Another way to consider mixing that I like to use.

This of course assumes that you might want to put all your stuff in individual hard disk tracks and mix them in a hard disk environment like nuendo or your sequencer or whatever.
What I like to do is just set everything to the center and add a little bit of temporary reverb to compose. I send each section to its own pair in the GigaStudio DSP station. (each instrument\section to its own pair, ensemble and solo. That way I can have the same instruments together and mix them together. My own philosophy anyway)
So, everything is going dry to its own various pairs of channels in various DSP station pairs, accross several computers. (as many as you can get to compose in real time)

When a song is done, I can then record each stem to its own pair of audio tracks. You can capture to wave or digitally record them or even an analog recording if needed.

When I'm done, I have for example, one pair of of hard disk tracks for solo & ensemble trumpets, one for solo & ensemble horns, one for each section of the strings-solo & ensemble and so on. This includes all articulations of those instruments, so for violins, that would include all the sustain, legato, staccato,repetition, anything from any other violin library, all going to the same channels. As I compose, I make sure their relative levels are taken care of with MIDI volume or expression. So, while composing, you can do some basic level adjustments and they will be hardwired into your sequencer tracks and convienient to access real quick. Your not worrying about any reverb or pan settings so you can keep the composing flow going.

It comes out to
5 pairs of tracks for strings
4-5 pairs for brass
4-5 pairs for winds
2 or 3 or so for percussion.
In the end I have less than 40 tracks (20 stereo pairs) to work with.

They are all panned dead center at this point. Then I can mix them real simply without having to go crazing from sampler screen to sampler screen and tweak that way.

Giga Studio does give you much of what you need to do the mixing and it is there if you don't have the other options but it is not the easiest way to mix.

My templates are the GSP performances for the Giga machines and a sequencing template that pans everything to the center. It works just fine for composing and you can have a MIDI template do some panning for you in your sequencer if you need to hear the instruments placed in the right place.

This is becoming less relevant with the current libraries like VSL an QLSO that are all done in a single environment but it still works and is much simpler than when I had to match several various libraries with various panning settings. With this method, my MIDI templates could make sure that everything is panned dead center. That way, I only had to do mixing at the hard disk stage with 15 or 20 pairs of channels to mix. Its really cool.

At that point you can then apply whatever eq or reverb or impulse technology you wish and pan them.

If you have a big enough mixer and multi outs for all your systems of course you can do this all live.

The disadvantage is that you have to make sure you have a good level mix of your individual articulations of course or you will have to remix a stem or two. Keep in mind though, that is all level adjustments that are being made in MIDI. You can get a good level mix before you capture these stems pretty well.

Something to think about anyway.

Dave

Wow taking a little longer to just use S1 compared to cakewalk's panning is well worth it. Also I did what david said above (this is before he posted though) and I maxed the volume of each instrument (0db no clipping). Then I loaded em all into CW 9 and adjusted the volume a little to make it sit better and mixed it down to a single stereo wav. Finally I opened it in SF 5 and added an acoustic mirror to it and now it is done. Though one question, how would I set up GS to record when I press play in cakewalk 9? I have tried several times but it never works. So I have had to press record in GS, hit play in CW and then edit out the time difference in SF, it is very tedious and is getting annoying. Please someone help [:'(]

Good point Adam. For years Cakewalk has not had the ability to send the appropriate MIDI clock that will start the GigaStudio capture. It sends some sort of basic MIDI clock but not the kind that Giga responds too. I don't know if they have put that into their latest stuff. The other sequencers work fine. I would assume that the NemeSys programmers may work on this a bit. A big request has been for multi track capturing in Giga. For now, it might help to create 4 metronome clicks at the begining (and end if you like) of your sequences using some percussive GigaStudio samples and capture them. Then you have some slates to help synch them up.
You added another good point in that you want your stems to be pretty strong and use as many of those bits as you can. You can then turn them down when you mix.
Take care
Dave

Thanks for the tip Dave that should work. Yeah I don't really see how much programming it would require for them to make a midi clock that works with GS, maybe it could be a free download for CW users?

@David Govett said:

Another way to consider mixing that I like to use.

....

Something to think about anyway.

Dave

Very nice summary Dave, exactly the same approach as my new setup. I return the Adats from my Giga PCs into Logic 5.5, where I can easily apply S1, RVerb, some EQ on the audio input signals, so I can do some initial "better than Midi-" panning here, while I work in the Midi Dept.

Not yet having VSL, I have made this setup up especially for handling and merging dry & wet libraries, like Dan's solo brass vs SAM's horns. You can first route the dry instruments through for instance CakeWalk's SoundStage or Waves RVerb with Early Reflections only, to make the dry & wet sounds similar. You can easily run a number of S1's and/or SoundStage instances within the input mixer.

Regards,

Peter

PS: I hope that non-VSL posts are not a problem when they address the general sequencing/recording processes that can also apply to using VSL... [:)]

You're welcome Peter.

@David Govett said:

Another way to consider mixing that I like to use.

This of course assumes that you might want to put all your stuff in individual hard disk tracks and mix them in a hard disk environment like nuendo or your sequencer or whatever....
Dave

http://www.silverspike.com/PlugIns/TapeIt/tapeit.html

regards

bc

Hi all,

I am using Logic Platinum with Giga and VSL. I just set panning in Logic and save it to my auto load template. Then as I'm composing I tweek it to taste. Is this an inferior way of achieving a good simulation? It seems to work and it is very simple, but perhaps I'm missing something.

