Shane_B. Posted February 12, 2021 Share Posted February 12, 2021 I'm really happy today. I got my routing problem fixed with my new Presonus Studio 1810c audio interface and I've been tinkering with mixing and mastering with the leveling tube comp in my sig. below. In a nutshell I had to disable the virtual mixer and use the front inputs that are controlled by the built in gain knobs. That's not in any of the manuals or tutorial video's that I could find. Just running through the unit with all the settings at their lowest so they really have no effect adds something that I just can't put my finger on. I can only imagine what a more expensive unit would do, but I'm very happy with what I have. I wish I would have done this a long time ago. BTW ... Amazon has those 1810c's at an even bigger discount now than I got on mine. They are listed as refurbished but mine came factory sealed, factory packed, and looked like it had never been touched. Maybe I got lucky. It's a great unit if you only need 4 inputs with mic pre's. I'm a happy camper. 👍 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
craigb Posted February 12, 2021 Share Posted February 12, 2021 I'm still in the "Gear is nice." camp. 😜 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shane_B. Posted February 12, 2021 Author Share Posted February 12, 2021 25 minutes ago, craigb said: I'm still in the "Gear is nice." camp. 😜 I'm having a blast with this. Now I need to upgrade my audio interface to something with more functioning inputs and go buy 6 more of these compressors to put on every bus. 😆 I just threw it on the drum bus in that tune I posted here a couple weeks ago and what a difference. I dialed it in in no time. My problem is my brain can't handle too many options. I've always been far better at mixing my songs on my old Tascam 8 track than I have ever been in any DAW. It's funny how we have VST's like auto dynamic EQ's but the ones I get the most use out of are the ones made to emulate vintage EQ's with just a couple of knobs. I can only imagine what it was like using the real thing in a real studio. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
InstrEd Posted February 12, 2021 Share Posted February 12, 2021 23 minutes ago, Shane_B. said: My problem is my brain can't handle too many options. Another club I belong too Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bapu Posted February 12, 2021 Share Posted February 12, 2021 Huzzah!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bruno de Souza Lino Posted February 13, 2021 Share Posted February 13, 2021 16 hours ago, Shane_B. said: I can only imagine what it was like using the real thing in a real studio. Most of your time will be spent waiting for stuff to render, patching stuff in and out, recalling settings for each session and dealing with ground loop issues. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shane_B. Posted February 13, 2021 Author Share Posted February 13, 2021 2 hours ago, Bruno de Souza Lino said: Most of your time will be spent waiting for stuff to render, patching stuff in and out, recalling settings for each session and dealing with ground loop issues. True! But ... if I get an interface where I can actually use all the I/O's, and go get 10 more compressors, mix everything ITB to stems, I only have to do it once. 😁 As for the ground loop thing, so far so good. The only problem I have right now is my speakers are making a WWII radio sound depending on how low I have my buffers set. It's not coming through my headphones and is not present in my mixdowns. I can work with it, but it's annoying. You'd think with all the hearing loss and tinnitus it wouldn't be a problem, but hell no. It's right where I still have some good hearing left. LOL! I had a blast last night. It was a bit of a pain I will admit, but it was worth it. I had a Drum, Rhythm Guitar, Lead Guitar, Bass, and Vocal track I ran through it separately. It did take a while but I just made supper while it was going. Then I used the new feature in Studio One 5 where you can simply draw out the peaks you don't want and I used Melodyne to take out the clicks on the bass. I'm afraid to listen to it now. You know it is, it can sound great while you've been at it for 3 hours, but then the next day it sounds horrible. I really wish I could emulate this ITB but so far I haven't been able to. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bruno de Souza Lino Posted February 14, 2021 Share Posted February 14, 2021 22 hours ago, Shane_B. said: I really wish I could emulate this ITB but so far I haven't been able to. I don't need the help of external gear to make my mixes sound horrible. I'm already a natural at that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
msmcleod Posted February 14, 2021 Share Posted February 14, 2021 I do all my mixing 100% in the box. But for tracking, I've got a selection of analog pre's, EQ's & compressors. To my ears they make a huge amount of difference. I'm kind of old school when it comes to recording, so I try to capture the sound the way I want it to sound. It also makes the mixing process a lot easier. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
InstrEd Posted February 14, 2021 Share Posted February 14, 2021 10 minutes ago, msmcleod said: I'm kind of old school My dad was a commercial photographer and always said you want to get the picture as close as possible and not in post processing. Of course he made his living in the day of film. I think you have the right idea in music. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Notes_Norton Posted February 14, 2021 Share Posted February 14, 2021 My analog saxophones are nice, although sometimes the reeds are a PITA. