Is "bus processing" a superfluous term

[joey2000]

I've heard terms like "mix bus processing" or "master bus processing" and near as I can tell, you can delete the "bus processing" part because it's a wordy way of just saying "mixing" or "mastering." T/F? If there's a diff, I'm not seeing a clear one and explanation in plain English appreciated.

 

[Tadpui]

Think of what a bus is. Bus processing would be any processing done on a bus or group. Not superfluous at all. Just another part of mixing, but not synonymous with mixing.

 

[joey2000]

Sorry but still sounds like it to me. "processing done on a bus or group.." ...as opposed to what? Not getting the diff.

 

[Tadpui]

As opposed to processing done on a single source or track.

 

[RAMI]

EDIT: Never mind.

 

[Chili]

I have never used a buss for processing group tracks until very recently. I'm still in the experimental phase to see what benefits I can get from it.

Buss or Group processing is to apply one processor/effect on several tracks at one time. Like the same reverb on the background vocals or one compressor on the drum kit as a whole. I find it just as easy and can get more control if I simply apply what I need to each track individually. But there must be a benefit or people wouldn't be doing it. Some will say it 'glues' the tracks together or simplifies mixing. I suppose that's where the experimental part comes in for me. I'll keep hacking at the idea until I see some difference then decide if it is worth my efforts.
As for Master bus processing: I never do it. Mix the song to two track in my DAW, then do any 'masterin' or finalizing in wavelab.

 

[RAMI]

I have never used a buss for processing group tracks until very recently. I'm still in the experimental phase to see what benefits I can get from it.

Buss or Group processing is to apply one processor/effect on several tracks at one time. Like the same reverb on the background vocals or one compressor on the drum kit as a whole. I find it just as easy and can get more control if I simply apply what I need to each track individually. But there must be a benefit or people wouldn't be doing it. Some will say it 'glues' the tracks together or simplifies mixing. I suppose that's where the experimental part comes in for me. I'll keep hacking at the idea until I see some difference then decide if it is worth my efforts.
As for Master bus processing: I never do it. Mix the song to two track in my DAW, then do any 'masterin' or finalizing in wavelab.

Nah, most people use sends for their reverbs. You put a separate instance of a reverb on every track that you want reverb on? Wow.

A good example of "bus processing" is using one EQ on your group of back vocals, for example, rather than using 8 instances of EQ.

 

[RFR]

Real simple. If you wanted a delay on a single guitar track, that WOULDN'T be buss processing.

Lets say you wanted to put the whole band, or song, in a certain size room with reverb, that would be an example of buss processing.

 

[Chili]

Nah, most people use sends for their reverbs.

Yeah, I use only one reverb and send everything to it.

You put a separate instance of a reverb on every track that you want reverb on? Wow.

Lol, no. I doubt my computer could handle the load. But my example was to use one reverb for all the background vocals. Maybe some people want to use a different reverb for backing vocals than they do for lead vocal.

A good example of "bus processing" is using one EQ on your group of back vocals, for example, rather than using 8 instances of EQ.

Now that I should try sometime.

 

[Massive Master]

Bus(s) = Group = Submix

Example: Tracks 1-8 are the drum kit. EQ's and compressors might be on every individual track. Buss them all to a single stereo group and put a "glue" compressor and/or and overall dip-in-the-mids EQ. Buss processing.

Same with the master buss -- Not unusual at all to have a dB or two of gain reduction on the right compressor just to glue the mix together a bit. Or a flavor EQ (think a Pultec or Baxandall type filter).

And certainly -- You can still process a reverb buss... I do it all the time. EQ, compression (sometimes extreme - sometimes on the send, sometimes after the effect, sometimes both).

No particular rules on that stuff...

 

[ido1957]

I automated two vocal tracks (with parallel comp). Once they are automated, it's a pain to move the whole automation line up or down to find the right level. So I sent them to a bus and then I can adjust both combined tracks with the slide of a fader.

I use a reverb bus for guitars and another one for vocals.

I also always send all the drum tracks to a single bus so I can adjust the overall level in relation to the mix.

Convenience mainly...

 

[mjbphotos]

I automated two vocal tracks (with parallel comp). Once they are automated, it's a pain to move the whole automation line up or down to find the right level. So I sent them to a bus and then I can adjust both combined tracks with the slide of a fader.

I use a reverb bus for guitars and another one for vocals.

I also always send all the drum tracks to a single bus so I can adjust the overall level in relation to the mix.

Convenience mainly...

In Reaper, you have both Groups and Buses. So I set all my drum tracks in one Group, all my instruments in another Group, all my vocals in a 3rd Group. No need to 'send' the outputs of each track to a bus to adjust overall relationship volumes.
I then have an instrument + drum reverb bus, and a vocal reverb bus, but I don't send the group signals to them, I send the individual tracks, so I can adjust each accordingly, for example I may want lots of snare reverb, but no kick reverb - if I sent the group drum signal to the reverb (or just applied a reverb to the group) I wouldn't be able to adjust the individual track level sent to the reverb.

