mixing is really a daunting task to me

[wes480]

despite my "force of nature" status, I am a complete newbie..don't be fooled.

I was starting some tracking today for round 2 of my recording project...gonna try to do things a little cleaner this time around...

I got a pretty decent drum sound out of the mics, made sure that none of the tracks clipped while recording. So, the tracks are in good shape.

Well, I go to play back in cooledit...and, the master mix is clipping all over the place...when all 4 tracks are playing at the same time.

I know this is normal...and that I have to adjust it all etc...but, what do I really want to do here? Seems like if I just go in and start turning down tracks by little bits everywhere...it is going to a.) sound bad, b.) take YEARS.

I would like for the tracks to stay at a consistent volume...at the same time, I think I don't want to have to turn them down a lot becuase that will make my overall sound weaker, and all of the DSP involved.

I'm sure this will be even worse once I get some bass and guitars and vocals in the mix.....and then when I add some overdubs later...it'll be a constant clipping mess!

I am really put out by this - is there something I am missing here? Whats the best way to combat this, both pre tape, and post?

-Wes

 

[chessrock]

Man, that sucks.

I'd recommend a visit to the Cool Edit Forum. Those guys are really a bunch of troopers over there. Gobs more patience than I have.

 

[wes480]

chess - you don't experience the same thing with the software you use?

 

[JMarcomb]

wes .. I get that all the time... when I transfer full mixes from Cakewalk back into sound forge my levels are out of control. Im just setting up a whole new computer because Ive been having so many problems with my Via chipset.

 

[chessrock]

I guess I don't really understand your problem.

Are you saying your individual tracks aren't clipping, but the overall mix is? That's normal, as the volume on each of the tracks is summing up. And as far as taking forever to turn down all the individual tracks ? ? Maybe a couple seconds per track. It's a small pain in the ass, yes.

What I really don't understand is what you mean by having it sound bad by turning down the volume and the DSP issues. I'm really confused by that. Turning down mixer volume won't make it sound worse. Just quieter.

My guess is I'm probably totally misunderstanding your problem, so I apologize. I can tell you that CEP pretty much sucks. I've had it for some time now, and it's about the quarkiest thing I've ever worked with. I would get Vegas if I had to do it over again, but for now, I figure I can make do.

 

[JuSumPilgrim]

My guess is I'm probably totally misunderstanding your problem, so I apologize. I can tell you that CEP pretty much sucks. I've had it for some time now, and it's about the quarkiest thing I've ever worked with. I would get Vegas if I had to do it over again, but for now, I figure I can make do.

What exactly is quirky about CEP? Its the most stable program Ive worked with and Ive been through most of em. I think CEP beats vegas in terms of quality of effect algorythms, layout, filters, CPU hogging, etc.

 

[ausrock]

Chess,

What is Vegas............Yeah, OK, so I'm not conversant with all the software out there..........lol.

Actually, one of you guys may be able to advise me...........I'm recording through analogue to a dedicated h/disk recorder, but am now at the stage where I am going to have to connect my PC up to the system to be able to run a final stereo mix to the PC for cd burning.
My question is..........how much does my soundcard come into play doing this and what is a good basic software to handle this stereo mix? CoolEdit, Wavelab, .....Vegas maybe?????

Sorry, if it's slightly off topic.

 

[chessrock]

Hey Aus,

For what you're doing, it looks like all you would need is a pretty minimalist program. I'd just get n-tracks for $60. That program is pretty good even for a non-minimalist.

www.fasoft.com

Vegas is Sonic Foundry's multitrack recording program . . . does the standard multitrack recording and mixing chores you normally would get with others like Sonar, Cool Edit, N-tracks and others.

As far as where the sound card comes in to play, you will want something with good analog-to-digital conversion. You can do this by getting a decent sound card (pretty much anything by m-audio, echo, others).

Or you could get a card that has digital inputs that will allow you to use an external a/d converter. Those can get expensive, and I'm not sure just how much they are worth it for the money, so do your research there.

Again, it looks like the minimalist approach will suit you best, since it appears you are only recording two tracks (stereo L/R) at a time, so something simple like an audiophile (m-audio) will probably do the trick.

 

[chessrock]

Jusum,

About CEP sucking. . . . What I mean is that it isn't very intuitive or user-friendly to someone just starting out with it. Yea, the 32-bit processing and dither algs are good . . . and I like the fact that when the program crashes, it at least saves what you were last working on.

But at at least for me, it doesn't drive or handle very well when compared to anything Sonic Foundry-based. For example:

* Why is it that two people here so far appear to not know where the main mixer volume control is? I spent what seemed like hours trying to find it.

