1

T4.5 'Fix Mix'

Task 1
Melodyne
I used Melodyne on all vocals except for 'group vocals' as using Melodyne
on them made no difference at all, as the group vocals sung an occasional
'pump it up', although adding to the texture, the group vocals were not
strong enough to stick out of the mix therefore I left them alone.
To use Melodyne, I selected the audio track, went to the audio FX plug in
Melodyne and once the window opened I soloed the track and selected
'transfer' within melodyne's window and played in the audio.
Once the audio had 'transferred' into the Melodyne window, and in the
correct key, I selected the pitch corrector and moved the notes so that
they were as close to the center of the note as they could be without
obtaining a robotic, auto-tuned sound.
When adding Melodyne to the guitar and bass I made sure that I selected
the correct algorithm. For a guitar I needed to select a polyphonic
algorithm due to the multiple notes played and for the bass, a melodic
algorithm, which I also selected for the vocals, I Melodyned the guitar and
bass as although care had been taken to make sure the instrument was in
tune, sometimes whilst playing, lower down the neck of the instrument, it
can sound in tune but the higher up the neck, it can sound out of tune and
therefore need fixing.
Once I was happy with how the instruments sounded, I bounced the track
in place onto a new track so that if I wanted to work on the rest of my mix
in a room without Melodyne, I could.
Compression
Compression can make sounds appear
softer and it can shrink an audio files
dynamic range.
'"THRESHOLD also known as the
'ceiling' as when the signal hits it, all
above the ceiling becomes quieter. -10 is
lower and will not have as much of an
effect as 40. Below threshold,
compressor has no effect. The
compressor reduces the volume to stop
the input signal from getting louder and
potentially avoiding digital distortion.
OUTPUT / MAKEUP GAIN - A compressor
will only adjust the volume when the signal becomes too loud or gets too
high. The Make-up gain comes into effect and this lets you bring the
signal back up to a healthy level and gives back the dB that was lost from
compression.
RATIO - The ratio indicates how much the audio is compressed or turned
down by. For example if the ratio is 2:1, anything above the threshold is

Daisy Grace Wakefield

T4.5

L3 BTEC Music Technology

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turned down. This means that if there is 2dB above the threshold, then
only 1dB is allowed through. An alternative way of looking at it is that it
has been turned down my 1dB, or 1dB gain reduction. 4dB above
threshold then 2 dB are allowed through, 8dB above, only 4dB allowed
and if 10dB the 5dB are allowed through.
Essentially 2:1 ratio means half.
ATTACK - The Attack time is about how quickly
the volume is reduced or lowered when the
input or signal exceeds, or goes over the
threshold. If the attack time is too slow, then
for a short time after this, you could hear
bursts of loud, uncompressed, music coming
through which would not be good for your
mix.
RELEASE - The Release time on compression is
about how quickly the volume can return to
normal when the input or audio is no longer
above the threshold. If you allow the volume
to come back too fast, then it will be obvious that the signal level is going
up and down just as if you were turning the volume up and down on a CD
player when listening to music or on a remote when watching television." (Taken from my 'Unit 2 Write up')
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On the vocals, I used a bus (Aux 2) and I
decided to use a pre-set, 'bright vocal',
and slightly change some of the settings
as well as adjusting how much of each
instrument I wanted to sent to the
compressor.
I used the Vintage Opto compressor on
the kick drum and top snare to create a
more punchy sound. For the bottom snare
and rack tom I used the Vintage VCA
compressor to make it sound louder and
brighter and on the floor tom, bass and
guitar I used the studio FET compressor and changes the threshold and
knee to give more power to the lower
frequencies.
I used the classic VCA compression on
the hats and the platinum digital
compressor on the overheads where I
changed the threshold slightly on each
one.
Drums into a software instrument
I recorded individual drum hits that I
could sample and use in case, when it
comes to the genres recordings, a
microphone wasnt clipped in correctly or
we did not arm a channel, we had back up drum sounds.
The drums recorded in I decided to change into a software instrument. I
selected a new software instrument, highlighted the new track and clicked

Daisy Grace Wakefield

T4.5

L3 BTEC Music Technology

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on the recorded audio file. I clicked on 'factory', 'audio-to-score', velocity
threshold'. I processed this and selected the new (green) file and
highlighted all notes within the piano roll and went to 'functions',
'transform', selected 'fix' and depending on what instrument I was turning
into a sample I.E kick drum or floor Tom, changed the note as on a
sampler, each part of the drum kit has its own note. I the opened up the
EXS24 sampler, went to 'factor', 'drums and percussion', 'acoustic drum
kit' then selected the setting I wanted. Lastly I went to 'functions',
'transform' and 'fixed velocity' to make sure that all the drum hits were the
same velocity.
You could have a mixture of recorded in drums and a sampled version of
the drums to give the drums more power in the mix, which is what some
people do to their mixes.
SNR EQ
I started by cutting away unwanted
frequencies not associated with the
instruments active frequency range.
Cutting away these frequencies also
helps to get rid of any unwanted
background noise (SNR). Once I had
cut frequencies away, I started to look
at
frequencies I could boost. The only tracks
I boosted belonged to both the overheads
and the hats and I felt that the hats and
cymbals were buried under the mix and
needed their own space.

Reverb
I used a bus (aux 1) on vocals
with Melodyne on; V1, V1.1, V2,
V2.1, V3 and V3.1. I selected the
space designer reverb, adjusting
some of the pre-set settings then
sending the amount of reverb I
wanted to the vocals. It took me several
attempts before I was happy as I did not
want too much reverb on the vocals as the
vocals were already doubled and did not
want the vocals to sound as if they had
such an obvious echo on them as in some
parts, the vocals are not in time with each
other.
DBFS & Headroom
Throughout the mix, I was conscious about
how much headroom I had to play with so
that I could avoid distortion. The highest

Daisy Grace Wakefield

T4.5

L3 BTEC Music Technology

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value in the digital world we could have without distortion occurring is
0dBFS. I kept checking once any changes were made to the mix that the
recording levels did not exceed the 'yellow zone', between 6 and 12

dBFS. The lowest value the output went down to was -4.1dBFS. I also
made sure that each track did not clip and so the overall mix.
I had enough headroom in the end to avoid distortion but if I were to do
this again I would have tried to stay in-between -12dBFS and -6dBFS so
that I have more headroom to mix with.
Dynamic range
This refers to the difference between the quietest and loudest part of the
waveform (in dB). From the waveform you can see if there is any digital
distortion. From my mix, it is clear from the sine wave that there isn't any

distortion.

Daisy Grace Wakefield

T4.5

L3 BTEC Music Technology