 

[gecko zzed]

In Reaper, you have both Groups and Buses. So I set all my drum tracks in one Group, all my instruments in another Group, all my vocals in a 3rd Group. No need to 'send' the outputs of each track to a bus to adjust overall relationship volumes.
I then have an instrument + drum reverb bus, and a vocal reverb bus, but I don't send the group signals to them, I send the individual tracks, so I can adjust each accordingly, for example I may want lots of snare reverb, but no kick reverb - if I sent the group drum signal to the reverb (or just applied a reverb to the group) I wouldn't be able to adjust the individual track level sent to the reverb.

I use the same process . . . lots of groups . . . and sometimes groups within groups. For example I will have group called vocals, and in that there will be a number of lead vocal tracks, then another group for backing vocals. Generally, I use a reverb bus for vocals at the top level.

For everything else except vocals I often have a group called 'band', and within that, groups for kit, guitars, and so on.

But like Mike B, I use different busses on elements of the kit for different reverb levels.

 

[Mr Clean]

The discovery of Buses and Sends was one of the best things I ever stumbled upon. I learned the hard way, using what little brain I have to think it could work. Little did I realise at the time that it's what everyone does!

 

[BroKen_H]

I hardly use aux sends anymore. I group vocals on one bus, guitars on another, bass tracks on a third, keys and pads on one or two, one for drums/percussion. Only reason I use aux sends is to, for example, apply a set reverb to all the instruments, but something different on the vocal.

Anyone ever use EQ on an aux? Something I've never seen a use for, but maybe there are real world applications I haven't considered...

 

[easlern]

I use busses for a practical reason: my DAW chokes when I have too many plugins active on individual tracks. Also like others said, if I have a doubled track it's a pain to keep the tracks identical by changing settings on each track's plugins.

I always pictured mastering as working with the final two-track mix though so mastering a bus is a new idea to me.

 

[ashcat_lt]

In Reaper, you have both Groups and Buses.

Well, no. (?)

In Reaper you have tracks.

Those tracks can be Folders which hold other tracks and can (usually do) also work as a group bus might. I think this is what you're calling a Group, but it's really just a track, and if somebody goes to search the user guide or the actions list for the word "group", this is not what they'll find.

Likewise, there's not really anything called a Bus in Reaper. Well, that MIDI bus thing, but I think that's poorly named. What you're calling a bus is just another track that you've got receiving audio from other tracks. There is nothing different about it just because you call it a bus, and you don't have to tell Reaper to create it as a bus. It's just a track like any other.

It is, in fact, completely possible to have a track with its own audio item set up as a folder ("group") with the audio from its children mixing into it and a bunch of receives from other tracks ("bus") mixing in there too. Then you could put some effects on that one track and they would process the whole mess. Don't know why you'd want to, but you could.

This might sound nitpicky, but I'm mentioning it for a couple of Reasons:

1) This is significantly different from most other DAWs out there. In fact, it's one of the selling points of Reaper. Last time I used Sonar or Cubase, if I wanted a bus that I could route other tracks to, I had to tell it to make a bus, which was different from a track in a number of ways. They both have folder systems, but IIRC correctly, they are just for organization and display and have nothing to do with audio routing or mixing.

B) This is the noob section, and I just know somebody's gonna open up Realer and start looking around for this Group you've mentioned, and they're not going to find it.

 

[joey2000]

Thanks for the clarifications/info.

Not getting what "master bus processing" is then. By definition, mastering is working with the entire group of songs (presumably for an album/CD) anyway. Or does that mean mastering some but not all songs vs all of them as one would normally do?

(PS pardon my pedantic side, but it's "bus," not "buss" )

 

[ashcat_lt]

Most people call the final stereo mix bus the master bus. Either way, there are good reasons to put processing on it which aren't exactly the same thing as mastering. Some folks (I) feel like there should be very little for the mastering engineer to do by the time we call a mix done.

 

[Tadpui]

Not getting what "master bus processing" is then. By definition, mastering is working with the entire group of songs (presumably for an album/CD) anyway. Or does that mean mastering some but not all songs vs all of them as one would normally do?

The master bus is a stereo track that contains the total summation of all of your individual tracks in a single project. It's basically the main stereo output of your project. So if you apply any FX to the master bus, it is being applied to the summed signal of all of your project's tracks. When you render a project, usually you render into a single stereo file (WAV or MP3 or whatever). What you end up with is essentially identical to your master bus in your project. It's just a summed total of everything that was fed into it.

The process of mastering is a different matter. I think that your impression of mastering is pretty accurate, but I think that you're getting the term "master bus" mixed up with the concept of "mastering". The master bus is just a thing, the top-level stereo track of a project. Mastering is a process, whose aim is to unify songs to make them belong together on a single album.