MIX CHALLENGE - MC048 October 2018 - Winners announced

[will.newton08]

Fese, FYI I uploaded the wrong versions initially so pls be sure to download the latest versions on my post. I also fixed the naming convention. Cheers

[RichardClarke]

Hi,

Here is my submission!

Wave file - https://drive.google.com/open?id=10iD8b ... p70ltrM2G
Mp3 file - https://drive.google.com/open?id=1dIKOs ... xag5UCU0P_



....and screenshots of my mix console in Cubase.

Desk 1 - https://drive.google.com/open?id=1VFNoX ... aMNpnzrdlB
Desk 2 - https://drive.google.com/open?id=1u0zrc ... cL1DCi3UmW
Desk 3 - https://drive.google.com/open?id=1TNs1K ... mn81jJsIDU

You can see all the main routing, FX sends and inserts on the screenshots.
All the individual instruments are rooted through a Drum, Bass, Front or Back buss which has an SSL compressor on it.

[Franz]

hello to all,

I come to the following topic in this very interesting competition with a title that has, among
other quality sounds very clean: outside the staggering number plug-in are used (is it really
necessary and if so, why ? ), and if you really want to understand and / or learn, I would like
the candidate to the mixing competittion explains how they do it: tracks are listened to first,
are they corrected right away or compared to other tracks, etc, etc, and also explain his
artistic approach.
To express myself well on the artistic notion which is (too) often neglected in the comments,
I take as an example in the title which interests us here, the VOICES. For my taste,
in many mixes proposed, the female voice is much too strong compared to the male voice:
it must, in my opinion, be a second voice and not be a duet, which would take away all its
meaning to the history. Here is a little idea of debat ....

Cheers

Franz

[fese]

I come to the following topic in this very interesting competition with a title that has, among
other quality sounds very clean: outside the staggering number plug-in are used (is it really
necessary and if so, why ? ), and if you really want to understand and / or learn, I would like
the candidate to the mixing competittion explains how they do it: tracks are listened to first,
are they corrected right away or compared to other tracks, etc, etc, and also explain his
artistic approach.

personally, if someone uses loads of plugins for this mix (guilty here) or very few, I couldn't care less because for me it's the result that counts

Regarding the explanations of the mix process, i think you have a point here. I always learned a lot from the mix challenges I took part in as a song provider, got new ideas that improved my own mixing, just by listening to the different results.

What would interest my in the explanations is not exactly what plugins where used and how you did your bus routing, but thinks like
- what problems did you encounter and how did you solve them?
- how did you EQ, e.g. where did you need to cut because it sounded ugly in your opinion, where did you use boosts. As someone who still struggles with eq-ing such information is always valuable.
- what tracks did you use for referencing? What did you look for in the reference (again, I still don't know how to really use reference tracks to effect)
- and of course the aforementioned "artistic" decisions: why did you do those to achieve what?

You don't have to explain your whole mix or the EQs on all tracks, but a few lines with what you regard as the most important things would be great!

To express myself well on the artistic notion which is (too) often neglected in the comments,
I take as an example in the title which interests us here, the VOICES. For my taste,
in many mixes proposed, the female voice is much too strong compared to the male voice:
it must, in my opinion, be a second voice and not be a duet, which would take away all its
meaning to the history. Here is a little idea of debat ....

I won't really comment on that because it would be unfair to those who already uploaded, but I can say that that was something I was definitely struggling with in my own mix, how to level balance Susan's additional vocals.

[fese]

....and screenshots of my mix console in Cubase.

Desk 1 - https://drive.google.com/open?id=1VFNoX ... aMNpnzrdlB
Desk 2 - https://drive.google.com/open?id=1u0zrc ... cL1DCi3UmW
Desk 3 - https://drive.google.com/open?id=1TNs1K ... mn81jJsIDU

You can see all the main routing, FX sends and inserts on the screenshots.
All the individual instruments are rooted through a Drum, Bass, Front or Back buss which has an SSL compressor on it.

You got all the track colors wrong!!! Guitars should be yellow, Drums dark blue and Keys green! I gotta deduct points for that...

