Idiot Guide to mixing and mastering please. (Reaper)

fretmeister

My little musical project is coming along nicely. I'm happy with the tones, the arrangements, and the actual recordings seem to be going well.

But I have no idea how to turn that into something polished. Never done it before.

Is there an idiot's guide to mixing and mastering somewhere? Book / video / website? Something that is so basic it's almost offensive to you experienced people?

Really really basic - like every step after I've unarmed the last track from recording it. But not done anything else with it at all.

I'm using Reaper.

Roland

Do any of the Reaper videos on their website, or on YouTube, provide the the level of information you’re looking for? I looked at a couple earlier this year. They take time to watch, so it’s not an instant guide. They discuss what to do, and how to do it in Reaper.

poopot

Have a read of this:

https://modernmixing.com/how-to-mix-music/

fretmeister

poopot said:

Have a read of this:

https://modernmixing.com/how-to-mix-music/

Thank you. 

Musicwolf

https://www.soundonsound.com/reviews/mixing-secrets-small-studio

 

Note that mixing and mastering are two quite distinct processes.  I'll venture that the first problem that you will encounter is getting your mixes to 'translate' i.e. they will sound quite different played on different systems / in different rooms.  Be prepared to spend some time listening on different systems, making notes and revisiting mixes.

Stuckfast

First of all, don't worry about mastering. Get the mix right and mastering will either be unnecessary or a very thin layer of icing on the cake.

Mixing used to be called 'balancing' and that is still a good way to think about it. A mix needs to be balanced in two senses:

(1) The relative levels of all the different instruments need to make sense, so that they sit well together.

(2) The mix as a whole needs to have a balanced frequency spectrum, rather than being muddy or tinny or over-bright or whatever.

In my experience most people are very aware of (1) and do a fairly good job of getting it right, but many people ignore the importance of (2).

Remember the most important tool you have is the fader. Don't use EQ, compression or other processing for the sake of it, or because somebody else tells you that's how to get a good sound. Use it only if you need it to fulfil goals (1) and (2). Plenty of classic records were mixed with no compression and little or no EQ.

PolarityMan

youtube is great for this, my sources are prob heavily biased towards metal but there is 100% going to be actual mixers you like who have content on you tube for free. 

John_A

I think the most important thing is knowing in your head what you want it to sound like, that’s why I find recording and mixing covers a piece of cake.   With original material you really need to have a goal, once you have, the technique to get there is something you can learn by reading up or trial and error 

hollywoodrox

poopot said:

Have a read of this:

https://modernmixing.com/how-to-mix-music/

Wow that’s a great resource. I’m currently watching lots of logic videos 
And other related stuff

andy_k

Treat mastering as a separate process.
I set up my projects as folder sessions, instruments into a mix bus, into a master bus, into master track.
I put mastering plugins on master bus, which can be used to get an idea of the final product, but they are not there to be used all the time.
You want to leave your final mix in a form which has all the sound you want , with enough headroom to allow a mastering engineer to have room to make the final adjustments, this will include EQ cuts and possible boosts, and final loudness adjustments, it is vital that this does not go over 0db, and has to allow some margins for conversion to MP3.
I only use my Master bus plugins when I want to render out an mp3 for playback on other systems, or to compare to mastered mixes.
Which in practice, is at the end of a mixing session, but I don't consider my mixes as being mastered, I do not have the equipment or experience to get it right just yet.
We now have products like Ozone, which can do a good job of giving you the tools you need, and it is useful to treat this as a separate process.
I leave my mix at a stage where I have 3-6db headroom, and render as a 48k 24bit Wav, which can then be processed in a mastering session.
Mastering can also be done with stems, which gives the engineer even more control of the final mix.
It also used to be the process of finalising track order, and volume balance for cutting to vinyl, so the reasons for the process are now somewhat blurred.
It is a good idea to arrange projects as albums, which makes more sense when working with final 2 track mixes, but when working on single tracks it can be done within the project, as I explain above.
Always treat it as a separate process to give your ears a break, and it can be better to use a second set of ears- if you trust them.

PolarityMan

andy_k said:

