using waves c4

[sparkyness]

Yep. There was that interview a while back someone posted in which CLA mentioned that he doesn't ever change the settings on some of his outboard gear. In fact IIRC, he said that he'd buy another piece of the same gear to use rather than change "his" setting. Bizarre, but not beyond the realms of belief.

 

[KeithRT99]

^ yeah i thought CLA uses the same chains and setups pretty formulaically when mixing.

also, i use the C4 to tame the low mids and low end on my guitars, just slap it on and listen to see if it sounds better, if it doesn't, then you don't need it.

 

[A Toolish Circle]

a lot of people come to that conclusion, and they pay *money* to people who didn't! Trust me man, if you stick with it (and actually read all these very helpful replies) you'd be on your way to becoming one of them. Or... you could just fork over a few grand (or more) and have someone else do it for you, but you'd still remain clueless. Your move.[/QUOTE ]


I disagree , i'm pretty sure there are plenty of chances to learn from the someone u pay to mix your stuff and to get feedbacks on , esp if u recorded ur own material

I learnt alot from sending my stuff away to get mixed and mastered and the feedback on what i could improve from the mixers and mastering dudes has been essential in my learning curve

I know a good mate of mine whose an awesome engineer recently sent his own band to be mixed by someone else because he didn't want to risk it doing it himself , and before that he never used to mix his own stuff because he didn't feel he was up to it

Part of the learning curve is knowing what ur limits are and what you can do well and what u need help on from others.

I think a few of the dudes here have recorded with Frederik Nordstorm have picked up quite a few tips from him and Peter wichers(ex soilwork ) has now become a producer himself

Plus i'm sure if Andy or James offered their services to the members here alot of them would snap up at the chance to work with them and have them mix our stuff

I know I would

Trying to be producer/engineer/mixer at the same time can drive people nuts which is why on the big projects there are so many more credits. Plus some people are better recording engineeers than mixers and some are the other way around and some are good at just producing so it's good to be a master of something rather than attack all 3 fronts at one go

just me 2 cents

 

[stringy_]

a lot of people come to that conclusion, and they pay *money* to people who didn't! Trust me man, if you stick with it (and actually read all these very helpful replies) you'd be on your way to becoming one of them. Or... you could just fork over a few grand (or more) and have someone else do it for you, but you'd still remain clueless. Your move.[/QUOTE ]


I disagree , i'm pretty sure there are plenty of chances to learn from the someone u pay to mix your stuff and to get feedbacks on , esp if u recorded ur own material

I learnt alot from sending my stuff away to get mixed and mastered and the feedback on what i could improve from the mixers and mastering dudes has been essential in my learning curve

I know a good mate of mine whose an awesome engineer recently sent his own band to be mixed by someone else because he didn't want to risk it doing it himself , and before that he never used to mix his own stuff because he didn't feel he was up to it

Part of the learning curve is knowing what ur limits are and what you can do well and what u need help on from others.

I think a few of the dudes here have recorded with Frederik Nordstorm have picked up quite a few tips from him and Peter wichers(ex soilwork ) has now become a producer himself

Plus i'm sure if Andy or James offered their services to the members here alot of them would snap up at the chance to work with them and have them mix our stuff

I know I would

Trying to be producer/engineer/mixer at the same time can drive people nuts which is why on the big projects there are so many more credits. Plus some people are better recording engineeers than mixers and some are the other way around and some are good at just producing so it's good to be a master of something rather than attack all 3 fronts at one go

just me 2 cents

Aye, I would absolutely kill to just watch some of these guys work. I've often wanted to compare my mixing to a big named dude. In fact, I think when Andy gets around to mixing the new Chimaira he should send ME all the raw tracks as well, and I'll try my hand at mixing them. Then we can post the results on the forum and I'll be driven off by laughter!

I'm trying to soak up as much as possible through the Internet, but I can tell right now that things would go 100000% faster if I apprenticed at a good studio with a good engineer.

