Which production concepts/techniques have improved your production the most?

[_al_]

For me:

Many years ago:

Buying a set of proper (but cheap) monitors, so I didn't have to use my headphones. Just using decent speakers in general, made me hear dynamics and level balance in a different way.
Ironically though, most people listen on headphones now

Using an IR verb bus to give colour to most aspects of my mix (set too short to be called a reverb, and too quiet to be noticed, until you take it away)
This just helps different elements sound like they belong together.

Distributing my working time between different tracks. Having 4 or 5 under construction at the same time.
When you spend too long on a single track, you start to develop emotional attachments and your perception warps somewhat, compared to when someone hears it for the first time.
Also... when you spend too long on a single project, you will become tired of certain elements and will no longer hear the impact they have on a casual listener.
By switching every week or so, I am able to keep an idea of how something sounds to a new listener.


More recently:

Buying Realphones! This has enabled me to be more confident in my decisions, and my work is translating a lot better now, on other systems

[Theoctavist]

learning on analog consoles and mixing to tape. the limitations, im very very thankful for. having a million vst options for everything under the sun isnt a blessing, its a curse.

also, checking in mono, mixing in mono.

pink noise mixing. but limitations have helped me the most. even today i just use the DAW as a tape machine, basically. i use VSTs for surgical eq work , and sometimes for sequencing, but thats it.

[Laion]

Ear training has helped me the most to then improve my EQ-ing and compressing skills. This along with the correct dose of saturation has brought my prods to the next level!

[RipleySterling]

Everything from Ian Kirkpatrick's livestreams.

[Thymos]

Hi folks,

Thanks for all your input! Its really inspiring and I hope not just for me. Keep it up!

Best regards

[ramseysounds]

Ignoring all the so called experts on youtube and internet in general who make ‘beatz’

[Ah_Dziz]

Spending far less time tweaking individual elements while writing music. Basically going back to the Writing, arranging, filling out, mixing/ tweaking method that was necessary when I had a finite number of tracks and sounds available. It lets you focus just on what's important at any given moment. It's far easier to do when working to a specific schedule, but I try and do things that way even when I'm not on a job now.

[Synthman2000]

Being trained for many years to be a pro sound engineer, by other pro sound engineers who did it for a living as well.

[Timid Dreams]

One thing that improved my production game was sampling. I found that adding melodic samples on top of my tracks really helped to bring the track to life and to bring about new potential ideas. I have been using a piece of software called "song surgeon" for awhile to find the key and change the tempo quickly. What does everyone else use to find the key?

[aevang]

For me, it's been leaving holes and space in the arrangement, and then filling that space with another instrument or sound. It creates a nice push/pull and makes sure nothing is stepping on other stuff too much or clashing - because things are happening at different times.

[aevang]

Oh - I should also add: Focusing on making sure the song is actually being written, as opposed to endlessly mixing and tweaking a half-baked idea. We're all guilty of it but me especially. Gregory Scott has a good video on it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImV7_-96tKk

[cron]

Getting things printed to audio as quickly as possible so I stop tweaking. I'd almost always find that something I thought was only 80% there was actually fine in context.

I used to be super hardcore with it and I'd use one DAW instance exclusively for sound design and audio export - typically messing around live while constantly recording, a wave editor for chopping those huge chunks of audio into individual files, and a second DAW instance exclusively for arranging those audio files and doing basic mix processing. It sounds cumbersome, but I worked significantly faster this way because I kind of thrive on restriction. It got me to focus more on arrangement and making the material I already had work in context, rather than endlessly revising the raw material and getting nowhere with the track.

[Bombadil]

Subtractive EQ.

[swilow11]

Using a synths presets is totally fine.

[lwj]

Incorporating more hardware (elektron workflow) and dropping the safety of non destructive editing ITB allows. Record, make mistakes and make the tracks about them. Commit and go.