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Author Topic: This whole "ITB" digital mixing thing is a sham.  (Read 18700 times)

Nizzle

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Re: This whole "ITB" digital mixing thing is a sham.
« Reply #15 on: December 19, 2010, 06:39:07 PM »

tom eaton wrote on Sun, 19 December 2010 13:19

Tony,

this IS a forum of engineers... we should be able to discuss both the general and the nuance of the process... what we want to hear as engineers can be different (and at times inconsequential) to what our clients need from us....

t


Surely, not just engineers.

There is no lack of discussion/ navel gazing/ obsessing about gear on this or any other forum here. I quite enjoy those discussions. It seems to me that a sentiment acknowledging the possibility that a constant focus on gear and the technology as it relates to capturing music can distract our attention from what, IMO, trumps all of that shit. Tom, your mentioning your "no headphones" sesh resonated with me which led me to recount a recent session WHICH THEN led another member of this forum to "re-focus" and possibly gain some perspective on what we're all really trying to do(I think). Capture magic. I know it sounds lofty, but I think that magic is why we're all here exchanging thoughts, observations, etc...

Just to be clear, Tom - I'm not in any way suggesting you aren't aware or don't agree with any of my observations. I just sensed a persnickety-ness to your response to Tony's observations that sometimes we can get caught up in the technology of it all...

That's all - Happy Holidays, all!

-t
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tom eaton

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Re: This whole "ITB" digital mixing thing is a sham.
« Reply #16 on: December 19, 2010, 06:44:44 PM »

Me? Persnickety?

Well, I never.

No, my comment to Tony was colored by his recent analog/digital thread in the Acid Test forum.  And I was hurt that he didn't send me flowers or anything for the studio name.  Or chocolates.  Or even a nice little card.

I don't expect much.  

As you were... I'll leave the ranting to Nicholas, before everyone thinks I'm as crazy as he admits to be.

t

Nizzle

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Re: This whole "ITB" digital mixing thing is a sham.
« Reply #17 on: December 19, 2010, 07:58:22 PM »

tom eaton wrote on Sun, 19 December 2010 15:44

Me? Persnickety?

Well, I never.

No, my comment to Tony was colored by his recent analog/digital thread in the Acid Test forum.  And I was hurt that he didn't send me flowers or anything for the studio name.  Or chocolates.  Or even a nice little card.

I don't expect much.  

As you were... I'll leave the ranting to Nicholas, before everyone thinks I'm as crazy as he admits to be.

t


Be well, Tom.
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kats

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Re: This whole "ITB" digital mixing thing is a sham.
« Reply #18 on: December 19, 2010, 08:37:16 PM »

tom eaton wrote on Sun, 19 December 2010 15:19

Tony,

Firstly, you never thanked me for naming your studio.  

      http://recforums.prosoundweb.com/index.php/m/337963/2571/?sr ch=empire#msg_337963

Secondly, weren't you just complaining about the "state of the art" in converters in another thread?  It's all part and parcel of the same thing... this IS a forum of engineers... we should be able to discuss both the general and the nuance of the process... what we want to hear as engineers can be different (and at times inconsequential) to what our clients need from us.  Most of us are in this biz because sound turns us on to some degree...when something sounds "right" or "real" (not necessarily the same thing at all) there's a satisfaction in the presentation...

I think we all understand that the presentation IS NOT the most important factor, but it is a part of the communicated art...and those of us who have decided to chase after this insane career tend to be inclined to seek something beyond "good enough."

t


Hi Tom! Well wouldn't you know it, you did recommend the studio name and it goes without saying (and it went without saying) thank you!

And yes I totally agree with the rest of your post. I didn't mean to imply otherwise or that I was giving the world some new revelation, but I think this forum  is more encompassing than just a gear site and I was touching on a different aspect of it. <--- Which btw was an acknowledgement of the point you were making in yours. I fail to see any contradiction between what either of us is saying.


