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Post by Johnkenn on Mar 5, 2024 13:42:33 GMT -6
Just as a theoretical question...In your opinions, can software "achieve the same results as HW - it just might take longer and more effort?" Or is it intrinsically inferior and the same results can't be achieved?
I'm still a HW sounds better kinda guy, e.g. - While interface pres and software emus come close, I still prefer the HW pres. The complicating factor is the stacking of tracks. The modeled pres can sound really good, but I do think there are differences especially when you're stacking. But I guess that's not really sticking to my mixing question and more about tracking.
Comps/EQ - there's still a more demonstrative attack with HW comps. Or at least that's what I think the issue is. But I have a much, much harder time telling a difference between HW and SW EQs. I have had the experience that HW EQ's sound more natural in the top end - like you can go to more extremes without it getting weird. Is that a Samplerate thing? Aliasing? IDK.
It just occurred to me: Good is good. If a SW mix sounds inferior, why can't you just mix it until it doesn't sound inferior? They're supposedly the same tools, right?
Here's an analogy (probably a convoluted one) I know when I first started using Luna, I was using the Neve "summing" and I felt like Luna might sound a little better than other daws. Once I heard that, I was able to work that into Pro Tools with a little more push with Slate VCC or Noise Ash N-Console. HW can be similar - sometimes you put something in the chain and it "just works." What I've found is that I can get plugins to be very similar...the advantage to HW being, I didn't have to futz with it as much. That's awesome - but brings me back to my original question: Can the same results be achieved? It makes me wonder about the most important thing in our whole chain - monitoring. If you can hear everything, why can't you mold it into the same result?
Like - instead of hardware, why not invest in high end monitoring and DA instead of HW comps and EQs? I don't know the answer - just asking opinions.
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Post by Johnkenn on Mar 5, 2024 13:47:43 GMT -6
A fun experiment would be mixing something entirely with HW - all LA2-3s, 1176's, blah blah...then do the same thing with the software counterparts. Not that I have dozens of 1176's lol. The convenience of software is such a siren call to me.
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Post by Blackdawg on Mar 5, 2024 13:52:16 GMT -6
I've done some no so scientific "tests" recently where I was like, fuck it, just use ITB on this mix or this master and see if I like it.
I've never hated it.
But then will be like, eh put just the SB on it to see. Damn....that's better. Welp....
So I think ITB is good honestly, especially if it's well recorded. And if time is short or recall is going to be important, I don't feel bad staying in the box. This helps now that I have some tools that I'm comfortable with and I think sound good ITB.
But if I have time. Still using the analog when and where it's needed. It just is better to me.
Probably doesn't matter to the listeners or even the artist most the time.
Although I'm mastering a record right now and the artists mixes weren't very strong and they did some revisions and then did a revision again to just one track. I was like, fuck it, I've spent way too much time on this project and am loosing money now so I just did ITB on that track within the album. Latest note was that tracks doesn't seem to have the "balls" it had before. So....gotta run it through the analog chain again anyways. Whoops...
But mastered a country single all ITB and it came out awesome. Client is happy. I'm happy. Did it very quickly. All good.
So.....I guess I don't have an answer haha
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Post by svart on Mar 5, 2024 13:56:23 GMT -6
I think SW can get you there faster these days. I used to think the opposite, but I took a mix I did primarily in hardware and then redid the mix in software with similar plugs to the hardware (1176 for 1176, etc) and it turned out better.
I'm glad I learned hardware, but I think software is superior for getting work done these days. Recall is something I have to do a lot and there's no way I could sit there and recall hardware before every session.
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Post by paulcheeba on Mar 5, 2024 14:00:05 GMT -6
I love a console and towers of hardware. I have nothing against mixing ITB I just wish pros would tell the truth.
