Burnsy's Pro Tools learning thread...

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Burnsy's Pro Tools learning thread...

Postby Burnsy » Tue Jun 05, 2012 7:26 pm

Ok Pro Tools users. I need some suggestions, I recently purchased Pro Tools 10, and I like it, I love it when it works well....which up until yesterday...was a normal occurence. After speaking with Andrew about my recent arm wrestling match with updating the software to version 10.2, I thought I might tell everyone about it, and maybe gain some insight. The good news is that PT10 is operational, bad news....the updated PT 10.2 wil not install.

So basically I received a message from the pro tools reminder that an update is available online. So I logged in and I downloaded it. In the PDF setup files of the updater, it states to go to the Windows Control Panel (yes I'm using Windows 7 with PT10...I know what you're thinking....a mac will come some day :( ...... , and uninstall it with the Windows uninstaller...and all its components. So that's what I did. Unfortunately I could not uninstall the PT HD 64 driver, it just would't budge. So I repaired it using the install disc, and tried to uninstall using the original PT 10 installer disc. This successfully uninstalled it.... sort of.....

So, after doing that, running CCleaner, and Win Cleaner for left over junk, I also read online to go to Reg-edit, and remove anything Pro Tools, Avid, or Digidesign. Which I did. Then I restarted the pc, and tried to install the 10.2 install upgrade.

After a couple of minutes I received the error "will not continue with setup because an older version of PT is installed on computer....please remove...etc." At this point I said enough of this spit. So I emailed Andrew, and he gave me a link to read through. So I checked it out, took what I could from it, and decided I should remove everything I tried to install (10.2), and just go back to PT 10. So I did the same removal procedure as above to 10.2. And I tried installing PT10 again.

So 2 days later, and about 14 hours later. I have PT 10 back up and running. I had to remove other software (Sonar Producer and Sound Forge) because for whatever reason, possibly that they were sharing some similar files (plugins mostly) PT refused to acknowledge the Asio drivers of my interface. After wiping my pc of Pro Tools' competition, it magically installed and works.

So I thought, maybe that's the problem with the 10.2 installer!!! So I uninstalled PT10 again, did the removal process as mentioned above, and with fingers crossed...waited for the update to install............to no avail.

So I uninstalled 10.2, removed all the leftover crumbs, and hoped and prayed PT 10 would install again. And it did. whew.

After this marathon of PT updates (I think I installed and uninstalled at least 15 times), and many coffees, and a bottle of wine later, I can record again. Not to mention the major hard drive defragging session I had afterwards. Next time I attempt to update Pro Tools software.... I guess I will have to alott a full weekend to the event....maybe I'll make a party out of it. Any takers? facepalm
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Re: Burnsy's Pro Tools learning thread...

Postby Mathieu Benoit » Wed Jun 06, 2012 9:50 am

Unfortunately you lost me at "Windows 7". I had all kinds of weird issues when trying to run DAWs on Windows, so now I avoid that operating system like the plague.

I'm running PT9HD on Mac and I've never had any issues (dating back to 7.3) that come close to resembling what you are discribing. Sorry, wish I could help.
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Re: Burnsy's Pro Tools learning thread...

Postby Malcolm Boyce » Wed Jun 06, 2012 1:32 pm

Split because I thought this deserves it's own thread.

Aren't we at the stage where ProTools works properly with Windows? I know y'all like bashing it, but problems with updating in the Mac domain must not be unheard of.

I know this isn't the right answer, but I have been running a version of Sonar7PE that is one or two shy of the latest patch because when I had "upgraded", my system acted super glitchy and was nearly unusable. It took several uninstall/reinstall cycles like you mentioned to actually figure out where things were going south, and when I finally got it sussed, I just decided to stay with stable VS an update that didn't have anything that I actually need.

