MIX CHALLENGE - MC099 August 2024 - Winners announced

[kombainera]

So my issue is solved thanks to @Mister Fox for the time. The problem was that for some reason when i exporded the file it was on monomixdown not stereo after i reexport it all stast are the same in cubase in reaper and in standalone mode. It was stupid human mistake and one more leason that i must check everything 2x and 3x times.

[Edling]

So here's my take on the song. I liked the lo-fi feeling of the drums in the original version so I wanted to stay somewhat true to that in my mix as well. Here's a summary of what I did:

Template setup
I use the UAD Api Vision channel on almost all tracks as this is my fav channel strip both in terms of saturation and EQ. For all groups (drums, bass, git, vox, etc) and master out I use the Britson Buss console emulation as it gives a subtle color.

Send effects
I used two different reverbs on the track, one mid-size spring reverb for body and a longer plate for some tail. I also used a delay, and to spice it up I ended up picking a more modern stereo delay with reverse effect called "Spaced out".

Drums
I ran the drumbus through an 1176 to get that compressed feel and then through a tape emulation plug for saturation and for shaving of the hi-ends as I wanted a more lo-fi feel to it.

Bass
As I wanted a little more bass out of the track I ran the signal through an Ampeg sim and then through an 1176 compressor for some control. I sent the bass to the reverbs during the first part of the song as I really liked that idea from the original mix.

Guitar
Used an LA-2A as I like it on acoustic guitars.

Marimba, Piano, Trumpets
Nothing special, boosted mid and hi frequencies to get some clarity. Added delay to the piano as I wanted some more sustained pad like sound. Ran the trumpets through a somewhat overdriven tape-sim to get a more "Motown" sound to them.

Vox
Used a de-esser in front and then an 1176 for compression. Again ran the vocals through a tape sim to add some saturation and body. I then routed the vocals to a complimentary channel which I distorted heavily and blended with the original vocal track to make it a bit more edgy.

Mixbus
I always have an API 2500 with the input barely touching the needles as it gives it just a bit of glue and tcoloration that I like. I had to boost the output a bit as I normally mix well below -1db but I wanted to get somewhat up to the specified levels Other than that I normally try not to pollute my mixbus too much and leave it up to the mastering engineer.

https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/ngedr8a9 ... d2lto&dl=0

[juhu]

Hello,

1) Enjoy my mixdown of "Falling" by LosTimpanis:
http://tinkerstate.com/mix-challenge/MC ... __juhu.wav

2) Documentation below (click on "Show" to expand):

► Show Spoiler

Highlights from this session:

• Automation on the Vocals “telephone effect” EQ on/off toggle during Choruses plus a few other places
• Automation on the Vocals to Tape Delay Bus Send on/off toggle during Choruses
• Automation on the Master bus to boost the entire mix post-everything by +1.0dB during Choruses
• I think the 3 automation lanes mentioned above are what elevate the mix from coming across as a sequence of sections that had been somewhat artificially chained next to one another, into something that now feels like an actual song with a coherent story to tell, plus some ear candy to boot!
• Mixed in Logic Pro
• API Vision Channel Strip plugin on all tracks, making heavy use of its built-in Gain, Filters, EQ, Comp and even Gate sections (more detail about Gate usage down the line)
• ATR-102 Master Tape plugin on Master bus, GP9 tape formula, Auto-Calibration enabled
• SSL Bus Compressor plugin on Drums bus, Master bus and Parallel Compression buses (more detail on parallel later)
• Ended up compressing the Vocals track by 4 different flavours of Compressor plugins in series, and while I fully understand that having so many different compression stages may come across as overkill or amateur hour, nevertheless, this is what enabled me to get the dynamics under control while improving the sound, so I just went with what worked on the material
• Bitcrusher plugin feeding into “telephone effect” EQ plugin on the Piano
• Stereo Spread plugin on the Acoustic Guitar in order to add width to it
• Bass track is compressed by Channel Strip Comp first, followed by 1176 Rev E plugin
• Shaker tracks grouped as a summing Bus
• Marimba tracks grouped as a summing Bus
• Drum tracks grouped as a summing Bus
• Snare Top & Snare Bottom tracks grouped as a summing sub-Bus within the Drums Bus
• Tape Delay Bus used as sends from Acoustic Guitar as well as Vocals (as mentioned above, the send on/off toggle from Vocals is automated)
• 5 separate Parallel Compression Buses used as sends across certain parts / groups
• Similarly, 5 separate Room+Chamber Reverb Buses used as sends across certain parts / groups
• each Parallel Compression Bus also sends a bit to its corresponding Reverb Bus
• The 5 Comp/Reverb Buses mentioned above are dedicated across parts / groups as follows: 1) Bass, 2) Acoustic Guitar, 3) Piano, 4) Vocals, 5) everything else, with identical Room and Chamber settings on all (the only exception being Predelay parameter which is slightly longer on Vocals, to help it sit ever so slightly in front)
• The reason for having such a complicated Bus setup was to be able to Gate the Room Reverb tail for some parts using that part itself as a side-chain trigger signal, in order to support the Channel Strip rhythmic gating effects so they don’t get “washed out” by long reverb tails
• Naturally ran out of CPU power with my 5+5 Buses and had to Bounce-in-Place some of the Buses in order to continue working

That concludes my highlights from this mixing session.

