Completely "In the Box"

[silvermaples]

Do you guys feel that you can professionally mix an album 100% in the box with good results or do you have to have some outboard gear to really get a completed professional sound?

Nothing with tracking, just from the mixing end of things.

I'm just curious as to what everyone feels, especially some of you guys that have all that nice outboard gear ;-)

-Cory

 

[RichS]

I think it can be done and I am sure it already has.

 

[guitarguru777]

Andy used to mix totally ITB ... so there is your answer

 

[Fbarre]

The professional sound mostly comes from the band or artist being really good prepared, having all instruments set up professionally, always using new strings on guitars and bass and new skins on drums, tuning guitars and bass before every take, having great songs and capturing a great performance with a high quality signal chain.

If the performance and the recordings are great, it will be hard to make the song sound bad. Just ask yourself if you can hear if a production has been done itb or otb.
It really comes down to how experienced and confident the engineer is with making desicions about how to manipulate and shape the recorded tracks, regardless of itb, otb or hybrid mixing.

But to answer the question, lots of productions have been made completely itb and sound great. Especially now that we have plugins like vcc or other console emulations.

 

[MindMunch]

Yes.

 

[egan.]

Yes.

 

[DanLights]

No doubt. I believe the source and signal chain are much more important to the "pro" sound, and of course knowing what you're doing with what you have

 

[avrinder]

No doubt. I believe the source and signal chain are much more important to the "pro" sound, and of course knowing what you're doing with what you have

spot on

 

[ze kink]

Spike Stent mixes completely ITB nowadays. Enough said.

 

[Mikaël-ange]

Already a reality... Never hear about Robert Orton, Serban Ghenea, TAL HERZBERG...

 

[DanLights]

Already a reality... Never hear about Robert Orton, Serban Ghenea, TAL HERZBERG...

no, not really

 

[Mikaël-ange]

no, not really

 

[BLUElightCory]

The professional sound mostly comes from the band or artist being really good prepared, having all instruments set up professionally, always using new strings on guitars and bass and new skins on drums, tuning guitars and bass before every take, having great songs and capturing a great performance with a high quality signal chain.

This is the secret to recording success. They might as well take down Gearslutz and just put up this quote.

 

[abt]

^ How about we just shorten it to "You can't polish a turd".

 

[Damage, Inc.]

The skill of the engineer makes more of a difference than the equipment he uses, so I feel that any competent engineer should be able to make a 'pro' quality album at practically any halfway decent studio. However, the number of really good engineers that still use outboard gear in the digital world, especially summing boxes and compressors, should tell you something.

 

[Loki Laufeyiarson]

^ How about we just shorten it to "You can't polish a turd".

According to mythbusters, you can...

 

[nialldoran]

yeah definatly, i think it comes down to the "Andy sneap could make a better mix with my plugin folder, than i could with his studio setup" thing, depends on each engineer and then i think that using hardware is the engineers choice and taste