That has been something that I have said for years. Instead of trying to add new bells and whistles with each new release, all the the DAW manufacturers should be concentrating on making a more solid, stable, efficient working environment. New bugs with each new version of every platform out there. I know this goes for most software, but I've experienced and heard too many stories from all the camps about losing time because of glitches in systems.

I'll say again... If a piece of hardware worked like some of these programs do right out of the box, you'd be back at the story getting your money back. With software it's... "We're working on it."
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Re: Burnsy's Pro Tools learning thread...

Postby Malcolm Boyce » Wed Jun 06, 2012 1:35 pm

...and, I haven't been using Win7 on my main recording rig, but on two other compys that I work audio on and my biggest issue is the whole 32/64 bit compatibility thing. In hindsight, I don't think I'd have installed anything 64bit on anything yet.
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Re: Burnsy's Pro Tools learning thread...

Postby Mathieu Benoit » Wed Jun 06, 2012 2:00 pm

Malcolm Boyce wrote:I just decided to stay with stable VS an update that didn't have anything that I actually need.

That has been something that I have said for years. Instead of trying to add new bells and whistles with each new release, all the the DAW manufacturers should be concentrating on making a more solid, stable, efficient working environment. New bugs with each new version of every platform out there. I know this goes for most software, but I've experienced and heard too many stories from all the camps about losing time because of glitches in systems.

Quoted for emphasis.

Malcolm Boyce wrote:I'll say again... If a piece of hardware worked like some of these programs do right out of the box, you'd be back at the story getting your money back. With software it's... "We're working on it."


Well that's apples to bananas... Hardware pieces are a self-sufficient system that don't require the co-ordination of several different companies to cover thousands of different variables. With software, there are too many variables to cover when you consider hardware, OS, program, ect... No two computers are exactly alike so it's hard to reproduce the results as well. Those results are also dependant on what else your computer may be up to at that particular time.

That's why I like Macs, the people that make the OS also assemble the hardware and it removes a number of variables. Not to say problems don't still occur but it makes those problems easier to deal with and less frequent.
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Re: Burnsy's Pro Tools learning thread...

Postby Malcolm Boyce » Wed Jun 06, 2012 2:06 pm

Mathieu Benoit wrote:Well that's apples to bananas... Hardware pieces are a self-sufficient system that don't require the co-ordination of several different companies to cover thousands of different variables.
Absolutely incorrect. Many/most devices we use in pro audio are designed specifically to interface with other devices and do so flawlessly most times. It's that kind of "out of our control" thinking that lets the providers of these platforms to continue to do what they do.

If a piece of outboard may or may not work with a particular console, how long do you think that manufacturer would be in business?
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Re: Burnsy's Pro Tools learning thread...

Postby Mathieu Benoit » Wed Jun 06, 2012 2:14 pm

Malcolm Boyce wrote:Absolutely incorrect. Many/most devices we use in pro audio are designed specifically to interface with other devices and do so flawlessly most times. It's that kind of "out of our control" thinking that lets the providers of these platforms to continue to do what they do.

If a piece of outboard may or may not work with a particular console, how long do you think that manufacturer would be in business?


What kind of outboard gear are we talking about here? If it's gear that simply passes audio then I'm not sure I get where you are coming from. Either way...as soon as you start "Interfacing" things together it really depends on the protocol used and the quality of manufacturing.
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Re: Burnsy's Pro Tools learning thread...

Postby Malcolm Boyce » Wed Jun 06, 2012 2:22 pm

Mathieu Benoit wrote:
Malcolm Boyce wrote:Absolutely incorrect. Many/most devices we use in pro audio are designed specifically to interface with other devices and do so flawlessly most times. It's that kind of "out of our control" thinking that lets the providers of these platforms to continue to do what they do.

If a piece of outboard may or may not work with a particular console, how long do you think that manufacturer would be in business?


What kind of outboard gear are we talking about here? If it's gear that simply passes audio then I'm not sure I get where you are coming from. Either way...as soon as you start "Interfacing" things together it really depends on the protocol used and the quality of manufacturing.