Treat mastering as a separate process.
I set up my projects as folder sessions, instruments into a mix bus, into a master bus, into master track.
I put mastering plugins on master bus, which can be used to get an idea of the final product, but they are not there to be used all the time.
You want to leave your final mix in a form which has all the sound you want , with enough headroom to allow a mastering engineer to have room to make the final adjustments, this will include EQ cuts and possible boosts, and final loudness adjustments, it is vital that this does not go over 0db, and has to allow some margins for conversion to MP3.
I only use my Master bus plugins when I want to render out an mp3 for playback on other systems, or to compare to mastered mixes.
Which in practice, is at the end of a mixing session, but I don't consider my mixes as being mastered, I do not have the equipment or experience to get it right just yet.
We now have products like Ozone, which can do a good job of giving you the tools you need, and it is useful to treat this as a separate process.
I leave my mix at a stage where I have 3-6db headroom, and render as a 48k 24bit Wav, which can then be processed in a mastering session.
Mastering can also be done with stems, which gives the engineer even more control of the final mix.
It also used to be the process of finalising track order, and volume balance for cutting to vinyl, so the reasons for the process are now somewhat blurred.
It is a good idea to arrange projects as albums, which makes more sense when working with final 2 track mixes, but when working on single tracks it can be done within the project, as I explain above.
Always treat it as a separate process to give your ears a break, and it can be better to use a second set of ears- if you trust them.

So I dont usually mix into a mastering chain but I have on some projects put a mastering chain on the master bus then as the very last plugin (after the amstering) have an A/B plugin. In my case magicA/B but metric A/B or anything else would work. This prevents any reference tracks from being played back through your mastering chain when your top down mixing so you can reference better.

Some times I'll also whang a pro-q2 on there so I can use the filters to listen to specific freq ranges of the reference tracks, 

The hardest thing with this approach is sticking to it though as its really easy to not take the time to reference and zoom off down a rabit hole tweaking stuff only to come back and reference and realise you've made something worse.

there was another comment on here about how balancing is the easiest prat that people jsut pick up,..weirdly for my I find it the hardest part in that unless your song is very un-dynamic and you have very good perfromances there will def be the situation where you get one section sounding balance and then another section sounds all out of whack. 

Now automation can solve this to a degree but what if its within 1 bar? the old fashioned approach would prob be to ride the fader but for me thats where the compression and limiting come in. 

I'm by no means a fantastic mixer though. 

andy_k

The great thing about Reaper is the folder structure, I mix in a mix bus folder into a master bus folder, into the 2 bus.
 References and my mixes live in a mix folder that sits outside my master bus, so it is pretty easy to solo / mute to compare tracks. I only have Voxengo Span on my main 2 bus, and can send my references through that too.
I find it useful to mix into the plugins on my master bus, and I use FGX which has gain compensation for this purpose, but that gets turned off for the final bounce, then the track goes into my 'Mixes' folder for playback outside the chain.
It all gets turned off for mixes that will be used in a mastering session.
I try and balance my tracks with the clip gain, and use vol automation where it is needed, either on the track or the group folder, which is another good thing about folders-it makes stems easy to create.
Kenny has done a few vids about rendering recently, which explains some of this.

Cirrus

If I could re-iterate the advice I gave before, go and make loads of mistakes, to learn what does what.

Start by balancing mix with faders. Pan things about. Don't be afraid to hard pan. Don't be afraid to emphasise the bits of the arrangement you think are awesome - a perfectly balanced mix can be dull.

Once you've done what you can with the faders and pan knobs, just... listen. Listen for the problems, and listen for the cool bits. Fix the problems without ruining the cool bits. Does the vocal sound like it's dipping in and out of the music? Compress it. Try different compressors and listen - they'll all hold the vocal in a slightly different way. Is the kick too boomy? find where it's boomy and EQ the boom away. Or maybe add click to compensate. Or realise that it's not the kick at all, it's the bass that's boomy.

Is the groove not quite as weighty and punchy as you'd like? Try sending kick, snare and bass to a single track, and compressing them together so they turn into one lump of sound, and mixing that back in with the unprocessed kick, snare and bass. Hey, you've just parallel compressed! Or maybe you didn't need to do that, and you could just compress the drums as one unit and the bass as another unit.

Is the entire mix dull? Boost the high end. Try just the drums, or just the vocals, or the master bus. Try boosting at 8k, 12k, 16k - is one a better option than others? Is there a place you can boost that adds excitement and air to the sound without also making things sound sizzle, or harsh, or brash?

There's always loads of different ways to approach various issues, and honestly the only way to know what to do it to practice loads, and you begin to learn what works for you.

fretmeister

I'm beginning to think about paying someone to do the mix!  

Lazy? Moi...

I still remember the very first recording I ever did.

Actual tape. Play my parts then go to the pub. Pop back into the studio occasionally to see if any over dubs were needed. (No mobile phones in those days!)

Listen to the finished article later!

poopot

fretmeister said:

I'm beginning to think about paying someone to do the mix!  

Lazy? Moi...

I still remember the very first recording I ever did.

Actual tape. Play my parts then go to the pub. Pop back into the studio occasionally to see if any over dubs were needed. (No mobile phones in those days!)

Listen to the finished article later!

Or... give the stems over for the next “mix challenge”

see what others make of it!...

poopot

Or... have a crack at mixing someone else’s stuff... that way you’re not emotionally invested in the track and you may be more objective in your approach...