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Post by drbill on Mar 5, 2024 14:16:34 GMT -6
With HDX setup as I have it, and with my I/o set up as it is, being able to insert hardware into my DAW has revolutionized the speed and sonics of everything I mix. I still use plugins, but the hardware does the heavy lifting. And there is zero patch cords needing to be employed the way I have it set up. Yeah, I have all the hardware coming up on bays, but I rarely use them unless tracking. The hardware inserts instantiate 4-5x's faster than most plugins. And the sonics rarely leave me needing to endlessly "fiddle" like plugins do. My $0.02. YMMV
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Post by tkaitkai on Mar 5, 2024 14:36:42 GMT -6
For me, the main thing is to just make shit sound awesome. You can do that with both HW and SW.
HW and SW don’t sound the same. To my ears, at least. It’s not so much a matter of one being inherently superior, they’re just different. HW sounds like HW and SW sounds like SW. I don’t know why, but that’s what I hear.
IMO, where you really start running into trouble is when you start trying to make SW sound like HW. Don’t do that. If you have to mix ITB, embrace it and make it sound as good as possible. It won’t sound like analog, but maybe it doesn’t even need to.
That said, my hot take is that good HW just sounds effortlessly “right” most of the time. Less fussing around. And it’s more fun to use.
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Post by Dan on Mar 5, 2024 14:51:40 GMT -6
Emulations suck unless it’s something like sound toys decapitator and radiator or the fuse ones that are pure dirt meant to eff stuff up or hide things. All the software 1176 can go die in a fire. They have nothing on things like the Goodhertz Faraday Limiter and Vulf Compressor. I’d rather use the Sonnox Oxford dynamics I payed full price for years ago than the new softube vca I just got for free.
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Post by drumsound on Mar 5, 2024 15:00:54 GMT -6
I really feel that if you have a sonic/emotional concept for a mix, and you have experience and understanding of how to get that, the tools kind of don't matter. The tools I use to get a sound, and the I like and that my clients like, are sometime very different than other engineers, and the same as others.
I do think monitoring is important. I do think that good tracks are important. I do think that knowing what to do (whether the tracking is good or not) is important. I think tools that MAKE SENSE to the person using them are important.
I really like a lot of the workflow of mixing ITB. That workflow helps me to get to my end goal. I already had a console, so there's analog summing, and it's quite easy to insert a mix bus chain. I could probably just export stems to the console, and insert hardware on each, but I'm quite happy to keep the hardware on the mix bus and have everything else happening ITB.
I did use hardware FX a lot more when I first went ITB. I used to do set up my drum parallel compression in HW a lot at the beginning. With both, I'd record them back into PT, so I could change their level, but without extensive notes, if there was a big change I was guessing and A/Bing a lot. The more I embraced the workflow of ITV, the less I went out of the box.
I use bus comps that recall fairly easily and an EQ that is all switches. I take photos and use the Snapshot plugin to get my hardware recalled, and it's quite easy.
I guess that's a long answer to say, I just don't care anymore. I just mix and the things around me, software, hardware, monitoring, mics, they're all just the tools I use.
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Post by enlav on Mar 5, 2024 15:06:30 GMT -6
It just occurred to me: Good is good. If a SW mix sounds inferior, why can't you just mix it until it doesn't sound inferior? They're supposedly the same tools, right? I started to get along more with software (and hardware) more when I stopped pretending they were the same. Exceptions exist of course, but once I stopped trying to plant settings from one to the other and just sort of embraced the tools as very separate things, I started to appreciate both far more.
And then in mixdown, it becomes a decision tree. Vocal too dark? Try a plugin EQ. Sounds too harsh after? Well, I could spend more time in plugin land figuring out the right balance or a dynamic EQ, but may as well patch in the LH95 and see if that high shelf just works.
Obviously, there's value to making plugins that sound like hardware as an alternative way to get close to a sound or effect we're already familiar with, but that doesn't mean everyone's best approach to ITB or Hybrid mixing is to treat plugins like the real thing.
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Post by niklas1073 on Mar 5, 2024 15:08:28 GMT -6
I think the answer is more complicated than just executing it as similar as possible. I think most of us will agree that good hardware during recording is is still the only way to go. After the a/d conversion the interesting part begins.
I think we will always end up in the situation that you can not fully replicate the process hw vs sw, and probably shouldn’t even aim to. Just as you will not achieve the same mix with a 1073 console vs. a tg12345 console, and likely not mixing a project with pro tools vs luna.