* I can understand and appreciate the +/- controls on the bottom right, but what's with the other zoom features? Why so many, and why is it so un-intuitive? I'm getting the hang of it now after like 6 months using it. But I miss Sonic Foundry's idiot-proof highlight and zoom . . . especially the use of the ARROW keys. Ingenious.

* Why can't I just do a normal, destructive punch in/out without CEP wanting to save EVERY take? I appreciate the thought, but if I'm doing a punch-in, or a re-take of a punch, I'm doing it because I didn't like the previous one. Why do I want to save all my mistakes?

And why does the merge/join/splice feature just work "most" of the time? I understand why CEP is doing it, but to me, it's overkill and only further adds to the confusion of things (Which take did I want to save? Was it take one or take 8? I just want to save my last one).

* What happened to the "bypass" function, or the "create undo" checkbox when I use plugins in CEP?

* Why is it that when I mix something down and forget to "insert in multitrack," I will lose it if I go to multitrack view. Okay, so I know I didn't really lose it per se, but why can't I just go to "window" at the top toolbar and go back to it . . . like any other NORMAL windows-based program?

* Why is it that when I save a mixdown, I have so many different 32-bit and 24-bit formats to choose from ? ?

It's kind of like the entire dedicated wall of fabric-softener brands they have at the grocery store.

Sorry for sounding like Andy Rooney here, but why is it so important? And wouldn't it be nice to have a 16-bit option (with dither) thrown in there . . . just for good measure? I appreciate the options, but I'm a musician/engineer . . . spare me the geek stuff!

These are all just little gripes that I am slowly but surely learning to work with and master. And believe me, the list most certainly does go on . . . My main beef is that when working with Sound Forge, everything just came to me very easily. I never had to pull out any instructions or use the Help function. Ditto for the demo version of Vegas I played with for a while. It was all just very simple and easy to figure out . . . just like Acid, Video factory, and any other Sonic Foundry program.

There. I feel better now.

 

[wes480]

It always seems to me in CEP that things take longer than they should...I think I have a decent system...

AthlonXP 1600+,256mb RAM, ATA100 HD..etc..

and say I record 3 tracks...3 minutes long, takes it a while to "draw" the tracks on there at the end and be useable again. We are talking amaybe 5 seconds...maybe I am just overestimating where current DAWs are for PC? heh

What I meant about the DSP stuff..long story really, and...something that I shouldn't even worry about. But, some of the more advanced members say that "cheap DSP" on any of our PCs etc. is going to hurt the sound quality. And that is why you should get a Soundcraft Ghost, or Protools or whatever, for professional projects. But, in the spirit of learning...lowering volume here I come.

 

[Steve351]

i know what your saying with quality....

dont worry contrary to other people in here i know what you mean about sound quality...everything has a sound level at which is has best projection and sound quality...although are you really sacrificing sound quality if its clipping before you lower it? i suggest lowering the main mix untill it doesnt clip and leaving individual track recording levels the same...and dont let the newbie thing fool you ive been recording for quite a while now although i dont know how to do the simple things, thats my problem i have a studio in my room that i took over when my brother moved out our band records our cd's there the problem is we dont have a simple rig where we can just record our practices hehe....we are currently just trying to hook up a normal tape recorder so we can record our practices but the problem is we have to patch the vocals PA with the guitar PA somehow into 1 tape deck i guess i could record then just dub it later or maybe i could hook it up to an EQ both of them i could hook up the tape decks to an EQ then the EQ to a tape deck....hmmmm oh well ill figure it out
later
also for contact information on The Last Minute e-mail us @ TheLastMinute@itookmyprozac.com (sorry about the quality of the picture had to drop it to make it under the max file size)

 

[JuSumPilgrim]

Jusum,

About CEP sucking. . . . What I mean is that it isn't very intuitive or user-friendly to someone just starting out with it. Yea, the 32-bit processing and dither algs are good . . . and I like the fact that when the program crashes, it at least saves what you were last working on.

But at at least for me, it doesn't drive or handle very well when compared to anything Sonic Foundry-based. For example:

Its 32 bit float, not straight 32 bit, which CEP was doing when other programs were still doing fixed 24 bit processing. As I understand it, float processing has less errors and does DSP better.

* I can understand and appreciate the +/- controls on the bottom right, but what's with the other zoom features? Why so many, and why is it so un-intuitive? I'm getting the hang of it now after like 6 months using it. But I miss Sonic Foundry's idiot-proof highlight and zoom . . . especially the use of the ARROW keys. Ingenious.

