for a nice low end bump if the mix behind it is pretty stable, no spikes etc), dry up vox and drums and drop the guitars in level, maybe carve out some freq’s upto 250hz on the middle of the stereo field freq’s and give a bit more to the bass in that area.. i.e. EQ the bass to the centre of the mix.

Some starters…

Regards

D.

www.myspace.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundclick.com/VOLiTiAN www.reverbnation.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundcloud.com/VOLiTiAN

[VOLiTiAN]

I would say a couple of things, firstly no not having problems with the multi-out’s. DAW’s are known for having just reference meters rather than accurately calibrated to a standard eg K-12 etc, if you want to compare the levels the best thing to do first is get some decent metering software. Also I would assume that the other plugins (prob synths?) are normally set quite high in volume (additional post processing to make the presets sound nice on their own etc) where as superior needs mixing to an environment….

Regards

D.

www.myspace.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundclick.com/VOLiTiAN www.reverbnation.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundcloud.com/VOLiTiAN

[VOLiTiAN]

Any reason you can’t just program the rolls in by hand using velocity edits?

There is no “1 size fits all” solution, if the sound isn’t working for you, it’s normally down to the programming and the layer limits…

Regards

D.

www.myspace.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundclick.com/VOLiTiAN www.reverbnation.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundcloud.com/VOLiTiAN

[VOLiTiAN]

It depends on the approach, subtractive EQ’ing the parts which are too bright might help the mix overall, however I would suggest looking at the lower mid-range around 200-500hz, there’s a lot of mud to be found round there unfortunately but the warmth comes from that range (assuming the mix isn’t overly unbalanced to another freq set) other tricks like using analogue tape plugins etc might help just add subtle character.

Regards

D.

www.myspace.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundclick.com/VOLiTiAN www.reverbnation.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundcloud.com/VOLiTiAN

[VOLiTiAN]

Any particular reason you’re using the piano roll to program drums? It’s not like you can “sustain” a snare….

The drum editors are there for a reason, they handle aftertouch etc differently. Plus the workflow is more specific.

Also when you say “when I program them, the velocities for each part of the drum seem a bit random”, that’s very vague. What’s random? the sound produced? The midi velocities you’re seeing onscreen?

Kind regards

D.

www.myspace.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundclick.com/VOLiTiAN www.reverbnation.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundcloud.com/VOLiTiAN

[VOLiTiAN]

Depending on the sound you’re going from the mix feels a touch thin, or lacking some warmth, also the guitar tone is nice but being honest, are you sure you’re not mixing them a touch favourably i.e. they are a touch loud…. also some of the snap from the snare is missing especially in the more built up parts of the track, perhaps carving a little notch of EQ for it’s attack and then maybe a small amount of sidechaining on the rhythm guitars from the snare….

Regards

D.

p.s. please work on the tuning of your bends on the lead work, it really detracts from what otherwise sounds pretty cool.

www.myspace.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundclick.com/VOLiTiAN www.reverbnation.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundcloud.com/VOLiTiAN

[VOLiTiAN]

Oh dear…

Regards

D.

www.myspace.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundclick.com/VOLiTiAN www.reverbnation.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundcloud.com/VOLiTiAN

[VOLiTiAN]

The drums lead you to thinking the mix will be clearer than it is, the guitars are very muddy, and need some serious work, they sound very centered and certainly the lead is getting lost – sounds like some panning, EQ, compression is and some sidechaining is needed. At the moment the entire arrangement sounds like it’s sitting “on top” of the drums.

And caps aren’t necessary for topic titles….

Regards

D.

www.myspace.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundclick.com/VOLiTiAN www.reverbnation.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundcloud.com/VOLiTiAN

[VOLiTiAN]

ORIGINAL: fizbin

Kontakt, the worst NI thing ever? You serious? It’s pretty clearly the best all-around sample player out there IMO. And certainly not the worst thing NI has ever come up with.

It’s kind of their flagship product and supports a huge percentage of the content that comes along with Komplete.

Massive is great, but if I had to choose between the two, Massive would go, easily. I can replace Massive. There’s nothing out there that can do what Kontakt can.

Massive is great, but if I had to choose between the two, Massive would go, easily. I can replace Massive. There’s nothing out there that can do what Kontakt can.

Not entirely sure where you’re getting your opinions from, but there are a good few other manufacturers/developers who offer this same functionality, and like with all samplers, the library can be read pretty much universally (and *that* is Kontakts strong point, the libraries), however to make the use of the specialist features, scripts etc still have to be written – bespoke – to see any of those benefits, as it would do with any sampler.

The fact is you could easily replace most NI products (massive equivalents would be U-he Diva, Cakewalk Rapture, Dmitry Sches Diversion, Future Audio Workshop Circle etc etc), and especially in this instance as superior was designed for programming drums etc, whereas Kontakt clearly was never designed for this as it’s sole purpose and anyway who disagree’s clearly hasn’t used Kontakt extensively, in fact I’d have to say “at all” 🙂

Also are these pre-processed? It might be explain why you’re hearing the kit pieces sounding “better” than other sample sets….

Would still be nice to *sample* our own custom kit pieces and use them alongside/inside a TT kit to be able to put in the same room etc, but still managed by the SD interface….