We live in an age where we can assume that if we patch a compressor into a channel of a console it will work correctly, but if we install a plugin into a DAW and it causes the system to flail, even though it meets all the "system requirements" it's out of the control of who make and sell it.

It's just a different mindset that those who manufacture these products are working with. We just take for granted that hardware will work because that's what they provide us with. Granted, there was a time when that was probably not as true as it is today, but these DAWs aren't new anymore, and that excuse won't last forever.
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Re: Burnsy's Pro Tools learning thread...

Postby Mathieu Benoit » Wed Jun 06, 2012 2:28 pm

But... That compressor only needs to pass audio. There is no way passing audio will screw up the console. That being said... if the compressor was outputting 15A/120V from it's line out, that might "crash" the console...lol. It would literally impossible to mess something like that up in the production/design stage though.

So... Apples to babanas. I say that because I can't find enough common points to compare the two scenarios.
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Re: Burnsy's Pro Tools learning thread...

Postby Malcolm Boyce » Wed Jun 06, 2012 2:39 pm

Mathieu Benoit wrote:But... That compressor only needs to pass audio. There is no way passing audio will screw up the console.

You are living in a world where you can take that for granted. As I'm sure Al will concur, there are many ways that carelessly designed electronic components can wreak havoc on interconnected gear.
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Re: Burnsy's Pro Tools learning thread...

Postby Mathieu Benoit » Wed Jun 06, 2012 2:47 pm

Malcolm Boyce wrote:
Mathieu Benoit wrote:But... That compressor only needs to pass audio. There is no way passing audio will screw up the console.

You are living in a world where you can take that for granted. As I'm sure Al will concur, there are many ways that carelessly designed electronic components can wreak havoc on interconnected gear.


Fair enough. But the same level of variables that are out of the control of the manufacturer are still not in play.
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Re: Burnsy's Pro Tools learning thread...

Postby Burnsy » Wed Jun 06, 2012 4:08 pm

Wow, thanks guys, didn't realize I'd get some fervent activity with this topic. Malcolm, you raise some good points about stability and software. My experience with Sonar Producer 8, was good. I never had any problems updating and stability was good on my 6 year old HP desktop, which I tweaked to blackviper's specs http://www.blackviper.com/. I was running Sonar off my laptop, which is a year old HP Pavillion, 6 Gig RAM, Duo Core processors, for me a significant upgrade. Again, no issues. Pro Tools, on the same laptop..... worked fine, until it came time to update. The information PT provided was far from sufficient, and getting back to the regular install was a long and tediously frustrating process. Its back up, and stable....but I WILL back up, and think twice about updating it in the future.... best advice Andrew gave me was to wait 6 months after, and see what others are experiencing.

So my laptop is configured, performance wise, for the best possible processing of audio it can achieve. It is a bit of a cluster-F making everything compatible with everything else. But I would return something back to the seller if it gave me continuous issues.
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Re: Burnsy's Pro Tools learning thread...

Postby Malcolm Boyce » Wed Jun 06, 2012 4:23 pm

Sorry for pseudo derailing your thread Tom. I would certainly not be so quick to update anything after my last experience with Sonar7. Waiting to hear what happens to others is certainly good advice. That being said, I was doing the old... "latest and greatest" version thing and really had no specific reason to do so when I had my problems. It's amazing how many of us do the same thing without really questioning the consequences. I know anytime I've done these kinds of "upgrades" I've been careful to be between projects, but sometimes you only discover issues when you are tasking the system, and that's exactly what happened to me a while back when I installed the new patch that buggered up my system. All seemed fine until the next substantial tracking project and whammo.... Nightmare...
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Re: Burnsy's Pro Tools learning thread...

Postby Mathieu Benoit » Wed Jun 06, 2012 4:31 pm

Burnsy wrote: Its back up, and stable....but I WILL back up, and think twice about updating it in the future.... best advice Andrew gave me was to wait 6 months after, and see what others are experiencing.


