What do you always do when recording?

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musicsdarkangel

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when you record/mix, what effects do you very often use on what instruments/vocals?? Do you quantisize....just tell me if you can, what do you do a lot when you mix and record... (must do's, just make better, eq, compression, whatever).
 
Well, to start with I never use EQ when recording. It just makes things worse in the end. I try to get the sound I'm looking for with mic choice / placement. Also minimal compression. Prehaps a bit on drums or bass. Deffinately NO effects while tracking. There's nothing worse than realizing that you've recorded a great performance only to find that it's not usable due to too much reverb or the compressor was mis-adjusted or something like that.:D
 
an only exception to effects when tracking would be on my lead guitars....Usually I don't regret the effects at a latter date, and it helps to know the *final sound*.

when mixing, I usually like to set up several reverbs (which the parameters are always subject to change), but I like a good non-noticeable room sound, and a nice airy longer decay sound for the other. I do this fairly soon, as it helps to get a rough idea with the reverbs quick. As a minimum, I'll set up two to start. Personally, I like artificial reverbs....a newbie trait I have had for 25 years+..I suppose. But even if the final verbs settings aren't the ones I use in the final mix, it helps to "breathe" a little life into the mix at an early stage for me....especially the vocals. (now I use them sparingly now!!!)

I genererally skip EQ's completely in tracking...a usually very minimal in mixing too...just comes out that way. I find when I start doing extemem EQ stuff, I regret it later (like it sounds freaky on other systems...no matter how much I compare it on MY different playback systems).

I quantize...only in sequencers (that's the only place..right?), and usually go the next value past what most of my note lengths are in my sequencer. Like if most notes are an 1/8th note...I quantize to a 1/16th.

did you mean normalize?? yeah..usually on the final mix before any other processing...but not on individual tracks
 
when tracking, i dont touch the eq unless it's definitely something thats not going to cause a problem.
if im recording to 24 track analog, i sometimes run a few compressors on the drums, but i dont compress much at all, just to keep levels in a good region.

when mixing, the first thing I do is pull every patch lead out of all the patch bays, and start from scratch. make sure before you start the track, all your eq's and aux sends are all reset.

quantizing. i dont like to quantize cus you kinda loose the feel of it. if it's drum tracks, then yeah, ill quantize, but piano stuff, hmm, i dont always like to.

i start with thekit and work my way up on the mix. get the compressors going, select which compressors i wanna use. ive just added 8 Triple C's to Studio A's rack list, so that's gonna replace all previous compressors we used to use on drums. the triple c is awesome! it's like loads of different compressors in one!

never say to yourself "im going to use this reverb on a vocal". if im mixing for a commercial track, ill spend long time going through reverbs looking for the right vocal one, usually comes off a Lexicon 480 or a PCM 80.

erm, what else, dont reach for that LF EQ knob unless you're sure that the bass drum really needs more bass. your monitors can be lying to you!

umm, a good thing to remember if you already dont do this, try and grab at least two takes of backing vocals. gives you options to play around with stereo effects. and even if you've got the best vocal comp, just record a whole take of the singer singing it through. if at mixdown, there's abit of vocal which isn't working, you've got parts to replace it with.
 
I use those things that define the absolute minimal sound I am looking for in an instrument (such as guitar distortion) plus only a dash of reverb.. I may use eq.. but only sparingly.. (We are talking stand-alone eq and not the mixer's eq, right? Because I do use the mixer eq to establish the gain) The one effect that I will always use between the instrument and the recorder is a noise gate-unless I want hisses and bumps before and after my songs, of which I haven't yet desired..

I also turn all my controls down and start from scratch when mixing.. I don't have studio monitors (I'm still trying to pay off all my other gear) so I have to contend with Cerwin Vega stereo speakers, tilted on their side, and I keep both the bass and treble nobs on the receiver all the way up to keep me from overcompensating on either end...
 
first off, you dont need to use a stand alone unit, although it does provide greater accuracy as most of them are more than 4 band.

as for noise reduction, whats causing the noise? are you playing your electric guitar close to your computer monitor, or some tv? to be honest, noise surpression is not always great cus a lot of them can make the signal sound, erm, crap. use gates. gates will quickly, or slowly mute the audio signal at a certain "noise" level. the only good noise reduction costs a lot of money:-) if you use it on electric guitar, it has be wierd on sustained notes. try gates, behringer do a rack unit of 4 (?) gates.
 
so...

how do i put the gate on as an effect on the computer so that i can take it off and it will be gated?? cause i always have to keep the effect on, which causes screwed up lag. And one more thing, does anyone here know how to put an effect only on a certain part of a song in cubase5?
 
well,gates shouldn't really take up too much processor power, but you're saying when you turn the gate on, it's messing up other stuff?

solo the track you want to gate. turn off any input busses you have activated. turn the gate on and set it how you wish.

