How are People Printing Mixes (Routing) (Checking)

[JSmith1234567]

I am wondering how people are routing/listening/checking the mixes they are printing?

DP can send audio to speakers easily without that audio actually ending up on the printed mix.

If DP has something routed to your main L/R monitor-outs, you will hear it, but that doesn't mean it is actually being printed to the mix-bus or mix-print-track.

In the "olden days", we would monitor off the two-track return on the console, so we knew what was actually being printed to the final mix and be able to hear and check the actual final mix as it went down.

Now in the digital age, if you forget to assign something to the print-bus and master mix-track, it will still come out the control-room monitors and you will hear it, as well as your master mix-track, as long as both are assigned to the main interface L/R outputs.

This, however, again does not mean that it is being "printed".

I've forgotten many times to assign a track to the mix-bus, as DP defaults to your first pair of interface outputs when you add a new track, so you are hearing a full mix but the vocal or whatever isn't actually making it to the actual printed mix?

Unfortunately you can't get DP to default to the mix-bus when you add a track. It will only default to physical interface audio outputs.

[HCMarkus]

I am wondering how people are routing/listening/checking the mixes they are printing?

DP can send audio to speakers easily without that audio actually ending up on the printed mix.

If DP has something routed to your main L/R monitor-outs, you will hear it, but that doesn't mean it is actually being printed to the mix-bus or mix-print-track.

I've had that happen more often than I care to admit. A good reason to have a fairly comprehensive template and to add tracks using "Duplicate" or "Similar" options.

Also a good reason to check mixes before release!

[mikehalloran]

Templates!

Get it right. Know you'll do the same setup again. Save As Template and name it.

Teaching my users and students how to route their tracks so that they mix properly is the hardest lesson—and needs to be gone over and over and over till it becomes intuitive. Templates allow you to get this right without having to triple-check everything.

add tracks using "Duplicate" or "Similar" options.

Yes! Yes! Yes!

In addition, I Mute tracks that aren't supposed to Print. Excluding them from Selection only often results in unpleasant surprises. Conversely, if doing a submix of only a few tracks, I Solo those tracks instead. I do not have to combine Solo and Mute — it's one or the other.

This also works as a time saver—I can Select all and Solo individual tracks (say, Alto and Piano) for my singers to rehearse with. Do the Bounce, then uncheck Alto and check Tenor leaving the Piano solo'd, then Bass etc.

[bayswater]

In case you missed MIke's post, I'd suggest templates. A useful way to think ahead when you start a project. There's a lot you don't know when you start, but a print is something you can always anticipate. I think FM has the state of the art on this.

[JSmith1234567]

I am wondering how people are routing/listening/checking the mixes they are printing?

DP can send audio to speakers easily without that audio actually ending up on the printed mix.

If DP has something routed to your main L/R monitor-outs, you will hear it, but that doesn't mean it is actually being printed to the mix-bus or mix-print-track.

I've had that happen more often than I care to admit. A good reason to have a fairly comprehensive template and to add tracks using "Duplicate" or "Similar" options.

Also a good reason to check mixes before release!

That is what I have been trying to force myself to do too!

I actually have a small sign on my desk in a photo-frame reminding me to do just that!

Still, I find myself forgetting sometimes, with the result of the solo horn or whatever not making it to the final mix, even though I can hear it.

Checking mixes is fine if you are working on records, but when you are doing 60-70 cues, with stereo and 5.1 mixes AND stems, listening back to everything is most often not an option on any deadline.

I am trying to figure out how to listen "off the headstack" like in the old days as it were.

Maybe using one of the mix-track's send's, send it out one of the unused ADAT outputs on my audio interface, then back in and routed to the source selector in my monitor controller?

[HCMarkus]

Checking mixes is fine if you are working on records, but when you are doing 60-70 cues, with stereo and 5.1 mixes AND stems, listening back to everything is most often not an option on any deadline.

Point taken.