Best advice Andrew ever gave me is to stop updating things until I have a particular need for the update and the update is proven to be stable by the user base at large. ;-)
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Re: Burnsy's Pro Tools learning thread...

Postby macrae11 » Wed Jun 06, 2012 9:11 pm

Ok finally have a couple of minutes to chime in. First off, not that it's impossible, but I've never heard of any issue similar to this with any mac program. Sometimes something won't uninstall but nothing like this. Of course I've had plenty of bad patches and upgrades but that's a different story. Like has been mentioned, biggest thing is to ask yourself the question, why are you upgrading? If I'm upgrading to attempt to create a more stable system, I'll always make a clone of my system drive so I can instantly go back to my previous version without hassle. If I'm upgrading for features, always wait as long as possible unless absolutely necessary. I did jump into PT 10 a little earlier than I wanted due to special pricing Avid had on for a limited time, but it's been more or less successful. I did have two crashes during a good sized session yesterday, but only one of them was PT's fault. I still might look into 10.2 because things didn't improve in stability as much as I'd like with the increased RAM.

Back to your problem Tom, one place to check is to see if you're officially compatible or not. These links will tell you what you need to be running.
http://avid.force.com/pkb/articles/en_U ... y/en419171
http://avid.force.com/pkb/articles/en_U ... popup=true

Your interface isn't officially supported by Avid, but should still work. If your computer is not on the list it doesn't mean it won't work, it just means they won't guarantee it to work. Once you're past that the best place to check on these types of problems is here: duc.digidesign.com. Pro Tools has one of the most helpful user bases out there and they have a number of employees that regularly frequent the forums that are usually quite knowledgeable. They are a bit less helpful with unsupported systems, but will usually still do their best to help. Also sometimes if you don't get a response you might have to shout a little just to get heard in the volume of requests that go through there.

I know slightly less than nothing about Windows 7, so I'm afraid I can't be of much help. I used to be up on it but the last time I ran a session on a windows machine it was 2005 I think on an old Windows XP tower that I spec'd out myself.
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Re: Burnsy's Pro Tools learning thread...

Postby Burnsy » Wed Jun 06, 2012 11:53 pm

I will dive into those links Andrew, and see what I can learn. Much appreciated. So there are 2 things right now that I want to mention about learning Pro Tools. 1st thing; because I didn't dive too heavy into the workings of Sonar, I'm not sure if it offers something similar...Malcolm, I'm sure you can fill me in here... But Elastic Audio in Pro Tools is something that really wowed me the 1st time I saw it in action, and the first time I got to work with it. It blew my mind that performances by musicians don't have to be perfect, in particular to their timing...and using Elastic Audio, we can fix it to make it sound more or less perfect. Maybe that's old news to most of you, but it was something I didn't know existed until a couple of months ago.

The 2nd thing....and I'm not sure if this is a Pro Tools peculiarity, the SSL peculiarity, or just something that's understood by most, but new to me, was the huge difference in sound of my mixdown using the stereo record outs of the SSl, and the sound of the mixdown.....compared to the actual session playback quality before the mixdown. I was really happy with the sound of the mix before the mixdown. The mixdown seemed to have lost quality, seemed more compressed, less dynamic, and I dare say some frequency loss or degradation. One instructor told me that this is totally normal, and when we mix, before the mixdown, we have to compensate for that loss of audio quality. Is this similar across all software? What is anyone's take on this? Again, this could be normal to most of you, just new to me as I'm still learning.

Oh, just did a quick check to see if my laptop is on the recommended list of Windows computers for Pro Tools. The specs on my laptop are roughly a third of the processing powers of the one's they have listed. Hahahaha. Oh well, its all I have for now to work with. I'll try to make the best of it.
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Re: Burnsy's Pro Tools learning thread...

