Hey guys I 've noticed that some people perfer to output their mix to a submix track first and effect it there then output that track to the stereo master buss. I was wondering why do this is there any benefit to doing this? Thanks

 

Not exactly sure what u mean by submix track but submix tracks yes, plenty of benefits...

you get to seperate all ur sounds into their respective categories. Drums, Bass, Melodies, FX etc. then it enables you to control the overall dynamics and processing of each as well as the level and gain. It enables you to seperate categories of ur mix into their designated place and do a whole lot more overall processing on them... also it's great for monitoring headroom etc.

eventually they all go into one master and from there u add stuff to the master depending on what you want to do...

But the way you submix and the way you route certain tracks or what places you group and route certain mixes all depends on your knowledge and engineering skill...

Submixes and routing are two very powerful features and when used together in nifty and skillful ways, you can do some crazy ass things that give certain sounds a whole new level of power...

Another name for submix is known as BUS track, which I prefer using more

 

Last edited: Jan 1, 2016

yep the benefits are you will have more control over the frequency spectrum. separate then ad deferent compression to each sub mix.
them you can ride each submix in diffent location so the music has a more melodic movement feel. listen this track very loud you will hear the different submix moving around,

 

Are you talking about stemming tracks to busses or creating a pre-master buss?

I'm gonna assume you mean the latter.

The reason for it is that some DAWs like Pro Tools have their master bus inserts set to post-fader, meaning that the metering and the fader level come before any plugins you put on it, therefore if your meter shows you're peaking at 0dBfs, and you put an eq on the master with a +2dB low shelf, you'll be clipping, but the meters won't show it. By adding a bus and doing processing before the master bus you will be able to read your meters more accurately, since the signal chain will be pre-master meter -> plugins -> master meter.

Now you might be thinking "what is the purpose of having plugins post-fader?" Its handy for compression and limiting, since you can use the fader to drive them. If you have a limiter on a pre-fader insert and you're peaking at 0dBfs, when you automate the master fader up +1dB you'll be clipping even though the limiter's ceiling is set to 0dBfs.

Another reason to have a pre-master bus, but only in a DAW that has all pre-fader inserts, is that it makes exporting stems easier if you do your mastering on the master bus, because in one go you can print pre and post mastering versions.

 

Last edited: Jan 1, 2016

sory for the confusion i'm talking about a bus track that is fed from all other tracks in a session then sent to the master fader. so like a pre-master track i guess

 

ahhhhhhhhhhhhh, pre master buss, i see now... That's basically what you end up naturally doing similarily if you just stemmed your mix out and placed it into a master project.

You're whole entire mix track would have the inserts(at least what I would do if I stemmed out) and then place ur limiter in the master... pretty much similar level of control...

I've barely used pre-master buss since Live already has that feature to export out different BUSS stems pre master. Very useful :D

 

Last edited: Jan 1, 2016

Great thanks for the info guys cheers!

 

I have 2 main categories for using buses (maybe some other purposes like forcing things to mix, or for clarity, etc):

MANAGEMENT & CPU===
One way I use buses is for easier management & to save on CPU.

Say I want to apply the same gate/reverb/w/e to multiple tracks. I could instantiate one of each FX on each track, or bus them and have the same FX (but only once) on the bus. Easier management & CPU savings.

I may have a reverbbus, vocalbus, stereowidthexpantionbus, etc

If you're applying the same FX to 2 tracks, consider a bus. If you're sameing 3 or more, you should have a bus. Sometimes I have buses going to other buses.

BUT Because adding buses increases the track count, you should carefully consider the use of a bus, especially on projects with a high track count. Which is why I only bus ONLY AS NEEDED.

MULTIDELIVERY===
You can generally onry have 1 master in your project, but you want to have multiple deliverables.

Say I want to output a English, Japanese, and Cantonese tracks. The music is the same-ish, but the dialogue is different-ish. I use multiple buses, and render every bus at the same time.

You can extend/modify this concept to have 4 buses for say, CD, HR, Radio, streaming deliverables. Same-ish content, different mastering FXchains (and have scripts to SRC & encode afterwards).

 

Back in the day our computers were sucky suck and had no real horsepower and thats how we had to do everything. Bounce it down to a stereo track, then master. Our ol'skool mastering chains were resource hogs. Live mastering was just a dream for us back then

 

Pro Tools HD via Rosetta 800 Output to Tascam DVRA1000 matched sampler rate ect, although sometimes record DSD via analog inputs with no clock or dither then Saracon back to a sample rate, then master using T Racks or sometimes Ozone stand alone. Seems to do the job.
In a pinch out of pro tools direct but only when I don't have time or the inclination to do otherwise.
For serious mixing I never bounce out of pro tools unless it's a rough or mp3 test.