how do I get that "sheen, glossy, polished, commercial release" cd sound?

[NL5]

How about this question - How do you play basketball like Michael Jordan? I mean really. I see exactly what he does, but when I try to do it, I come up a bit short. Why????????

 

[XLR]

Alright, alright... I just can't take watching you suffer any longer.

Here: http://www.rane.com/pi14.html

.

Excellent.

The next piece of gear I buy is going to by made by Rane.

 

[groovyisland]

different people mean different things by sheen

gloss

i clicked on somebodys myspace page and i heard some sheen and gloss that i have no clue whatsoever how to get

go go band

 

[groovyisland]

yeah beri makes enhancers

with bass boost!

i had 2 of em

 

[danny.guitar]

hehehehe!......I'm gettin' me one of those.....
Does Behringer make it's equivalent yet?

LMFAO!

regards,
Spit.

They were going to but they opened the Rane and there wasn't anything inside.

 

[superspit]

They were going to but they opened the Rane and there wasn't anything inside.

ah...I see.....I thought there might be a special crystal or sumting spiritual?
That would make things a little more difficult! (?)
Cheers mate,
Spit

 

[rayc]

The Rane did contain the essence of insense as a path to sonic spirituality but it dissipated with time, (hence the go slow production/component shortage - it's hard to keep the smoke ina bottle) and the etheral reverb plate is informed by a late 19thC silvered mirror which has, due to age and handling, cracked.
I'd love to open one of the PDF's to see what other rib crackers are inside but I'm afraid.

 

[Marsh Outlaw]

Gloss

Not so sure about "gloss" but, besides reverb, panning and compression are critical tools.

 

[random effect]

nah honestly i can't think of any other way to describe it. It's sounds like the whole mix is surounded by a shiny piece of glass that just makes everything sparkle. I hear it on Nora Jones albums alot.

one things that i've noticed in my mixes that adds a lot of that high gloss is a little trick i like to do on guitar and drums. I'll start with the drum tip.

take the ambient room mic or one of the overheads and make a new track with a copy of one of these on it. then take that track and eq out all the low and mids (all the way up to about 7k). then compress the shiest out of it. 20-1 ratio, -32 threshold, fastest attack and slowest release setting possible. then blend that track into the full drum mix and watch it just start to sparkle. It gives the cymbals a great sheen and its extrememly controlled high end so it doesn't hurt the ears.

for guitar (if its a clean guitar) take a condensor mic about 10 inches away from the strings, 12th fret, and make sure your cabinet is isolated from the mic (btw this is for electric guitar). this will pick up a nice attack and high end sparkle from just the strings and you can blend this in with the miced amp signal to taste. BAM!! thats some good home cookin'.

 

[Emusic]

So I'm asking you guys/gals just how do you get that sound?

If your instructor did it in the same listening environement as you, then we can skip "a good listening environement."

Part of a great recording has to do with what is played ofcourse. A well know engineer once said "if crap is played, how can I mix that well?" (or something along those lines. In other words, the arrangement has to be separated and thought after in a smart way, even before its recorded.

I beleive that separating a good arrangement brings clarity to a mix. Separate the "layers" of your sonic image so that the different instuments is distinct and touchable. Clear and transparent. Then add sparkle in the high ends of what you beleive to be what should sparkle. I really don't think reverb is the key to make things stand out; as a great mix. People who can't mix great yet (like myself) tends to add more reverb than what is needed, because soloed those tracks seems so great with just another touch of verb.
Also different reverbs melt together tends to add "mud" to the sonic image. Yes, I do beleive that a lot of tracks need some delay or verb, but try less verb than you might think it needs, especially when partly muting your tracks.

I'm striving for those mixes myself these days. A lot of the crispiest things i hear on the radio these days is urban pop. Few instruments, a groovebased rythm beat with huge kicks and some great high end boosting makes a clear and transparent image where you feel you can touch that sparkling hihat or whatever is in top there.

If I find out how to do that I will write a short description; not this pagelong nonsense reply

 

[Ironklad Audio]

I hear it on Nora Jones albums alot.

i've heard her stuff more times than i'd like to admit, and on her albums i hear great musicians playing great instruments in a great room more than anything else

 

[LeeRosario]

BW,

I don't know if this has been mentiond already, so I apologize in advance. But if you're thinking commercial sound, there has been research in the way of what exactly it is about gear that makes the human being react in a positive way.