Postby Mathieu Benoit » Thu Jun 07, 2012 9:53 am

Burnsy wrote:1st thing; because I didn't dive too heavy into the workings of Sonar, I'm not sure if it offers something similar...Malcolm, I'm sure you can fill me in here... But Elastic Audio in Pro Tools is something that really wowed me the 1st time I saw it in action, and the first time I got to work with it. It blew my mind that performances by musicians don't have to be perfect, in particular to their timing...and using Elastic Audio, we can fix it to make it sound more or less perfect. Maybe that's old news to most of you, but it was something I didn't know existed until a couple of months ago.

I had the same reaction to it when it first came out in 7.4. Now that I've used it extensively, I know that the best results will come from the best performances. Not to mention it's way faster to just get good performers. I tell my clients all the time and it's usually true: "Hire session guys and you'll save money in the end."

Now elastic audio has its limits, particularly with cymbals that sustain and acoustic guitar. You have to be very careful when editing, start with broad strokes and always strive to fix things with the least amount of warp markers possible. There are things in the end though that EA just can't pull out of the ditch. With experience though, you'll come to know if the take you got is salvagable. Nothing worse then tearing down a drumkit and having a drummer leave the studio only to find out that you don't have enough usable material to comp/edit together.

My point is, always strive for the best performances you can get and use EA as a last resort. If you get it into your head that EA can fix anything then you'll find yourself learning the hard way that it can't... (like I did. :mrgreen: )

Burnsy wrote:The 2nd thing....and I'm not sure if this is a Pro Tools peculiarity, the SSL peculiarity, or just something that's understood by most, but new to me, was the huge difference in sound of my mixdown using the stereo record outs of the SSl, and the sound of the mixdown.....compared to the actual session playback quality before the mixdown. I was really happy with the sound of the mix before the mixdown. The mixdown seemed to have lost quality, seemed more compressed, less dynamic, and I dare say some frequency loss or degradation. One instructor told me that this is totally normal, and when we mix, before the mixdown, we have to compensate for that loss of audio quality. Is this similar across all software? What is anyone's take on this? Again, this could be normal to most of you, just new to me as I'm still learning.

Ah the old analog summing debate. I was hoping we could have it here. Personally I'm getting way better this year at hearing the little things that I never used to notice, specifically types of distortion and noise that I couldn't perceive before. I can also notice the obvious difference between 16bit and 24bit. Maybe if I started working at 96K that might make a difference in my decision making as well, I don't know yet. Maybe if I mixed through analog summing that would also improve my decision making.

I haven't tried analog summing yet and I have no idea if it sounds "better" but I really doubt it's something that can be all that obvious in a A/B test, unless somethign is in fact broken. It would probably be more noticeable if you were mixing through it from the beginning. I believe Andrew is going to test this theory soon. His is going to take tracks that aren't his and mix them both on his PT rig and through the SSL at the school. There are a ton of other variables to consider when changing rooms like that but I am curious to hear his thoughts on how analog summing changing his actual decision making.

Burnsy wrote:The mixdown seemed to have lost quality, seemed more compressed, less dynamic, and I dare say some frequency loss or degradation.

Are you trying to say that the mixdown on the SSL was worse sounding than the PT playback? I guess I have a few questions to ask in that regard: Are you mixing through the SSL from the start, and if not why are you then mixing down through the SSL at the end of the mix? I don't know how you guys work over there, so I guess I'm just trying to figure out how you are coming to these conclusions.

I really wanna have this discussion to learn so please give more details about how you came to these observations.
Burnsy wrote:One instructor told me that this is totally normal, and when we mix, before the mixdown, we have to compensate for that loss of audio quality.

How does one compensate for this "loss of quality"?

Burnsy wrote:Oh, just did a quick check to see if my laptop is on the recommended list of Windows computers for Pro Tools. The specs on my laptop are roughly a third of the processing powers of the one's they have listed. Hahahaha. Oh well, its all I have for now to work with. I'll try to make the best of it.


