Tim Smith

Setting up a room for mixing and calibrating the monitors can seen like a daunting thing to a home studio guy. It really isn't a difficult thing to correct. While what happens when we DON'T have anything calibrated has already been explained, I will try to explain the same thing condensed in another way, just in case you might not be getting what's going on. Here is a a very real scenario in many home studios- The mids and bass have a longer wave than higher notes. Why is this important in most rooms with no sound treatment? If you could see an audio wave, you would be able to tell the size of the wave itself closely matches the room dimensions of the walls and ceiling. The invisible sound wave matches the visible dimensions of the room. One you can see, the other you can't but we KNOW these invisible waves are close because we know how long a given wave is for that frequency. Why is it important to know this? Because the result is what are called 'standing waves' . These waves will have a tendency to not only color or make muddy lows and mids, it also has the effect of amplifying these same frequencies. If you use a set of monitors that already has some mud, the room will only make it worse. When you hear this in an untreated room the first thing that will fool you is you will think there is too much bass or low mids. What you didn't know is the room only made it seem there was too much bass. As a result you will reduce those frequencies or knock down the bass in EQ. When you play the track back on a more balanced system guess what? It will have all or much of the bass taken out of it. This is because you heard the ROOM and not the real mix. Similar issues can occur if recording something like an acoustic guitar in a similar room. The recording picked up way too much low end woof in that room. SDC mics help in that as well, instead of LDC mics since they minimize the low end. Different rooms can have different hype at different frequencies, but GENERALLY most rooms are picking up and reflecting more bass and mid than high end. How do you solve this? Bass traps can help as can some sound absorption panels here and there. You don't want an acoustically dead room either, you just need to knock the resonances out. Believe it or not normal everyday towels stacked tow or three high and put into some kind of a pretty frame to hang on the wall are more effective than acoustic foam. There is a science to the way this is done. Ceilings and floors are just as important. A carpeted floor or large rug saves you some trouble there. Panels are often hung from ceilings. I've successfuly used electronic correction options with pretty good results. This can save so much work in room treatments. If you can use both it's even better. What I use- IK Multimedia's ARC 3 for my room monitors Sonarworks headphone correction to correct imbalance in my mixing headphones Louder volume works against you while mixing. It is best to mix at lower volumes. Long mixes can cause ear fatigue and you then get the Fletcher Munson effect. This is your tired ears fooling you. This is why a mix always sounds worse the next day because your ears are rested.

Levels are actually a pretty complex subject if we cover all of the applications. For example, if we are exporting to a streaming service the level may be slightly different than a level for a CD master. In your case the audio is simply for rehearsal and needs two things. It shouldn't clip and it needs to be plenty loud enough to be heard for rehearsal without turning the volume all the way up. In order not to clip the signal it has to be under 0db RMS in all parts. The track should be mixed and at least partially mastered to trim the peaks to a place where you can bring the volume up to a consistent level without killing your dynamics. After this is assured, import all tracks . Then either apply the normalize function or automate volume to consistency between tracks. Normalizing will default everything to 0db. To normalize multiple tracks at once hit Ctrl A to select all tracks. There may be other ways to do this in Cakewalk.

Similar here, only I think it's the Horizon bundle I have and a bunch of one offs. Sticking with Waves over the long haul does cause me to occasionally think about WUP. I WUPPED once when I got it for half price. So far using older plugins hasn't affected anything. Fingers crossed. So far as accommodating plugins Cakewalk has to be right up there as one of those DAWs that will take just about anything and keep on ticking. Not so much can be said for others.

The staff view is usable. I have always seen this aspect of the program as having much potential but not nearly as developed as either a dedicated notation program or the staff view in a few other competing DAWs. It could also be said there are some DAWs with the same basic staff view functions as Cakewalk which are more of an afterthought than a well developed function for notation work. Inputting data with a mouse is tough no matter if using piano roll or staff view. This is why most musicians have some kind of a midi keyboard. The keyboard notes correspond to the notes in the piano roll making this task so much easier. The piano roll has many advantages and why I primarily use it over staff view. I think once you get the hang of it you won't go back to staff view. Some advantages I see as easier in piano roll are: - the ability to easily make changes to multiple events all at once using the smart tool and others -The ability to use ghost notes when comparing multiple tacks. This is very helpful to composers since the ghost notes are a quick way to see timing and music relationship with other tracks -The ability to easily change keys and/or tempo -the ability to easily change dynamics -the ability to copy either portions or an entire track to another track. Once done, this data can be more easily manipulated than attempting to copy new data from scratch. i.e. lassoing a portion of data on the other track and dragging it all down a 3rd, or deleting only the high portions of that track and using the low portions for a bass line.

