Stem Mixes

GroupDIY Audio Forum

Help Support GroupDIY Audio Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

Seeker

Well-known member
Joined
Feb 8, 2010
Messages
333
Location
Orlando, Fl
I have some projects coming up that will require having stem mixes available.... not all of my comps  have an external side chain input, so my choices are keep that stuff off the master buss, or say screw it and figure it doesn't matter, as the point of stems is that it will be mixed differently anyway... I havent done much of this kinda thing, so thoughts/suggestions are appreciated.
 
Feedback compressors usually do that (missing the side chain) unless talking about something like the SSL which has the feedback inside the side chain detector.

If delivering the stems I probably would let the master compression for the person who is mixing them, unless is for a guitar hero or something like that, where you need them to sound as mastered but independent tracks so they can be muted. In that case you could compress all the stems with one compressor, just make the master and send it as a side chain, one stem at a time. Compressor would be acting just as if all the mix would be going through.

JS
 
Thanks for the reply Joaquins,  the project is a small budget film, and I don't know exactly what will happen with it once it leaves my hands, but it is unlikely that it will be legitimately mastered.  I've built a habit of using some processing on the master buss for flavor,  & I was really missing having some saturation to kinda glue things together but after some experimenting I've got some mixes happening that I'm pleased with that only use my pico comp on the master buss.(wich has an external side chain)

Just a slightly different way of getting the job done from the way I've done a lot of things previously...
 
Well, good luck with that. I think it's good going for that side chain comp, I guess you are doing a few passes through to compress every steam.

I like to take my productions to master in a proper studio I trust, they have pretty nice gear, the control room is really nice and they have many people working great there so you can pick the man depending on the style. Doing the mastering in the same place by the same person who did the mix is kind of anti mastering. Mastering usually correct errors in the monitoring and maybe a general decision mistaken by the mixing because you listen to it so many times or something. Once at the university we mix different tracks by different people in the same studio, a pretty good one, then we went to a mastering studio and all the mixes had the same problem at the low-mid range... I tend to do mixes a bit dark, easy to add a HF shelving in mastering and if I try to do them brighter I usually end up with other problems, so I just work my way and leave the mastering to bring up the HF a few dB. I could add that extra HF at the end but I don't see the point, a lot of added value with a proper mastering and it's usually quite cheap in a proper production compared to the complete production, I guess less than 20% in most cases, so, if I  the client can pay that extra I think it really worth it.

JS
 
I definitely think it's worth it, but I'm not writing the check & convincing others to shell out more $ on a small budget project can be tough.  I think it's kind of like I used to play in bands, now I do solo performances with a loop pedal (sometimes I get to hire more musicians but more often not).  Is it better?  Probably not, but most people don't care, and I get to pay my bills and play another gig...
 
Back
Top