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Merry Christmas and best wishes for 2025 everyone!  🎄🎅🏽 Happy to see this tradition still going strong after 18 years and a big thank you for your efforts on this again TC ❤️

The album's done and up. GO GET IT!  

Eighteen of these. Eighteen years. Holy shitballs, Batman! Another album is in the books. This year we have seven songs of various moods, genres and tempos, all set for everyone to listen to and as you get deep into the holiday spirit. While we wait for Dyne to update the site, I'll be hosting the zip file. Once he's done, I'll change the link here to go there. Make sense? Good. A big thanks to the remixers who joined up, and to Dyne for hosting these albums for yet another year. And on behalf of everyone involved, Merry Christmas! https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/h38xbepspwtd7oo0fo91y/Final-AOCC18-Album.7z?rlkey=8vsnooq9wi4bcvisxk5xl4ki0&st=fph8zglt&dl=0

Thanks! Didn't see this until just now, but you cleared things up for me. I will say though that I don't typically accept friend requests/DMs on Discord from people I don't know IRL, simply because I don't really use it as social media and outside of the OCR server (which I'm mainly on to lurk and workshop whatever WIPs I end up finishing) I mainly use it to share memes and connect with friends (and friends of friends, etc). Hope that doesn't crimp your style at all.

Using specific stereo widths for instrument and direct signal tracks for more clarity and assertiveness in the mix and for a more impressive representation of panorama and spatiality in the soundtrack -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ready for another round of text, visuals and audio samples to show how I've improved my mix? Well then, let's go. ... Recently, I finally got round to working on the remaining drum tracks in my almost finished Crisis Core - Final Fantasy 7 remix. In contrast to the previous drum kit reverb (one aux reverb send for all individual drum elements), I created separate aux reverb sends for each drum element so that I could finally process the reverb for all drum elements individually and place it more precisely in the panorama. I experimented a lot with this (including counter-panning the instrument and the corresponding aux reverb send), but in this specific case I came to the conclusion that the mix sounded best and most credible when I panned the reverb for the cymbals, snare and toms in a similar way to the individual drum components. I only made a small exception with the centered kick drum and panned its reverb a little more to the right side (approx. 5 dB more than on the left side - as usual, I panned the aux reverb send hard to the sides without involving the centre) in order to be able to balance the slightly leftward position of the snare and snare reverb with the reverb of the bass and its slightly rightward position in the mix a little better. That alone made it sound a little bit cleaner and kinda sorted. … But thanks to my curiosity and love of experimentation, I immediately pursued another question with the drums, namely whether I could achieve a further improvement in the mixing if I also reduced the stereo width of the drum elements in the direct signal even more or even set them to mono (and only used the reverb of the drum elements on the sides to give the respective drum element in the overall signal with reverb the spatial width in the mix) - similar to what I had already done with the bass in the previous audio samples in the last post. I had already reduced all the drum elements to a stereo width of around 50% for some time. In previous posts I've written about how the direct signal from the bass should only play in the centre of the mix if possible and can be widened through its reverb at the sides (and made into a clear, un-muddied stereo signal), while most drum elements come across fully well in the mix in their direct signals, if they are located somewhere between the sides (with the majority of the instruments and the aux reverb sends) and the centre of the mix (with the dry bass direct signal) - in case of doubt, it is better to move the dry drum signals a little more towards the centre than too far to the sides, because in the latter case the drum elements would lose a lot of their punch in the mix. Of course, you can also place all drum elements in the direct signal completely mono in the centre (this could be a consideration if the other instruments and signals are already playing very lively in the mix and are already making generous use of the stereo width). However, even with a well-designed stereo reverb for the individual drum elements, you won't be able to get much sum signal stereo width and a significant representation of spatiality for the respective drum element with its reverb in the mix in this case. … As I wrote earlier, I didn't notice any real sound improvements in the drum elements such as snare, toms and cymbals after I further reduced the stereo width of the respective direct signal without reverb, starting from an existing stereo width of approximately 50%, or even set it completely to mono. As a result, the spatial effect of these drum elements suffered rather than giving them noticeably more assertiveness in the mix. But the kick drum was a little different. During my experiments, I even came to the conclusion that the mix (in this particular soundtrack) is best enhanced if I set the kick drum in the direct signal to mono in the centre and achieve the spatial effect solely via the reverb of the kick drum on the sides. This gives you plenty of power and assertiveness in the centre of the mix and also provides really good clarity, a better fine resolution in the sound and a more finely staggered panorama with a more impressive spatiality in the mix. ... I'll demonstrate it for you in the following audio recording excerpts in a direct comparison between the previous version and the new version of the soundtrack. The old version is mainly defined by: - a kick drum with a stereo width of around 50% in the direct signal - remaining drum elements with a stereo width of around 50% in the direct signals - one single aux reverb send for all drum elements of the whole drum kit The new version is mainly defined by: - a kick drum set fully to mono within the center of the mix in the direct kick drum signal - remaining drum elements with a stereo width of around 50% in the direct signals (like in the old version) - 4 individual aux reverb sends for 4 different drum elements … So, let's start with the audio samples. 