 
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Tony K.
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Entertainment is a bore, communication is where it's at! - Brian Jones 1967

Fletcher

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Re: This whole "ITB" digital mixing thing is a sham.
« Reply #19 on: December 20, 2010, 06:33:22 AM »

The way I've always looked at my end of a session is to help "create" the best environment possible for the players - make them comfortable in the room, and hopefully that environment will inspire them to play what ever it is they're playing as well as they can possibly play it -- AND THEN to capture and present that performance [or performances] with the most faithful recreation of the artist's intention possible.

Some recordings want to be "Lo-Fi" - and they should be presented that way.  Other recordings want to be presented with the "highest" possible level of fidelity - in which case the tools shouldn't be the limiting [no pun intended] portion of the program.  

Yeah - we all know you can make a "great" record on a cassette 4 track - with a Tascam 3500 console - recorded to ADATs and mixed "in the box".  That's not the point.  The point is that some music lends itself to the highest levels of audio "integrity" -- and for that music you should be using and pushing the tools to the best of your ability to help the artist present the music in the manner most conducive to that artist's vision.

Nothing more, and hopefully - nothing less!!

Peace.
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CN Fletcher

mwagener wrote on Sat, 11 September 2004 14:33
We are selling emotions, there are no emotions in a grid


"Recording engineers are an arrogant bunch.  
If you've spent most of your life with a few thousand dollars worth of musicians in the studio, making a decision every second and a half... and you and  they are going to have to live with it for the rest of your lives, you'll get pretty arrogant too.  It takes a certain amount of balls to do that... something around three"
Malcolm Chisholm

kats

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Re: This whole "ITB" digital mixing thing is a sham.
« Reply #20 on: December 20, 2010, 10:35:16 AM »

...IE to be a facilitator.

I totally agree. One thing we can probably agree on is that sound plays a large part  in fostering those "moments".


The dumb thing about all this philosophizing is that it really comes down to everything.
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Tony K.
http://empirerecording.ca

Entertainment is a bore, communication is where it's at! - Brian Jones 1967

Tomas Danko

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Re: This whole "ITB" digital mixing thing is a sham.
« Reply #21 on: December 21, 2010, 11:21:02 AM »

tom eaton wrote on Sun, 19 December 2010 15:27

I have to sympathize with Nicholas to some degree.  There is a tangible thing that is lost when you record... always has been, seems like it always will be so.  If your intention as a recording engineer is to preserve as much of that initial magic as possible, it does become frustrating to feel that you have to work after the fact to make things resemble the magic that you heard before it went onto the recording medium.  I feel it, too.
 

Since most of us deal with hyper reality anyway, not realism, I tend to ignore hearing what the instrument really sounds like in the real room.

Instead, I listen to what the mic signal sounds like, and go from there in order to get the desired result.
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Jim Williams

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Re: This whole "ITB" digital mixing thing is a sham.
« Reply #22 on: December 21, 2010, 11:28:10 AM »

Tomas Danko wrote on Tue, 21 December 2010 11:21

Since most of us deal with hyper reality anyway, not realism, I tend to ignore hearing what the instrument really sounds like in the real room.

Instead, I listen to what the mic signal sounds like, and go from there in order to get the desired result.


You can learn a lot by listening to the instrument in the room before you mic it up. Don't discount reality.
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Jim Williams
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Fletcher

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Re: This whole "ITB" digital mixing thing is a sham.
« Reply #23 on: December 21, 2010, 11:53:11 AM »

What Jim said -- the idea [at least in my twisted mind] is that the player generally will have a better idea of what they want something to sound like than I will... so by listening to where they are, and then trying to "translate" that sound  / texture into the "recorded world" while listening to make somewhat sure that the new sound being added will "fit in" with / not detract from the entire presentation is my usual goal.

Nothing is "absolute" - but for me its definitely a "base line" starting point the great [vast] majority of the time.

As always, YMMV.

