Looking for a secondary DAW (for mixing/mastering) which will eventually become my primary DAW (for all things)

[syntonica]

Yes, mixing and mastering are distinct skills

Indeed they are!

I can attest to this. I have my own mixing style, for better or for worse, but I've never understood the whole mastering thing for the digital realm. I understand its need for vinyl or tape, but I deal in wholly digital. I don't want to mix my music so it sounds good on crappy speakers, I want it to sound good on good speakers.

I remember demoing some version of Reason, wearing my good cans. I played the demo song and it sounded like caca. Disgustedly, I pulled the plug on the headphones and the audio came out the crappy PowerBook speaks. Magically, the demo suddenly sounded good--not great, of course, but good. Who the eff does that?!? That was the biggest reason for me not buying Reason. Apparently, they were trying to sell to laptop users to stupid to use real speakers.

But yeah, separate skills. I'll shut up now.

[musicproducerdee]

Really? Why? What if you're in the middle of your mixing process you realise that your bassline needs to be a bit snappier, for example? How do you deal with that without going back to Bitwig, changing the envelope settings and re-rendering? Closing yourself off from those kinds of options has to make mixing way, way harder than it needs to be, surely? That's how we used to have to do things - get every part onto tape before we started mixing - but it was a horribly inefficient process that I am profoundly happy I do not have to deal with any more.

If I want to change something mid project, yes, I'll have to go back to Bitwig and do it. There's no other way around it. But that doesn't happen to me all that much. Once I've bounced everything to audio, I already know if the bass is punchy enough for the song. I don't bounce things to audio unless I'm absolutely sure that I'm happy with the sound. But yes, it happens once in a while, and I have to go back to the project and make the changes.

Which is my entire argument for not using multiple DAWs. But you can choose at what point in the process you export your MIDI. You could do your automation once you get it into Cubase, instead of doing it in Bitwig, at least for some parts if not for every track.

I agree, I do not prefer using multiple DAWs. I was happy with the production aspect of Bitwig, but not the technical aspect of it (mixing, mastering), hence I decided to look for a secondary DAW. Although, I should have mention that I'll eventually switch to it, to make it a one stop shop. I do not enjoy switching between DAWs, I would very much like a DAW that fits my creation workflow as well as technical workflow. I found Cubase to do this best for me, hence I chose to go that route.

Again why? It makes absolutely no sense to me. What do you actually do with them?

Two reasons: One is to avoid CPU overload issues, which happens quite a bit when I have massive projects with multiple synths playing a lot of unison voices. I know I can freeze tracks to save CPU, and I do that sometimes, works without any issues.

The 2nd reason is, to avoid clutter. I absolutely hate clutter and producing, mixing & mastering in the same project becomes quite messy for me. Also, I like the idea of committing to audio, or else, being the fidgety person that I am, I keep changing things around forever, and never end up finishing songs. Yes, I change things even when I'm happy with the sounds, I find a new sound and go like *oh I love this sound, let's replace the old one with this*, and I keep doing things like this forever. Exporting to stems puts me in a slightly different mindset, because I know that the song is now arranged, I just need to enhance it by mixing, cool, let's get it done.

I know it's a me thing, and I'm ok with it, for now

Because bouncing it to audio removes too many options for me to change it later. There are songs on the album we've just finished that I had been working on for more than a year, where I changed not just a sound, but swapped out instruments, in the week before we ruled a line under everything and decided we were done. In fact, just yesterday I swapped out the kick sound in a song I first started working on in 2020, even though we've officially finished the album. If I'd been working with stems, I'd have had to go back and re-render parts a dozen times a week over the past 6 months. But the reality is that I almost certainly wouldn't have bothered, I'd have tried some series of kludges to fix it as best I could because going back and changing the instrument would be way too much hassle. The way we work, nothing is finalised until the moment we deliver it to our label and I think our songs are much better for it.

Makes sense. If it's not finalized, why bounce it to audio at all. Even so, since you'll are already aware that nothing is finalized until the moment it's delivered to the label, it wouldn't do much good to commit to audio. In my case, I'm a one man show, and I usually work one song at a time, finish it, and then move on to the next. So, it doesn't really matter how I chose to work, as any hurdles are going to affect only me. So, it's best I make things fit my workflow.