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cristiano Sadun Posted February 14, 2021 Share Posted February 14, 2021 (edited) Usually (not always, but usually) there's simply confirmation bias at work when it comes to outboard. So long you know that you like the ART compressor and and you believe it will add something.. you will hear that something. Just to be clear: I like and use outboard, having some good pieces of kits. But it's not for the sonic difference - it's more because turning knobs without looking at a screen makes my mixes better- I hear things, as opposite to looking at them. Self-bias is powerful: I once spent minutes fine-tuning a fader and discerning quite a lot of differences with just 0.5 or 1dB differences in fader position... only to realize afterwards that I was manipulating the wrong fader, on a muted channel! Our mind plays tricks all the time. That's also the reason of the DFA button on old consoles. It would be a worthy addition to Cakewalk's excellent console as well. The only way to know if it's true that your HW compressor is adding some magic is to find an emulation, have a friend bounce a mix using the emulation or not (and accounting for any noise etc) and listen without knowing which is which. One of my compressors is a MC77 - a 1176 style FET unit by Purple Audio. It sounds lovely on the right source for the things that a 1176 does, and being even more grabby, it can do things that the original one can't. Once I wanted to use it for a stereo signal - and, not being inclined to buy another for just the one mix, I went and bought the plugin instead. Dialed it in, and went on with it - all good. After a few days, having a vocal line to work on, I went to the 77 and had it work its magic. The plugin crossed my mind, and made an experiment, copying the settings on a mono instance. I bounced the two versions and used a little script to scramble names and dates. I could not discern any difference whatsoever. Of course I may have lead ears, but circulated a segment among some friends in the biz, some of whom most definitely do not have lead ears, and they couldn't tell either. Some joked on why the heck I was sending two identical files! Some time after I also made experiments between my real UA 610 and the UAD emulation on the Twin, and my real LA2A and the UAD counterpart, with identical result. Take away the knowledge of what's what, and the only magic that's left is your ability to mix. Of course I don't mean the compressor doesn't add something good. But it's not it about being physical outboard, it's about the fact that you found a setting you like with a unit you like, easy since you were just turning knobs and there was nothing to look at. That's the big advantage of hardware. Edited February 14, 2021 by Cristiano Sadun Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shane_B. Posted February 15, 2021 Author Share Posted February 15, 2021 1 hour ago, Cristiano Sadun said: Self-bias is powerful: I once spent minutes fine-tuning a fader and discerning quite a lot of differences with just 0.5 or 1dB differences in fader position... only to realize afterwards that I was manipulating the wrong fader, on a muted channel! Our mind plays tricks all the time. The only way to know if it's true that your HW compressor is adding some magic is to find an emulation, have a friend bounce a mix using the emulation or not (and accounting for any noise etc) and listen without knowing which is which. Some time after I also made experiments between my real UA 610 and the UAD emulation on the Twin, and my real LA2A and the UAD counterpart, with identical result. Take away the knowledge of what's what, and the only magic that's left is your ability to mix. Of course I don't mean the compressor doesn't add something good. But it's not it about being physical outboard, it's about the fact that you found a setting you like with a unit you like, easy since you were just turning knobs and there was nothing to look at. That's the big advantage of hardware. I've done the changing of the wrong fader many times too. 😄 I doubt there's any emulation for any of the ART gear. It's low end, but the funny thing is, it's in a lot of pro studio's. I see a lot of youtube video's from guys in real working studio's who love it. Although I see the price is going up on it. I use the mechanical bypass buttons on the unit to set the output level so it's equal to the pre-processed input and then I bypass Pipeline in Studio One to A/B the original signal to the ART. If I just rely on the bypass on the unit it's still going through it technically and I'm not getting a true bypass. My problem is I get too lost in VST's. I do much better with just a few knobs that I have to manually adjust. Especially with EQ's. I can spend hours tweaking 1 track with Melda's AutoDynamic EQ. I just compared the remix I did the other night with the ART routing to the original mix of the song completely ITB and there is a night and day difference. One thing I like about using Pipeline in Studio One is, you can reverse phase with it and then use the mix slider to blend it in with the original signal. Although that could be done ITB too. Two things have completely changed the way I mix and master that I have discovered in the last week. This routing thing and the ease of adjusting spikes in your waves in Studio One 5 now. It is so easy and it's graphically responsive so you can see the changes you are making to the waveform in real time. I'd like to upgrade my Melodyne 4 Studio to 5 Studio that detects sibilance and allows you to adjust it so you don't have to use a de-esser next. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gswitz Posted February 15, 2021 Share Posted February 15, 2021 I love good gear. I tend to record a good mic through a good pre. I send that to my compressor. Performing into gear with real time feedback helps. Recording the original before sending it to the compressor is a nice safety, but i rarely need it. I tend to just use the original for compressor wet dry mix. I use maudio align to calculate offset. I love analog fx. Delays. Phasers. Moog everything. Wah. Drive. AMP!!! Cheap gear is cool too. I've had art pres. The most useful thing i picked up was a patch bay. It makes it easy to connect any output to any input without climbing around under the desk. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cristiano Sadun Posted February 15, 2021 Share Posted February 15, 2021 7 hours ago, Shane_B. said: I've done the changing of the wrong fader many times too. 