I guess its subjective. I had no trouble and have found CEP to be the most intuitive program out there, period. I started with Cool Edit 96 4 years ago and was up and running in a couple of months. The brilliance of its design and why its still usable after youve mastered every inch of it is precisely bec every feature has a range of options. The zoom features are indispensable for lining things up, magnifying in case you want to manually cut without using zero crossings.

* Why can't I just do a normal, destructive punch in/out without CEP wanting to save EVERY take? I appreciate the thought, but if I'm doing a punch-in, or a re-take of a punch, I'm doing it because I didn't like the previous one. Why do I want to save all my mistakes?

You can set it so that once you merge all the other takes are gone. I never had a problem with this. The destroy wave vs remove wave option makes alot of sense so you can sort through tracks later on and choose one you thought wouldnt cut it or that has parts of it that are salvagable.

* What happened to the "bypass" function, or the "create undo" checkbox when I use plugins in CEP?

I dont know.

* Why is it that when I mix something down and forget to "insert in multitrack," I will lose it if I go to multitrack view. Okay, so I know I didn't really lose it per se, but why can't I just go to "window" at the top toolbar and go back to it . . . like any other NORMAL windows-based program?

I think they fixed that in 2.0. Whatever wave was used last in edit view is still there as long as you didnt click on any wave in your multitrack.

* Why is it that when I save a mixdown, I have so many different 32-bit and 24-bit formats to choose from ? ?

When I first started using waves plugs a few years ago, the tracks I did any processing with waves would get corrupted after saving. I tried saving in a dif file format and the problem was gone. I had been saving everything to the default type 1 which was incompatible with waves. Switching to type 3 "normalized float" solved the problem.

It's kind of like the entire dedicated wall of fabric-softener brands they have at the grocery store.

Sorry for sounding like Andy Rooney here, but why is it so important? And wouldn't it be nice to have a 16-bit option (with dither) thrown in there . . . just for good measure? I appreciate the options, but I'm a musician/engineer . . . spare me the geek stuff!

It is a grocery store and thats what makes it so great. Go to a grocery store in zanzabar and we'll see how long you like having one options for toilet paper...some kind of rolled leaf.
There is a 16 bit dither option, thats one of the coolest things about CEP. When you convert from 32 bit to 16 bit you have over a dozen dif noise shaping options and you can set the dither from 0 to 1. (I started with low dithers like .3-.4 but CEP generally does better with higher dither rates like .7- .9) Also triangular p.d.f. (probability distribution function) is recommended by CEP bec of its minimal 4.8dB SNR loss and negligible noise modulation.

These are all just little gripes that I am slowly but surely learning to work with and master. And believe me, the list most certainly does go on . . . My main beef is that when working with Sound Forge, everything just came to me very easily. I never had to pull out any instructions or use the Help function. Ditto for the demo version of Vegas I played with for a while. It was all just very simple and easy to figure out . . . just like Acid, Video factory, and any other Sonic Foundry program.

There. I feel better now.

To each their own. I treasure the options I have in CEP especially with such an intuitive layout. I dont think the algs in sound forge are as good as CEPs for most things. Although theyre not bad. The delays, reverbs and chorus are much better in CEP (i.e. dont have that classic robotic DSP sound to them) and all are characterized by more parameters so that you have a better chance of coming up with a usable sound (although I havent really found a *great* DSP chorus yet). Compression is better in sound forge. EQ is better in CEP although waves is better than CEP there. All around I dont think sonic foundry stuff compares to CEP in quality or quantity (in terms of parameters). But one mans options is another mans confusion. Sound forge does cost more though.

 

[JuSumPilgrim]

It always seems to me in CEP that things take longer than they should...I think I have a decent system...

AthlonXP 1600+,256mb RAM, ATA100 HD..etc..

and say I record 3 tracks...3 minutes long, takes it a while to "draw" the tracks on there at the end and be useable again. We are talking amaybe 5 seconds...maybe I am just overestimating where current DAWs are for PC? heh

What I meant about the DSP stuff..long story really, and...something that I shouldn't even worry about. But, some of the more advanced members say that "cheap DSP" on any of our PCs etc. is going to hurt the sound quality. And that is why you should get a Soundcraft Ghost, or Protools or whatever, for professional projects. But, in the spirit of learning...lowering volume here I come.

The whole DSP is bad thing is overdone. When you overdo the DSP and convert down to 16 bit with low quality software and then burn to CD with shitty D/A converters, it will sound bad. If youre not dithering, it will sound bad. There are definite steps that need to be taken that you learn over time -about how to make DSP sound good. Also CEP does background mixing so that the summing of tracks, volume changes, effects, etc. all happen accurately. That takes a few seconds sometimes. You can work during this time and it shouldnt hinder anything.

