{"id":882,"date":"2016-03-14T13:09:39","date_gmt":"2016-03-14T13:09:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/abletunes.com\/blog\/?p=882"},"modified":"2021-07-07T12:47:30","modified_gmt":"2021-07-07T09:47:30","slug":"why-mixing-is-a-worthy-tool-to-master","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/abletunes.com\/blog\/why-mixing-is-a-worthy-tool-to-master\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Mixing Is A Worthy Tool To \u201cMaster\u201d?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>This article is mostly for those thinking of (or have already decided to) \u201cconverting\u201d their audio hobby into profession. It\u2019s not a \u201cDAW-specific\u201d thing, whatever DAW you run just have a read. At the same time, being a BIG Ableton fan, I can\u2019t but mention that according to recent <a href=\"https:\/\/edmranks.com\/top-5-best-music-production-software-daws\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">EMDranks<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/ask.audio\/articles\/the-top-11-most-popular-daws-you-voted-for\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Ask.Audio<\/a> opinion surveys \u200a\u2014\u200a <strong>Ableton Live is leading the global race as the most popular DAW<\/strong>.<\/div>\n<div>This time I\u2019d like to share some extra reflections on the most complex subject in sound production domain, and yep its all about <strong>the everlasting science (&amp; art) of mixing audio<\/strong>.<\/div>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-932\" src=\"https:\/\/abletunes.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/everlasting-science-of-mixing-audio.jpg\" alt=\"everlasting-science-of-mixing-audio\" width=\"600\" height=\"338\" \/><\/p>\n<div>Ain\u2019t trying to deliver the ultimate truth here, but still have an opinion on the subject, having spent over a decade studying, experimenting, digesting \u201cthe hardest part\u201d of the formula both with a tutor that I took in 2013 (ca 10% from overall time spent) and via self-education both prior and after the course (ca 90%).<\/div>\n<div>I wish I could have learned it faster\u200a\u2014\u200abut I\u2019m still staying VERY positive that I\u2019ve finally made it at all, having multiple panic attacks through the years that <strong>I. Will. Never. Ever. Make. It.<\/strong><\/div>\n<div>So here we go and hopefully you\u2019ll make a good use of it and will reach you professional destination faster.<\/div>\n<h4>7 Things You\u2019ll Improve Dramatically Having Learned The Concepts Of Mixing (random-ordered):<\/h4>\n<style type=\"text\/css\">\n#page {<br \/>\n}<br \/>\np:first-letter {<br \/>\n  float: left; \/* float to let text wrap around it *\/<br \/>\n  font-size: 3.5em;<br \/>\n  color: #333;<br \/>\n  font-family: 'PFDinDisplayPro Medium';<br \/>\n  letter-spacing: 5px;<br \/>\n}<br \/>\n<\/style>\n<div>\n<p>1 Your arrangement and production skills (that in turn will make you stronger as a producer). <strong>You will understand how to get more spending less. Doing less. Redoing less.<\/strong> How to save tons of time properly planning things in advance and going step by step, steadily approaching the goal\u200a\u2014\u200aa balanced, well-crafted mixdown.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p>2 It will make you stronger as a live performer (even a great production may get ruined by terrible PA setup in the venue )\u200a\u2014\u200aand I\u2019m sure you meet it multiple times when going out. What\u2019s the point spending hundreds of hours producing and perfecting it and then having it ruined by a drunk (or non-qualified) guy responsible for PA set-up in the club? Understanding mixing will allow you to double-check the settings yourself during sound-check and if something goes wrong\u200a\u2014\u200ato introduce the corrections necessary.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p>3 Understanding mixing makes communication with mixing\/mastering engineers you may still want to place the orders to\u200a\u2014\u200aFAR easier. That saves your time, money and improves the final quality of your artwork. Sounds big, right?<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p>4 Without a doubt it will make your message to the world far more powerful, <strong>especially when you got vocals<\/strong> in your productions\u200a\u2014\u200apersonally I\u2019ve been to dozens of concerts where I could hardly grab what the vocalist is singing. PSHT! I got dozens of communications with venue PA\/FOH people trying to deliver this simple message to them during the show with 50\/50 success at best.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p>5 Right, it\u2019s a long way to go, it won\u2019t happen in weeks (you\u2019re lucky to get it within months)\u200a\u2014\u200ahence there still will be a need to hire pro mix\/mastering engineers for your projects for a while but still: starting from the very first hours you spend learning, your communication with the pros will be improving steadily\u200a\u2014\u200aand what could me more important than mutual understanding inside of the team working over the same project?!<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p>6 There is a high probability that one day you\u2019d like to move on and switch from producing\/performing music to something else, more complex like sound design, spacial audio tech, creating Max4Live devices, doing game audio or music for film. With mixing concepts learned, digested and implemented on practice\u2026 Wait\u200a\u2014\u200ahave your chances to get there just DOUBLED? TRIPLED?<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p>7 Yep, working with the goodies a-la factory loops from the <a href=\"http:\/\/abletunes.com\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">favorite label<\/a> is nice and fast, and for some it will surely do, but if you\u2019re aspiring to get a taste of the picture as a whole\u200a\u2014\u200aand use it for creating your unique sound signature (apart from other things)\u200a\u2014\u200ayou MUST learn what is mixing and how-to-do-it properly, so just think about it.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>More than this\u200a\u2014\u200aactually it\u2019s hard to imagine a person calling himself \u201ca sound producer\u201d and having no solid understanding of this subject.<\/div>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-933\" src=\"https:\/\/abletunes.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/mix-3D-structure.jpeg\" alt=\"mix-3D-structure\" width=\"600\" height=\"339\" \/><\/p>\n<p><center>Source: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gearslutz.com\/board\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Gearslutz.com<\/a>, Author Unknown<\/center><\/p>\n<div><strong>Once again\u200a\u2014\u200aevery mix is a (VERY) complex 3D structure (some say\u200a\u2014\u200aeven a 5D one).<\/strong> We have dozens of components that should be added to the formula in a specific order and\/or proportion while the parts of our equation (eg. COMP\/EQ\/REVERB units) may have up to a dozen tweakable parameters (or more).<\/div>\n<div>No big deal to imagine the myriads of probable combos. And we did not even touch the gain staging, monitors setup, HP nuances, etc.<\/div>\n<div>Hopefully I\u2019ve provided you with some \u201corganic\u201d meditation food\u200a\u2014\u200ato make you start thinking in that direction. I highly recommend you to invest time and effort digging the subject and it will \u201cpay you out\u201d pretty soon.<\/div>\n<div>Take care.<\/div>\n<div><strong>Article by Andrey Romanenko<\/strong><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This article is mostly for those thinking of (or have already decided to) \u201cconverting\u201d their audio hobby into profession. It\u2019s not a \u201cDAW-specific\u201d thing, whatever DAW you run just have a read. At the same time, being a BIG Ableton fan, I can\u2019t but mention that according to recent EMDranks and Ask.Audio opinion surveys \u200a\u2014\u200a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1280,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-882","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-tips"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/abletunes.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/882","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/abletunes.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/abletunes.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abletunes.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abletunes.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=882"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/abletunes.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/882\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1326,"href":"https:\/\/abletunes.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/882\/revisions\/1326"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abletunes.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1280"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/abletunes.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=882"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abletunes.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=882"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abletunes.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=882"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}