In all seriousness, could you explain what the intention of the front and back bus channels is?

[RichardClarke]

....and screenshots of my mix console in Cubase.

Desk 1 - https://drive.google.com/open?id=1VFNoX ... aMNpnzrdlB
Desk 2 - https://drive.google.com/open?id=1u0zrc ... cL1DCi3UmW
Desk 3 - https://drive.google.com/open?id=1TNs1K ... mn81jJsIDU

You can see all the main routing, FX sends and inserts on the screenshots.
All the individual instruments are rooted through a Drum, Bass, Front or Back buss which has an SSL compressor on it.

You got all the track colors wrong!!! Guitars should be yellow, Drums dark blue and Keys green! I gotta deduct points for that...

In all seriousness, could you explain what the intention of the front and back bus channels is?

Of course! I read some books recently by Nathan Nyquist about creating depth in a mix. One of the books uses a technique where you put your instruments through 5 compression groups. Front, back, bass, drums and aux.

All groups have very gentle buss compression to glue the instruments in that group together. The idea is not compress them so much (1 - 2db) but to control transients.

The simple explanation.....The front group has a slow attack so the instruments in that group keep their transients and stay to the front of the mix. The back group has a fast attack to keep transients tucked in and make those instruments less in your face. Although I would read Nathan Nyquists book if you want it explained properly better, what I have explained is the basic principle I hold onto to try to stay on track.

I am using this technique and his 3 space reverb at the moment a lot as its helping me focus on 2 fundamental long term weak spots in my mixing, reverb and general depth. I am a long way from being a master of it though and so you should not regard my mixes as a good demonstration of his techniques! The main benefit for me is it clarifies some of my mixes choices and the mentality has been more important to me than the technique itself. It kind of forces me to think should this instrument be front or back?...and trying to see the whole picture and think about depth in general.

I am definitely guilty of not explaining my mixes very well, partly because i'm not sure what people are actually interested in and will bother reading. You mentioned about the artistic decisions being very interesting actually. I agree a lot with this.

Most of the what I did is Standard EQ or using an particular EQ to try to get an analogue sound. I use the EMO F2 (low pass filter and high pass filter) but it was kind of redundant on some channels as I might have just used the Pass filter on the SSL channel and forgot to remove the F2 later. I often apply the F2 as gentle high and low pass filters as the first part of the shaping of the mix on nearly every channel.

I use the F6 side chained to dip the lows on bass when the kick comes in so they are tied together better and more complimentary. Its a trick I use almost all the time these days and love.

The J37 slap back was for a bit of analogue grit on the vocals.

I struggled with the correct level for Susans voice and i am not convinced by what i did in retrospect. I always had mixed feelings about what to do there and never really resolved them.

Another thing i totally wanted to do was create a growing a whirlwind of Beatlesesque psychedelia in the chorus's. So it kind of melted into something more spooky feeling but was still beautiful and coherent enough. Like you were slowly slipping into a David Lynch dream with Leonard Cohen singing in the ballroom in The Shining!...Thats the picture in my head anyway

Sadly i realised i didn't have anything like the skills or techniques to pull it off or even make a tasteful attempt so i played it safe and there's a bit of tape delay and that's it. I should probably spend some time reading up on how George Martin and co did all that stuff. One day I'll have those skills......one day!! (or i'll go deaf trying!).

[Kelson]

Here's my entry. Great song!

Wave: https://www.dropbox.com/s/w34fhklvfvmna ... n.wav?dl=0
Mp3: https://www.dropbox.com/s/lghh6snbder3a ... n.mp3?dl=0

Here's a few screenshots of the Mixer and Automation:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/qxvt1jfwro6d8 ... 1.png?dl=0
https://www.dropbox.com/s/ajvfxrvhi2kux ... 2.png?dl=0
https://www.dropbox.com/s/02y1ujxj6pg40 ... 1.PNG?dl=0
https://www.dropbox.com/s/mimkjtrm1pu29 ... 2.PNG?dl=0

Editing:
Edited the solo acoustic guitar part for more precise timing. Edited all three backing vocal parts to more closely match the timing of the lead vocal. Edited the last note of most of the rhythm tracks to fade out together.