I honestly can't imagine a more inefficient way to do things than the way you describe. As I said, there was a time when we had to work that way but those were not the days when I was able to do my best work. I used to be involved in developing pipelines for post-production studios (visual effects for film and TV) and what we were always aiming for was to be able to go as far back down the pipe as possible and make changes, without having to commit anything. So things like rendering stems stops you form doing that and makes your workflow less efficient. Moreover, I can't see any advantage in doing it that way. Like I said the other day, production is a continuum, it is not a series of discrete processes undertaken one after the other.

To each their own, I guess. I'd like to point out that, before rendering to stems, I spend a lot of time producing, sound designing, arranging etc. So, I'd argue that 80% of my song is done there. Going back and changing things is already done for me during this stage. I'd write a bassline today, and create a whole song, and once the song is done after a week or so, I'd go back and change the bassline. This is my process. So, when I've decided to export stems, all this is already done and done and done, again.

The longer you put off rendering anything, the more options you leave open to do the best possible job.

I think it's the complete opposite actually. The longer I put off rendering anything, more likely am I to go round and round in circles and never actually finish any work. Hey, as I said, everyone has their own way of working. No right or wrong here. Someone might think that my way of doing things is wrong. That's fine, I'm getting done what needs to be done for me.

[musicproducerdee]

Hey, do ignore my quoting blunder in my previous post, heheh

[BONES]

Secondly, the former -which widens the overall sound of the song- is an example used to answer your question on why one would mix first and master a rendered file; it's not in favor of your method/arguement (I know, so sad isn't it?).

In that case, you're talking nonsense. You can widen a mix before or after you render it equally well. A plugin doesn't know whether it is dealing with a single rendered file or a mix, does it?

Well then why are you so concerned about how others do their work to get to the end zone if you are adamant with your process?

I could ask the same question of you. We all come here to share our knowledge and experience, to learn and to help others.

So there were no mastering engineers but there were engineers?

Yes, the engineer's job was/is to set everything up for recording. Mic up the amps and drums, set up the vocal mic and plug it all into the mixer. You know, engineering shit. The engineer facilitates the producer's work. He's usually the guy who knows the studio inside and out and can fix things that go wrong.

The reason we call someone who does mastering an "engineer" is that in the old days, mastering was done by the actual engineers who operated the pressing plant, people who didn't necessarily have any musical knowledge or ability but understood audio signals. They'd have been people who had gone to university and had a degree in science or electrical engineering.

Any mastering was done by the manufacturer

OK, so maybe those cats weren't called engineers but the point being they were a separate entity from those who mixed songs.[/quote]
Because they were doing it for different reasons. e.g. They would EQ a track with too much bass so that it didn't make the needle skip out of the groove. That is literally what mastering was about in the vinyl era. There was an RIAA approved EQ curve that material had to conform to and the engineer doing the mastering would ensure that it did. If it wrecked the song in the process, that was beside the point, the process was purely technical. Of course, after a while I am sure someone saw the value in making sure their music conformed before they sent it to the pressing plant, so that there was no chance of it being wrecked by the mastering engineer, and that's when it would have come out of the pressing plant and into the studio, where it would be a consideration during mixing, not a separate process undertaken after mixdown. That came much later.

I like standard cars versus automatics. Now somone like you would ask, "Why? Why bother with a clutch and have to deal with 3 pedals when you can just deal with two? Why would you want to shift gears when you can get an automatic to take care of it for you? The way you're doing it is not efficient."

Oh dear, you don't know much about me at all, do you? But I will answer your question for you - a manual transmission adds to the experience of driving. For me it is totally non-negotiable. If I'm not changing my own gears, I may as well be chauffeured around the place. I'd walk everywhere rather than buy a car with an automatic gearbox. But that's because I own a car for very different reasons to most people.

With the latter I fall asleep from sheer boredom!

Abso-fucken-lutely!

Mixing and mastering bores the shit out of me so *for me*, it's quicker (on top of it sounding better to my ears) to focus on one as opposed to doing both simultaneously. Maybe it makes no sense in the modern DAW age and guess what, I don't give a f**k.