It's all any of us do. Even with Andrew's 20 GB of RAM. :twisted:
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Re: Burnsy's Pro Tools learning thread...

Postby macrae11 » Thu Jun 07, 2012 12:27 pm

Mathieu Benoit wrote:
Burnsy wrote:1st thing; because I didn't dive too heavy into the workings of Sonar, I'm not sure if it offers something similar...Malcolm, I'm sure you can fill me in here... But Elastic Audio in Pro Tools is something that really wowed me the 1st time I saw it in action, and the first time I got to work with it. It blew my mind that performances by musicians don't have to be perfect, in particular to their timing...and using Elastic Audio, we can fix it to make it sound more or less perfect. Maybe that's old news to most of you, but it was something I didn't know existed until a couple of months ago.

I had the same reaction to it when it first came out in 7.4. Now that I've used it extensively, I know that the best results will come from the best performances. Not to mention it's way faster to just get good performers. I tell my clients all the time and it's usually true: "Hire session guys and you'll save money in the end."

Now elastic audio has its limits, particularly with cymbals that sustain and acoustic guitar. You have to be very careful when editing, start with broad strokes and always strive to fix things with the least amount of warp markers possible. There are things in the end though that EA just can't pull out of the ditch. With experience though, you'll come to know if the take you got is salvagable. Nothing worse then tearing down a drumkit and having a drummer leave the studio only to find out that you don't have enough usable material to comp/edit together.

My point is, always strive for the best performances you can get and use EA as a last resort. If you get it into your head that EA can fix anything then you'll find yourself learning the hard way that it can't... (like I did. :mrgreen: )

The exact point I was going to make.
Mathieu Benoit wrote:
Burnsy wrote:The 2nd thing....and I'm not sure if this is a Pro Tools peculiarity, the SSL peculiarity, or just something that's understood by most, but new to me, was the huge difference in sound of my mixdown using the stereo record outs of the SSl, and the sound of the mixdown.....compared to the actual session playback quality before the mixdown. I was really happy with the sound of the mix before the mixdown. The mixdown seemed to have lost quality, seemed more compressed, less dynamic, and I dare say some frequency loss or degradation. One instructor told me that this is totally normal, and when we mix, before the mixdown, we have to compensate for that loss of audio quality. Is this similar across all software? What is anyone's take on this? Again, this could be normal to most of you, just new to me as I'm still learning.

Ah the old analog summing debate. I was hoping we could have it here. Personally I'm getting way better this year at hearing the little things that I never used to notice, specifically types of distortion and noise that I couldn't perceive before. I can also notice the obvious difference between 16bit and 24bit. Maybe if I started working at 96K that might make a difference in my decision making as well, I don't know yet. Maybe if I mixed through analog summing that would also improve my decision making.

I haven't tried analog summing yet and I have no idea if it sounds "better" but I really doubt it's something that can be all that obvious in a A/B test, unless somethign is in fact broken. It would probably be more noticeable if you were mixing through it from the beginning. I believe Andrew is going to test this theory soon. His is going to take tracks that aren't his and mix them both on his PT rig and through the SSL at the school. There are a ton of other variables to consider when changing rooms like that but I am curious to hear his thoughts on how analog summing changing his actual decision making.

I don't think Burnsy is specifically referring to analogue summing, although that's certainly part of the equation. The question I would ask Tom is, have you tried mixing in PT using the console as a controller and compared that to your original mix? I'm almost certain you haven't because I don't think you've gone over that in class yet. Without hearing what Tom's hearing, my first suspect is the volume difference that is apparent when monitoring through PT off the Rec bus, vs monitoring directly off the Mix bus. It's a very significant drop that could be making it very difficult to make an accurate comparison. I just learned about this recently so I haven't had time to explore it yet. I only mix post stuff on the SSL which doesn't really do surround, so it's mostly just used for monitoring and maybe some mix bus compression. I'm going to spend some time trying to sort this out, or at least find a reasonable work around in the near future. Just cracked the manual this morning as a matter of fact.

