O.K., I want to try something here that some of you might take exception to, but let's give it a try. Let's say we have recorded a bluegrass group (banjo, guitar, mandolin and bass). Everything was tracked well, and there's no major problems with sound (they were all recorded perfectly). Now, I'm using Nuendo for processing and mixing, but use whatever frame of reference you are used to in terms of pluginsetc. What plugs would you use on each instrument to get it to sound great, and what stereo bus plugs would you use? Please fight the urge to say "Well you've not given enough information" or what about? Just assume that everything else is constant - afterall it is a hypothetical! Any takers?
Rob
Comments
WindowsXP, 2000, 98 SE ? AMD or Intel CPU ? What kind of speak
WindowsXP, 2000, 98 SE ? AMD or Intel CPU ? What kind of speakers ?
Alright, just kiddin'.
I don't think that you need much in terms of plug ins. I would select a nice, realistic "room" (i.e. reverb plug-in) as an FX send, depending on where you would like to "vision" the band (maybe the "Barn" setting for "reverb type" ... :D ? sorry, couldn't resist ...).
Depending on how well the players did on their individual tracks you might or might not need a compressor. My first choice is always the LA2A or the 1176 on my UAD card, don't know if you have that available. The hardware versions will do in a pinch :D .
You will probably need a little bit of a good quality EQ on some or all of the instruments to acoustically separate them from each other. However, given that they are 4 natural instruments that have very distinct tonal characteristics you should probably go light on this. Don't apply anything unless you really think it improves the mix! Do the good old A/B test ;) . You can use a Highpass on the individual channels if you need to get rid of some "low frequency rumble" such as foot kicks, bumps etc. But I guess you said you were starting with nicely recorded signals so maybe no need for that ...
Of course, I would also pan the instruments so that they appeared as a "group of players surrounding stereo mics". Just play around with it until you find a setup you like.
I would not apply anything to the stereo sum if the instruments were indeed well recorded and evened out a little by compressors in a previous stage.
And I guess that is about it ... :roll: . If you have indeed well recorded signals, less is more! Consider all thoseplug-ins"band-aids" that help fix one or another problem in your mix. The better the material you start with, the less "band-aids" you will need.
I am sure that others will have more and better ideas but maybe this helps to get you started.
MisterBlue.
TDM? RTAS? VST?AU?
TDM? RTAS? VST?AU?