now, connect the soundcard outs to the soundcard ins and turn off any monitoring that you have.if you haven't got anything like this, before you conncet the out to the in, double click the speaker icon in the system tray and mute the live input.

create a track (CTRL+T). now, make sure that track is highlighted, the solo light is on, and the track that you are gating has NO dot in the solo indicator.

hit play and hit record. you should see cubase recording the gated track onto a new track. once's it's done, you get remove the normal track from cubase, and you will then have a gated track, without having to put on a plug in. what card have you got. if you've got multiple outs, you can run a gate with cubase, externally.

as for turning effects on and off. it's part of Cubase's automation. dirext X effects are not compatibale with VST automation as far as I know, but the VST plugins are. open up the mixer panel, click WRITE automation, and a new track will appear in the arrange window. locate the point of the song where you wanna turn the effect on and off. hit play, turn the effect on and off. rewind, take off the WRITE automation and click READ. it should turn the effect on and off. you can also automate what you do with the plugin (balance, speed, etc), only if it's a VST plugin though.

-Romesh
Long Wave Studio
 
2 things..

well, i have a project card from the project pack, its 20 bit. its sorta crummy. but, uh, how do I connect soundcard outs to ins?? i don't quite understand. And err, turning off monitoring as in the stuff that plays the music, right?
 
you just need to connect a lead from the OUT port to the IN port.
 
I always lay the drums down first. If it is a solo guitar/voice thing I always lay the first tracks down with a metronome or a click track.
 
The American approach is typically *not* to commit yourself to any effects while tracking, but apparently Brits are willing to use effects more at the recording phase. I cautiously lean toward the British approach. I've learned, for example, that miking my acoustic guitar the way I do, I'm always gonna hafta cut the lower frequencies at some point, and so these days I'm doing it at the front end and saving myself the trouble of doing it in the mix. I use the bass cut function on the mic, and also on the channel strip. I've started cautiously boosting a bit of mid and top range on guitar and vocals too, with usable results. My feeling is: if you're not taking great big chances, why not get it the way you want it when tracking?
 
the thing is, once the other instruments are sat in the mix, you might need to change a few things such as effects to make instruments more prominent or whatever. but if yuo've recorded them, there's no way out. in the pro world, you really have to record most things with no effects cus bands are so demanding at mixdown if its for a single or something.

even the distortion of guitars, i record their amps, and i record the DI's, so we can around later aswell.
 
Dobro's quite right -- there IS a basic difference in recording "ideology" amongst British and American professional studios.

Brits ARE more willing to play with effects and commit them to tape, while American engineers traditionally prefer the control factor and handle this at mixdown.

This is described on page 1 of Bobby Owsinski's "Mixing Engineer's Handbook".

Bruce
 
yeah i have noticed that just by reading stuff here. youguys do a lot of thigns different to us in the uk.

but not all brit studios are prepared to commit to effects on tape.

a majority though.
 
glad i caught you bruce...


y'know there was that whole 3630 debate a while ago. i told you id produced a single at a studio using 3630's?

there are some sound clips on the net if you wanna hear that you can get an allright sound out of them if you use them properly!










there's 3630's all over the kit, bass and rhythm tracks.

the only problem is that, i didin't create the mp3s and some one has encoded them in low auality so bear that in mind.
 
Hi ya Romesh...

A debate over the 3630? really?? I can't imagine why... it's GREAT comp!!! ;)

Actually, it'll take a while to download, so I'll type while I'm waiting.......

I used a 3630 - yes, it can be made to work... BUT - there are some serious issues... my personal beefs about the unit (based on my experiences) are:

1) non-transparent processing - with the unit in the signal chain, it adds significant coloration. If you are looking for this "color", then it's fine, but in my case I wasn't...

2) artifacts - when the comp is engaged, there was always a small fuzziness or slight pops and crackles that occurred during processing

3) circuit chaos - it wasn't noticeable at the -10 gain stage, but when I migrated it into Blue Bear Sound, at +4 - it didn't take much to overload the input stage and send the circuits to howling....

I thought it might be a defective unit, but I borrowed one brand new from my local store for comparison and it was the same..........

So, I agree, it CAN be made to work - I just found it ridiculously hard to make it useful....
The RNC on the other hand is a pro unit all the way.... if you've never tried one, it really would be worth your while to get them to ship you one or two... you'll be amazed at how good these things are. I don't think there's ANY other piece of gear out there that gives you as much bang for the buck.

Hmmm... downloading at 10% - it's going to be a while... :)

Cheers,
Bruce
 
i agree about the colour, it's not as transparent as the other compressors i have. by the way, i dont use 3630's, i just wanna clarify the fact that you can get a good sound from them. ive never experienced pops and crackles or anythign like it.

are you a rep for RNC or something?!
hehe.

let me nkow when you've listen to the tracks.
 
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