I've just opened my mixed and mastered project, changed the Waves compressors on the vocal bus to AA, Arturia, UAD... and you know what? NOTHING! The sound doesn't change at all.

So my question is, what's all that overhyped marketing about?

 

It's not about the plugins, it's about the road from a to b, sometimes you need two to three plugins to achive let's say a 90% of what you need, but sometimes one plugin can get you further...

i think this is an issue on your end, as far as AA plugins go they do have some GEMS, and you couldn't have possibly understood and mastered the plugins since their release on sister site, so for now i do suggest you invest more time into getting acquainted with the plugins read about them watch some Youtube videos and tutorials and learn how to get the most out of them, plus don't forget the oversampling, and don't compare the versions unless you render and have both of them playing back to back on another daw.

here's a website that's shared on some of the AA releases, read it and see what are you after, what tonal are looking for is it api is it neve what you actually need, then go back and do your comparaison...

anyway good luck

 

it’s not about AA. What I mean, that I’ve changes 5 compressors from different companies.
Make similar setting to sound good in mix, and final mix doesn’t change at all. Same goes to eq, on every channel, and master section.

If someone curious, open mixed n mastered projecf, and try to change plugins on their alternative.
Results will be interesting

 

why don't you share a before and after, or at least make a video about it so we can see what's going on.

 

Secret sauce. If you have a good mastering chain, you don't need much of a mix process.

 

That happened to me too, and I wondered why i worked so hard adjusting things and could not achieve what I wanted.
The only advice i have to is make sure you don't have all FX bypassed.


Not that i ever did that multiple times or anything...

 

its not about the car its about the driver, if you know how to drive well the car doesnt normally matter that much.

 

Like DS- MK3 + MD4 HD + Clipper + Limiter

 

Mmm that's kind of right... But, you can't compare a 600cc motor vs 2000cc, for not put any brand.

 

me and mario andrettii could switch cars and hed still beat me.

 

matter of fact id prob crash his car right away

 

Depending on our experience we seek different levels of subtle details. And after achieving a well made volume-mix (including proper choice of sounds) the return value starts to decrease exponentially. But a great mix and master compared with a raw volume-mix will almost always blow your mind.

Many times you can get lost trying to save a mix you have managed to destroy yourself. Those are the times when you switch off all fx and the darn thing sounds better and alive again

.

 

Last edited: Dec 8, 2023

Why we need so much English lessons, if in end it understand ?

 

To me "mixing" often includes sound-design, where I want to change the sound / timbre of the material. In those cases choice of plugins can make a huge difference.

If you just want to do some cuts and boosts with EQ or do some basic compression with a few db of gain reduction on a few channels, the sonic differences between EQ A and EQ B or Compressor X and Compressor Y are probably much more subtle. The differences become more pronounced, the heavier the processing is. In some genres you want an analogue-like sound, so it matters that you use plugins that can authentically recreate the characteristics of analogue. In other genres like EDM, techno and so on, you can probably get away with using any bog-standard EQ and compressor, since you are not after those specific characteristics (even though some technoists / EDM-people are).

 

Mastering chain will improve your mix, but it can not do the mix for you. Mixing (for me) is about a) shaping the sound of the individual elements and b) placing the elements in the overall context of the musical piece, creating enough space for each element to shine. Mastering can not do this, since you have no access to the individual elements at that stage.

 

it's about persuading you your mix sucks because you didn't buy XY game-changer plugin, and justify wasting money on plugins to think your mixes will be better,
welcome to the fucked up audio world

 

wow , lots of opinions here , but I want to ask ..... have you ever been in a mastering - mix studio , with
'real' , mastering engineers and heard what they do or the equipment they use ?? Im only a multi-track engineer ,
have been for many many years , and i can say with reality , there's noway i would ever attempt to say I can be a
master - mix engineer , not ever !!! the folks Ive met , who do this stuff at 'a rocket science level' are generally not
pro musicians nor song writers , they know one thing , and that is mastering sound.

Ok , Ive been in the mastering studios of Ludwig mastering house , the Ocean way studios , and Finished Trax in
Glenn Falls. ive seen the equipment they use and got much advice from these people. ( but mine was for a better
ability to bring my project to them to mix down and master.) And all of them told me straight up , "LESS IS MORE".

Ive found thru all my years in recording bands , I use hardly any efx whatsoever to record bands with. ( maybe only
a bit of EQ , on trcks to bring out the "Ambiance and Timbre" of what the particular instrument should be sounding like.
If you dont get it proper coming into the multi-track files in the beginning , then you wont be able to "polish" it up when you
get to your final 2 , 4 or 6 track mix down , to prep it up for a mastering mix.

I do suggest you try this , rid yourself of all these damned plugins , and just keep it bare bones. ( I give an idea ..... ) ,
I own magix sequoia , and going by advice of mastering engineers , i ONLY used the plugins that already came with
my DAW ). And yes , of course , Sequoia has aweso,e plugs that come with it . but all you need is a great simple EQ ,
and Dynamics and a Compressor. Try using whats already in your own daw , to bring your music into formation , then ;
Use them very sparingly , 9 it shouold only enhance what you need to be done , anything more is just polished turds !!)

Then once your thru with all your tracking , now begin your process of assigning AUX or SUBs to tracks and then use your
Higher end plugs that you like and need to assign. But use them sparingly !!! if you ever need alot of efx on your mixes , and
think that will make it sound better , then you've already killed you mix down efforts !! And probably need to start over again
with you recording process.

You truely only need a great Couple of compressors , a track EQ and channel strip EQ , A few fav leveling Amp plugs , maybe
a fav Dynamics plug , also maybe a few super nice reverb * that are friendly to your choosen EQ's ). and these will set you
on your way to a great mix from beginning to end.

Hope some of this will help lead ya to a good result !

 

Last edited by a moderator: Dec 8, 2023

Bypass the The God Particle instance you put on the master out.

 

Indeed, it's not the hyped expensive or exotic FX plugins that make the sound, much more basic "sound scaping" at the source and mixing. Using only a few stock plugins in your DAW can give you a final result that's good enough for 99% of your audience.

 

the girls at the club disagree