Victor Flores

Thanks Tim, and forum.

All right Tim: Here's my findings; I followed steps 1-3 as per your suggestions, starting from scratch, and I wound up having to drop down to -26db on the faders in order for the master fader to peak at -9.3 which is where I ended up after the static mix. So I think this is a win. Let me know if you agree; and Thanks for all that helped in this thread. (Too many to mention) Looking forward to when I can get some sound panels for my walls and start inviting musicians over to track and mix my own songs, rather than some one else's files.

This tutorial says to just slap a trim pluggin on the master fader. I've done what was suggested as to get a healthy level. So if that's all it takes, then I guess I'm all set for now.

Well, I've given up on trying to leave the faders alone, and have had some success in getting the master fader to peak closer to -6, but when I bring the faders down past a certain point, they all become the same level because I run out of real estate. I would love to have a live sitting with some one who can spare a few minutes one day, and once we come up with a solution, I can post my findings to this thread for anyone who struggles with the same issue. Hit me up if I got any volunteers.

Like any song, there are spots where almost all the tracks may be playing at the same time; but there are spots where there are only a few playing at the same time. Like I said. I decided to download the stems to a song called "Stay" by Workday Release. Just learned that Warren Huart did a mixing tutorial on the song. If any one wants to give it a go them selves(gain staging the song) and report back their findings, that would be beneficial to the thread, plus great self practice; but I do realize this is time out of every ones life. Any who, I really do appreciate every ones time and input so far. video or gif footage would be even better.

I started from scratch tonight. Got rid of trim plugin; selected all tracks, went into clip, selected gain; brought it down to -6db. Bounced all tracks. Played song through entirety. And then proceeded to lower or raise gain knob on top to bring peak levels to -12 or close to it on all 73 tracks. Played the song again, and when it was all said and done; the master fader was peaking at +21.4db Really thought starting at a lower level (-6) was going to fix the problem. But back to the drawing board.

Thanks Alan: I started at -18, and even that was too hot given the large number of tracks.

Hey Glenn: I go a bit more in depth into the reason why in my second to last thread about my master fader being too hot. (Which you chimed in that thread as well) but here's the scoop. I watched creatives sauces' video on gain staging; and he suggests -18 RMS and -12 Peak aprox. I tried leveling all audio (No VST instruments) tracks to -12 peaks, and after doing so, the Master fader was at +13db. So I brought all the gain knobs down as much as I could, and the master fader was still in the positive. So I remembered the "Blue Cat Gain plugin" to bring down the gain even more because it can go down to -60db. I wound up having to go to -26 on all tracks, just to get the master fader at -12db peak.

Holy cow guys...I just really payed attention to your post msmcleod; and wow...I want to cry lol.. I just spent like 2 weeks turning those darn knobs one at a time for 73 tracks, and now I see what you mean. I just tried it out, and created 72 duplicate tracks of one that had the BC Gain plugin loaded up, and did it in a matter of minutes, and it works beautifully. Thanks guys

Glen: I went with what the tutorial by creative sauce suggested for gain staging which is at the point that I'm at teaching my self through videos. My goal was to give my self -10db of head room at the master track, and I wound up having to bring the 73 tracks to peak at about -26db to make that happen. The native gain(Trim) knobs only go down to -18, which was leaving my master track to peak at +11db. msmcleod: Thanks, I'll be looking into that; makes no sense at the moment, but will check it out later, so I don't want to rush it, and want to fully grasp it.

Thanks for the quick response. I just came across this video after struggling for over a week with this issue. It tells you to group the plugins; and so I did, and it works. But even though I am happy to be able to change all 73 tracks at once, one still has to go through all the tracks one by one to change the setting to group, in order to have them change as a unit (group); which is time consuming, not to mention if you later decide to change your mind to not have them grouped, one would have to ungroup them one by one. None the less I guess the problem is solved. Thanks again.