Oh well, I'm 20 and I still have time left. I just received my letter of acceptance from the engineering school I'll be getting my electrical engineering BS from, so hopefully I'll end up in the audio world somehow. I could work for SSL as a field technician...that'd be really cool. Lol!

 

[JeffTD]

Actually I think the opposite is true....I think most of the mega mixers at this point do have some sort of template, or starting point. There is no way that they could mix 2 songs a day at that level with out it. I think the key is to have a similar starting point and tweak from there. Ive continually been surprised when checking my recall notes and noticing that the console had many of the same settings from a metal project to a blues project. I dont think in terms of presets in analog world but i find there is a point where the board starts to sound good.

PS I learned alot just from adapting the CLA presets.

I think I over-simplified what I was saying... what I meant was that they all don't do the same exact thing to every project.

It's going to be similar and they probably tweak from a 'base' setting they've established along the way, but it's not like "well, we slap this, this, this, this, and this here, a bit of this and this on the master bus, and wahlah".

 

[Suicide_As_Alibi]

I think I over-simplified what I was saying... what I meant was that they all don't do the same exact thing to every project.

Haha - as I go through a project, I tend to save a preset for an effect before I make any major changes (basically out of habit, I do the same thing when I'm using word or whatever). And every time I start a new project, I load in the presets from the one before... and then spend hours going through each one and tweaking it more and more until it's completely different. It's so fucking stupid but I still do it every single time

Steve

 

[JBroll]

Silly question, anyone ever try this?

I'm fucking broke so I have to find 'unorthodox' ways of doing things that would be quite simple for people who had the money to spend on a decent piece of software... this means that when I'm trying to tame low end on my recordings I wind up not able to use this lovely little C4 gizmo. What I do instead is duplicate the track in question and set one of the two out of phase, then on one of them I drop one band of a DAW's included EQ completely and play around with the Q and range to basically make a 'mold' of the frequencies that need taming (or in some cases, highs that need boosting and/or compressing). Once I've done this, I copy the 'cut' one to another track and combine the original and the first 'cut' one so that I have one track of just the frequencies that need compressing and another (the second copy that I made) with everything but those frequencies, so that when the two are in the same stereo location and volume they sound identical to the original; the excised low end can then be compressed on its own, among other things. Sounds complicated, yes, and I may have gotten something backwards (and I'm also positive that I explained it poorly), but it's cheap as fuck and it seems to work just fine. Anyone else ever done stuff like this?

Before I forget, one thing that does sound interesting on this approach is reverbing the two track parts differently (just a bit more 'room size' on the mids); I don't know how else to do this but I'm pretty sure it's out of my range so I haven't looked it up. Also, light flanging on the cut-out section adds a lot to the sound without being the cheesy 80s metal sound that makes kittens cry.

Just thought I'd throw all that out there.

Jeff

 

[mjlaudio]

I think I over-simplified what I was saying... what I meant was that they all don't do the same exact thing to every project.

It's going to be similar and they probably tweak from a 'base' setting they've established along the way, but it's not like "well, we slap this, this, this, this, and this here, a bit of this and this on the master bus, and wahlah".

Fair enough didnt mean to call you out there. I think the problem with the waves plugin thing is the insinuation(sp) that those are the only presets CLA uses. He is using years worth of presets and concepts im sure. I think the hardest thing to know is when it sounds cool enough or if you're lucky great. Thats where its at.

 

[TheStoryteller]

I'm fucking broke so I have to find 'unorthodox' ways of doing things that would be quite simple for people who had the money to spend on a decent piece of software...

There are some excellent freeware multiband compressors out there as well. These two come too mind:

Slim Slow Slider C3 - download here: http://www.geocities.jp/webmaster_of_sss/vst/

GVST Gmulti - download here: http://www.gvst.co.uk/

I don't think these are worse than the C4 in any way.

 

[gabriel g.]

First of all. EQ the guitars is enough. You dont need any multiband for guitars at all. Multiband is realy interesting for a drum group or a master because:

A multiband is able to compress differnent frequences in a different way.
Guitars aren´t between 22-16000hz they are in the middle.

So it´s also stupid to cut of the midds in a guitar track.