Mathieu Benoit wrote:
Burnsy wrote:The mixdown seemed to have lost quality, seemed more compressed, less dynamic, and I dare say some frequency loss or degradation.

Are you trying to say that the mixdown on the SSL was worse sounding than the PT playback? I guess I have a few questions to ask in that regard: Are you mixing through the SSL from the start, and if not why are you then mixing down through the SSL at the end of the mix? I don't know how you guys work over there, so I guess I'm just trying to figure out how you are coming to these conclusions.

I really wanna have this discussion to learn so please give more details about how you came to these observations.

I think I know the answer, but it would be good to hear it from Burnsy.

Mathieu Benoit wrote:
Burnsy wrote:One instructor told me that this is totally normal, and when we mix, before the mixdown, we have to compensate for that loss of audio quality.

How does one compensate for this "loss of quality"?

By mixing through the complete monitoring chain so that your mix takes any deficiencies or changes into account. It's why you would listen off the repro head on an analogue 1/2" machine as opposed to directly off the mix bus of the console. I've been primarily mixing in PT with outboard so this phenomenon hasn't been an issue to me in sometime.
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Re: Burnsy's Pro Tools learning thread...

Postby Alain Benoit » Thu Jun 07, 2012 12:40 pm

macrae11 wrote:By mixing through the complete monitoring chain so that your mix takes any deficiencies or changes into account. It's why you would listen off the repro head on an analogue 1/2" machine as opposed to directly off the mix bus of the console. I've been primarily mixing in PT with outboard so this phenomenon hasn't been an issue to me in sometime.


This is why analogue mixers to this day no matter how small/cheap have a tape input.
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Re: Burnsy's Pro Tools learning thread...

Postby Malcolm Boyce » Thu Jun 07, 2012 12:40 pm

Burnsy wrote:The 2nd thing....and I'm not sure if this is a Pro Tools peculiarity, the SSL peculiarity, or just something that's understood by most, but new to me, was the huge difference in sound of my mixdown using the stereo record outs of the SSl, and the sound of the mixdown.....compared to the actual session playback quality before the mixdown. I was really happy with the sound of the mix before the mixdown. The mixdown seemed to have lost quality, seemed more compressed, less dynamic, and I dare say some frequency loss or degradation. One instructor told me that this is totally normal, and when we mix, before the mixdown, we have to compensate for that loss of audio quality. Is this similar across all software? What is anyone's take on this? Again, this could be normal to most of you, just new to me as I'm still learning.
I need you to clarify for me exactly how you are routing and mixing. What you are monitoring during mixing should be what you are actually printing. If not, you need to revisit your setup and fix that. No, it is not totally normal to be listening to a mix, and then printing and listening to that and it being very different from what you were happy with.
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Re: Burnsy's Pro Tools learning thread...

Postby Malcolm Boyce » Thu Jun 07, 2012 12:44 pm

macrae11 wrote:...It's why you would listen off the repro head on an analogue 1/2" machine as opposed to directly off the mix bus of the console...
Or at least check things in repro. You typically wouldn't mix that way unless everything was done and all you were doing was hitting play and record and letting it roll.
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Re: Burnsy's Pro Tools learning thread...

Postby Malcolm Boyce » Thu Jun 07, 2012 12:49 pm

macrae11 wrote:
Mathieu Benoit wrote:
Burnsy wrote:The 2nd thing....and I'm not sure if this is a Pro Tools peculiarity, the SSL peculiarity, or just something that's understood by most, but new to me, was the huge difference in sound of my mixdown using the stereo record outs of the SSl, and the sound of the mixdown.....compared to the actual session playback quality before the mixdown. I was really happy with the sound of the mix before the mixdown. The mixdown seemed to have lost quality, seemed more compressed, less dynamic, and I dare say some frequency loss or degradation. One instructor told me that this is totally normal, and when we mix, before the mixdown, we have to compensate for that loss of audio quality. Is this similar across all software? What is anyone's take on this? Again, this could be normal to most of you, just new to me as I'm still learning.

