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Originally Posted by shadowman So, I'm finally trying to learn how to record things properly after doing it my own little way for a while. I just came across this site, and I was hoping that someone here could explain some of the basics of a mix bus to me. I'm sure this is most basic of the basic to everyone here, so I hope you guys are willing to help out a newbie!
I've always done everything in the box before, and I use a few different programs like Audition or Cubase. When I've recorded before, I've just recorded everything onto tracks, adjusted their volumes and EQ'd them some, placed them in the mix, and then just mixed everything down to a single file. But after reading a lot here and getting into it all more, I want to learn how to use buses more.
I now understand that I can use mix buses to send groups of tracks to and then process them all at once. For example, I could create a drum mix bus and send all of my individual drum tracks to it to apply compression to them all at once. So, I have some questions about the mix buses I'll be using in my DAW. Here we go...
1. When I send tracks to a mix bus, there is a volume fader and a wet/dry function. How does this volume mix with the normal volume of the tracks? If I have the volume set on my tracks and I boost the volume of my bus, am I just increasing the volume of the tracks all at once, or is this bus like another separate track that's in addition to the individual tracks?
2. With the wet/dry function, I assume that this is the amount of the effects and the original signal that I have in the bus. Should you keep both balanced (like 60% wet and 40% dry), or does it matter if you have both at something like 70%?
3. I see many people talking about parallel compression in the mix bus, especially on drums. In my DAW, I can use either serial or parallel effects. What advantage does using parallel have?
4. Finally, I hear people talking about the 2 mix bus. Is this the same thing as the mixdown I'm doing when I mix all my tracks down to one file, or is it something completely different?
Sorry I'm asking a bunch of newbie questions. I just hope someone has the patience to answer me! I'm just looking to learn. This is a great site! |
Let me start with #3 and give you my cynical snarky answer - parallel compression is great for when you don't know the difference between compression and limiting, and therefore don't know how to set a subgroup compressor.
What happens is people limit the subgroups rather than compress and it totally destroys the sound (in a bad way, not a cool way). Since it's blended in with the uncompressed signal, they can mask the sound of the limited signals wimpy attack and it doesn't sound like it's set wrong.
If I were to be positive with my answer, I'd say it's an easy way to mange dynamics, but the truth is, ultimately, if you're really careful with your subgroup compression, you'll wonder why you'd have the uncompressed signal at the same time. Seriously, if you want an uncompressed sound, why would you be sending it to the subgroup compressor.
This is all a generalization anyway. There's lots of reasons for both approaches, but I do believe that the parallel approach allows people to be lazy.
Going back to #1. I don't understand what you've written. When you've got a subgroup buss, you've got a send and a return. Adjusting either which affect the volume of the compressed tracks. Adjusting the send will also increase the compression.
If I were you, I start by sending the group to the subgroup buss compressor. Monitor only the group return. Tweak the compressor until you've got the sound you want. Then monitor everything with the fader for the return all the way down. Then gradually bring it up until you've got the sound you want.
That might also create some gain staging problems. You might also want to consider bussing the same source (we're talking drums, right?) to a dry bus with puts the uncompressed signal on a fader. That will allow you to pull down the dry (uncompressed) signal to achieve the balance between wet and dry and keep proper gain staging. If you pulled down all of the drum faders, that would affect the level your sending to the compression which you may not want to do. Also, I'm pretty sure if you put the same compressor plugins acres the dry send, but bypassed, you'll get the same latency and avoid phase problems.
I don't understand what you're asking in #2 at all.
For #4, the 2 buss or mix buss or stereo buss are all the same thing. Do you use a master fade for your mix and put anything on that? That's what people are talking about.