Peace.
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CN Fletcher

mwagener wrote on Sat, 11 September 2004 14:33
We are selling emotions, there are no emotions in a grid


"Recording engineers are an arrogant bunch.  
If you've spent most of your life with a few thousand dollars worth of musicians in the studio, making a decision every second and a half... and you and  they are going to have to live with it for the rest of your lives, you'll get pretty arrogant too.  It takes a certain amount of balls to do that... something around three"
Malcolm Chisholm

Tomas Danko

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Re: This whole "ITB" digital mixing thing is a sham.
« Reply #24 on: December 21, 2010, 01:29:38 PM »

Jim Williams wrote on Tue, 21 December 2010 16:28

Tomas Danko wrote on Tue, 21 December 2010 11:21

Since most of us deal with hyper reality anyway, not realism, I tend to ignore hearing what the instrument really sounds like in the real room.

Instead, I listen to what the mic signal sounds like, and go from there in order to get the desired result.


You can learn a lot by listening to the instrument in the room before you mic it up. Don't discount reality.

Perhaps I'm not expressing myself correctly, it often happens when a Swedish person tries to write in English.

Of course I listen to the sound in the room first, and also move whatever around to make it sound good acoustically (including microphones, musicians and what-have-you).
It's just that I don't use that aural experience as reference for the end result, since it always gets lost in translation anyway.

Instead, I consider the signal from the microphone when doing aesthetic decisions and so on.
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"T(Z)= (n1+n2*Z^-1+n2*Z^-2)/(1+d1*z^-1+d2*z^-2)" - Mr. Dan Lavry
"Shaw baa laa raaw, sidle' yaa doot in dee splaa" . Mr Shooby Taylor

Nick Sevilla

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Re: This whole "ITB" digital mixing thing is a sham.
« Reply #25 on: December 23, 2010, 02:13:39 AM »

breathe wrote on Thu, 16 December 2010 21:40

My mixing system (PTHD3 Accel with Apogee AD/DA16-x's and Rosetta 800 mixed analog) going through my current setup of JH-416A, with API, Drawmer, Distressor, and Manley channel compressors, with the Thermionic Culture Culture Vulture Mastering Anniversary Edition on bass and guitar duties, mixed through a Dramastic Obsidian bus compressor into a Crane Song HEDD192, I feel like I can melt face.

Nicholas




ae;iubvpiz ;tugeint7G3R ;IEUG ;;ehirutv ;eoziuhxetv.kjbdnxd;ritvnhz;hn;iuhyrtbvs;iu
.
.
.
aweiuygtbV :IUWgrviugz'/ljbwvet.

I think I make more sense.

Now namesake.

Please.

SHOW ME THE MUSIC.

Merry Christmas
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It is quite possible, captain, that they find us grotesque and ugly and many people fear beings different from themselves.

www.nicksevilla.com

Tomas Danko

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Re: This whole "ITB" digital mixing thing is a sham.
« Reply #26 on: December 23, 2010, 07:21:31 AM »

Nick Sevilla wrote on Thu, 23 December 2010 07:13

breathe wrote on Thu, 16 December 2010 21:40

My mixing system (PTHD3 Accel with Apogee AD/DA16-x's and Rosetta 800 mixed analog) going through my current setup of JH-416A, with API, Drawmer, Distressor, and Manley channel compressors, with the Thermionic Culture Culture Vulture Mastering Anniversary Edition on bass and guitar duties, mixed through a Dramastic Obsidian bus compressor into a Crane Song HEDD192, I feel like I can melt face.

Nicholas


ae;iubvpiz ;tugeint7G3R ;IEUG ;;ehirutv ;eoziuhxetv.kjbdnxd;ritvnhz;hn;iuhyrtbvs;iu
.
.
.
aweiuygtbV :IUWgrviugz'/ljbwvet.

I think I make more sense.



Yeah, sure.