So all we can do is aim to make the best possible mix with the tools we have at hand and have committed to. There I don’t believe a hw mix will come out better or worse than a sw mix, different for sure. But I do believe the itb process will in most cases have the advantage of not needing to compromise in gear quantity, not needing to deal with noise and inconsistency (inconsistency is good but always better when controlled and not random). So if you would recreate a hw only mix itb, the itb mix would likely fall short, but only because you would restrict the capability of the itb process. And recreating an itb mix in hw would likely never be possible due to the limitations of hw processing…. maybe in a few places today you would be able to pull it off close enough to make some sort of assessment.
so all and all after all the hw vs itb debates and as fun as it has been… I actually right now realized how irrelevant it actually is 🤣
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Post by christopher on Mar 5, 2024 15:16:43 GMT -6
I don’t know if you guys have tried this yet?:
solo an instrument, pretend you are recording it on hardware. Adjust your chain as if you are dialing the perfect sound, worry free about whether you are overdoing it. Then capture it.
Do the whole session this way. ie, start with drums, add bass, etc.
it surprisingly only takes 30 seconds to dial most things. Lots of things sound great flat, it just takes a moment print them. Especially stuff that’s only at each chorus.
Then take those new tracks, open them in a new session. Now see how much the plugins are calling out.
For me, this helps me finish faster, I don’t feel like every little thing needs a plugin
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Post by ragan on Mar 5, 2024 15:38:57 GMT -6
A fun experiment would be mixing something entirely with HW - all LA2-3s, 1176's, blah blah...then do the same thing with the software counterparts. Not that I have dozens of 1176's lol. The convenience of software is such a siren call to me. I’ve done this a few times, on a basic level. Just printing individual tracks through my handful of channels of hardware and then also processed them with plug-in emulations. The last time I did it, myself and my good audio buddy tested ourselves blind, independently. It wasn’t that subtle a difference. The hardware sounded better to both of us. I was already incorporating hardware, but he was all ITB at the time. After that comparison, he bought 32 channels of Symphony MKII and a bunch of hardware. 🤷♂️ I like DSP, it’s fun and cool and useful. But in head to head comparisons with good hardware, my ears pick the hardware. |
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Post by Johnkenn on Mar 5, 2024 16:12:22 GMT -6
I love a console and towers of hardware. I have nothing against mixing ITB I just wish pros would tell the truth. Yeah...I'd be more than shocked if Serban Ghenea's mixes didn't touch a single piece of HW. |
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Post by thirdeye on Mar 5, 2024 16:17:53 GMT -6
I mix hybrid. I think I could maybe do without most hardware inserts. But the hardware pieces I've noticed that make the biggest improvement for my mixing (and I would not want to be without) are our SSL Sigma (has 2 stereo busses with inserts on each bus that can parallel/sum), a 2 Bus Compressor, a 2 Bus EQ, and the stereo AD I print the mixes with.
