LUNA is now free for all Mac users

[Uncle E]

Agreed, I haven't, either. I do like the summing quite a bit better than CTC-1 and Softube Tape in the Mix FX, though. Which Mix FX are you using that sounds better?

[jamcat]

Agreed, I haven't, either. I do like the summing quite a bit better than CTC-1 and Softube Tape in the Mix FX, though. Which Mix FX are you using that sounds better?

I own both CTC-1 and Retro Mix Legends.
I use the Brit Console from Retra Mix Legends in Vintage (SL-4000) mode. I emulate a full tracking console and a full mixing console in Studio One with Mixer Views and destination routing. For the mixing console, I do SSL SL-4000 E/G. The Brit Console MixFX is part of that. It makes a huge difference bringing more depth, width, and glue to the mix.

In LUNA, so far I've only run the demo project. I can't really hear any difference whether the Neve and API summing is on or off. What should I be hearing there?

[Uncle E]

I own both CTC-1 and Retro Mix Legends.
I use the Brit Console from Retra Mix Legends in Vintage (SL-4000) mode. I emulate a full tracking console and a full mixing console in Studio One with Mixer Views and destination routing. For the mixing console, I do SSL SL-4000 E/G. The Brit Console MixFX is part of that. It makes a huge difference bringing more depth, width, and glue to the mix.

Thanks. Will have to try that one.

In LUNA, so far I've only run the demo project. I can't really hear any difference whether the Neve and API summing is on or off. What should I be hearing there?

The mix will sound filled out. Seems to interact with the tapes, as well.

[jamcat]

I own both CTC-1 and Retro Mix Legends.
I use the Brit Console from Retro Mix Legends in Vintage (SL-4000) mode. I emulate a full tracking console and a full mixing console in Studio One with Mixer Views and destination routing. For the mixing console, I do SSL SL-4000 E/G. The Brit Console MixFX is part of that. It makes a huge difference bringing more depth, width, and glue to the mix.

Thanks. Will have to try that one.

I think Retro Mix Legends is all around better than CTC-1.
The Alpine console is modeled on a vintage API. The Brit Console gives you 3 different SSL eras: "Vintage" is the SL-4000, as mentioned. "Super" is the SL-9000 "Superanalogue", and "Modern" is the VHD+. The 2nd/3rd Harmonics knob only works with that one.

[Lutin mutin]

I am a Logic Pro x user.
And because now Luna is free an accessible to all Mac users (no need to have an UA device to use it), I've downloaded it and played with.
It is really a very great DAW, with a lot of good workflow interesting things.
But...
For the moment... Logic Pro x will be my Go to DAW, as well as in the "creativity trials", then in the composition and mastering process...

Habits ? "integrated" personnal workflow ?... DAW conception approach "philosophy" ?...

[elxsound]

I own both CTC-1 and Retro Mix Legends.
I use the Brit Console from Retro Mix Legends in Vintage (SL-4000) mode. I emulate a full tracking console and a full mixing console in Studio One with Mixer Views and destination routing. For the mixing console, I do SSL SL-4000 E/G. The Brit Console MixFX is part of that. It makes a huge difference bringing more depth, width, and glue to the mix.

Thanks. Will have to try that one.

I think Retro Mix Legends is all around better than CTC-1.
The Alpine console is modeled on a vintage API. The Brit Console gives you 3 different SSL eras: "Vintage" is the SL-4000, as mentioned. "Super" is the SL-9000 "Superanalogue", and "Modern" is the VHD+. The 2nd/3rd Harmonics knob only works with that one.

Sorry for the naive question, but does Studio 1 work similarly to Luna with a console layout?

I’m still hunting for a dedicated mixing environment.

I have Logic, Cubase 12, and Reaper for this. I started with ProTrolls.

I’m using Live for everything else and can mix in Live, but would prefer a different host for this.

Luna is looking good for this, but I’m not a fan of the cash grab.

[mgw38]

To me Luna feels a bit like Mixbus due to its summing emulation. I’m not the super expert when it comes time mixing but it seems that Luna is pretty suitable for that purpose.

[Uncle E]

Luna is looking good for this, but I’m not a fan of the cash grab.

The tape and summing extensions are what make it stand out. They're already on every channel, you just need to choose which you want to use and activate it. It's a sum is greater than the parts (pun intended) situation, I don't get the same sound when I use the UAD tapes in Studio One.

If you don't invest in the tapes and summing, there's not much point.

[elxsound]

Luna is looking good for this, but I’m not a fan of the cash grab.