Maybe using one of the mix-track's send's, send it out one of the unused ADAT outputs on my audio interface, then back in and routed to the source selector in my monitor controller?

I like that idea.

[philbrown]

In addition, I Mute tracks that aren't supposed to Print. Excluding them from Selection only often results in unpleasant surprises.

I had a couple of situations where I was bouncing and had a track muted, but forgot that track had mute automation, so it would unmute mid-track. SURPRISE! Now I disable tracks entirely in those situations vs.just muting. Depends on the specific situation of course, and I realize there are other ways to handle this. I believe disabling a track entirely frees up those track resources (like plugs) but not absolutely sure about that, to be honest.

[pencilina]

I always go to the tracks window, make the selection and make sure I don't have anything hidden I want printed.

[rukidding]

Using Input monitoring removes the guesswork and allows you to compare live Virtual instrument tracks, stems and mix tracks simultaneously. This is a template without MIDI tracks. Reverb pucks disabled to save resources.
s=5.1 stems (can be stereo), r=reverbs, g=groups. This allows you to hear all your effects recording in real time or use offline bouncing. Toggle speaker icons to compare any tracks in conjunction with using mute tool.

[FMiguelez]

As has been already mentioned above, a good reliable template makes things so much easier and reliable every time.

When there are a lot of mixes and stems to be printed & monitored/checked, I always do the following (which is preset in my template):

* Print everything in real time (the sum of the Stems = the final mix. All signal goes through dedicated buses to record stems and final mix at the same time) while I monitor/check the final mix. The outs of those printing tracks are different (i.e. Out bus 5-6 to a HW mixer), so this way I ensure that what I hear is what I get in the printouts.

Since the sum of the stems is identical to the final mix (clean master fader), that's what I monitor as it gets printed. To check the final mix I just flip it's polarity and check it against the normal stems. If everything is right, then I only get silence, but this is not even necessary 'cause I know the final mix is guaranteed to be correct because of the previous busing.
If you feel you MUST check the final mix anyway, the previous polarity-flipped track could be incorporated into the workflow and printed along everything else, and if you see a flat line it means the mix is identical to the stems. Then all that is left to do is simply delete the flat-lined track.

So it's like shooting 3 birds with one stone; all that printing and checking is done once in real-time. It works really well

If I did a good job, the only difference between the final mix and final master (done separately later) is the final level of the latter (usually 4 to 6 dBFS louder). All EQ, compression, limiting or MB comp is done at the track/stem level for this to work well. If the final master sounds too different from the unmastered stems/final mix, then it may or may not be an issue, depending on what is asked of you, and depending on the style you're doing. This works especially well for orchestral stuff. Music that relies heavily on effects on the master fader will never sound identical to the stems (some music editors/supervisors don't care about this, but a lot do, IME). Doing as much as possible at the stem level, when possible, alleviates a lot of these concerns.

[mhschmieder]

Be careful to make your templates in a naked project that has never had any audio tracks. I got bitten by this years ago, and lost some recordings as the audio recorded tracks from a template-initiated project went somewhere else and got deleted.

I need to update my own templates for VCA, and also for my revised use of Track Groups as an alternate to intermediary aux sends and sub-mix busses.

[mhschmieder]

Although it isn't essential due to all the routing options and computers being more powerful today, I still do a fair number of stem bounces in each project, if for no other reason than I've been burnt one too many times by plugs that go away in some fashion mid-project (e.g., no 64-but version, plug requires phoning in each time and vendor disappeared overnight, incompatibility issues that arise unexpectedly, etc.).

Having said that, I now tend to set each project up for simultaneous stem routing even if I save some of the stems on disc. When I started out, I had too weak of a computer, but also I didn't know at first that there's no "real" limit to the number of auxes or busses. Coming from the hardware world, that had never occurred to me, especially as my pre-DP computer based music experience had been exclusively as a paid studio musician in Pro Tools sessions, where every track cost extra!