This week I have been working on mixing and mastering my first track roads. I have watched lots of tutorials and used the knowledge I have learnt from reading my books on mixing, it's been an interesting process, but it's where I struggle a lot with mixing, so I need to improve on this. This is a skill that will help me with my future career, it's essential I become competent at mixing, so I think for the rest of the project I will be working on my fourth track, and learning how to mix and master, and perfecting, mixing and mastering all four tracks with the skills I plan to learn.
I started watching a couple of hour-long tutorials on mixing just to learn how to mix properly because the song was sounding muddy.
This tutorial from point blank music school was very interesting.
This was helpful to go into more depth on how to use EQ correctly.
This gave me lots of useful tips.
This guy when really in-depth into EQ from a scientific perspective, and it was really interesting to learn from him, I see EQ in a completely different way now.
Then I started to cut out the unwanted frequencies in every mixer channel, and tighten the parts that made that sound stick out the most. I also as you can see in this picture i cut out the frequencies in the melody with the piano boosted, and vice versa so they aren't playing on the same frequencies, this creates space in the mix.
I did a lowcut on the piano as the low end wasn't necessary. then cut out some frequencies with an annoying sound that I didn't want in there. I have learnt from the tutorials that instead of boosting frequencies, it is better to cut out frequencies.
This sound was taking up to much of the frequency spectrum, it had a lot of reverb on it, so I cut out most of it, and boosted where it sounded the best, and where it gave me the sound that I wanted.
I also lowered the levels on the mixing console. and panned certain instruments to the left, and certain to the right, this is so It creates more stereo space in the mix, and instruments aren't competing with each other.
I also used trackspacer a lot during the mixing process, this picture is me using it on the snare, so whenever the snare activates, it cuts out the frequencies where the blue line is, out of the rest of the song, you can set it to be really accurate and only cut out between the two lines, so where the blue line is, and the white line cuts down is where this happens, where the other blue line is it doesn't cut. this is like a mega sidechain effect.
This took a long time, but it is sounding a lot better, there are still a few things wrong with it, like the drums generally just sound muddy, and I can't seem to change that. I also want the song to sound powerful, especially the drop, but I don't want it to sound muddy. so this is difficult, it just doesn't sound as clean as I would have liked it. and after mixing it, the drop doesn't sound anywhere near as good as it did pre-mix, so i. am going to have another go at this, and research more into how to get the sound I want. through trial and error, I'm sure I will eventually get it. there is also the possibility because i. have heard it so many times, and it is my own work, I'm being a perfectionist, when really it does sound good, I'm not sure.
I then had a go at mastering the track.
To master the track I added a limiter to boost the overall sound and push it to its limit.
I also used ozone elements, and I used a song by Illenium as the reference track to match the width and EQ .
This is the final outcome
in conclusion, I have learnt how to mix and master better and efficiently, there is still more room for improvement, but I am fairly happy with how it has turned out, I do want to have another go at mixing though. I find watching YouTube tutorials a good way for me to learn as I am a visual learner. Mixing and mastering is a skill I need to learn for my future career aspiration. I would say I achieved my goal for the week and the project as a whole is nearly finished and fitting with the deadlines I have set. I will definitely complete the project by the deadline. over the next week, I am going to be finishing and mixing/mastering my fourth track, as well as having another go at mixing roads. I will then be perfecting all four songs and making sure I'm happy with the EP then if I have time, writing interludes.
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