😄 I doubt there's any emulation for any of the ART gear. It's low end, but the funny thing is, it's in a lot of pro studio's. I see a lot of youtube video's from guys in real working studio's who love it. Although I see the price is going up on it. I use the mechanical bypass buttons on the unit to set the output level so it's equal to the pre-processed input and then I bypass Pipeline in Studio One to A/B the original signal to the ART. If I just rely on the bypass on the unit it's still going through it technically and I'm not getting a true bypass. Haha great minds Yeah the Art is definitely an alright piece of kit. But that's a bit the point... it's never the kit, it's the person using it. Or at most the combination. That Neve console with banks of 1073s will still sound like crap in the wrong hands. 7 hours ago, Shane_B. said: My problem is I get too lost in VST's. I do much better with just a few knobs that I have to manually adjust. Especially with EQ's. I can spend hours tweaking 1 track with Melda's AutoDynamic EQ. Absolutely! Haptics and clarity of purpose are the main benefit of outboard. Besides the looks and the fun of course! Plus, you usually don't want to buy rackloads of the stuff, so it limits your choice that for some people is very beneficial. 7 hours ago, Shane_B. said: I just compared the remix I did the other night with the ART routing to the original mix of the song completely ITB and there is a night and day difference. I don't doubt it. It means you're better at using the ART than whatever else you were using before! On a side note, this can be an indication that you're not yet in terms of goal/solution when it comes to get a mix you like. If you were, you would get just as good results ITB as not - because great mixes don't just "happen" - they are the result a very deliberate set of choices which, nowadays, are quite irrelevant of the type of tool - hardware or software. That said, when it comes to learning stuff the sky's the limit and we never stop getting better if we want (it's the fun of playing an instrument or recording or mixing, and most stuff worth doing)... and when you want results here and now, the best tool is the one that gets you there! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jim Roseberry Posted February 15, 2021 Share Posted February 15, 2021 I struggled for years to get good DI recordings of Fender style (passive) electric-bass. The sound was clean/clear... but "anemic". Tried numerous SansAmp racks/boxes, Solo-610, and many other DI options... but the sound was never what I had hoped. Finally decided to invest in a couple Neve channel-strips. Boom! There's the sound I struggled so long trying to achieve. The bass has clarity/definition... and authority. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bruno de Souza Lino Posted February 15, 2021 Share Posted February 15, 2021 13 hours ago, Shane_B. said: I use the mechanical bypass buttons on the unit to set the output level so it's equal to the pre-processed input and then I bypass Pipeline in Studio One to A/B the original signal to the ART. If I just rely on the bypass on the unit it's still going through it technically and I'm not getting a true bypass. Some people sometimes run effects chains with analog gear where the analog part is just there to color the sound without altering it. Of course, you have plugins that emulate that kind of saturation giving you control over it but... That doesn't cover the investment on that piece of analog gear. 13 hours ago, Shane_B. said: My problem is I get too lost in VST's. I do much better with just a few knobs that I have to manually adjust. Especially with EQ's. I can spend hours tweaking 1 track with Melda's AutoDynamic EQ. Just because you have all the bells and whistles doesn't mean you have to use them. In most cases, getting the plugin that does the job quicker is better than one that does everything. Sometimes, one knob space in the ProChannel is everything you need instead of fiddling around in something like Pro-R or navigating folders looking for the perfect impulse response. You see guys like Produce Like a Pro doing mixes and they have hundreds of plugins, but always seem to use the same 5 or 6. Then you wonder why people are still using R-Bass and R-Voice. It's because they're simple to get your head around having only 3 controls. Good plugins hide unnecessary complexity from the user. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shane_B. Posted February 17, 2021 Author Share Posted February 17, 2021 If anyone's interested to hear a sample of my analog adventure I just added a hardware master test to the thread of a song I posted in the song forum. It's pretty significant comparatively. I did remix it too I didn't just run the original master through the hardware. Here's a link. You don't have to comment or anything unless you want to. Not plugging the post, just showing a comparison. I did a lot of testing and reading a long time ago and found that Soundcloud converts songs better at a specific RMS and Peak level. It still seems to be the case. I forgot and mastered the original post to K14 iirc but I did the remaster to -18 RMS/-6 Peak which seems to be roughly K20. That seems to be the sweet spot. The volume is significantly different between the two so use caution if you listen to both. 👍🏻 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jackson white Posted February 17, 2021 Share Posted February 17, 2021 On 2/15/2021 at 6:19 AM, Jim Roseberry said: I struggled for years to get good DI recordings of Fender style (passive) electric-bass. The sound was clean/clear... but "anemic". Tried numerous SansAmp racks/boxes, Solo-610, and many other DI options... but the sound was never what I had hoped. Finally decided to invest in a couple Neve channel-strips. Boom! There's the sound I struggled so long trying to achieve. The bass has clarity/definition... and authority. Gone down a similar path wrt boxes, etc, but find the bass+setup itself makes a difference. The challenge is can you get close enough with something like the Lindell channel strips? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bruno de Souza Lino Posted February 17, 2021 Share Posted February 17, 2021 5 hours ago, jackson white said: Gone down a similar path wrt boxes, etc, but find the bass+setup itself makes a difference. The challenge is can you get close enough with something like the Lindell channel strips? "Is that triangle hitting clearer because you just changed the power supply or because you never noticed it before?" - Ethan Winer Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Please sign in to comment
You will be able to leave a comment after signing in
Sign In Now