[mixmaster.one]

My submission for MIX CHALLENGE - MC099 August 2024
https://drive.google.com/file/d/11kPaKw ... sp=sharing


Documentation: [TRACK: Plugins (Sends)]

KICK: Pro-Q3, StandardCLIP (Lexicon 480L)
SNR: Pre 1973, SSL Comp (Spring reverb)
HAT: API-2500 (SP2016)
DRUMS ROOM: Pro-Q3, Studer A800
OVERHEADS: SSL Comp
SHAKER: Empty (EMT 250)
GUIRO: Pro-Q3 (EMT 250)
DRUM BUS: SSL Comp, Pro-L2
BASS: Fairchild 670, StandardCLIP (Lexicon 480L)
HORNS: LA-2A (H3000 hall reverb, Lexicon 480L)
AC GTR: Pro-Q3, DIMENSION-D, Fairchild 670 (Lexicon 480L, slap delay)
MARIMBA: L1 Limiter (Spring reverb, Lexicon 480L)
PIANO: Pro-Q3, LA-2A
LEAD VOCAL: Fairchild 670, Pro-Q3, 1176, DeEsser (H3000 hall reverb, Lexicon 480L, Spring reverb)
MIX BUS: API-2500

[kombainera]

Hi there my entry : https://drive.google.com/file/d/1pNijmi ... sp=sharing

acustic guitar : low mid cut and send to a revurb
bass guitar : i duplicated the original file so i can split the proccesing for the low and the hi part ,soothe on the low bass cose the notes was very uneven and some eq on both tracks
kick: compression and limiter i am not sure how the drums was programed but when i look in wavescope the hits seems the same only the tranzient part have big bumbs not sure if its from velosity or something else
snare : limiter again eq compression i try to put some tape there to tame a bit the snare but i thing for this song pooky snare is the way to go.
rest of the drum tracks: just eq and balance
Drum buss: a bit of eqing out some low mids and boosting upper hies and buss comp 1 db for glue
Percussions: just fader balance
marimba: api style eq for color api bus comp and limiter
Piano: Here i start to feel the lack of layer so i send the piano to a shimmer fx to create some sort of a pad
Trompets: eq api style buss comp and send to fx again
Vocal: Paralel compression to take a bit the dynamic out eq buss compression and sooth and the end to tame some stuff send to 4 fx room short plate delay and doubler
Master: compression , brit style channel strip for color , eq to cut 1-2 db in low mids and 1db boost at 3k and true peak limiter at the end just for volume boost

After my problems with export i remix the song from the start all over again this time in luna and still
got a lot of problems in the process of setting the finale loadness tested 5 limiters and all loadness meters that i know and every time i got not the same values like in the daw on the real time playback maybe bad drivers or converters or i dont know but after the 6 real time export i just give up and leave it at -18 lufs and -1.4-1.5 peak just to be sure i am ok with the rules.

[drunk-ffx]

Just for fun: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1yqW78z ... sp=sharing

Not sure if I am matching those LUFS... Also wasn't unsure about the provided stems, those aren't same length and also aren't recorded at 109BPM, but whatever, stretched it to 109BPM then with the Porsche algorithm...

EQ on most tracks is UVI Shade (I like its gui the most), drum recordings were a mess, eqed and compressed snare and kick using Shade and MDynamics. Kick was compressed a lot, was a transient thin thingy. Bass got a bunch of compression, eq and saturation (softboob VCA compressor, shade), so it sounds like an actual bass. voice got mdynamics, vca compressor (sat) and firecobra (distortion/sat), and delay+ in reverb mode (Bitwig internal). Acoustic guitar was spread, to provide room for the voice, highpassing highband-chorus and bitwig spread + UAD lexicon 224 (have to try it, though the gui is so annoying). Most tracks 24dB highpassed with Shade, for extra phasing issues. Supermassive asds to kalimba track, compression and highpass of course. Less reverb is more, if you ask me, esp. for a pop production. Bass has a fast low-band-eq-duck-by-kick.

Hope you like it.

[Isa]

And finally, there's a file called "Drums_Snare_SpringorPlate". I realise that this is the snare reverb but I'm curious about the naming. Why "SpringorPlate"?

Cheers!

When trying to the isolate the sound on my VST. The wording was confusing to me. I believe it said spring plate. What was happening was that the snare was playing at the same time. So I just rendered the spring plate snare because it was different than other snare that my MIDI was playing.

