All right, milestone four. This is the last step in our capstone project. You'll commit to any last changes in your arrangement and recording in response to the constructive peer review from your last assignment, and then do a final mix and post the result. Lowden has provided a boat load of valuable information about mixing. I'll add some tips and things to avoid. You'll have a chance to hear my final mix of my example song called, Do Unto. The mix is the last step in the process of realizing your artistic vision. What characteristics does a good mix have? Start with balanced levels, so that you can hear all the parts clearly. There's a clear focus on the melodic element. In this case the vocal. Spacial placement is important via panorama or dimension that fits the ascetics of the song. Another aspect of a good mix is overall tonal balance. Balancing the frequency spectrum low, middle and high. You want processing that promotes emotion, interest, clarity and presence with an atmosphere and feeling appropriate to the song. What is your overall level, and what's the dynamic range between the loudest and the softest parts of your song. That should be appropriate to the genre and to your song in particular. Okay let's talk about some issues that come up as we try to achieve these goals. First one is monitoring. Mixing with audio monitors versus mixing with headphones. When you have a chance and it's not always possible but when you do you automix on audio monitors. The reason is that when you listen on headphones the sound is isolated to your ears. But when you hear audio monitors, you're not only going to hear the sound, you're going to feel it with your body. Particularly the low frequencies. As a result when people mix on headphones, when I hear my students mixes, I can almost always tell when they're mixed on phones. Because they tend to overemphasize the bass frequencies. The other thing is, the panorama. Once again, when you use headphones, the right side is isolated to your right ear. The left side to your left ear. But when you hear audio monitors, you're hearing a little bit of each side. So when you want an accurate indication of what your listener is going to hear on speakers, you need to mix on speakers. Another issue is mixed volume. No matter what the energy level in your song, resist the temptation to mix at a loud volume. nothing tires the ears out faster than high sound pressure levels. Rest, take breaks, let it sit overnight. It won't sound the same to you in the morning. I guarantee it. Another issue is playback systems. You want to listen to as many playback systems as you can. Listen on your laptop, lipten on, listen on earbuds, listen on audio monitors if you have them. Sometimes, I'll burn a CD and listen out in the car. I have a bunch of different playback systems as part of my home studio. Some of them are really expensive. Some of them are inexpensive and small. So, you have to make a compromise that sounds the best on a broad range of playback systems. So what are the most common mixing tools? Almost always you're going to do level setting, you're going to use some reverb, you might use delay you don't have too. You're going to do some dynamics processing with compression and limiting. Definitely going to use some EQ, some panning, and some, perhaps some special function processors like pitch control. I would say the most common issue that comes up in production stemming from inexperience is the tendency to overuse processors, to use too many processors and to use extreme settings. The key to good use of EQ dynamics and other processors is moderation. Another useful tip is to separate out the drum sounds, each to it's own channel strip, that way you can assign a different kick drum. A, a different snare, in other words you can orchestrate them, and you can also use different processing. When you get to dynamics this is one of the most important issues you're going to face in your mix and that's one of the most misunderstood. We'd like the overall level of our mix to peak at unity gain, where the output channel strip is registering at zero, zero. But we can't let it go over or it will incur digital distortion. Digital distortion is not like the rich warm tube distortion that we love from a rock or blues guitar. And it's not like the very subtle hint of harmonic distortion that some people think accounts for the warmth we hear from a song recorded to tape. Digital distortion is ugly. Lowden's tip to trust your ears on this is extremely important, don't necessarily trust what the DAW is telling you graphically, listen and trust your ears. So let's talk a little bit about dynamics by genre. Keep in mind that different genres have a different common practice regarding dynamic range. Here are a few genres on a continuum from the most dynamic range to the least dynamic range. As you can see on the graphic, the least dynamic range is the classical genre and the most is heavy metal. You can make your own list. At the very least, start thinking about the genre you are using for your project. A dry voice is very clear, very present and very close. And that's why when you listen to advertising. You are going to hear the voice over with no reverb at all. But too much reverb can cause a part to sound distant or indistinct. Panning, I usually envision the ensemble on a stage. So you can place the performers, starting in the middle with the vocal. Usually the drums and bass are close to the middle, and then you can work out to the sides. You might want to put the guitar on one side and the piano on the other, because they're playing in the same frequency range. But you're, once again you're after a sense of space and a sense of clarity. In terms of EQ, it's good practice to use both cuts and boosts, but I recommend if you limit your boosts to ten DB at the very most. And usually you can get it done with less than 5 dB. If you do a lot of boosting in your EQ, you are going to mess up your gain levels and it's going to have a detrimental effect on your mix. Another part of your processing where trade-offs is important is equalization. If you are going to EQ to try and make your mix sound warmer. If you overdo it, it's going to sound muddy. If you try to go for a sweet sound, it could end up sounding nasal. If you want to mix the sound, or a particular part to sound very present, it could end up sounding thin. If you go for an airy sound, it could be sibilant. If you go for bright, if might end up being harsh. So keep in mind that, you're always balancing these trade offs. It's just a very important part of mixing. A final tip. When you're bouncing your mix, be careful to set the start and end points of your bounce so as not to cut off the full ramp up of audio at the beginning, and the full ring out in reverb decay at the end. You might even do what I do which is to leave a cushion at the beginning and the end, and then trim your bounce after the fact. So mixing is a subject that is as deep and wide as music itself. We say that a mix is never really done, you just reach a point where you have to stop. Above all, don't hurt yourself and have fun.
