as for the beat of this song i did not make it its an instrumental from another song maybe there are ways to make an already masterd beat to sound good with the mix but i havent figured that out yet. as for my vocals i dont know what to do..what do you mean by limiting?
This seems to be an increasingly common problem (at least on this BBS); rookie recorders trying to match up their own vocals with pre-mastered beats.
The big issue there is that the "beats" you're using appear to have been fully mastered already. This is not uncommon, apparently. The problem with that is they have already been run through compression and limiting (limiting is just a very strong version of compression) and whatnot to sound good on their own, but with everything smashed to a brick already, it's difficult to fold in the vocals in a neat, clean way.
You can hear that as a problem in your car when your vocals do not stand out because the volume levels of everything are all the same. You can see that readily in your mix when you look at it in the timeline and your waveforms look as if you ran a grass cutter across them cutting everything flat at about -3dbFS (that's what we often call a "brick", because the waveform looks so flat and solid.)
Im surprised you're asking what limiting is, because I would swear that you have run your vocals through a limiter or heavy compressor; they are just too crunched and even-sounding to be completely unprocessed.
You have three choices; 1) make your own beats, probably an unrealistic option for you right now. B) re-master or un-master the beats you do have first to get some dynamics back into them so they're not so flat; also probably unrealistic to ask of you. III) reduce the volume of your beat track so the vocal is simply louder than the rest of it. This will not give you the optimum sound, but it's the only "easy" solution that won't require practice on your part first.
And also, the question remains whether your beats are mono on their own, in which case they're pretty troublesome. You really need some stereo beat tracks to give you some room to mix.
maybe it could be my soundcard thats causing all of this since i did not make that beat. also when i have about 2 windows open on my desktop other then my daw sonar starts getting static and slowing down and when i play back a song it sounds as if its off beat with the song its weird. anbesty ideas? im trying to mix and make things sound good and maybe i could i just feel like im missing a couple basic things or maybe the computer is??
Your sound card could certainly be the source of the high noise floor you're getting, if they are not already in the beats.
Close down everything on your PC - especially any Internet connections and browsers - while mixing. You don't need anything else open and you certainly don't need to be connected to that BP oil spill called the Internet while doing it.
Also, look up "latency" in your online help files in Sonar.
Some people find one DAW package easier to use than another, but it's really a matter of personal style and preference. And at the core, there's not a super-duper amount of difference between them, the differences are mostly in the fine details.
I think what most of it boils down to, fivestar, is you're discovering the unfortunate truth that this stuff, while not really all that hard, is not as easy as one thinks at the start. You'll get to a good mix the same way a musician gets to Carnagie Hall; practice, practice, practice
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G.
as for the stereo thing i did export to 16 bit stereo what i didn't do is double the vocals its just one take and that's all maybe that's why it doesn't sound like it has to much of a body. maybe i need to read a little more on how to record i have heard about dubbing and all those things but there's so much to learn its overwhelming you know. Ive heard of people panning vocals right and left to give that stereo image but i read that after i put my song out there. if you guys have any tips it will be greatly appreciated thank you!!