My MIDI was playing two snares one with reverb and one without. I just rendered the one with reverb as a precaution. (So that I wasn't missing any audio)

[scottfitz]

Hi all,
Thanks to the artist and to Mister Fox for giving us this challenge!

Here's the link for my mix
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1wIYmWV ... sp=sharing

I have to say this was an extremely difficult track for me to mix. In the end I've decided to go with this version early partly because I'm trying to work under time pressure/spend less time on each mix. Also partly because this challenge I could see myself spending an incredible amount of time on I like the original mix for it's uniqueness and subtlety and so I've tried to take my cue from that style, but tried to make it a bit more conventional sounding.

Specific Notes

(Assume EQ on pretty much every track)

Drums
Kick - just EQ
Snare - Fabfilter C2
Hats - 1176
OH - Distressor
Room - Distressor
Bus - API2500 into softube tape

Bass
verse
HPF
crystalline mono room verb 20%

chorus
Fabfilter C2
Fabfilter Saturn
another C2 for sidechain to kick

Marimba -
splitEQ
fabfilter C2
Transient Shaper
soothe2
kraftur
Pulsar Mu for the tone only
marimba fx - valhalla shimmer, shaperbox

piano
RC20 saturation

acoustic
Fairchild
Studer tape

vox
soothe2
cenozoix compressor doing about 4dB GR

vox fx
valhalla plate -> black box (panned left)
room -> softube saturation (panned right)
valhalla slap (chorus only)
valhalla hall (chorus only)

mixbus

the god particle
fabfilter saturn - gentle saturation

Please ask if you'd like any more details about my mix
Cheers and good luck all

[Ultimate Beta]

Hi Folks,
Here's the link to the finished mix...

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1v4BIox ... drive_link

MC099_LosTimpanis_Falling_Ultimate Beta

Mix Details:
1. Acoustic Guitars – Significant cut out in mid frequencies with high frequency boost around 2k – 20k Hz. Introduced plate reverb and mild exciter.
2. Bass - Drastic EQ boost in the low to lower mid frequencies with mild saturation using the DAW’s stock plugin.
3. Drums Hi-hat – Carved out frequency around 655 Hz with heavy compression and mild exciter.
4. Drums Kick - A drastic boost at 50 Hz, added with multiple EQ moves across the frequency spectrum. Shaped the drum tone to resemble a pop or Bossa nova genre in certain sections.
5. Drums Overhead and Drums Room – Nothing done except for the volume balance.
6. Drums Snare – Heavy saturation and compression with Saturn 2 plugin and stock plugin.
7. Guache Shaker – Nothing done except mild panning.
8. Guiro – Steep low cut at 1k Hz.
9. Vocals – Compression using CLA plugin. Reverb throughout the song, with echo only in certain sections.
10. Marimba – Nothing done except volume balance.
11. Trumpets – EQs cut out in the mid-frequency with mild saturation.

Special thanks to Mix Challenge Founders and Staff, Song Providers, the Sponsors, and my fellow folks.

Regards,
Ultimate Beta

[FADA]

Hi! First post and entry:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1O4R1bx ... drive_link

Drum Bus: UAD Studer A800 for tape saturation (most of the drum sound/character), UAD Distressor compressor, little bit of plate reverb
Kick: EQ big bass and high boost, gated, some compression
Snare: Gated, some EQ
OH: Little Radiator for grit
Room: Decapitator for crunch

Percussion bus: Soundtoys Little Radiator, Devil-Loc

Bass (split in low and high):
Bass low: EQ bass boost, low mid cut, RBass + parallell distortion with decapitator
Bass high: par distortion + spring reverb

Acoustic guitar: EQ high pass to 90 hz+low cut+high mid and high boost, 1176 compression, Soothe2, Soundtoys Little Radiator, SketchCassette II, fresh air, 1/8 delay, Valhalla Vintageverb

Marimba: EQ low cut+high boost, Izotope RX to remove some clicky attacks, 1/8th delay for some movement (really liked this one)

Piano: EQ low cut+high boost, 1176 compression, Soundtoys Little Radiator, SketchCassette II, Fresh Air, 1/8th delay

Trumpets: Saturn2 to remove some room, Devil-Loc, Fairchild compressor, Echoboy

Vocals: Melodyne and Autotune for some tuning, EQ low cut, low mid cut, some nasal mid cuts, Fabfilter Pro-MB to duck some high mids, RVox and LA-2A compression, de-esser, Soothe2, UAD Pure plate reverb and a little hint of Echorec slapback delay

Mixbus:
Shadow Hill compressor with 0,5 db compression, Gulfoss, Oxford Inflator, God Particle with some high boost and without limiter

That's about it! Open to questions and any feedback is welcomed. Have fun mixing everybody!