 

[chessrock]

Announcement: This is now the new location for the Cool Edit Forum . . .

Hey Jusum,

You mentioned there's a setting that will let me merge all the takes . . . what is that? I've noticed if I highlight and right click on some of the wave blocks, the drop-down menu will give me the merge/join/splice option. Sometimes this works for me and other times it doesn't. Very odd. Anyway, how do you go about joining a group of "blocks" together -- either the ones you're just moving around, or the various punchins/outs on a given track?

Thanks!

By the way, I don't think I've ever used any of CEP's effects, other than amplitude. I guess I'm spoiled by Waves and Sonic Timeworks. I agree with you on the chorus/flange. I still have yet to hear a plug that gets it right. Although I do like to slap a little Wave's flange/chorus on guitar from time to time.

 

[elevate]

I started with Cool Edit 96 4 years ago and was up and running in a couple of months.

It took you a couple months to get going with CE? I was doing all kinds of stuff in Vegas in a matter of hours. Maybe I'm not understanding right what you were saying.

 

[Fangar]

despite my "force of nature" status, I am a complete newbie..don't be fooled.

-Wes

Ok. We will need to get that changed to "FARCE of NATURE".

Fangar

 

[chessrock]

It took you a couple months to get going with CE? I was doing all kinds of stuff in Vegas in a matter of hours. Maybe I'm not understanding right what you were saying.

Yea, same here. He kind of proved my point. Jusum, I'm only messin' with ya. I can picture you as a kid in a candy store with all those noise-shaping algs to choose from. I just can't deal with it all. Give me whatever toilet paper happens to fall off the shelf!

 

[JuSumPilgrim]

It took you a couple months to get going with CE? I was doing all kinds of stuff in Vegas in a matter of hours. Maybe I'm not understanding right what you were saying.

I was also learning the fundamentals of recording at that time. Things like EQ, compression...the dif bet 10:1 vs. 2:1 ratio, etc. CEP is laid out so if you are at all experienced you can be up and running in minutes, not hours.

I should get some kind of commission from syntrillium.

 

[JuSumPilgrim]

Yea, same here. He kind of proved my point. Jusum, I'm only messin' with ya. I can picture you as a kid in a candy store with all those noise-shaping algs to choose from. I just can't deal with it all. Give me whatever toilet paper happens to fall off the shelf!

I dont use CEPs effects as much as waves either. Waves is heads and shoulders above everything in terms of comps and EQs. Waves is generally the first thing I reach for. I think when it comes to effects like flange and phase and chorus its not as clear. CEPs chorus is not amazing and it can screw up a track and kill the transients if you go beyond 15% wet or 3-4 voices but used with taste its good. I havent heard a better one. Not waves, not sound forge, not cakewalk, not logic, not cubase. Everything Ive heard sounds digital and robotic.
I do end up using CEPs reverbs alot bec I know them very well and they do better midrange verbs than waves. Stereo reverbs in CEP are untouchable in my opinion. I seem to be alone on that though. I dont see anybody else touting CEPs reverbs and it could be that its just a matter of knowing the sweet spots.

Chess, there shouldnt be any issue with undoing a plug transform. In "settings" under the option menu in the "system" tab--the last option on that tab is enable undo. Check that box.

Also in "settings" in the multitrack tab towards the bottom on the left side there is an option to "delete old takes after merging." Check that.

Also the blocks are not mergeable. You can outline them and mix them down to either mono or stereo waves. Merging is only for punch ins. If you want to extend a track or if the punch in goes beyond the wave, just outline the start of the punch in to end of the track and the wav will continue beyond what you outlined. Heres the quirky part: You have to merge in order of events. That means the punched in part of the wave FIRST and the extended part SECOND otherwise it wont show up in the multitrack. Why? I dont know...possibly bec syntrillium was giving free bong hits in the caf that day. But if you do it in the wrong order you can reinsert the entire track and youll have everything from the start to the end of the wave.

Its funny how you pick on the one or two slightly screwy things. Everything else is as intuitive as ...... toilet paper (your analogy). Which is pretty intuitive.

 

[chessrock]

You have to merge in order of events. That means the punched in part of the wave FIRST and the extended part SECOND otherwise it wont show up in the multitrack. Why? I dont know...possibly bec syntrillium was giving free bong hits in the caf that day.

Somehow, that wouldn't surprize me in the least. Thanks for mentioning that. You just saved me hours of future frustration on the punch-in merges.