Geesh. I really thought you had an Alembic.?

It isn't ALL a lie. Just most of it.

I think I can relate by looking at those facial expressions. He feels the way I feel after a good poop.

What you talkin' bout' Willis?

No worries @abacab I expected and was prepared for all of it.Believe it or not these kinds of expenses are fairly common with me. Just comparing those necessary expenses to these frivolous ones When it comes to plugins, software updates, improvements and so forth, sometimes I'll buy something because I just think It's good to keep up with it. Right now I'm debating on whether I want to have the latest version of Studio One 5 when it updates. I haven't used the program much but I think it's a good program. I might skip a generation on that, same as Ableton. If Arturia followed what many companies do they might offer a better discount to anyone who recently purchased their last version. They maybe could argue since I received a discount they don't feel that is necessary. If I don't think it's a fair price I simply won't buy it. In that sense they work for me the customer, no matter how harsh that might sound. If their price is too high and no one buys it they are hurting only themselves. Several here have already commented they think 199.00 is too high and even 149.00 is too high. I guess we all have an opinion. In my opinion, this isn't an extensive update. It's a very welcome and nice update though. Just a little early here for someone who just bought VC8 . For me that's probably what is really going on here. To me it's "new" when it really isn't new. I guess V8 has been out for awhile now.

Thanks @abacab Well...my logic ( if you want to call it that ) goes something like this: Within the last 2 weeks my extra expenditures- New tires 1000.00, Fuel pump replacement, 500.00, Tree removal, 2500.00, stumps grinded, 350.00, new outdoor furniture for wife 800.00, New pool liner 1600.00 with me doing the install, Misc property expenses 500.00. I just dropped 249 for V 8. I not very excited about it yet since I don't make 80's genre music. This is small taters, but I think it's too much for me to want to pay right now and I don't think I'm missing out on anything. I have enough synths to make me happy for a long time yet If a 99.00 sale comes along ok I'll probably go for that. I'm not paying what amounts to full retail price. The 199.00 upgrade " if i don't have SQ80 V" is going to be someone else's upgrade. Not mine

I went in for V collection 8 for 249.00 as an upgrade to the software that came with my controller. I haven't seen any upgrade pricing in my email at work. There may be something in the Arturia customer portal on my home computer. I haven't had the chance to look yet. As of now the lowest upgrade price seems to be 149.00. If I spend that I'll be in this for 4 bills. For me that really isn't a discount "if" that's my price. This is what I would have paid retail with zero sales.

I have the 9.99 offer. I already have the Twin L. Hard to beat this price for what it does but I don't need two of em'.

Not fully familiarized with V8 yet. For 149.00 though I might do it. There look to be lots of improvements and additions. Other than Pianoteq it's difficult to find such nice sounding modeled instruments. I don't know what my deal is yet. I have't looked.

I never get good results regardless. I never thought to play like a rock guitarist because I can't play like a rock guitarist. Oh you said 'try'. I have done that.

Big fingers, little strings. This can't be a good thing.

She wasn't THAT small.

I'll be staying away from "dust in a baggie".

I don't know if you have any of the Waves collections. I'm guessing you probably do. The last time I check my WUP it was up there. One non WUP option would be to just buy something like the F6 and when WUP comes up for the collection ignore it until it becomes obsolete. Just buy another F6 for 29.00 I am not willing to buy either the Eventide Split EQ or the Kirchhoff for full price. I try to wait for a sale. If a sale doesn't happen I guess that's my answer.

VST3 if it's there. Apparently it isn't.

I keep looking. I see 64 bit in the spec. Ok. VST 3? Trying to decide if I need to upgrade my old set of AIR plugins.

Yet something else to consider. Eventide's Split EQ uses an entirely different concept. It splits frequency adjustment from transients.

Thanks @Quick Math. This is very helpful. I will check it all out.

Thanks for this info. Yeah a blind test is certainly the best. Hofa blind plugin? I didn't know this existed. A handy way to check what you really like for sure. Did you find this for a better price than it normally is? I would love to see a 50% off sale on this.

Yeah I was told I am borderline diabetic. I have cut back on sweets for the most part. There is the occasional temptation. My wife came back with 1/2 of a fruit topped cheese cake from a women's gathering. They didn't eat it it all and she doesn't want it...............so I figure I need to eat it all at once. That way I won't be tempted to eat any of it later. Most of my friends make faces when I mention cottage cheese, like "I can't believe he eats that stuff" . I LOVE cottage cheese, especially the kind that isn't low fat. My guts haven't turned to cement yet. I have made a load or two of mortar mix.

You'll get there man. Sometimes it's a process to get there. You now know what it isn't.