Digital or Analog Mixing

[NL5]

Well, I'm trying to decide wether to upgrade my mixer to an old analog Soundcraft, or ditch it all-together and mix in Cubase, Whaddya'll think? I kinda like having a more hands on mixing, but I don't have much outboard gear, got quite a few good plugins tho. Don't know if the investment in a board would be worth it. Any advice?

Thanks,

Gunnar

 

[Blue Bear Sound]

Personally, I prefer analog mixing..........

 

[Farview]

The biggest argument for having the board is the number of preamps it has. Doing a large drumset with outboard pres (even cheap ones) will cost thousands. It is also much easier to do a headphone mix with a board as well.

 

[Blue Bear Sound]

The biggest argument for having the board is the number of preamps it has.

Or if you simply like the workflow or the way it "feels/sounds/etc..." I hardly ever use the on-board pres.... mind you, I have spent thousands on outboard pres!!

 

[Farview]

I still get Metal heads with 2 kicks, 8 toms, side snare and chimes. And the whole band has to play together (or they will get lost) Having that many outboard pres to cover everyone would be insane. (and not worth the investment to do 4 song demos in 20 hours) The mods I did to the Ghost were worth it.

 

[Blue Bear Sound]

I hear ya... it's pretty much the same for me!

 

[xfinsterx]

on the other hand...

i have a good time mixing in pro tools and the automation of faders plugins and various different funtions is awesome from my experience.

if i feel like im not getting the sound i want from my plugins for eq and tube sounds or whatever, ill just send it through some outboard stuff, and thatll fix it every time for me.

i do miss physical part of it like i used to do though....(manual style mixing)
but thats all thats gone though,,, the sounds are still there.

 

[giles117]

I have a great time mixing in DP4.

Of course I have 4 Mackie Controls (can't give up those faders)

So far as the pre-amp issue I have a bunch of those 8 channel puppies running into my 2408 MkIII and cue mix console is now controllable via the Mackie Control's

So In My studio I am completly digital (in the box)

In My recording truck I have a desk.

 

[Ronan]

About 98% of the albums I mix, I mix analog. There are a lot of reasons for this, but the primary one is that to me analog mixing sounds better, even if you are talking about a soundcraft or mackie range of mixer. I also like the feel of analog mixing and in many ways it can be more flexible. I like being able to make subtle changes to the sound by how hot I run my line inputs and I like being able to do parallel processing with analog gear to sounds on different chanels without worrying about phase etc.

Digital mixing is getting more common (and actually better) but I still think it has a long way to go and still the overwhelming majority of hit pop and rock records are mixed analog.

 

[doulos]

i mix in pro tools and i always use outboard gear and i have a controller as well as a digital mixer i love my faders.

 

[mixsit]

Metal heads....and chimes...

 

[Bdrum]

Large Kits

I have a twelve piece and only a 12 channel board
I guess I dont need overheads or ride and HI- HAT cymbal mics.... It's in a five piece and taking up 7 mics
I still need two more condensors...

 

[masteringhouse]

Personally I'm a fan of using a hybrid of digital and analog mixing. There are quite a few studios that I've been involved with that use things like Pro Tools through SSLs, or cut to tape, fly into Pro Tools to mix, or do things like comps in PT and fly it back to tape for mixing.

Analog isn't going away, and digital just adds to our collective pallette of tools that we can use.

 

[Cloneboy Studio]

Currently I'm mixing digital, but want to progress to the point I can mixdown to analog tape thru an analog mixer. Reason why is I hate how digital summing sounds--it always screws up my mix and doesn't sound right.

 

[jeff5xo]

Currently I'm mixing digital, but want to progress to the point I can mixdown to analog tape thru an analog mixer. Reason why is I hate how digital summing sounds--it always screws up my mix and doesn't sound right.

Ok, can someone point me to a link? I keep seeing the word "summing" come up.............I'm not clear what it means. Thanks in advance!

 

[Giganova]

For those of you who mix analog: how do you mix analog?? Forgive my ignorance (I have a digital mixer). Analog mixers have no track automation, do they, so how can you mix a song with like one or two dozen tracks?

Are you guys talking about tracking or mixing?

 

[HangDawg]

For those of you who mix analog: how do you mix analog?? Forgive my ignorance (I have a digital mixer). Analog mixers have no track automation, do they, so how can you mix a song with like one or two dozen tracks?

Are you guys talking about tracking or mixing?

Some mixers have full automation. Mine however only has mute automation which is better than nothing. You have to do volume changes by moving faders and pans by twisting knobs. If you don't have enough hands, get somebody else to help. I've just started mixing analog myself and not only does it sound better, it's fun. You have to rehearse all the fades/pans/mutes/effects and then go for it. It's like a whole other performance.

 

[Cloneboy Studio]

For those of you who mix analog: how do you mix analog?? Forgive my ignorance (I have a digital mixer). Analog mixers have no track automation, do they, so how can you mix a song with like one or two dozen tracks?

Are you guys talking about tracking or mixing?

Analog consoles had automation (flying faders) a long time ago. It's an expensive option. However, you don't need it to mix with. Most of the stuff you can just do by hand.

 

[dr.colossus]

i think its kinda like the difference between programing a piano part or playing it live...

ronan made a good point about running the inputs hot. did a pt mix session on thurs, and i just wanted to nastify the mix... its kinda hard to push things, they just get louder, not rounder...

 

[crankz1]

Ok, can someone point me to a link? I keep seeing the word "summing" come up.............I'm not clear what it means. Thanks in advance!

Basically it means taking "x" number of inputs and combining them to "x" number of outputs (typically two outputs for music ... Left and Right). More outputs would be used for mixing multi-channel surround sound mixes.
In essence, a mixer is a summing device in that you can have multiple inputs summed (added together) to a set of outputs.
Same thing thats going on with your multi-track software mixer .... you have multiple tracks getting summed together to output to your two (right and left) monitors.