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Post by stratboy on Mar 5, 2024 16:26:32 GMT -6
FWIW, I think music style matters. If I’m mixing a song that got tracked mostly live, with acoustic and/or electric instruments as the core, hardware makes a difference. Lately, I’ve been creating and making music that is almost all VI with a few electric and acoustic guitar overdubs. ITB sounds just fine. Maybe the plugins detract slightly from well-recorded acoustic sources, whereas they meld with digital sources. At least that’s my theory …. For now …
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Post by Johnkenn on Mar 5, 2024 16:31:40 GMT -6
A fun experiment would be mixing something entirely with HW - all LA2-3s, 1176's, blah blah...then do the same thing with the software counterparts. Not that I have dozens of 1176's lol. The convenience of software is such a siren call to me. I’ve done this a few times, on a basic level. Just printing individual tracks through my handful of channels of hardware and then also processed them with plug-in emulations. The last time I did it, myself and my good audio buddy tested ourselves blind, independently. It wasn’t that subtle a difference. The hardware sounded better to both of us. I was already incorporating hardware, but he was all ITB at the time. After that comparison, he bought 32 channels of Symphony MKII and a bunch of hardware. 🤷♂️ I like DSP, it’s fun and cool and useful. But in head to head comparisons with good hardware, my ears pick the hardware. Yeah - I have too and come to the same conclusion...but right now, I'm trying a plugin counterpart to its hardware...and yeah - maybe the HW sounds a little more effortless? But there are things the plug does that I like as much if not better. I'm not trying to convince anyone one way or the other...just thinking out loud. Another issue I have with HW is the tweaking I do maybe days/weeks apart. Not even talking about the recall, but I'm constantly tweaking all the way through a mix. It's one reason I never printed say - a drum bus. Drums are the first thing I start with always, but I usually get them sounding good, then I tweak all the way through a mix. So, I don't want to print it until the end of the mix. That's...not convenient. Now - I can hear the HW lovers (I am too) smirking with their cups of tea saying, "I only use the best regardless of the time it takes..." To them, I say..."OK." When I get paid $1000 a mix, we can take our time...but not when it's on a tight budget and you want me to bring EGs up - no bring them back down - actually bring them up. Honestly, I don't really get that anymore, but if I do and I have to think about re-patching and matching 6 pieces of HW, I'm gonna be unhappy. So I'm really just trying to figure out how to best do the hybrid thing. I think I mentioned - I've never really used HW inserts for mixing. I'd usually just print the bass and move on...but I don't really want to do that with something like Drums... |
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Post by copperx on Mar 5, 2024 16:32:25 GMT -6
>> Just as a theoretical question...In your opinions, can software "achieve the same results as HW - it just might take longer and more effort?" Or is it intrinsically inferior and the same results can't be achieved?
Here's my simple take: it depends. If for example, one is recording rock, using software alone is inferior because it doesn't sound like the records we grew up listening, and no matter how much time you spend tweaking your plugins, you will not get there. If you don't care much for the past, and you're ok with crazy fast transient information, then it doesn't matter. Millions of people are growing up listening to 100% ITB mixed stuff. And for the popular genres of today, the ITB sound is even part of the aesthetic. After a sufficient amount of time, it will not matter. People will even get nostalgic for icepick transients.
However, to me, the difference still matters. But I'm old and soon will be dead. YMMV.
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Post by Johnkenn on Mar 5, 2024 16:34:41 GMT -6
FWIW, I think music style matters. If I’m mixing a song that got tracked mostly live, with acoustic and/or electric instruments as the core, hardware makes a difference. Lately, I’ve been creating and making music that is almost all VI with a few electric and acoustic guitar overdubs. ITB sounds just fine. Maybe the plugins detract slightly from well-recorded acoustic sources, whereas they meld with digital sources. At least that’s my theory …. For now … See - I would have said the other way around. When I track, I track in pro studios with really nice gear and rooms. When it's tracked really well, you gotta work hard to screw it up. So, I've kinda found that ITB and OTB made less difference...but when I track stuff at home myself, the fake drums, B3, fake Amps, etc...tends to sound 2 dimensional to me. |
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Post by Johnkenn on Mar 5, 2024 16:36:56 GMT -6
>> Just as a theoretical question...In your opinions, can software "achieve the same results as HW - it just might take longer and more effort?" Or is it intrinsically inferior and the same results can't be achieved? But I'm old and soon will be dead. YMMV.  |
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Post by copperx on Mar 5, 2024 16:41:33 GMT -6
With HDX setup as I have it, and with my I/o set up as it is, being able to insert hardware into my DAW has revolutionized the speed and sonics of everything I mix. I still use plugins, but the hardware does the heavy lifting. And there is zero patch cords needing to be employed the way I have it set up. Yeah, I have all the hardware coming up on bays, but I rarely use them unless tracking. The hardware inserts instantiate 4-5x's faster than most plugins. And the sonics rarely leave me needing to endlessly "fiddle" like plugins do. My $0.02. YMMV
Nice, but how do you handle recalls?