1) Comparison of the direct signals of the kick drums (kick drums without reverb) ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Old version:   Kick Drum Direct Signal - Old Version.mp3   For a kick drum, the sound seems pretty bold, stable and... ... dry like a huge sand desert. In the section with the metering devices on the picture down below you can see how the kick drum behaves in the stereo field: The vectorscope on the far left and the directional indicator to the right of the vectorscope show how much of the total stereo field is taken up by the kick drum - pretty much exactly as I set it, about 50% of the full stereo width. … New version:   Kick Drum Direct Signal - New Version.mp3   Doesn't seem to sound so much differently compared to the old version of the kickdrum without the reverb. Maybe, with some decent studio headphones you can already hear the new kick drum sounds a little bit less blocky and more centered. Just the digital metering devices provide really good information about the considerable change in the signal of the new kick drum: Here you can see that the new kick drum is really in the centre of the mix as a mono signal, without making any effort to break out into the stereo field to the left or right. … Next, let's take a look and listen to how the two kick drum versions behave in combination with their reverb. 2) Comparison of the kick drums in combination with their aux reverb sends ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Old version:   Kick Drum With Reverb - Old Version.mp3 Yeah, finally some reverb. Sounds a lot less dry, but I'm still thirsty. The digital metering devices don't show anything too exciting here, except that a medium-width direct signal merges with a really wide reverb signal and the two signals almost reach full stereo width as a sum signal: … New version:   Kick Drum With Reverb - New Version.mp3   Well, now this sounds really wet, spacious but still clean and punchy. Could it be that the huge difference between the fully centered mono direct kick drum signal and its aux reverb send, which is fully panned to the sides, creates this crisp 'n' assertive kick drum sound and the imagination of this huge space? Because apart from changing the direct signal of the kick drum to a completely centred mono signal and a few minimal adjustments to the reverb signal in the stereo field, I haven't changed anything else here. The convolution reverb has the same settings in both versions, the EQ filters have almost the same settings, the proportion of the aux reverb sends that go into the dry signals is the same (-2dB in both versions). And the loudness meter also shows a similar loudness level, whereby the kick drum with reverb in the new version is displayed slightly quieter by 0.2 dB than the kick drum with reverb in the old version, but still sounds somehow more powerful and louder. The measuring instruments also show some quite interesting things here: You can clearly see here that the centred mono signal does not blend and blur so easily with the wide reverb signal. From the image, you could almost think that Odin's Gunge Lance attack is piercing a flabby Hungry (an enemy in Crisis Core and the Final Fantasy 7 universe). Perhaps in the end, this is exactly what gives the mix more audio definition and better clarity. … But let's listen to how the entire drum kit sounds with reverb in both versions. 3) Comparison of the whole drum kits with reverb ------------------------------------------------------------- Old version:   Whole Drum Kit With Reverb - Old Version.mp3   Sounds really good, doesn't it? At least the coarseness of the slightly wider, somewhat blocky kick drum is not quite as noticeable here in the complete drum kit, because you are distracted a little more by the other drum elements and their reverb effects. … New version:   Whole Drum Kit With Reverb - New Version.mp3   Well, that sounds like a really good delivery. Punchy, assertive drum sound that still impresses with a proper reverb ambience in a clear mix. I also like the fact that I panned the kick drum reverb slightly more to the right to balance out the reverb of the snare drum, which is panned slightly to the left like the snare drum, in the panorama of the mix. Apart from a little more clarity, this creates a really cool drum ambience. … But now the crucial question... How do both versions of kick drums and drum kits behave in the overall mix when all the other instruments are added? 4) Comparison of the old mix with the new mix --------------------------------------------------------- Old version:   All Instruments With Reverb - Old Version.mp3   Sounds really good at first listen. Only when you listen more closely with good studio headphones do you perhaps realise that the kick drum intervenes in the mix in a somewhat cumbersome, dominant and conquering manner and takes up quite a lot of space in the mix, somewhat overshadowing or pushing aside other instruments such as the bass or even low-frequency areas of the harp. ... New version:   All Instruments With Reverb - New Version.mp3   Sounds much better straight away. The kick drum comes through much more relaxed in the mix without overlaying the bass or robbing the harp of its stereo field or slightly displacing it from the stereo field. … And this is exactly what I wanted to emphasise and make clear with the experiences I made some time ago. Not every question about more clarity and assertiveness in the mix must, can and should always be answered or solved immediately with the use of an EQ or EQ filter plug-in. Sometimes it can be better to reduce the stereo width in the direct source signal of one or two instruments so that other instruments have more room to "breathe" or play in the freed up stereo field. Just make sure to not overdo it. So, don't tear any black holes in the stereo field so that the spatial coherence of the instruments and signals in the mix is preserved and the mix doesn't end up coming across like a solar system full of distant planets and some kind of dead silence in between. As a little bonus, I'll give you an insight into the latest remix version with a few recently composed bells (at least a small excerpt from it, so as not to reveal too many new features and highlights from the soon-to-be-released Crisis Core remix), which came to my mind after I got the strong feeling that the initial part of the continuously building mix could still get some smooth and gentle additional ambience: 5) New mix with bells --------------------------   All Instruments With Reverb And Bells - New Version.mp3   In the initial rough version, I recorded the bells with my MIDI keyboard, in a way that makes it easier to feel the sad certainty of the imminent death of the main character Zack Fair after his last heroic battle against the sheer endless Soldier forces from Shinra, which his girlfriend Aerith probably received via the life stream or by the voice of the planet. Depending on the culture, bells often symbolize death, mourning, but also resurrection, return, a new beginning, moments of peace, the element of air or harmony between the earthly and heavenly worlds. This fitted in really well with my plan to finally try out this really interesting "Vita Handchimes Bells and Glass" VSTi in my DAW Samplitude, after other instruments such as sansula, vibraphone, electric piano or pan flute, which were also under consideration, didn't quite meet my expectations in this context and were ultimately ruled out when it came to choosing the best possible instrument for this part. … Then there's probably only one major thing left to do - finalising the electric guitar part mentioned in the previous post and composing a third electric guitar track for this part. So far I'm on schedule, so my Crisis Core remix "Wings Of Freedom" could easily be finished by the end of the year. ))