Production music woes

[tha_lode]

Heh.

I think a declicker might help you out in that situation. There is never time to find the source of the problem, only time fix it...

Reminds me I once did a doc where the score had layered in some sounds of someone walking across the floor on the floor above. Of course the director never noticed in the editing room, and I had to do some serious looping and reverb trickery to get rid of that part of the song. (it was a minimalist electronica/glitch type track)

And also why limit/maximize the tracks to 0db? It makes inserts in protools distort even if you are doing nothing but a slight highpass...

ps. Since this i my first post I guess I should say hi.
I work in post in Norway. 50/50 divided between TV stuff (mixing docs and docuseries) and features (mostly dia cleanup and ADR). I work on PT just upgraded to 10.3 and love it.

[Mundox]

Originally Posted by tha_lode

I think a declicker might help you out in that situation. There is never time to find the source of the problem, only time fix it...

What I meant to say was, we mistake these for glitches in dialogue, atmos etc. And don't expect them to find them placed in music tracks intentionally. Bad choice.

Yes, one other thing I hate is when editors use production music that has sfx (like birds chirps, surf crashes etc.) in them!

Anyway, welcome to GS!

[Nate Hoffman]

I just love the tracks that begin and end with roaring hiss. As for the clicks and glitches, sometimes I wonder if those are part of certain samples within virtual instruments that nobody bothered to properly edit. They often happen at the beginning of each note played by a certain instrument.

[kevbrowne]

Where are you getting this production music from?
No company I know will accept tracks with sfx. As for glitchy sounding stuff,we all bought Omnisphere!

[tha_lode]

Originally Posted by kevbrowne

Where are you getting this production music from?
No company I know will accept tracks with sfx. As for glitchy sounding stuff,we all bought Omnisphere!

The doc I worked on was using music from the record a Norwegian artist had released. They simply had never bothered really checking what was going on when you cranked up the music.

[inf0l]

Originally Posted by kevbrowne

Where are you getting this production music from?
No company I know will accept tracks with sfx. As for glitchy sounding stuff,we all bought Omnisphere!

Regarding Omnisphere - are you sure you are following ther TOS?

tagpass posted the following in another thread here on GS:

Originally Posted by tagpass

I do music and sound design for games, and contacted Spectrasonics a while back to inquire about using Omnisphere as a sound design tool. (Elsewhere in their FAQ, it mentions that you cannot use their samples for SFX.)

The way it was explained to me was that you could use Omnisphere's synth engine for sound effects, but not any of the samples contained within the library. What's weird is that many of the descriptions of their patches say they would be great for sound design, but their license seems to prohibit it. Since I'm paranoid, I just never use Omnisphere for anything but music tracks. Ultimately, the tech guy that responded to my inquiry said something to the effect that if I wanted to use Omnisphere for sound design, I could send them any SFX I created with it, and they could decide if it was within the appropriate usage on a case-by-base basis.

[Willeyh]

Originally Posted by tha_lode

ps. Since this i my first post I guess I should say hi.
I work in post in Norway. 50/50 divided between TV stuff (mixing docs and docuseries) and features (mostly dia cleanup and ADR). I work on PT just upgraded to 10.3 and love it.

Welcome fellow Norwegian!

[audiobob]

Originally Posted by Mundox

I deal with a hefty amount of production music on TV shows I mix.

One question to the composers of such tracks: Why would you use patches that sound like digital clock issues/glitches? It doesn't sound good in a post production environment where such sounds are automatically associated with problems. And 100% of the time, they send engineers to a wild goose chase to find the source of the glitch.

Off my chest, now I can relax.

I dealt with this exact problem recently with a piece of custom music for a TV spot. Drove me crazy finding the glitch, come to find out it was a digital click patch that was in rhythm throughout the track. I had the client request the composer remove the patch.

[brandoncross]

To ad to this, I get vinyl emulation fx on tons of production music. I mean, come on, the editors can't hear those small pops with an avid roaring right next to them in an edit bay. When they come to the mix I get,"what's that popping sound" all the time. It's basically unfixable and no one is happy. Composers please just leave out the vinyl plug in.

[kdm]

Originally Posted by brandoncross

It's basically unfixable and no one is happy. Composers please just leave out the vinyl plug in.

This is one reason why productions should be budgeting to hire true composers more often than not, imho; and especially on the modern media world, ones with sound design experience (and even post experience in my case).

We know what is going to work in post and what isn't. Yes, vinyl, glitch tracks are all a recipe for headaches for the editors/mixers. I never use either for this exact reason, unless it's a music-only score that specifically calls for it. The same goes for white noise sweeps, heavy low end bass/subsonic additives, etc.

Production music tracks (not all libraries, but many) are created by musicians writing simply for a general style, not an actual visual, and many will have little or no experience writing around dialog and a scene. To stand out, it's understandable to want to use any "current" sounds and ideas to get the library and then the directors, ad agencies and producers to buy their track.

In the past I've mixed projects with library cuts from major libraries, and the mixes were often too compressed, and the arrangements too busy and too broad spectrum. When you have to mix music that far under VO to make it work because it takes up too much sonic space, the emotional and dynamic impact of the piece suffers.

As the saying goes, you get what you pay for. But at the same time, it is what it is.

[Brent Hahn]

Originally Posted by kdm

When you have to mix music that far under VO to make it work because it takes up too much sonic space, the emotional and dynamic impact of the piece suffers.

In the full mix, the VO needs to be the "lead instrument," so it helps if the composer can think that way.

[smurfyou]

The good ones have a version without FX. If I'm cutting music in I will avoid using such tracks if they don't have an FX free version.