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Post by viciousbliss on Mar 5, 2024 17:20:27 GMT -6
You can compensate a lot for what plugins lack if you have access to a quality saturation device like a Cranesong Hedd or a VSM-2. Is the general consensus that the biggest differences between hardware and software occur in saturation devices? That's the line of thinking that I've been leaning towards. When I tried the Magic Garden chain at Access Analog, I wasn't feeling it much until I cranked the Hedd some. $12,000 Elysia Alpha didn't make as big a difference. Full, smooth, exciting, you really need quality saturation for that. The quality of the plugins you're using, how you use them, and the combinations you come up with all play a big role too. My mixes are much better since using the UAD Culture Vulture as a starting point on each sub-mix. But you take anything out of the chain and it's a big loss. The one thing I will say is that the hardware saturation really provides a dramatic enhancement to anything I run through it. Just took a demo from a band I used to do some work with over 15 years ago. Using some newer VSM-2 settings I came up with, and the quality is just radically better. This makes a bigger difference than the Fusion or any hardware comp I've tried. With eqs, I'll say it again. I think the PA SPL PQ set a new benchmark. I've also started using the PA Vitalizer just for the soft/tight bass control. If anyone wants to try hardware saturation, the Black Box and Culture Vulture 15 are usually pretty accessible at Access Analog. They may still be giving out some free time to try the Magic Garden chain too.
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Post by drbill on Mar 5, 2024 17:37:58 GMT -6
With HDX setup as I have it, and with my I/o set up as it is, being able to insert hardware into my DAW has revolutionized the speed and sonics of everything I mix. I still use plugins, but the hardware does the heavy lifting. And there is zero patch cords needing to be employed the way I have it set up. Yeah, I have all the hardware coming up on bays, but I rarely use them unless tracking. The hardware inserts instantiate 4-5x's faster than most plugins. And the sonics rarely leave me needing to endlessly "fiddle" like plugins do. My $0.02. YMMV
Nice, but how do you handle recalls?
For me it's pretty simple. But to write it all out would kind of take a small book. I've got it dialed in after years of experimentation though. Recall for me is virtually as fast as an ITB recall. |
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Post by enlav on Mar 5, 2024 17:44:04 GMT -6
Nice, but how do you handle recalls?
For me it's pretty simple. But to write it all out would kind of take a small book. I've got it dialed in after years of experimentation though. Recall for me is virtually as fast as an ITB recall. I recall reading that you have enough hardware where you're able to leave most of the settings as they are. Those 76s are set for a purpose, and if you need that purpose, you patch in. Is that right? |
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Post by drbill on Mar 5, 2024 17:57:25 GMT -6
For me it's pretty simple. But to write it all out would kind of take a small book. I've got it dialed in after years of experimentation though. Recall for me is virtually as fast as an ITB recall. I recall reading that you have enough hardware where you're able to leave most of the settings as they are. Those 76s are set for a purpose, and if you need that purpose, you patch in. Is that right? Essentially yes. But it does get more convoluted than just that. I have enough gear to pretty much get what I want, and it not, I'll use a combo of hardware and plugins. All tracks in my sessions are in "input" until finalized. Where it gets tricky is stepping rearwards from the end product to : - Final Mix (at unity); to - Stems (at unity); to - Printed contiguous "Final" tracks all at unity with printed automation and hardware; to - Automated "Mix" tracks with non-printed (software) automation, inserts, FX, EQ, etc.; to - Pre automated mix, midi & VI tracks (if used); Once my mix is "finished", Ill print the printed final tracks, stems, and final mix all in one pass. For a recall : So a simple automation recall may only require me to go back one step, two steps or all the way 5 steps back. If a tweak on the stems won't get it, I can go back to my printed (post FX/Automation/etc) tracks. If it's a massive change that requires completely doing something radically different, then I go back to my automated mix tracks. If it's something like a re-write and remix, then I can go back all the way to Midi and VI tracks if used, or call back musicians. Where PTHDX rules in this scenario is it's incredibly robust. It's quite elegant once laid out, but requires a TON of DSP mixing power. This is why I need multiple hundreds of internal busses.... |
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