Regards

D.

www.myspace.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundclick.com/VOLiTiAN www.reverbnation.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundcloud.com/VOLiTiAN

[VOLiTiAN]

Hey that’s cool Juicy, my post wasn’t aimed at yourself, but good to know that after our little “mis-hap” a while ago things have settled now and we seem to be agreeing on the same points 🙂

I think there’s only so many times where you want to freeze the drums, and start mixing them only to find you’ve got hits that are back-to-back but have say different velocities on a double-kick beat etc and you have to unfreeze, re-edit and re-freeze (esp when the projects start getting more convoluted)

I found with all the groove monkee beats, half of them sound out of time??? and every snare is mapped to a weird rimshot rather than GM standard D1, annoying for auditioning…

Regards

D.

www.myspace.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundclick.com/VOLiTiAN www.reverbnation.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundcloud.com/VOLiTiAN

[VOLiTiAN]

Re: above post, see my post on another thread…

http://toontrack.com/forum/tm.aspx?m=112935

Regards

D.

www.myspace.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundclick.com/VOLiTiAN www.reverbnation.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundcloud.com/VOLiTiAN

[VOLiTiAN]

Apart from the fact it’s been a month since his original post, why on earth would someone who hasn’t even mentioned Dell, want to visit their support? And moreover it’s a software issue involving some kinda config conflict in his host DAW environment by the looks of it, how would Dell be able to help there? Do they suddenly have specialists we should all know about?

No, clearly not, so stop spamming….

Regards

D.

www.myspace.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundclick.com/VOLiTiAN www.reverbnation.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundcloud.com/VOLiTiAN

[VOLiTiAN]

To be honest, as a good matter of course, when you start to pick different beats from different players, recorded by a slightly altered setup, or programming your own modifications to the groove/new groove, I tend to think it’s beneficial to just open up the entire MIDI track and *visually* look to see if kit pieces are in line with what you’d imagine they should be doing, i.e. scan over ensure velocities are consistent with what you think they should be.

Aside from that going back and listening to the audio whilst checking the MIDI is always a good idea, it can often help to pick out any silly errors and perhaps more importantly down the line if you *know* your MIDI is spot on, give you clues as to which kit pieces might need further mixing etc, it’s a very circular process but it’s good for ironing out creases and knowing your tracks inside and out, better 🙂

Regards

D.

www.myspace.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundclick.com/VOLiTiAN www.reverbnation.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundcloud.com/VOLiTiAN

[VOLiTiAN]

Whilst I respect the post, there is nothing ingenius or particularly fluid about the workflow.

In this modern age, the necessity for importing audio after it’s been recorded has been completely done away with, effectively, all he’s doing is using the HDR as an external ADAT style device, and in all fairness what would make the most sense is to have the S/PDIF sending timecode and just having the two projects sync correctly.

There’s a touting of pre-processing that can be done by the HDR due to it’s own DSP however once committed to the final take the editing process does then actually become destructive which is what most engineers seek to avoid.

This whole process can be done in 2 simple steps with a suitable ASIO device…. and I’m loathe to admit this reminds me of too many times in the past where i’ve tried to make an old piece of equipment work just for the sake of being tight and wanting to make use of it, but all the time knowing there’s a far simpler solution which you’d never look back from.

My ideal setup….

Fast powerful plenty of headroom PC
Novation nocturn or similar
Tascam USB2400 or similar
great ASIO interface with good solid mic pre’s
as much visual real estate space as you can afford….

kinda like this…

http://i1137.photobucket.com/albums/n509/VOLiTiANMusic/15122009075-1.jpg

Regards

D.

www.myspace.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundclick.com/VOLiTiAN www.reverbnation.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundcloud.com/VOLiTiAN

[VOLiTiAN]

Y’see this is what kinda bugs me about these questions or about the product – it’s a whole chicken/egg situation….

Anyone who’s *anyone* would not expect to get a perfect sound with presets, that’s just fact, there are far too many subtle nuances, variations etc a plus music is organic always changing, for there to ever be a “one-fits-all” solution…

Now is it EZmix’s fault that the mindset above starts to become more prevalent? Of course not, it’s just another tool to be used however we see fit, but when you post on a forum that you’re already using upwards of 20 tracks and you can “pin point” the sound you’re looking for, then why on earth are you using presets? Or even asking subjective questions about which presets to use based on genres?

Surely you can add more of a descriptive, “i’m looking for extra sizzle in my hi-hats but not too bright” or “my kick drum is lacking some bottom end punch” anything at all….

The above just comes across as looking for others to do work to save time. Time, that funnily enough no-one will be able to save you, because when you actually take someone’s advice on a preset it’s going to be complete luck if it’s perfect due to the fact no-one has heard your mix yet/levels, fx chain etc etc (ad infinitum)

Best advice, put a mix up on the ‘net somewhere, allow people to listen to it, express what it is you’re looking to specifically change (and be detailed), and whilst you’re waiting for a plethora of replies, get some demo’s of EQ’s, compressors etc and start learning how to use them, by the looks of it, that’s your next step and you’re half way there anyway….

Sorry for the rant

D.

www.myspace.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundclick.com/VOLiTiAN www.reverbnation.com/VOLiTiAN www.soundcloud.com/VOLiTiAN

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