healthy looking drum tracks????

[Nick The Man]

im having some trouble mixing these drum tracks .. really i just have trouble mixing and ive got a screenshot here, let me know if these drum tracks LOOK good


top track is Snare Bottom
2nd Kick
3rd Mic inbetween rack toms
4th Left overhead
5th Right overhead

 

[elementary]

they look a good bit louder than i would record, but i dont know if theres a physical reason why thats bad. I think there are posts about it somewhere, im sure someone could refer you

 

[SouthSIDE Glen]

The only way to tell if drum tracks are any good is to be able to smell them. But I can say that the kick is the wrong color; kick always sounds better as red or orange.

What do you mean do they "look good"? There is no way anybody can tell by looking at a waveform editor whether a track sounds right or not.

I can tell you that you're recording the snare waaaay too hot. You should not be coming anywhere near clipping on any individual tracks; your gain staging on the snare is messed up somewhere.

But how much, if any, that has to do with what you perceive as a general mixing problem I have no way of knowing by your short description and Vegas snapshot.

Why are you having trouble mixing them? What does not seem to be working for you or what sounds wrong? An actual description of the problem in those kinds of terms would be worth a thousand pictures. And an audio clip would be worth a thousand descriptions.

G.

 

[phaqu]

Why are you micing the snare just from the bottom?

 

[Bulls Hit]

Have you blown the waveforms up to see if you're getting cancellation between the mics?

 

[RAMI]

The only way to tell if drum tracks are any good is to be able to smell them.

Stop it man, you're killing me!!!!

 

[thajeremy]

There is no way anybody can tell by looking at a waveform editor whether a track sounds right or not.

G.

what ever you say man....I can...I looked at the screenshot before I finished reading the post and I already knew that the top track was snare, second was kick and so on....your drums sound fine man...carry on...

 

[MadAudio]

What I want to know is do you really use that many buses on a mix? Wow!

And you don't name your tracks? File management must be a drag!

But like Glen, I want to know exactly what kind of trouble you're having. Seems like you just need to pull them down more based on the clipping I see going on.

 

[mixsit]

Have you blown the waveforms up to see if you're getting cancellation between the mics?

What (how's) that?
Wayne

 

[Bulls Hit]

If say the snare is bleeding into the kick mic and they're not in phase, then the kick mic will destructively interfere with the snare mic when both tracks are played back together.
If you blow up a snare hit waveform on both the snare and kick tracks and the peaks align, then that's good. If a peak on one track aligns with a trough on the other, then that's not good.

so
^ (snare track)
^ (kick track) = good

^
v = not good

Quite often you can improve the volume of snare & kicks by just nudging the tracks along relative to each other so the peaks line up

 

[RAMI]

If say the snare is bleeding into the kick mic and they're not in phase, then the kick mic will destructively interfere with the snare mic when both tracks are played back together.
If you blow up a snare hit waveform on both the snare and kick tracks and the peaks align, then that's good. If a peak on one track aligns with a trough on the other, then that's not good.

so
^ (snare track)
^ (kick track) = good

^
v = not good

Quite often you can improve the volume of snare & kicks by just nudging the tracks along relative to each other so the peaks line up

AH! I get it. Cool man, you learn something new everyday.

Though, I don't work with software when I record. I use an outboard recorder now (TASCAM 2488). But I flip the phase on my snare pretty much all the time because of the overheads. Does that pretty much take care of whatever phase issues would occur with the click also???

 

[NL5]

AH! I get it. Cool man, you learn something new everyday.

Though, I don't work with software when I record. I use an outboard recorder now (TASCAM 2488). But I flip the phase on my snare pretty much all the time because of the overheads. Does that pretty much take care of whatever phase issues would occur with the click also???

You flip the phase on the top snare mic?


Nick - why are you at 16 bit?

 

[RAMI]

I only use one snare mic...And, yes, I flip the phase or else it's out of phase with the overheads.

 

[Bulls Hit]

People generally flip the phase on a snare mic when micing top and bottom because the mics are so close to the sound source that one is almost exactly out of phase with the other.

However the sound takes longer to reach the overheads so the transients on the overhead tracks will be slightly behind the snare track. That's when nudging them along can help, but as long as they're not overlapping too much it's usually not a problem, and will in fact just contribute to 'your sound'

 

[mixsit]

If say the snare is bleeding into the kick mic and they're not in phase, then the kick mic will destructively interfere with the snare mic when both tracks are played back together.
If you blow up a snare hit waveform on both the snare and kick tracks and the peaks align, then that's good. If a peak on one track aligns with a trough on the other, then that's not good.