But can you melt face?
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http://www.danko.se/site-design/dankologo4s.gif
"T(Z)= (n1+n2*Z^-1+n2*Z^-2)/(1+d1*z^-1+d2*z^-2)" - Mr. Dan Lavry
"Shaw baa laa raaw, sidle' yaa doot in dee splaa" . Mr Shooby Taylor

Nick Sevilla

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Re: This whole "ITB" digital mixing thing is a sham.
« Reply #27 on: December 26, 2010, 02:48:22 PM »

Tomas Danko wrote on Thu, 23 December 2010 04:21

Nick Sevilla wrote on Thu, 23 December 2010 07:13

breathe wrote on Thu, 16 December 2010 21:40

My mixing system (PTHD3 Accel with Apogee AD/DA16-x's and Rosetta 800 mixed analog) going through my current setup of JH-416A, with API, Drawmer, Distressor, and Manley channel compressors, with the Thermionic Culture Culture Vulture Mastering Anniversary Edition on bass and guitar duties, mixed through a Dramastic Obsidian bus compressor into a Crane Song HEDD192, I feel like I can melt face.

Nicholas


ae;iubvpiz ;tugeint7G3R ;IEUG ;;ehirutv ;eoziuhxetv.kjbdnxd;ritvnhz;hn;iuhyrtbvs;iu
.
.
.
aweiuygtbV :IUWgrviugz'/ljbwvet.

I think I make more sense.



Yeah, sure.

But can you melt face?


You could ask my clients, except they would not be able to respond, due to their mouth being welded shut from my MELTING THEIR FACE!!!

lol
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It is quite possible, captain, that they find us grotesque and ugly and many people fear beings different from themselves.

www.nicksevilla.com

MagnetoSound

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Re: This whole "ITB" digital mixing thing is a sham.
« Reply #28 on: January 03, 2011, 03:23:04 PM »



Enjoying this thread enormously!




(Especially this bit)


kats wrote on Mon, 20 December 2010 15:35

The dumb thing about all this philosophizing is that it really comes down to everything.


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Music can make me get right up out of my chair and start dancing or it can get me so pumped up I have to walk around the block.
It can also knock me back and make me sit there and cry like a little baby. This shit is as powerful as any drug!!!
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Chromatic Paste

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Re: This whole "ITB" digital mixing thing is a sham.
« Reply #29 on: January 04, 2011, 12:50:55 AM »

Here is an interesting article about Spike Stent now mixing "in the box" from Sound on Sound:

"Another development in part furthered by Stent’s move to the US was that he had to change his working methods to suit today’s technology, music, working methods and budgets. After 25 years of swearing by mixing on an SSL, Stent decided to adapt to the current in-the-box method. He is coy when prompted for specifics, but does explain “I mix most urban and pop records in the box now, while rock and acoustic records are usually done via the G-series desk. I like the way that the guitars and real drums are affected by the sound of the desk, and while I’ve been doing a combination of mixing in and out of the box for the last six years, last summer when coming back to England after mixing the Muse album, my assistant, Matty Green, and I had some time on our hands and really got the microscope out to make sure we could get that same sound in the box as from the desk. I had some time on my hands to experiment and really managed to dial that in.”

“Moving to mixing in the box wasn’t a watershed moment, more of a natural progression. Computer processing has become more powerful, and plug-ins are so much better than they were. I normally use shitloads of Waves plug-ins, the E-Channel SSL bundle, I like the Chris Lord-Alge plug-ins, the Waves PuigChild, I use the R-Bass a lot, [Metric Halo] Channel Strip is an old favourite, for delays I use [Sound Toys] Echoboy a lot, and for colouring things I think the [Tech 21] Sansamp is great. I also like some of the Pro Tools 8 plug-ins, even though I’m still using 7.4 — I’m waiting until 8 stabilises. I learned very early on that not jumping straight in with new software was the best strategy. In addition, producers, record companies, and artists are used now to the fact that they can call you, even two months after your mix, and request a change, and you just bring up the Session and five or 10 minutes later the change is made. So mixing in the box is about time and being flexible, and of course it also saves on the budget.”

http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/feb10/articles/it_0210.htm
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