MIXING IN
A HOME
STUDIO
I frequently get emails from my students about how they
should go about the mixing process in a home studio set-up
but in a more professional manner. Here are a few tips that
might help you to avoid some common mistakes and achieve
great results.
Tips for Beginners
1. Mixing is about getting a good balance and making the
elements sit correctly in the audio spectrum. Every single
instrument or track should be well heard and should not clash
against each other.
2. Your ears are your primary reference monitors! Make sure
you take good care of them.
3. It is a common misconception that we should have high-end
reference monitors, AD/DA converters or an expensive sound
proofed room to mix. First, you need to understand your
sound and how your studio monitors translate to your ears in
your room.
4. Most DAW’s come with tonnes of plugins to mix and master,
you don't necessarily need to spend on purchasing third party
plugins to get a good output.
5. Make sure that you are seated in the “sweet spot” of your
Left and Right monitors, such that the monitors are facing
you to form an equilateral triangle.
6. Mix your song in a low volume to get the best results.
Mixing at really high volumes might cause ear fatigue or
headaches and could really mislead your judgement.
7. Do not spend long hours mixing one song, take frequent
breaks and maybe step out to clear your mind.
8. Remember, the brain always teases your ears! Sometimes
you might tweak a good-sounding track and end up messing
up your original tone.
10. The golden rule is to keep it simple.
Getting a good mix
1. Listen to the song a couple of times in order to get an idea
of the feel and the structure so tou can get what the artists are
trying to convey.
2. Some people prefer to keep a reference track from a similar
genre to get an idea of how your song should sound in your
final mix.
3. Note down the levels of your reference mix, the panning
positions and the effects and how they sound in the mix.
4. Always remember to balance your levels before jumping in
to insert your plugins.
5. Make sure that while editing or applying effects and
plugins, you’ll need to audition the tracks in the context of the
mix and not while it’s in solo.
6. Make sure that you always record or track your song with
good levels and not try to fix your mess while mixing. This is
one of the worst mix practices and will definitely not produce
a good end product.
7. Try to solve most of your balance issues by using the
faders in your mix and by panning. Do not depend entirely
on plugins to save your mix. In most cases, adding an
unnecessary number of plugins in the wrong places only
makes your mix worse.
8. Don't overdo things like EQ and compression, etc. Try to
maintain the original sound and tone of your instruments
and vocals.
ORGANIZING your MIX SESSIONS
1. Label your tracks neatly so that it's easy to navigate. Using
color coding on your tracks also makes it more simpler to spot
tracks and groups in large sessions.
2. Use a template-based approach with your EQ, dynamics and
effects sends, auxes and import your tracks to work faster and
save time.
3. Always send a pre-mix version to your client, get some
feedback and find out what they really want in the song.
4. Plan your effects sends and returns and in a session with a
large number of tracks, grouping helps quite a bit.
5. Listen to your mix from a bunch of different sources like
your home music system, in your car and through your
phones, so that you will know how your mix sounds on other
devices and make the necessary changes in order to get it
sounding great irrespective of the device.
6. Mixing in mono always helps you in making better mixing
decisions as all your sound is narrowed down to the dead
center, making your individual levels more apparent.
7. Mix in low volumes and always trusts your ears.
Author: Baba.L.Prasad. He is the owner and chief Sound/Mix and Mastering Engineer at Digi Sound Studio. He also teaches Sound
Engineering and Music Production courses. For more details, visit www.digisoundacademy.com
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