A big player in this is Rupert Neve. If I can find these articles again (it's been a long time) I'll send them right to you.

Rupert spoke of the mental affects certain frequencies bring out in people. He did this behind the extensive research of experts of the pyshcoacoustic field. For example, an absense of lowend in mixes tends to trigger a frustrated feeling. Shrill highs and edgyness bringing a sense of alertness to the audience.

Fletcher might be good to ask on this. I beleive he's the closest one here to having spoke to Neve.

So in other words, I think the answer dosn't just end up being in the practice of having a great producer and mixer, because quite frankly that's a given. But it tends to be that the great ones know exactly what locations to record in and what gear to use.

I beleive that's your sheen, gloss and polish. I mean shit man, I can't begin to tell you how many shitty mixes have sold me just because they where saved by things like an SSL preamp, analog tape and etc.

just my two cents.

 

[Sinner]

It takes experience. Give the same recipe and ingredients to a master chef and a novice cook and the master chefs version will taste better every time.

What you don't want is the whole thing to be sickeningly sugar-coated, eh Jon?

 

[BluMusic]

I've tried boosting the high end, I've tried compressing the mix, I've tried reverb quality euqipment and I'm still not getting it. I heard one of my instructers get it in class once during the mixing process so I don't think it has to do with mastering to get the sound. In fact the tracks where not recorded very well and he still got it. When I asked how he said most of the stuff I've tried before. So I'm asking you guys/gals just how do you get that sound?

Hey Big ~ If you read any of my previous Post, you'll see I'm probably the last person that can give you advice on how to get the sound you're looking for bcuz I'm in search of it as well in my mixes.

HOWEVER - night before last, my wife & I went out and I put in a CD that I made a few years back of some originals that were placed on the shelf and as we listened to these songs, she asked me exactly what I was thinking, "How come these songs sound so different than the ones you're doing now?"

I use Cubase SX3 which I upgraded from SX1, granted I'm getting pretty familiar with Cubase and have learned many things about this program but prior to getting Cubase, I was an Atari User.

My Atari set-up was strictly Midi as you know and I would overdub my Guitar and/or Vocals after all the Midi Instruments were recorded. btw, my home setup was more than primitive to say the least but for some UNKNOWN reason, each and every song recorded with this setup had that sound. Every instrument was distinctive, clear, well-balanced, punchy and spread out over the spectrum without any long laboring work to accomplish this. All I ever did was play, record into the Atari, and when I wanted a CD of my work to listen in the car, I simply placed a line-out from a freakin Home Stereo System into a CD Recorder. None of the project were over driven and I used a bevy of sounds which included, Bass, Drums, Keyboards (Layers), Horns, Strings, Percussions or whatever I wanted in a particular tune.

So now I have this powerful package and I can't get anything close to that awesome sound I got from that old Atari setup. Now I'm starting to think made it's the midi that did the trick but as you know, I have to drop everything down to Audio in order to Export to a WAV or MP3 file. If I could Export out to my CDs with my Midi Recordings without having to convert them into Audio, at least the instruments with Midi capability, then maybe I can get that sound once again.

But for me, I'm doing a lot of SRV/Hendrix type Blues songs these days and now I'm talking almost 100% Audio Instrumentation. I even play my Drums & Bass direct into the Board and out to Cubase.

So to piggy back off your question, I'm starting wonder if going into my Board then out to Cubase is my problem and maybe I should be going directly into my Sound Card, would be a better way to record my instruments? I'm using a M-Audio Delta-66 which doesn't have nearly enough Inputs for the Instruments I have.

My Mackie is a 16 ch and even that isn't big enough for my needs really since I'm using L/R on almost everything except my Bass Guitar & Vocal Mics but I have 5 Mics that include 3 condensers for Acoustic Guitar, a 58 for my Vocals and a 57 for when I play guitar through one of my Amps.

I'm trying hard to get that sound as well and I recently purchased iZotope Ozone 3.13 which I'm starting to like very very very much. Some on here say, I didn't need it bcuz of what Cubase already has installed but sorry guys, I'm getting stuff from Ozone that I could never get from the Plug-ins in Cubase, so I'm happy with this purchase.

 

[Bob's Mods]

Ahhh.....Getting that pro sound.....

