Tips on how to "fit"instruments properly in a mix

[Tom-D]

Hi
Ive got a song going on right now.And now I want to make the mix loud(not VERY loud, but loud haha)and now I experience clipping and distortion.I bet that its because some tracks are not EQed properly so sth is clipping.Ive tried to analyse all the eq and tried to avoid it(for example Ive cut a lot of bass in guitars and boosted the bass in the bass guitar etc.).But still, there is a lot of clipping.Offcourse I can use a limiter, but I want to use it as little as possible.
And now the question: is there a vst plugin, that can analyse the wave forms of the master bus and show me which particular frequencies are causing clipping ? Or pinpoit me which instrument is doing this.So I can adjust that.Im a total beginner in EQ and I think im doing a lot of things the wrong way.

 

[Torniojaws]

Distortion = the limiter is hit too hard by the source material, or you only have distortion guitar in a given part. Pull down all tracks a few dB, so that you don't get clipping even without a master limiter.

As for analysing various frequencies, a tool called spectral/spectrum analyzer does it. Voxengo SPAN is free and does a good job.
http://www.voxengo.com/product/SPAN/

 

[Tom-D]

Thanks for the reply.Also another question comes to mind.What to do to avoid squashing of drums after limiting ? Especially the snare.
Ive put the Gclip vst on the snare, but still the punch does not cut through.

 

[Torniojaws]

Thanks for the reply.Also another question comes to mind.What to do to avoid squashing of drums after limiting ? Especially the snare.
Ive put the Gclip vst on the snare, but still the punch does not cut through.

GClip as the last plugin on the snare channel, and cut the snare signal as much as you can without damaging its punch too badly (without limiter), and maybe try a transient plugin before GClip. Also try blending a snare sample (50% mix) with the real snare to make it fatter.

 

[JBroll]

There was a big thread on loudness a while back, a bit of search might help there.

Does the distortion correspond to bad behavior out of a few tracks, or is it pretty much constant? If it's the first, tame the naughty tracks a bit; if not, back off on the limiter and consider using something else to more gently pull things down to prepare for the limiter.

Jeff