Hello forum: I am gain staging a session with 72 tracks, and am using a gain plugin called Blue Cat on all tracks. I can change all my trim buttons in cakewalk at once by holding down control, and bringing down the trim level. But as soon as I try to do the same with the BC plugin...I hold control and bring down the gain knob and only the first track gets affected. All other 71 tracks remain in the 0db position. Any one know how to make the plugin change on all tracks at once? it can become super time consuming to change all 72 tracks one by one; and find out, you're not getting the desired result, so now you have to do it all over again and again. Thanks ahead. PS: I tried using the connect button on the bottom, and they all change at once, but it doesn't keep. As soon as I close the window, they all go back to 0db.

Thanks Glenn and Quick math, didn't even realize you guys had commented; I am not getting an email stating that I've gotten responses like in the old forum with Sonar. Any who...I am finding my self bringing the gain plugin all the way down to more than -30db on most tracks just to get the master track to peak at -10db. I've been meaning to post an update with my findings, but figured Id just state where I'm at after finding out there were more responses in my topic thread.

Will do brother. Thanks

Have you ever made instructional videos? I learn by watching a heck of a lot more than by reading. You obviously know your stuff and your video can be helpful to us noobs. But that's only if you got the time. Thanks again. I'll check it out when I get home. Been out all day

Thanks for fast and indepth response Tim. It's a lot to take in and even though I've been using cakewalk since 2004 for comping ideas for songs, I've only started to try to lean mixing recently. So I'll try my best to wrap my head around what you've said, I'm sure I'll have tons of questions once I start applying what you've suggested. As for you light granade, I saw the thumbnail for that video, and have it saved in my YouTube play list to watch later. The thing about mix bus tv is sometimes he just talks and explains without showing clips of what he's talking about so I don't follow his videos so much, but I'll take a look at it. Thanks guys for your help.

Hello Forum: I am trying to teach my self mixing, so I decided to download the stems to a song called "Stay" by Workday Release. I watched a video on gain staging by creative sauce on youtube, and followed it as best as I could. The song has 75 tracks (Ambitious I know) and I have about 6 stereo buses for the instruments and vox tracks plus 4 other stereo buses for compression, EQ, etc; that haven't been engaged yet. I have all track faders at Zero, And all peak at -12 or lower; as well as my 6 stereo buses. Here's the problem, the master fader is peaking at: 11.1 when I hear I should be somewhere around -3. Any suggestions? Thanks ahead

Awesome thanks forum.

Not what I wanted to hear, but thanks.

Hello Forum: I'm looking to save some ram by placing a single instance of BBC Orchestra but multiple instruments or tracks. I've looked all over youtube, and most tutorials show users using multiple instances of the VST but, that's not using the ram resources wisely in my opinion. So if any one knows a way, please get back to me. Thanks ahead. PS. I saw some one do it with Kontakt, but when I try his setup with BBC, it doesn't respond the same way; every time I select an instrument, and then proceed to the next, the first instrument doesn't keep.

Ok. Problem is now solved. The issue was not a cakewalk issue, I was pressing to out of the 3 buttons to reset the keyboard, and now that I have reset my midi controller, all is back to normal. Thanks forum!

How about guitars and synths? modulation wheel always is used for expression, not volume; so I still have that issue.

Hello forum: I have a Keystation 49es midi controller by M-Audio, and when I used to move the modulation wheel, the guitar synth would wave from slow to fast, and if I were using a string vst (BBC Orchestra for example) the volume would get louder, and certain instruments would pop in giving expression to the instrument. But recently I was helping a friend setup his midi controller, and I think I may have changed something in my midi controller settings in my control surface preferences. Now, the synth doesn't make any waving sound, and the expression on the strings ensemble just goes up and down in volume. Any ideas on how to get my settings back to where it was? Thanks ahead. PS. So far I've tried resetting my keyboard, deleting my ACT data, and using a generic one, and that didn't do the trick either.

My keyboardist has a Yamaha Motif XF6 if I'm not mistaken, so I think it comes with SPDIF output, so when the time comes, we'll cross that bridge when we get there. Thanks Bitflipper. Thanks again forum.

Then I'll stick to my setup, thanks Forum. 😀