Getting that high quality pro sound on a budget has been my quest for a very long time. You are probably listening to stuff that was recorded at a high quality commercial studio by engineers with lots of experience and any piece of gear and software at their disposol. If you think you are going to sound that good useing anything less you are in for a shock....forget it. Modest home recordings with average plugs and gear are not going to do it...and I have tried...for years. Now, that being said, you can however come close enough to make you happy. Yes, you can sound close enough to be happy with the final mix.

Yes...you do:

1. Have to have respectable gear.
2. Know your gear and how to track.
3. Develope an ear for mixing and be able to do it well. Understanding how to use an EQ is critical.

But that pro recording has other tricks done to it that give it that pro sound where sheen is only one part. This is the mastering side of the equation:

4. There is small amount of widening going on. I use Ozone 1 to accomplish that.
5. The bass is smoothed & thickened in some way. You need to have a good bass guitar. I use Cakewalk's TapeSim to help here.
6. The sheen...a secret weapon...the AirEQ demo!
7. A small amount of loundness maximizer for good measure. I use the one is Ozone 1.

The sheen has less of an impact without the other parts of that pro sound sound...a smooth bass and slightly widened stereo field.

The AirEQ demo by Elosis is a free demo plug in. It is the ONLY plug or piece of gear I have tried that does the sheen thing on a pro level. And by sheen I'm refuring to the high end content only. The section that does this is the AIR adjustment. I only use it for it's AIR section on vocal tracks and the Main mix. The demo is limited. It won't let you record your tracks or save your settings once you've tweaked it. There is a way around that however. I never use it for general eqing. I use my regular eq for that. I just use the AirEQ for air only. That way its a snap to set when I open a project as the setting is 2:00 most of the time. To record your mixes using the demo version you must perform an "in the box" digital loop (if your software allows it) or a "hardwire out of the box digital loop" or the least desirable "hardwire analog loop" because this will cause loses from two conversions.

Please note I have not included compression. Using the above as a basic guideline, I can record using a minimum amount of gear and software and obtain an acceptable copy of a pro recording. Not a perfect copy but a good fake.

My 2 pennies. This works for me, your mileage may vary.

Bob the mod.

 

[flatfinger]

Well for my incredibly insightfull tip , at risk of being thrown out of the masons knights of audio templar mix'n and master'n society, I will point this out............................................................

Many M.E.'s often (probably less often since everyone has a DAW in there pocket!) don't do shit to a mix outside of the tiniest amount of eq on leveling against the other tracks in the compiliation.

Mr. Katz has a saying.............

"The perfect master begins with the perfect mix")

Don't just assume that mastering is going to work miracles on the pedestrian mix.




Willz,
I will get flamed for this , but listen to those mixes you want to emulate , and then look at the rms and peak frequency response curves for the whole song , look for common traits . This is relevant only to similar genre and orchestrations in the same vein as your mix.


now back to your regularly scheduled banter and BS!!!

 

[Bob's Mods]

One more thing...Reverb

I forgot to mention the addition of reverb to add some space. A tasteful amount mind you. I use the Sonitus reverb from Cakewalk. It has a handy widener in it that really stands out with the widener in Ozone. I use it in the main mix bus only. Most low end reverb plugs sound like garbage if you push them too hard so know when enough is enough.

You'all have the right to tape a paper on my back that has "kick me...I'm an asshole" written on it for forgetting something as important as reverb. It may not be necessary in all cases but can help to bring out that "pro sheeny shiny glossy polished sound" that is part and parcel of great commercial studios that the original post'r was looking for.

Mod Man

 

[Trell Blaze]

Bigwillz, what genre are you mixing? Is it mostly synth based or acoustic instruments?

I keep telling people that skilled use - I repeat, SKILLED use of lo cut/hi cut EQ can go a LONG way in polishing up a mix but a lot of folks around here seem to oppose EQing anything alltogether.

 

[Bob's Mods]

Not useing EQ to get a good mix is bad advice. Use it as a high pass filter and notch filter to remove resonance. Also use it to notch out offending frequencies. Mimimize using it to boost however. Learning how to high pass and notch problem areas is a must learn skill.

 

[Trell Blaze]

Not useing EQ to get a good mix is bad advice. Use it as a high pass filter and notch filter to remove resonance. Also use it to notch out offending frequencies. Mimimize using it to boost however. Learning how to high pass and notch problem areas is a must learn skill.

100% agreement on all of that...