Bouncing loud tracks

S

Stephen Jones

New member
I'm still sort of a newbie with Cakewalk 9 and this forum, so please excuse if this has been answered several times before.
I'm very confused as to how you handle bouncing tracks to create more memory when the tracks in question are too loud and will peak and distort when mixed.
Seems if you lower the main output faders when you bounce then afterwards you have to remix your levels relative to the rest of the song. Is there a way around this? I imagine it is a relatively often occurance to end up with peaking outputs halfway through tracking a song.
I'd also be curious to know if this issue has been dealt with at all with better results in SONAR.
thanks,
steve
 
Hi,

Sounds like your problem originally stems from your recording technique. Garbage In = Garbage Out, ie. if your levels were too high when you recorded, you a leaving yourself no head-room in the track to then mix the individual parts together.

How "hot" are you recording in Cakewalk? How high do your input meters go when you are recording? I normally try to set it up so that I am just starting to hit the yellow band - this seems to leave me with enough room to then mix in every other part.

For the situation you are currently in, you should be able to mix down the offending tracks by decreasing the level of the master fader. Do this -

1. Mute all of the tracks except those that you want to mix down
2. Play the tracks to be mixed down
3. Play with the Master Output slider so that you can play the tracks back without them hitting the red peak meter
4. Play with each track's volume sliders to make sure that the tracks you intend to bounce are mixed properly for each other.
5. Once you are happy, then use the MIXDOWN TO TRACK command. Make sure you leave all the checkboxes selected in this dialogue so that it routes your output through the master slider.

This should create a track with everything mixed down into it which you should then be able to use to mix everything else against.

If you find that you simply can't do this then try some of the following -

1. Try decreasing the original volume of the source tracks using Cakewalk's internal "-3dB Quieter" command. (Double-click on the audio portion of your file, right-mouse click and then select "-3dB Quieter". Do this to all of the dodgy tracks and then repeat steps 1-5 above.

2. If this still doesn't do it, try getting hold of a LIMITER - this is a tool which allows you to stop or "limit" your levels from going over a certain point. Using this on the offending tracks and then doing steps 1-5 above would fix the problem. LIMITERs are available as DX plug-ins for Cakewalk/Sonar or you could export the source tracks to something like Sound Forge or Cool Edit Pro v2.0 and use their internal limiting functions.

If you do go with a limiter - be careful - it is VERY easy to destroy the dynamics of your music using this tool, (and compressors), to the point where there is no more loud and soft in the song, just one constant level.

Let us know how you go!

Q.

2.
 
Hi again.
Qwerty, most will tell you that the best way to track in the digital realm is to get as much signal as possible without peaking. This will yield the fullest signal, best signal to noise ratio, etc. Regardless, this is not really the issue here.
Let's say you've got a good mix going, and somewhere along the way you've had to lower your mains -3 db to avoid peaking. Not that unusual, right? Now let's say you want to work on some aspect of the song but you don't have enough memory, so you opt to mix down some of the tracks to one stereo track. The problem, unless I'm mistaken, is that the level of your mixed-down track as compared with the level of the rest of the song will be compromised. If you leave the mains as they are (at -3 db) then your bounced tracks will be that much quieter than the rest of the song and then after you bounce you will have to raise the level of those mixed tracks back up (ie + 3 db) to compensate. If on the other hand you mix down those tracks with a main fader level of 0db so you don't have to remix after the fact, then you run the risk of peaking.
OK, clearly the first option is the better one. I'm just wondering if there's a better way to solve this issue because it seems like somewhat of a bother to have to remix tracks every time you bounce/mixdown. The only other option is to always make sure your song can be compatible with mains at 0db, and we all know life just isn't always that perfect...
steve
 
The only thing I have been able to come up with is dynamics processing (ie. compression, limiting, etc...). If anyoneone knows of a better way, I am eagerly awaiting the answer to this one.


Vice
 
Stephen,

I just started using Cakewalk like a week ago, so I don't know if you can do this or not. But when I was using Vegas, the "mix to new track" option mixed down just the tracks, without any bus or master volume/pan/fx changes. So, presumably, if there is a similar option in Cakewalk, you could mix down the tracks at their original levels and you wouldn't have the -3db going into the mix.

On the other hand, i guess this would go back to your clipping problem. I guess I would mix down those tracks with the main fader at -3db. then after they are mixed down, you could bring everything else down 3db, and bring the main back to 0, but this is a pain in the ass. So I guess after all of that, I really can't answer your question, except, your main in clipping because of the addition of X number of tracks to each other, so wouldn't you still be ok in regards to clipping if you are only mixing down a few of that full number of tracks?

i think i confused myself more trying to answer than I did just reading the question. sorry.

josh

btw, does CWPA9 have level meters on the tracks? For some reason I thought it did, but then when I installed the full version, I don't have them. Was I hallucinating before, or do I have to do something to see them?
 
UPDATE

With my most recent song, I mixed down tracks by lowering the mains volume. It seemed to work pretty well. I still used a little compression on the drums. The overall song level came out better than what I normally get. Who knows, I was probably lucky this time anyway...


Vice
 
It seems to like when you combine a bunch of tracks you should get the same new peak levels whether just mixing or doing submix, and/or a bounce(?) After tracking nice and hot, the first thing we have to do at mix time is bring the track volumes down so the master doesn't clip. Same adjustment if some of them are going to a submix. Then the new sub's volume might need to be adjusted for it's new level in the mix. (Is that the same idea?) It's easier to change to sub than all the others.
Cheers
wayne
 
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