Mixing:

Drums - Didn't use much compression since I wanted to keep them fairly low in the mix, but present enough that they're felt the entire time.

Bass - I didn't feel it needed any compression, just some EQ to take out some of the midrange that was competing with the keyboard and guitar.

Elec Guitars - I wanted them pretty much in the background, the biggest thing I did was highpass them so the low end wasn't getting in the way of the other instruments.

Acoustic Guitars - These were probably the hardest part to make work. I compressed both of them a decent amount to get more evenness as well as for the solo part to pop out. I also automated the rhythm acoustic part to get quieter when the lead comes in.

Accordion and keyboard parts - I didn't feel I had to do very much to these, just some eq to make them balance a bit more.

Vocals - I wanted the lead (male) vocal to be a lot more in front than the female vocals. I compressed the lead a fair amount and added some reverb and delay to give it some natural space. The backing vocals I tried to have fairly present, but to not get in the way of the lead. I also used ReaFir for some noise reduction on the backing vocals as there was some hiss or hum in the signal.

[vitaminx]

Hi everyone,

This is my first post here in mix-challenge and therefor also my first submission ever on this forum
The song is very nice, I enjoyed the mixing process quite a lot.

Here are the files:
formfisch - LastDance (Ramón Pankow aka vitaminx), mp3 format, 320kbps, 44.1kHz
formfisch - LastDance (Ramón Pankow aka vitaminx), wav format, 44.1kHz

I've used all of the records which were mentioned in OP as reference for my mix, and additionally this one:
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds/Kylie Minogue - Where The Wild Roses Grow

I started a worklog but forgot to take notes after half of the mix or so but here is what I have:

OS: Linux
DAW: Reaper
Tools: linvst, jack, cadence, claudia

- usually I start to mix in mono, and when I feel that the sound is OK I work on the stereo image
- manually removed some noise on quiet parts of akkordeon and e-guitar tracks with volume automation
- added gate to tambourine and voice tracks to remove noise on quiet parts
- some timing adjustments on voice tracks, not too much, I like that they drag sometimes
- all tracks go to u-he Satin tape emulator to add some analogue feel, with more or less drive depending on the needed saturation, tape type is "Vintage" with 15ips
- then I've put Variety Of Sound's TesslaPROmkII on all tracks with more or less drive to add more analogue saturation, for some tracks it's set to "Console" emulation, other to "Tube'
- most tracks then go through Ignite Amp PTEq-X which I use as a high pass filter, others go through Tokyo Dawn Lab's Slick EQ to attenuate the low end, the EQ supposedly adds some non-linearity too
- after that I use slight to medium compression on most track with u-he Presswerk to even out the volumes, with again somewhere around medium analogue saturation
- automatically and manually deessing Susan's voice with Reaper deesser and manual volume automation
- another pass of manual volume automation and stereo widening of Susan's vocals to make them flow "around" the male voice
- routed some tracks to barely audible small and medium reverb channel, I've tried to strike a balance between natural, but not too dry sound
- a lot more changes i forgot...

[Jerze]

Hello All, Thanks to Formfisch for supplying the song to mix. I'm not sure about the space I choose but it is what it is. I did a lot of automation bringing parts up or down in the different sections and took parts out at times to try and create some different movement... The two instruments I struggled with the most were the kic and piano. I need to work on getting a vintage sound more.

Here are my downloads. I switch over to Drop box as I couldn't figure out how to let people download without signing into Soundcloud.

Wave- https://www.dropbox.com/s/4rvhewglcf8lj ... v.wav?dl=0

Mp3- https://www.dropbox.com/s/qg5y7bnkda9in ... 3.mp3?dl=0



Drums-Each channel had Scheps omni then into a drum buss with light compression and
Saturation

Bass- not much Eqing and a compressing

Gt Electric- just notch out some freq

Acoustic- ssl g channel eq and compressing, saturation and notching out some freq

Tambourine- eq

Music box-eq

Accordion-Kramer tape eqing

Zebra Bell Piano-

Vocals-Scheps omni, Kramer tape then to a Vocal buss to blend male and female vocals

If you have any question or comments let me know.