Second to make your guitars sound great. Use a good mic or just record with a pod. Don´t fuck around with some sm57 fakes. You need an ass blow of sound trhough your monitors. And then you have something to mix.

When you have some strange fizzle and you have to cut a lot of high frequenzes you can just forget your recordings.

When you have good tracked guitars. You must give every instrument in your mix his differnent place in the frequenzes. There for you can use an analyser.

and when you´ve done that, you can but an multiband on it. And than a maximizer or something like that.

 

[Gnash]

When you have some strange fizzle and you have to cut a lot of high frequenzes you can just forget your recordings.

And than a maximizer or something like that.

Yeah, the C4 is great (On a bus) I always boost a little.

 

[~BURNY~]

First of all. EQ the guitars is enough. You dont need any multiband for guitars at all. Multiband is realy interesting for a drum group or a master

So I guess Andy is stupid right?
The idea of the multiband on the guitar is to focus on a single band thus keeping the boominess under control (especially when palm-muting).
Sure you can use an eq to do that but you won't keep the energy constant which is the idea behind the use of C4.
But you're absolutely correct about getting the sound right in the first place cause no MB comp or EQ will make a poop sound like gold.
Don't use C4 unless you know what you are doing.

 

[sparkyness]

multiband is also great for bass. The very nature of the low-end of the bass is different to the mid-high/highs you need for cutting through a mix with it.

Paul Northfield always used this technique very well. His stuff with Trujillo esp. on The Art of Rebellion is bass compression at is best to my ears.

 

[Keiffer]

First of all. EQ the guitars is enough. You dont need any multiband for guitars at all.

seems you've missed the concept of (Dynamic EQ) using it to tame the bottom end and why it's advantageous over normal EQ.

 

[chadsxe]

First of all. EQ the guitars is enough. You dont need any multiband for guitars at all. Multiband is realy interesting for a drum group or a master because:

Seems like you missed out on the point. Do me a favor and try it. Then A/B it with a eq cut. To me it sounds a lot more natural and less offensive when you tame thing with a notched compressor als the C4.

A multiband is able to compress differnent frequences in a different way.
Guitars aren´t between 22-16000hz they are in the middle.

Yeah no. They "TEND" to be most active in the mids but there is still a lot of useful stuff almost everywere else.

So it´s also stupid to cut of the midds in a guitar track.

Never say never..

Second to make your guitars sound great. Use a good mic or just record with a pod. Don´t fuck around with some sm57 fakes. You need an ass blow of sound trhough your monitors. And then you have something to mix.

This is all based on context. A pod might sound like crap to a lot of people and the same can be said about a 57. There is a lot more to the equation then a mic.

Not trying to start a fight, I am just giving my opinion.

 

[gabriel g.]

I dont undestand your opinion as a fight!!!

I think it´s cool to have someone with different opions to talk.

First: I don´t think andy is stupid. I think is a awsome engineer.

Second:I´m recording about 6 years. I know there are people on this forum who do this alot longer then me.
But my experience says: You must have a very good sound when you recording or your end result sucks. So for the podxt users who haven´t the possibility to record there great loud amps. Try the diamond rectifier. It´s an amp of the metal pack. This one sounds real close to a real one.
And I think, start with little bunch of plugins and dont use the full palette.
Then your result is much more natural and dont sound like techno.

 

[chadsxe]

Well I agree with you 100% when you say its always best to have a great sound in the first place. But because this was out of context with the converstation that was going on it ended up in a simply miscommunication.

 

[gabriel g.]

I do understand what you mean but:


The first question was about c4 on guitars and so on, or am I wrong???

I think I could help someone to say to him that the best sound is first of all a question of great sounding tracks.No plugin will help us with fucked up tracks

 

[chadsxe]

Ha...I have no clue anymore. At least we are on the same page now.

 

[JBroll]

Great sounding tracks are great sounding tracks, but a great sounding mix is not going to be mashing everything together and that's the end of that. It's called a 'mix' and not a 'parfait' for a reason.

Jeff