Which is good for anyone reading this thread to know, so they can discount you as some kind of hidebound fringe lunatic. Meanwhile, I just want to do the best possible job in the least amount of time so I do everything at once. I don't even see mixing as a separate process from the rest of it. As soon as you add a second instrument, you are mixing. For me, the entire process, from that first little musical idea to a mastered song, is just one thing with no discrete stages at all. So by the time I have a working arrangement, I also have a working mix that's mostly mastered, too. From there I will refine the arrangement, the mix and the mastering plugins until it's finished. There are no intermediate points where the arrangement is set in stone or the mix is finished, the whole thing is either finished or the whole thing isn't. It's the most efficient and flexible way to work that ensures the best possible result.

And the reason would be... ?

Do this: open up one of your projects, load a flanger - with the feedback and rate all the way up - onto the master bus, now go ahead and mix the song.
After you do that, come back and ask me this question again. [/quote]
OK, I see your problem and I can help you with it - a flanger is not a tool you should be applying at the mastering stage. It's not well suited to that kind of work.

Why?

Because when one does a mix, it should sound completely satisfactory. There is no "Fixing it in the mastering process"; that's ridiculous.[/quote]
Then what is the purpose of mastering? If your mix is already perfect, why master at all?

Mix a song to a point you love it. Only then is it ready for mastering because all mastering does is accent the mix. Mind you, there are scenarios where the character of a song can change with mastering but in general, mastering is about taking what has been mixed and waxing it.

The two main plugins in my mastering chain completely alter the character of a mix in very desirable ways. Don't ask me why or how but they do and they are not processors I would leave until I'd rendered a mix because they can drastically alter the balance of elements within the songs. I'm sure I could add that character by adding dozens of effects to individual channels but I'm lazy and I hate producing so I do it the easy way. If you enjoy making your life harder than it needs to be, have at it.

[teilo]

but they are also highly intertwined

For your homework, I want a 500 word essay explaining how mixing and mastering are highly intertwined. I also want examples demonstrating their intertwiney-ness.

That you need to even ask the question means that no number of examples will satisfy you. Besides, you've also already admitted my point in your argument with BONES, and I don't argue just to argue.

[TechGirl]

I used Calkwalk 9 to edit MIDI files. You can edit them fine in later versions but Calkwalk 9 is super simple and doesn't have all the other features that you don't need.

[? ? ?]

Then what is the purpose of mastering? If your mix is already perfect, why master at all?

Well, aside from the context discussed here, one obvious example (i would think) would be to make sure an album worth of material all sounds equally balanced (level) when doing ie LUFS standards and whatever else BS is necessary these days.
Much easier to take stems from all the songs, align them up in a single project file and have at it versus doing each separately within the main project file.
In regards to a song that is perfectly mixed, there is a world of difference when one processes a stereo file with left/right -mid/side EQ for example; it really opens up the mix.
Could you do this type of processing within the main project file by throwing the EQ on the main bus? Sure. As I stated I've done it. Is there a difference versus doing it that way as opposed to a rendered file? I personally hear a difference.
When I did it your way the results were unsatisfactory: still not as wide as other songs I was comparing it to (had this boxed in sound even after widening it), it sounded too piercing at times.
You seem to be getting good results though so obviously i did something(s) wrong but I'm not sure what. I am constantly improving so not sure why I was getting bad results.
Actually as i type I recall that ear fatigue is one. Much easier on me to focus on mixing, then rest a day or two before mastering.
Anyhow, ATM mastering a single stereo file is working like a champ. Does that make me a lunatic traditionalist? Don't give a f**k to be honest. Amen and God bless the clutch.

[BONES]

Well, aside from the context discussed here, one obvious example (i would think) would be to make sure an album worth of material all sounds equally balanced (level) when doing ie LUFS standards and whatever else BS is necessary these days.

Actually, that is the main reason we master our stuff. But it's a purely technical process, just like in the old days, the songs don't generally end up sounding any better for it. On the LUFS front, I've noticed that Bandcamp does a way better job of making the mp3s loud than I do. We upload mastered wav files and when they spit out mp3s, they are really loud. OTOH, our CDs aren't usually as loud as everyone else's. I can't bring myself to pump it up too much, I like to leave at least some dynamics in there somewhere.