Yeah that's cool. But we should add that the natural state with close/far combos (I.E. the timing/phase you can set up initially with mic placement) is always somewhat out of phase -and might be the keeper tone. In other words, aligned doesn't have to be the best tone?
Wayne

 

[Nick The Man]

Wow i have alot of questions to answer .. where to start?

well just to start i knew that posting a thread like this with such a ridiculus concept and name i would get ripped somewhat. But you guys have kept it to a minimum and i appreciate that! But i guess my actual question was .. are these tracks recorded to loud? Which ive learned that YES they are. The snare peaks at around +2db.

Glen: my original plan for posting this thread was on concerns of volume and peaks. but I'm also having trouble mixing these. Everything just sounds muddy, its all one sound. I don't know they just sound very bland. I haven't EQ'ed anything and i think that it will help. Even though it would be my first time EQing drums to make them fit in a song.

phaqu: My reason for micing the bottom only is ... well i never like the way the snare sounds when miced from the top.. and i think the overhead mics do a good enough job with the top.

MadAudio: I don't use that many busses on a mix but i have them there just incase. In vegas i set it up so that every new project i open has 8 busses just incase. oh lol and i usually do name and label everything, but this was very early in the recording process ... i usually label after recording .. but i should just label at the same time that im selecting inputs and arming them for recording.

NL5: 16-bit ... all this time i didnt even realize i was in 16 (like im talking all the times ive recording using vegas ive been in 16 without realzing) thank you very much for pointing that out! 24bit here we come

Everyone else: phasing was not the issue on this one But thank you for the contribution, and there was some good ideas thrown out there

 

[SouthSIDE Glen]

Glen: my original plan for posting this thread was on concerns of volume and peaks. but I'm also having trouble mixing these. Everything just sounds muddy, its all one sound. I don't know they just sound very bland. I haven't EQ'ed anything and i think that it will help. Even though it would be my first time EQing drums to make them fit in a song.

Sorry for the nooge re the thread title, Nick, I couldn't pass it by .

Yeah the snare is too hot, but that doesn't sound directly related to what you describe here. It sounds to me like it's probably more on the other side of the wires - in the miking technique - than in the recording levels in Vegas themselves. Yeah you can (and should) do some EQ and eventually other signal processing to tweak the individual sounds in mixing, no question there, but your raw tracks should sound bland and muddy either.

Make sure the kit is properly tuned before you start recording.

Then I'd recommend starting with the overheads first. Get them set so that alone they sound as good as you can get them; a nice crisp, clean balanced sound. Ok the kick will be next to non-exitsant and the snare my not be as in the face as you like; that's OK, that's what the other tracks will be for. But first get a good general sound and balance from the OHs. When you have that, you can then use those as the "base coat" of you drums.

Then do the same for the kick and the snare, one at a time. Once you have those individually dialed in, do a rough live mix in you headphones or monitors. Bring up the HOs first, the pull the kick in to fill in the bottom properly, and finally pull in the snare just enough to give you the presence you want. Make note of some shaping EQ that you might want to apply in mixing to get the tracks to cooperate better.

Then decide if you even need the tom mics. They could just be adding mud to your OH pickup of them. But if you do still want the tom mics at that point, then repeat the same process with tem as you did for the kick and snare.

Then when you have the roghh mix sounding fairly OK - with notes as to what compression or EQ you might need to add in mixing - go ahead and hit the record button.

HTH,

G.

 

[phaqu]

Well said Glenn.....Anyway, Ive only added a small amount of bottom snare to my original signal to liven it up ,when I actually use a bottom mic ,and that phase is usually inverted.I dont know if youll have a phase issue using the overheads though. If your getting good snare in the overheads, you shouldnt need that much bottom.

 

[Bulls Hit]

Yeah that's cool. But we should add that the natural state with close/far combos (I.E. the timing/phase you can set up initially with mic placement) is always somewhat out of phase -and might be the keeper tone. In other words, aligned doesn't have to be the best tone?
Wayne

Yes agreed. That's what I was alluding to in the previous post. Having everything aligned just allows for constructive interference and gives you the biggest bang

 

[MadAudio]

i usually label after recording .. but i should just label at the same time that im selecting inputs and arming them for recording.

The main benefit to labeling the tracks before you record is that Vegas will use that label as part of the file name. Saves typing if you're doing multiple takes in the same project.