Should I Stay In The Box?

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Drone
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Should I Stay In The Box?

Post by Drone » Fri Jul 03, 2015 7:24 am

I record thru an old Soundcraft 500 desk, with the EQ off, using the direct outs into my PC.

I've been toying with the idea of playing back thru the desk and mixing it all in real time. I sorta did this once before, except I was using Audacity, so I was printing two track stems thru the desk with EQ, and then mixing the stems in the box.

It's an old desk, I don't use the Pads on it, as some of them are noisy, and there's noise on the AUX busses as well, the main buss seems OK for just now.

My other option is a Peavey RQ someone gave me. I've use it before as mic preamps for recording, never played with the EQ on it or anything.

I don't have much in the way of outboard gear, so that also is a factor.
The previous statement is from a guy who records his own, and other projects for fun. No money is made.

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Tims96
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Post by Tims96 » Fri Jul 03, 2015 9:04 am

There's a lot to consider here.

I'd argue that most important is workflow. Do you enjoy mixing on a console vs. ITB? Do you listen better when you're not looking at a screen? The shift in perspective that you get from putting your hands on faders could be a huge factor, either positive or negative.

The other big thing is sonic quality. Do you like the sound of your board? What are your converters? If you're going back out to your board, then back in to print your mix, you're subjecting your audio to another round of conversion, which could negatively impact your mix.

Since there's so much to weight, much of it subjective, I'd recommend just trying it and see what you think! If it's more fun or yields better results, then it sounds like a good idea. If you're struggling in ways you weren't ITB and it adds a bunch of extra time to your mix workflow, it's probably not worth it.

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Post by MoreSpaceEcho » Fri Jul 03, 2015 10:19 am

if it were me, i'd stay in the box. i really like being able to listen to my mix in progress while having the computer do all the work for me. so i can use my brain solely for listening and not moving faders and remembering mutes and such. to me this is a pretty huge deal.

but mixing on a board is certainly more fun, so there's that!

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Drone
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Post by Drone » Fri Jul 03, 2015 10:29 am

I like the idea of mixing in real time, as I come from a live mixing background but my converters are cheap (M-Audio) and I only have 8 channels, 10 if I stretch it.

My current workflow is record in Audacity and dump into Reaper, just because I find Audacity's one click record really easy to do, rather than creating and arming tracks. If Audacity could do multitrack playback it would be a no-brainer.
The previous statement is from a guy who records his own, and other projects for fun. No money is made.

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Post by kslight » Fri Jul 03, 2015 4:32 pm

Without much other gear to mix through, I would just stay in the box.

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Drone
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Post by Drone » Wed Jul 22, 2015 8:24 am

Yep, after setting it up, and wiring it all, I realized I felt like I actually lost flexibility and the ability to finesse things, so back in the box I go :mrgreen:
The previous statement is from a guy who records his own, and other projects for fun. No money is made.

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Post by drumsound » Wed Jul 22, 2015 12:57 pm

MoreSpaceEcho wrote:if it were me, i'd stay in the box. i really like being able to listen to my mix in progress while having the computer do all the work for me. so i can use my brain solely for listening and not moving faders and remembering mutes and such. to me this is a pretty huge deal.

but mixing on a board is certainly more fun, so there's that!
I think this way as well. Even first getting console automation, I LOVED listening from other places without printing something first. I still do a lot of that. I stand out in the live room, or open the door and sit on the sidewalk as the mix blares from inside the studio.
Drone wrote:Yep, after setting it up, and wiring it all, I realized I felt like I actually lost flexibility and the ability to finesse things, so back in the box I go :mrgreen:
You could still you the console for summing and inserting outboard.

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Drone
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Post by Drone » Wed Jul 22, 2015 2:00 pm

drumsound wrote:
Drone wrote:Yep, after setting it up, and wiring it all, I realized I felt like I actually lost flexibility and the ability to finesse things, so back in the box I go :mrgreen:
You could still you the console for summing and inserting outboard.
Well I don't have a lot of outboard. So doing summing as in flat level passive mixing, setting levels in the box, i just incur another set of conversions as someone else pointed out :cry:
The previous statement is from a guy who records his own, and other projects for fun. No money is made.

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Post by getreel » Thu Jul 23, 2015 11:09 am

Why not create a template in Reaper instead of using 2 programs?

I like mixing ITB when I'm too lazy or know the client will wants lots of changes, edits, FX automation, etc. I mix OTB through a Soundtracs Topaz when I want the workflow and sound of that console. I have my setup where I can do either way

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Post by Drone » Thu Jul 23, 2015 11:27 am

Yeah I need to get around to figuring out Reaper more.

I just find using Audacity so damn easy, it's just the destructive FX settings I don't like.

I did have templates setup for ProTools, but it sucked so badly to use, I gave up and went back to Audacity.
The previous statement is from a guy who records his own, and other projects for fun. No money is made.

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Post by farview » Wed Jul 29, 2015 2:37 pm

There are only two reasons for going out of the box:

1. you have a great console/outboard gear that will blow away any of the plugins you have.

2. Workflow.

Chances are, the workflow in the box is probably better, since there will be a good amount of setup just to get all the tracks to their own output and into the board.

If your mixer is starting to falter, or there are scratchy pots, etc... it's probably not worth it.

The extra conversion isn't really a big deal, but real mixers are much noisier than the one in the DAW.

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