The tape and summing extensions are what make it stand out. They're already on every channel, you just need to choose which you want to use and activate it. It's a sum is greater than the parts (pun intended) situation, I don't get the same sound when I use the UAD tapes in Studio One.

If you don't invest in the tapes and summing, there's not much point.

That is definitely the draw to it, especially with ATR-102 on the master and when adding buses.

I'm still working my way around, but it's very easy to work with so far.

[elxsound]

Man, as nice as this is. I will move on with what I have until their marketing schemes make sense, even if that becomes never.

Who the f**k is running things there.

I see comparisons to IKmultimedia, but I think this might be worse.

Too much duplication in the bundles and strange pricing that burns old and newer users alike.

[bmanic]

Agreed. UA has completely lost the plot lately, in my opinion. Way too risky to invest any money into them right now.

Also I'm so deeply invested in Reaper that I feel it'd be a huge step back in freedom of mixing if I changed to some other DAW now. I've got all my lovely templates setup and ready to go so I can mix extremely quickly in it.

As for summing, to my ears it's always been a bit of a mixed bag (talking about hardware summing here). I've tried all kinds of solutions and very rarely do I feel it actually makes a "sounds better" difference. Something like a Silver Bullet on the mixbus or any critical busses makes a far bigger improvement on overall sound in my opinion.

[Uncle E]

As for summing, to my ears it's always been a bit of a mixed bag (talking about hardware summing here). I've tried all kinds of solutions and very rarely do I feel it actually makes a "sounds better" difference. Something like a Silver Bullet on the mixbus or any critical busses makes a far bigger improvement on overall sound in my opinion.

Did you demo the UA summing? It has a lot more impact than a clean summer like the Dangerous D-Box.

[bmanic]

As for summing, to my ears it's always been a bit of a mixed bag (talking about hardware summing here). I've tried all kinds of solutions and very rarely do I feel it actually makes a "sounds better" difference. Something like a Silver Bullet on the mixbus or any critical busses makes a far bigger improvement on overall sound in my opinion.

Did you demo the UA summing? It has a lot more impact than a clean summer like the Dangerous D-Box.

No not yet I plan on testing it soon.

I've had the Neve 8816 summing box for a trial and that didn't impress me at all. I've also of course summed through tons of different mixers, ranging from a basic Mackie 1604 (the original released many decades ago!), which I liked the most, all the way up to a full SSL 9k setup.

Yeah.. I went down the rabbit hole with that a few times as all the hype of analogue summing got to me. Luckily I didn't really find any advantages to it.. only mostly negative ones. The only exception being the Mackie which actually worked really well for a fun little project where I severely abused the preamps to bring some life into a rather large project of super anemic source files. I ran through the mackie with every single track, had to go through it like 4 times as obviously it doesn't have that many channels to begin with! That was the only successful summing venture I ever had. In pretty much all other cases I preferred the in-the-box summed versions.

Same happened in several Gearspace blind shootouts where I always picked the DAW version as my preference. So I'm pretty sure it's not my thing.

[elxsound]

Agreed. UA has completely lost the plot lately, in my opinion. Way too risky to invest any money into them right now.

Not that this would cause a change from using Reaper, but they seem to be backtracking by offering discounts to those who recently bought one of their native bundles.

They say they forgot to email bundle owners before offering the new bundles and asked users to contact their support for a discount coupon.

I guess they don't want to go the apology route like Waves, so it's them forgetting.

Anyway, I hope this is a sign of better things.

[Uncle E]

Yeah.. I went down the rabbit hole with that a few times as all the hype of analogue summing got to me. Luckily I didn't really find any advantages to it.. only mostly negative ones. The only exception being the Mackie which actually worked really well for a fun little project where I severely abused the preamps to bring some life into a rather large project of super anemic source files. I ran through the mackie with every single track, had to go through it like 4 times as obviously it doesn't have that many channels to begin with! That was the only successful summing venture I ever had. In pretty much all other cases I preferred the in-the-box summed versions.

Yes, that's pretty much how I use my modded Yamaha M512, as an effect. It makes everything sound like the 70's. I had a gorgeous 24-channel summer that had line cards from a Neumann mastering console inside but, as good as it was, I rarely used it because it sounded so pristine. Basically wasn't a strong enough of an impact to be worth the trouble.

btw, The Crystal Method mixed their first record on a pair of original Mackie CR-1604's. That exact model is the good one, other configurations and the VLZ's don't saturate the same.