dualflip
Audio Engineer
Ok so i remember seeing the other day a post that said that the most difficult part about mixing is setting the levels right, but i couldnt find it so i thought of starting this new one. Ok so i wanted to share something regarding volume levels
I was working on an album the other day, its mainly vocals and piano. So what i want to share is that mixing levels are not always dependent on the fader (and by that i mean volume fader of each channel) in the case of the album im mixing i encountered the problem that the piano sounded more up front than the voice, if i lowered the volume on piano too much it would go off, so how to keep a good volume on the piano without stepping over the voice?
Well heres the tip and actually its an old tip, reverb automation, or to explain a little better: reverb send automation. By adding a couple of db's in the reverb send on the piano while the voice is singing, the piano goes "back" into the mix without changing his volume, its actually more a psychoacoustic effect. So when the voice stops singing and i want to bring the piano forward (like in a solo for example) ill just lower the reverb send and the piano automatically moves forward. Some volume adjustments will enhance the effect.
So my point is this: when approaching level adjustments you have to consider all the aspects of a mix, and not only volume, "virtual depth" as i like to call it, its not only achieved by moving the volume fader up and down.
For example if you think of a small stage with musicians on it (lets consider an acoustic ensemble to eliminate the PA aspect) youll see that some of them are further and others are closer to you, so yes, the one more in front of you will not only sound louder but also the direct to reverberant field will be higher, meaning youll hear more of the direct sound and less difuse sound, this ratio changes when you hear the musician placed at the back of the stage, this gives your brain more hints about the placement of the instruments.
The same applies when you are mixing, more reverb and less direct sound translates into "further away", more direct and less reverb translates into "closer". Now im not mentioning here other important aspects which are compresion, stereo image and frequency or timbre.
Compression will also affect where the instruments appear to be, but since im not using any compression in the album i just did i didnt metioned it, athough its a very important factor.
Stereo image also affects the apparent level, more "opened" or "stereo" instruments will jump out more than mono instruments, so that also needs to be considered, in which case you may also try narrowing or expanding the stereo image of an instrument in order to give it more/less precence.
Frequency or timbre may be the most important aspect, a chainsaw will definitely sound louder than a harp even if the chainsaw is much much lower in volume than the harp. So brightening or darkening instruments, making the more edgy or smooth, masking or unmasking etc.. is a nice tool to position instruments in a mix, just by using eq, we can make things smaller to give more space to other instruments, or bigger when we need to fill up holes in the spectrum.
Phase and all other effects, like choruses, etc, also affect the mix levels, so in conclusion ill say that volume levels are in fact one of the most difficult aspects of a mix, because its one of the stages where all of the other processes combine and affect each other in order to create a clear, defined, and solid representation of the instruments.
Sorry for the big tamale
Cheers!!!
I was working on an album the other day, its mainly vocals and piano. So what i want to share is that mixing levels are not always dependent on the fader (and by that i mean volume fader of each channel) in the case of the album im mixing i encountered the problem that the piano sounded more up front than the voice, if i lowered the volume on piano too much it would go off, so how to keep a good volume on the piano without stepping over the voice?
Well heres the tip and actually its an old tip, reverb automation, or to explain a little better: reverb send automation. By adding a couple of db's in the reverb send on the piano while the voice is singing, the piano goes "back" into the mix without changing his volume, its actually more a psychoacoustic effect. So when the voice stops singing and i want to bring the piano forward (like in a solo for example) ill just lower the reverb send and the piano automatically moves forward. Some volume adjustments will enhance the effect.
So my point is this: when approaching level adjustments you have to consider all the aspects of a mix, and not only volume, "virtual depth" as i like to call it, its not only achieved by moving the volume fader up and down.
For example if you think of a small stage with musicians on it (lets consider an acoustic ensemble to eliminate the PA aspect) youll see that some of them are further and others are closer to you, so yes, the one more in front of you will not only sound louder but also the direct to reverberant field will be higher, meaning youll hear more of the direct sound and less difuse sound, this ratio changes when you hear the musician placed at the back of the stage, this gives your brain more hints about the placement of the instruments.
The same applies when you are mixing, more reverb and less direct sound translates into "further away", more direct and less reverb translates into "closer". Now im not mentioning here other important aspects which are compresion, stereo image and frequency or timbre.
Compression will also affect where the instruments appear to be, but since im not using any compression in the album i just did i didnt metioned it, athough its a very important factor.
Stereo image also affects the apparent level, more "opened" or "stereo" instruments will jump out more than mono instruments, so that also needs to be considered, in which case you may also try narrowing or expanding the stereo image of an instrument in order to give it more/less precence.
Frequency or timbre may be the most important aspect, a chainsaw will definitely sound louder than a harp even if the chainsaw is much much lower in volume than the harp. So brightening or darkening instruments, making the more edgy or smooth, masking or unmasking etc.. is a nice tool to position instruments in a mix, just by using eq, we can make things smaller to give more space to other instruments, or bigger when we need to fill up holes in the spectrum.
Phase and all other effects, like choruses, etc, also affect the mix levels, so in conclusion ill say that volume levels are in fact one of the most difficult aspects of a mix, because its one of the stages where all of the other processes combine and affect each other in order to create a clear, defined, and solid representation of the instruments.
Sorry for the big tamale
Cheers!!!