It drives me nuts when I hear a noise in my dialogue and I know it wasn't there before....after soloing tracks I find it in the music.

This is good advice for any new and inexperienced composers out there. Think about any extraneous elements you're adding and how they'll sound under dialogue or VO. Ask yourself if they really are necessary. If you feel they are, provide a version without because chances are everyone else will feel differently.

[kdm]

Originally Posted by Brent Hahn

In the full mix, the VO needs to be the "lead instrument," so it helps if the composer can think that way.

Exactly. When writing under a VO or dialog in a custom score situation, we can write more sparsely, with perfect between-line timings, without worrying about having a paced, catchy cue to attract a director or ad agency, and stand out among the thousands of other library cuts.

[Mundox]

Originally Posted by kevbrowne

Where are you getting this production music from?
No company I know will accept tracks with sfx. As for glitchy sounding stuff,we all bought Omnisphere!

If I had my choice, I would use Xtreme, Beatbox, Big Bang fuzz, etc.
But more and more I am presented with a cheaper alternative which I won't name.

As for real glitches, I think they are mostly related to bad mp3 decoding on FCP side. However, I did have a really bad case where all the tracks in the show had glitches in them, and I investigated and tracked it down to the source files of the library. It does happen.

[steins]

Originally Posted by kdm

This is one reason why productions should be budgeting to hire true composers more often than not, imho; and especially on the modern media world, ones with sound design experience (and even post experience in my case).

We know what is going to work in post and what isn't. Yes, vinyl, glitch tracks are all a recipe for headaches for the editors/mixers. I never use either for this exact reason, unless it's a music-only score that specifically calls for it. The same goes for white noise sweeps, heavy low end bass/subsonic additives, etc.

Production music tracks (not all libraries, but many) are created by musicians writing simply for a general style, not an actual visual, and many will have little or no experience writing around dialog and a scene. To stand out, it's understandable to want to use any "current" sounds and ideas to get the library and then the directors, ad agencies and producers to buy their track.

In the past I've mixed projects with library cuts from major libraries, and the mixes were often too compressed, and the arrangements too busy and too broad spectrum. When you have to mix music that far under VO to make it work because it takes up too much sonic space, the emotional and dynamic impact of the piece suffers.

As the saying goes, you get what you pay for. But at the same time, it is what it is.

So true. I know for sure that some of the time and money I've spent trying to make production music work, could easily pay for a composer. Plus, I would probably get a music mix with some dynamics left :-).

BTW, since I'm new to this forum and there are already a couple of Norwegians posting in this thread, it might be a good time to introduce myself, being a Norwegian myself :-). I'm coming from the 2-channel music mix world, but seeing more and more work in post and 5.1. I've mixed some documentaries, and just completed my first 5.1 movie score mix. I find post work to be exciting, fun and challenging, and it is so nice to be able to work with dynamic content rather than hyper-compressed music mixes. Although I love doing both. I've learned a lot reading this forum, and I hope I eventually can contribute something back.

Stein Tore

[mattiasnyc]

I agree with Mundox and Kdm and others. It's super annoying.

I did a pretty important set of ads for a company and noticed that same thing. In my case it turned out to be distortion and I couldn't figure out if it was on purpose or a result of poor processing, but the tracks were cheap so the producer had chosen to use them. After warnings about potential QC issues further down the line the producer did nothing. So out there are spots that sound like there are problems with them though it's just crappy music.

$$$

[JohnOmix]

This happens to me occasionally even with top-tier libraries like Extreme. Intentional odd sounds. Worst is a clicky percussion sound (that sounds exactly like a lip pop) run through a ping-pong delay! I used to pencil them all out but Izotope DeClick is awesome for this

[Max Holland]

Yeah I have found a lot of library stuff to have weird clicky stuff happening in it, traced back to the original source files and its still there. I figure its bad samples (likely) terrible SRC (less likely) or maybe even time compression to make a 30 second cut time out properly. I declick if I can, just astonishes me it even happens.

[Willeyh]

I got a 3 min "informative" commercial today, set for web and a conference where the box music track contains a 1-2 second white-noise crescendo into-a-break-before-it-hits-the-chorus.

How can anyone find that musical?

And this crescendo part is used in the opening and ending of the 3 minute film.

[coaxmw]

When dealing with composed music I usually request that the client gets the split/stem tracks of the music. It's rare that someone doesn't want to change levels or edits during the mix.
I have had tracks from commercial libraries with poor edits also, maybe a giant click in the middle of the track or a little double drum hit, it's rare but has happened every couple years.

[JohnOmix]

I had a track yesterday where the toms had a really clicky attack. It was annoying to me, but the composer intended it so it stayed in. Plus there were too many to spend 20 mins declicking

[philper]

On a series I mixed a few years ago there were 2 or 3 "cleared" library tracks that the editors used a lot. One of them had a lot of glitchy stuff in it and the other two had snippets of people talking. After doing lots of extra editing to make the talky tracks work w/ picture w/o the talky parts and de-clicking the clicky stuff, I asked them to stop using those tracks. They didn't--not to be mean but they would just not ever remember. So each time those tracks would come up after that I would either used one of my "remastered" versions or sub it for something else if there was no time. In this collection were also quite a few cuts with REALLY wide stereo, and others with serious phase problems between channels (like they used some really cheapo oddball processing). In one case a test mono sum managed to lose all the lead instruments. Those cuts got 'remastered" versions too. But lots of extra work....dumb, terrible composition. My rule is that the better the composer the less I have to mix their music around dialog--they are COMPOSING around the dialog, thanks

philp

[Mundox]

Today's flavor: Left heavy high passed white noise bursts leading into a PTC and a kick drum that resembles closing teeth.