Scott

Scott,

Since I was also a music teacher for about 30 years, I do permit myself to write something I used to tell to my students when they where asking if it was OK to do things in a certain way. My answer was”Do it as you like, as long at it does sound as you want it to sound”, and do not listen too much to people how are thinking they know how things should be done, because, as Aristotle’s said before me ¨The only think I know for sure is that I do not know much”. Of course this does not mean to take notice and learn from others, but there has to be a balance of self confidence and critic. All this to express the meaning that if your system of panning sounds good, just try the other ones, and only if they sound better, to you, change. [[;)]]

Iwan

As right as Iwan is from a principal point of view, there may be _really_ a intrinsic problem with panning on stereo tracks of Logic (and similar platforms):

I may be wrong, but AFAIK, the panning on stereo-tracks is just a _levelling_ of the two tracks. IOW, the louder the left side gets, the lower in volume the right side will be. This is not the same effect that you would achiece by panning the left side to full left individually, and turning the right side to a center-position, for example: In this second case, the stereo-width would be smaller, of course, but the acoustical content of the right side is still as audible.

This is why I tend to use the S1 as pan-pot, so to speak, because I can most easily maintain a chosen stereo-width while still being able to change the actual position of the signal in the stereo-field. You could also use two mono audio-objects within Logic and go the "analogue" way i described above (... "analogue" because that's the way i work on a real console, opposed to a DAW).

HTH,

/Dietz - Vienna Symphonic Library

Interesting, but isn´t Waves S1 a bit too CPU-intensive to apply it to every instrument, in addition to a reverb?


Javier.

PS- pssst Iwan. That was Socrates [:D]

@Dietz said:

As right as Iwan is from a principal point of view, there may be _really_ a intrinsic problem with panning on stereo tracks of Logic (and similar platforms):
]

Dietz,
Of course I do agree with you, I record the MIDI without panning and when mixing, I put an S1 on every single audio track. I do not like to pan in GigaStudio at all.
But I think it is good to find the good things by hearing and not only by reading.....or by ¨Mr SO and So said, it has to be done like this" [[[;)]]]
This is not anything meant to be personal [[[;)]]]
Iwan

@Another User said:

PS- pssst Iwan. That was Socrates [:D]

Sorry about this, must have been late at nigth and it is allready a few years since I am out of school [:D]

Iwan

No offense taken, Iwan, I stick to the old saying: "If it sounds right, it is right!" (... what a pity that I didn't invent this ;-] ...)

/Dietz - Vienna Symphonic Library

@Dietz said:

No offense taken, Iwan, I stick to the old saying: "If it sounds right, it is right!" (... what a pity that I didn't invent this ;-] ...)
/Dietz - Vienna Symphonic Library

Thanks Dietz!

I just like to add that you are a professional with much knowledge and many years of experience in hearing and in adapting too many different situations in the audio domain. Personally I did learn much with reading your posts. I do try out every thing you suggest and some things did really work very well for me. But even with this I am not able to achieve the professional results you do. What I want to express, is that information is a very high value but it should not fool anybody about our abilities.
I had very big success with my saxophone sound, which a lot of famous conductors considered as unique –and get me quite a few gigs -. [[;)]]
If I explain someone about my embouchure he will probably not be able to get the same results

But you know all this [:O]ops:

Iwan

Scott, instead off panning with the standard Logic Pan, try using the DSP station in Giga. Use it to create the stereo width you'd want with the VSL sections/instruments, It tends to let you create a more controlled sound, but also "direct" sounds bit more.

@KingIdiot said:

Scott, instead off panning with the standard Logic Pan, try using the DSP station in Giga. Use it to create the stereo width you'd want with the VSL sections/instruments, It tends to let you create a more controlled sound, but also "direct" sounds bit more.

King,
Is this what you mean by "clapsing down" ( I am not sure about the words....)? Is this the same as reducing the field in S1? I did try the system the Garritan GigaString templates provides, but I can obtain better results with panning only on audio level with the S1. But I will try some more.... [:O]ops:

Iwan

King,
I thought that that was in essence what I was doing. The pan setting I'm talking about in logic is the midi message pan for each track asigned to each instrument in Giga. the stereo left and right are then monitored from giga through logic on a stereo audio track. My question is, when I tell giga through midi pan messages to pan sounds, is that the same as changing the pan directly in giga's dsp station? I'm new to giga and just assumed this is what would happen.

Thanks
Scott

Iwan,

Yup thats what I call "collapsing the stereo field". I tend to like S1 a little better just because it works visually and I can get quicker results.


Scott,

Midi panning in logic will only affect standard MIDI Pan, which is based on power/volume of each channel. What happens is if you pan from center to left, the right channel volume is reduced, meaning you'll lose some of the characteristics of section samples especially.

With the DSP Station, you are given control of each channel in the stereo signal, thus you can pan both the left AND Right signal towrads the left. This way you keep the right channels characteristics, but jsut output it from more of the left of the mix.

This is how panning works even outside of giga in most cases.

King,

Thanks for the explanation. Its all starting to make a little more sense now.
I'll definitly give that a try.
Scott