Ah the old analog summing debate. I was hoping we could have it here.

I don't think Burnsy is specifically referring to analogue summing, although that's certainly part of the equation.
I agree. I know you want it Matt, but in this case it's most likely just a workflow issue.
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Re: Burnsy's Pro Tools learning thread...

Postby Mathieu Benoit » Thu Jun 07, 2012 12:52 pm

macrae11 wrote:
Mathieu Benoit wrote:
Burnsy wrote:One instructor told me that this is totally normal, and when we mix, before the mixdown, we have to compensate for that loss of audio quality.

How does one compensate for this "loss of quality"?

By mixing through the complete monitoring chain so that your mix takes any deficiencies or changes into account. It's why you would listen off the repro head on an analogue 1/2" machine as opposed to directly off the mix bus of the console. I've been primarily mixing in PT with outboard so this phenomenon hasn't been an issue to me in sometime.

I know that Andrew, but that isn't the impression I'm getting from reading Burnsy's post. Maybe it's just the way it's worded... He seems to imply that there is a step that one does "before the mixdown" that can fix the "loss of quality.". If that is not what he meant, then it should be clarified all the same.
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Re: Burnsy's Pro Tools learning thread...

Postby Mathieu Benoit » Thu Jun 07, 2012 12:56 pm

Malcolm Boyce wrote:I agree. I know you want it Matt, but in this case it's most likely just a workflow issue.


I do want that debate... but unfortunately right now I don't really know what he is getting at exactly so, I guess that will have to wait. We need more information to continue this dialog. But I'm VERY interested in continuing it.

Welcome back Burnsy! (lap
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Re: Burnsy's Pro Tools learning thread...

Postby Burnsy » Thu Jun 07, 2012 1:29 pm

18 Tracks playback from Pro Tools. Protools Outputs coming into the SSL on the REC bus, using the EQ, Sends, Returns, Pans, and Faders to create the mix I want to hear. Once mixed on those 18 channels, I use the SSL Direct Record Stereo Outs from the patchbay, and I patch it into the Aurora Lynx inputs on the patchbay, specifically ch 15 and 16. This gives me the stereo mix, which I've assigned to the MIX bus, and I record that in Pro Tools, on inputs 15-16 as my stereo mixdown. I don't think I'm missing anything...... chime in Andrew if you think I may be.

There was definitely a change in volume, as you had mentioned Andrew, from the REC bus to the MIX bus. But what I seemed to be missing was more than that, as if it was compressed again somehow.... or the dynamics had been changed a tad. The vox, kik, and snare, sounded louder the original of the mix, the rest of the mix sounded weaker than the original mix. I didn't assign the master compressor to the MIX bus so it wasn't compressed twice, although to my ears it sounded that way.

And I completely see the value in having musicians perform their parts well, as opposed to dealing with extreme sloppiness using EA. For example, Andrew gave us an assignment that he told us would take an hour. Basically he took 6 tracks that were originally time perfected, and sounded good...and he messed each track up individually, in different timings, and the assignment was to put it all back together and make it sound good again. So it took me 3 and a half hours to get it sounding to how I liked it. I remember thinking, I hope I never have to deal with a band whose performances are THIS bad. Time is money.

Thanks Matt, and it's good to be back.... from a long long hiatus. I'm in school at the Centre for Arts and taking Audio Engineering, as you've probably gathered. And for those of you who know me....I've been wanting this for a real real real long time. My personal circumstances now allow for this to happen...even though I'm a bit late in the arrival. Better late than never! Oh, I'm also performing again... Life is good. :-o
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