Mix Challenge

Hello everyone, first of all it is an honor to know that my mix has been qualified. It is to thank the organization for correcting so many mixes and above all for giving feedback, since it is what helps us to advance on our way.

Moving on to fixes, I added some Parallel Compression to the guitar to make it fill the center of the mix more, corrected small volume and positioning adjustments on the rest of the instruments, and highlighted the lead vocal so it would come forward.

Finally, I wish everyone luck and look forward to the next contest!

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1-0Fpu7 ... sp=sharing

Almost forgot to post this

Thank you for choosing my mix for round 2.

Followed the feedback as best as I could:
- brought down the overall drums and added some more volume automation for the instrumental sections.
- reduced the width of the panning for the banjo and added automation during fills.
- brought back some high-low frequencies for the accordion.
- main vocals already had quite heavy saturation for the parallel bus so I only brought it up slightly and changed the resonance frequency closer to 3Khz


Hope these changes are an improvement to the previous version, good luck to all!

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

It's the 26th July 2023, 00:05 (UTC+2) - the 2nd Mix Round has officially ended.


STATISTICS

• Unfortunately, not everyone has sent in an edit (missing: @Alex Van mixland, @unclesnuggles couldn't continue due to computer issues)
• We have 0 Wild Card uses to advance into the next round (none available this month)
• We have 0 participants that decided on not to advance through the use of a Wild Card (none available this month)
• We have 0 submission after the deadline

Please check your upload links again, and have an eye on this thread for more feedback and a possible Mix Round 3, or an announcement of the final results.



I'm now opening up the room (again) for Q&A's and giving each other feedback (which is highly encouraged)

Please check out all other games on the community.

Please also consider becoming a Song Provider - no more material means no more Mix(ing) Challenges. Our Song Pool is nearly empty again!


See you on the flipside.

Hi all,
On my second mix my approach was more positive in that I tried to get the song moving instead of worrying about the bleed from microphones. I think this was the way to go, not sure if I made a better mix, but instinctively it felt right to have my focus on enjoying the music instead of my focus on trying to 'fix problems'. It could be that this is always the right approach? In the past I have definitely spent way too long down rabbit holes trying to fix all kinds of little things or vaguely relevant aspects, thinking all the while that this is what mixing is all about.

By analogy I think it could be the same mistake as looking at yourself in life and trying to fix all your flaws. While you may think this is a route to self improvement, unfortunately it can drain the life out of you and if you lose track of your enjoyment of life then the whole thing is lost anyway.

Cheers all.

scottfitz wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 29, 2023 14:14 CEST

Hi all,
On my second mix my approach was more positive in that I tried to get the song moving instead of worrying about the bleed from microphones. I think this was the way to go, not sure if I made a better mix, but instinctively it felt right to have my focus on enjoying the music instead of my focus on trying to 'fix problems'. It could be that this is always the right approach? In the past I have definitely spent way too long down rabbit holes trying to fix all kinds of little things or vaguely relevant aspects, thinking all the while that this is what mixing is all about.

By analogy I think it could be the same mistake as looking at yourself in life and trying to fix all your flaws. While you may think this is a route to self improvement, unfortunately it can drain the life out of you and if you lose track of your enjoyment of life then the whole thing is lost anyway.

Cheers all.

I really like your second mix, a definite improvement - top end is much clearer and the instrumentation sounds thicker with a more balanced frequency spectrum. The one thing I would say is I think your lead vocals have been slightly pushed back as a result and could have been a tad louder, but overall a great mix, nicely done

Agree with your points as well, it's very easy to obsess over the technicalities in the quest for perfection when ultimately it's the sound enjoyment that matters to the end listener. It's a skill to be able to be objective and detach yourself from the emotion of the material in order to make unbiased judgements, but similarly it's also beneficial to be able to look at things subjectively and with emotion because at the end of the day it's the enjoyment that makes it worthwhile!

BenjiRage wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 29, 2023 22:58 CEST

scottfitz wrote: ↑

Sat Jul 29, 2023 14:14 CEST

Hi all,
On my second mix my approach was more positive in that I tried to get the song moving instead of worrying about the bleed from microphones. I think this was the way to go, not sure if I made a better mix, but instinctively it felt right to have my focus on enjoying the music instead of my focus on trying to 'fix problems'. It could be that this is always the right approach? In the past I have definitely spent way too long down rabbit holes trying to fix all kinds of little things or vaguely relevant aspects, thinking all the while that this is what mixing is all about.

By analogy I think it could be the same mistake as looking at yourself in life and trying to fix all your flaws. While you may think this is a route to self improvement, unfortunately it can drain the life out of you and if you lose track of your enjoyment of life then the whole thing is lost anyway.

Cheers all.

I really like your second mix, a definite improvement - top end is much clearer and the instrumentation sounds thicker with a more balanced frequency spectrum. The one thing I would say is I think your lead vocals have been slightly pushed back as a result and could have been a tad louder, but overall a great mix, nicely done

Agree with your points as well, it's very easy to obsess over the technicalities in the quest for perfection when ultimately it's the sound enjoyment that matters to the end listener. It's a skill to be able to be objective and detach yourself from the emotion of the material in order to make unbiased judgements, but similarly it's also beneficial to be able to look at things subjectively and with emotion because at the end of the day it's the enjoyment that makes it worthwhile!

Thanks v much for listening and giving kind feedback BenjiRage, it helps a lot to escape my own world of introspection about these processes. With regards the vocal level I do struggle to deal with how the balance changes as the listening volume changes, but as you say what I did with the instruments might be taking away some focus from the vocals. Thanks again for these thoughts.

Competition Conclusion: And the Winners Are...

Ladies and Gentlemen, the moment is finally here! First and foremost, we would like to express our gratitude to each and every participant who dedicated their time and efforts to make this competition such a nice experience. The level of talent and skill displayed was outstanding, making the selection process incredibly challenging.

Without further ado, allow us to announce the top three placements:

1st Place: PauPeu
2nd Place: DarlRarl
3rd Place: dstra

A huge congratulations to the podium! Your mixes resonated with our vision and showcased your attention to detail.

In addition, we would like to give a special nod to FixInTheMix with an honorable mention. The mix was caught our ears and we also liked this mix alot. However, it was slightly outside the specs of the competition with regard to loudness.

Thank you once again to everyone involved, especially MrFox for organizing and overseeing this site. Your contribution creates a valuable learnign experience for all of us. Every competition is an opportunity for growth, learning, and refining our skills. We're truly lucky to have such a wonderful community, and we look forward to hearing more from you in future projects.

Until the next competition, keep mixing, keep exploring, and keep sharing your passion with the world!

Warm regards Pål and Magnus

First and foremost, congratulations to the winners!
We are ending the game here and do not go into Mix Round 3.


The Winners Podium is
1) @PauPeu .....(entries: Mix Round 1, Mix Round 2)
2) @DarlRarl .....(entries: Mix Round 1, Mix Round 2)
3) @dstra .....(entries: Mix Round 1, Mix Round 2)


We perform with the usual - in order of the winners podium, please select one license out of the pool and mention it in this thread, then (important) get in touch with me via PM with your full name, email address and your plugin selection. If one company has been selected, it's not available for the rest of the podium anymore.

I'll update the "winners podium" thread shortly.


Thanks again for your participation. You can leave the thread alive if you want to exchange tips/tricks, edits, etc.
And thank you @Naturecord for the final words of feedback and encouragement.


Please check out Mix Challenge 093 and Songwriting Competition 072

See you on the flipside.

Congrats to the winners!

Thanks very much to the song provider!! appreciate it

To the mixers that was a tough game! see y'all on the next one