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  4. Gain Staging in Cubase with MIR Pro

  • Gain Staging in Cubase with MIR Pro

    G
    G

    Hello, 

    I usually use MIR Pro like I virtually am in a real recording and mixing environment: In the mixing project I put it before any other plugin like the instruments were first recorded in a room and then mixed and processed (I am curious to read about other workarounds though). 

    I used to do Gain Staging in Cubase before starting the mix in order to balance the peaks of every instrument at about -18/-15 dB. Now that I use MIR Pro I do Gain Staging first with the plugins deactivated, but when I activate the MIR Pro plugins the volumes are turned down or up depending on the faders on MIR Pro itself. So I basically move the faders all at once in order to achieve the right volumes again. Does it makes sense? I'm curious to read about how you deal with this. 

    I also thought that I could use directly the MIR Pro faders to do gain staging instead of the pre-Gain section of Cubase but I'm not sure if this will affect someway the distances and relationships between the instruments into the room, 
  • DietzD
    VSL Team
    DietzD
    last edited
    last edited

    @Another User said:

    I also thought that I could use directly the MIR Pro faders to do gain staging instead of the pre-Gain section of Cubase but I'm not sure if this will affect someway the distances and relationships between the instruments into the room

    MIR Pro's Instrument-faders will never change the the dry/wet ratio, so there's no need to be afraid of any other effects than simple volume changes. What _will_ have implications on the dry volume as well as the dry/wet ratio is any kind of position change, especially when moving the Icon away from the Main Microphone. You can restrict this behaviour to "positioning only" by de-activating the option for Distance Dependent Scaling in the Dry Signal Settings panel.

    HTH,

    /Dietz - Vienna Symphonic Library
  • G
    G

    Thank you for your reply, Dietz :)

    Do you think it makes any difference if I do gain staging with the MIR Plugins activated? So I don't risk to get lower signals when I turn them on due to MIR Pro's faders. 
  • DietzD
    VSL Team
    DietzD
    last edited
    last edited

    @Another User said:

    Do you think it makes any difference if I do gain staging with the MIR Plugins activated? So I don't risk to get lower signals when I turn them on due to MIR Pro's faders.

    Well - you might be counter-acting volume settings you plan to do (or already did) in MIR. However: As long as you are perfectly aware of _what_ you're doing, you will be fine either way. 😊

    /Dietz - Vienna Symphonic Library
  • V
    V

    I do the gain-staging with the pre-gain in Cubase with MIR enabled. I never touch the levels in MIR Pro.

    For fine tuning I adjust the placement, and sometimes the individual wet/dry sliders (things like contrabass and tuba seem to benefit from "cheating" with less reverberation).

    Any dynamic or frequency processing I try to apply at the source performance/MIDI programming first (velocity, CCs and articulation). If I need plugins to shape the audio more I will apply them as inserts *before* MIR Pro as I prefer to distort the imaging from the MIR room reflections as little as possible. Applying eq and compression after MIR on many tracks will end up eating away at the clarity of the spatial relationships of your sources. 

    This is for my naturalistic/realist aesthetic, but of course if you or I wish to manipulate the audio for other purposes, do whatever the material calls for.