[javipedrocca]

hello to all,

I come to the following topic in this very interesting competition with a title that has, among
other quality sounds very clean: outside the staggering number plug-in are used (is it really
necessary and if so, why ? ), and if you really want to understand and / or learn, I would like
the candidate to the mixing competittion explains how they do it: tracks are listened to first,
are they corrected right away or compared to other tracks, etc, etc, and also explain his
artistic approach.
To express myself well on the artistic notion which is (too) often neglected in the comments,
I take as an example in the title which interests us here, the VOICES. For my taste,
in many mixes proposed, the female voice is much too strong compared to the male voice:
it must, in my opinion, be a second voice and not be a duet, which would take away all its
meaning to the history. Here is a little idea of debat ....

Cheers

Franz

Hi!
I think you have a good point.
Listening to the mixes of other participants is a great way to learn, and it is much more effective not only with a description of the processes, routing, etc., but also understanding the concept to reach the final result.
Since this is my first Mix Challenge, I did not take into account how important the concept and description of the workflow is.
I apologize for that.

What would interest my in the explanations is not exactly what plugins where used and how you did your bus routing, but thinks like
- what problems did you encounter and how did you solve them?
- how did you EQ, e.g. where did you need to cut because it sounded ugly in your opinion, where did you use boosts. As someone who still struggles with eq-ing such information is always valuable.
- what tracks did you use for referencing? What did you look for in the reference (again, I still don't know how to really use reference tracks to effect)
- and of course the aforementioned "artistic" decisions: why did you do those to achieve what?

You don't have to explain your whole mix or the EQs on all tracks, but a few lines with what you regard as the most important things would be great!

This was my work flow.
Listen to the original mix a few times, before you start mixing.
I discovered some things.
1) The song is beautiful!
2) is very well played, and the arrangements are simple and effective.
3) the original mix is ​​very good!

Then I began to work with the concept of "I will not make artistic decisions, I will try to be as transparent as possible, the engineer's job should not be noticed here"
As a footnote I must say that my wife thinks that that is ALSO an artistic decision.

I decided to strengthen the previous points respecting the original mix as much as possible, using it as a reference.
The first thing was to import the tracks to the Pro Tools session and get a balance only with the faders. Then I began to equalize with all the instruments playing (without voices), by problems of masking between some instruments (for example the piano and the guitar in the zone of the bass and mid-bass). I have two sets of monitors, Yamaha Ns10 and Adam A7x. I used the Ns10.
I made cuts on the lows and low mids of the piano until I started listening to the lows of the guitar. I always try to equalize like this: if I find two instruments competing in the same place, I equalize cutting the masker, until I can hear the two complementing each other. Just then I make small boosts in the area where each one makes me more pleasant, and highlights the way they complement each other.
Then it was more evident that the instruments that handle the groove are the piano, the guitar and the drums.
The guitar is mono, and the piano is stereo. I decided that a stereo guitar would work better with the piano, and it would not sound just like "I've panned this instrument to this side"
In my first post I described how I did it.
Then, equalize everything again, and start panning instruments to achieve a stereo balance (on Adams). While doing all this, I was adding tape plugins, but to control transients as naturally as possible to add color, and compression too. And then I returned to equalize, but with my monitoring in mono (Ns10). When I could hear the instruments clearly, separated one from the other and without masking, place the voices in the mix, without eq, only faders and deessers.
At that moment, I began to work to try to achieve an adequate ambient sound. The compression of the drum's Room took me to look for the same type of reverb for everything, to create a unified ambient sound. I used a room reverb and the send is filtered and equalized BEFORE hitting the plugin.

I had previously listened to some small inconsistencies in the tempo of the solo guitar so I made small editions to correct it.

Then I equalize and compress the voices and do the automation (Adams) to get to the mix that I posted.

The whole process took approximately 6 hours, with breaks of 10 minutes every hour.
Most of the time it was dedicated to the equalization and compression of voices and automation.

I will appreciate comments and suggestions.

Cheers, J.