Much easier to take stems from all the songs, align them up in a single project file

I don't quite do it like that, I still do 'em one at a time but I try to use similar settings on the limiter and they end up pretty close.

In regards to a song that is perfectly mixed, there is a world of difference when one processes a stereo file with left/right -mid/side EQ for example; it really opens up the mix.

Again, you can do that on the master channel in a mix, you don't need a rendered file for that.

I personally hear a difference.

Then there is something wrong with the way your DAW renders audio because if the input is the same, the output will be, too.

[? ? ?]

it's a purely technical process, just lilke in the old days, the songs don't generally end up
sounding any better for it.

Depends who you ask. The average joe listener thinks louder sounds "better".

Anyhow, a bit of a side show, I thought of changing some terminology to explain things better.
What is referred to as mastering - where one is accentuating the mix - should be referred to as exactly what it does, accentuates the mix (as opposed to calling it "mastering").
The technical stuff is what should be referred to as mastering. So:

1. Mix the song
2. Accentuate the mix: Accentuating involves adding a signal chain to the master bus of the mixed song
to enhance the final mix, so it seems it's not necessary to render a file to accentuate separately, although one can (IE if one
rather have it done as an outside job).
3. Master: the technical stuff which in our current time is setting the file to LUFS etc. standards

My preference is to accentuate the mix *after* mixing as opposed to doing both simultaneously.
If the accentuation of a mix is done as an outside job, I would leave the master bus of the mix empty when
rendering the file (zero processing).
For mastering one can master stems in a separate project or master within the
mixed and accentuated project.
I prefer to do the former if it's an album worth of material. Talk about inefficiancy doing each separately but
to each their own.

Then there is something wrong with the way your DAW renders

Nah. Mind you, I did use a different, older DAW when I was mixing and accentuating on the same project file but so what.
I don't buy that one DAW renders better than another (disregarding any bugs of course).
Having bad results mixing and accentuating on the same project file versus having better results doing each
separately was due to an error or errors on my part.
Perhaps the plugs in the signal chain could have been ordered better, perhaps there was too much processing
verus what I do when accentuating a rendered file (use less plugs).
Maybe the stock plugs in the older DAW (Live version 8 )aren't as good as the stock plugs I use now (Reaper 6).
I also have to consider that my mixing skills have improved (always are). Perhaps the unsatisfactory results I heard mixing and
accentuating on the same file were due to bad mixing skills and had zero to do with the signal chain on the master bus.

[BONES]

Depends who you ask. The average joe listener thinks louder sounds "better".

No, it doesn't because I am talking about my music and my mastering, so better is what I say it is.

I prefer to do the former if it's an album worth of material. Talk about inefficiancy doing each separately but to each their own.

You can't batch master an album, you still have to master the songs one at a time. I don't finish one song and move onto the next, I work on the album as an entirety, from start to finish. When we decide the album is finished, I render all the songs out together, then I spend an afternoon mastering them all, although we've decided to let Greg Reely master the album we finished a couple of weeks ago, as much to get his name in the credits as anything else. He'll be mastering from rendered mixes, not stems (because it's cheaper).

[Trensharo]

If the plan is the move over eventually to the secondary as the primary then Cubase or Logic.

If you produce electronic music, then I think Ableton or Bitwig is fine, though.

I don't think most people need a dedicated "Mastering DAW," either. People who know how to master music are generally able to do a great job without having to go to something "dedicated" to it (WaveLab, Sound Forge, etc.). Those solutions exist largely for people who spend all their days mastering, and not producing (no need to deal with the feature bloat getting in the way when working in production DAWs).

[BONES]

This may come as a surprise to you but not all electronic music is EDM. Live/Buttwig might be more useful for EDM but there are plenty of genres of electronic music for which they are not.

BTW, part of the fun of annoying users who've blocked you is to quote them and say outrageous things about the drivel they write. "Notifications for nothing" seems like a nice bonus.

[musicproducerdee]

Just came here to say that, since this thread, I've chosen to work with Cubase as a DAW, and finished my first mixdown last night

I also added the SSL 360 Plug-In mixer to my setup. That was fun too.

On to the mastering session now