Cerrax

What about orchestral rock? Ever heard the string symphony version of Bring Me To Life?

Nothing to flame over, it's a simple matter of preferance. The big point that I think comes out of this thread is that people confuse loudness and compression with punch and energy. A well mixed track hardly needs ANY mastering to sound really good. Mastering is just supposed to smooth out the rough edges and add some elements which make a track seem complete. Creating a punchy song is easy when you know the proper way to mix the instruments together (and knowing somewhat of how to compose it). That's very true. But for some things (like orchestral music) its tough to keep the loudness high because of the drastic differences in dynamics and the fullness of the sound overloads the meters very quickly. That's why I use my CD burner method (see above post).

I don't know exactly how this works, but when I record something on my computer, it usually is very quiet even after intense normalization (both automatic and manual). All my meters are ready to clip but to my ear the mix is very quiet in comparison to professional recordings. But then I take the mix on my iPod and plug it into a stand alone audio CD burner I have, and the meters are only up to like halfway. When I burn a CD I can almost double the loudness of the mix without any clipping what so ever. Why is this? I know its not compressing or limiting or anything like that because my dynamics are still intact. What the hell is going on? Anyway, I'm going to do that from now on and then copy the CD back on to my computer. There's almost no loss in the quality and I can drastically increase the volume of the mix. Its weird, but it works.

I don't know about books, but I know a lot of composers you could listen to. I like a lot of orchestral music. Some of my favorites: Frank Ticelli "Vesuvius", "American Elegy" Robert Smith "To Challenge The Sky And Heavens Above", Northwoods: Of Might And Mettle" Gustav Holst "The Planets: Jupiter", "First Miltary Suite in E flat" Carl Orf "Carmina Burana" Dimitri Shotikovich "Symphony No. 5: Finale", "Festive Overature" Percy Granger "Shepard's Hey" Alfred Reed "Hounds of Spring" Ludwig van Beetoven "Moonlight Sonata" Giuseppe Verdi "Dies Irae" These are just a few. There's a lot more but i can't think of them right now.

More like 15 GB It's huge anyway, Darth, channels>add>fruity soundfont player. Not the Silver Edition. It's only 1 GB (hence why its only $140). The Platinum Edition is 15 GB (and its also like $2000. But obviously its got a hell of a lot more samples). Not to nitpick, but the Silver edition is 2.4gb, the Gold edition is 15gb, and the Platinum edition is 68gb. Thanks zircon. Maybe I'm thing of something else thats only 1 GB. GPO maybe? Oh well.

More like 15 GB It's huge anyway, Darth, channels>add>fruity soundfont player. Not the Silver Edition. It's only 1 GB (hence why its only $140). The Platinum Edition is 15 GB (and its also like $2000. But obviously its got a hell of a lot more samples).

I use East West Quantam Leap Symphonic Orchestra (EWQLSO for short. It's about $140 on ebay) It's a massive sample library (1 GB) with almost any kind of orchestral instrument and lots of different articulations, vibratos, trills, tremolos, etc. It can be used as a plug-in to FL and almost any other music program (like Finale, Sibelius, Logic, etc). If you want to hear a demo of what it sounds like there's lots of demos out there. I used it in my Top Gear Symphony.

Well I've never had any noise problems with my iMic. Are we even talking about the same thing? You're talking about the membrane and iMic isn't a microphone, at least not the one I'm using. Its just a little external port for a microphone. I bought a decent vocal microphone for $40, and with the iMic, I get same kind of sound as mics at my school.

Whoever sends me vocals recorded with iMic or a built in mic from a Macintosh or an other Laptop again, will die a painful death (and you can mix your stuff for yourself!). *cough* er... just had to express how much I like "built in" microphones and 10$ mics from Radioshack or something like that. You know, I'm kinda getting sick of everyone on this site bashing me for the equipment I use. I'm on a budget. A very, very tight budget, and iMic may not be AWESOME OMFG FTW microphone pre-amp, but its enough for the amount I paid for it. If you're trying to give me advice on what equipment to use, there are much more civil ways of doing it. I'm not proclaiming that my equipment is the best and I'm such an awesome remixer because I'm not. But for the people who visit here and wonder "How the hell am I going to start remixing with only $200?", I'm an example of remixing on low cash. Would you like to challenge the quality of my work? Would you like a fellow Audio Engineer to come into your studio, take a look around and say, "Pfft. I wouldn't be caught dead using that piece of crap!"

Synful Orchestra. $500 for a crappy orchestra synth. Only thing thats good about it is the realistic vibrato it has. But the quality is terrible (except the violin. That on'es pretty good.) And no percussion Needless to say, I'm glad I have EWQLSO instead.

Normalizing can be fruitless if you've already taken those steps manually when you are creating the mix. I don't have a normalize option in my editor, so I have to do it manually. Compression, like others said, will mess with the dynamics. I personally try to stay away from compression because too much of it will ruin the song IMO. Limiting is also problematic, as it limits the peaks of the frequencies, this can result in a strange sound in the mix if by some strange event a frequency spikes in the song, it will not do that with a limiter on it and may make the song sound bad. Normalizing is probably your best option. Or just don't make it so loud.

I have a $40 mic and I record vocals with it, but it's much harder to record louder stuff like my trumpet. Even with the compressor all the way up, it cracks and distorts quite a bit. It's just a regular cardiod dynamic microphone, but it's enough for me. I also use an iMic external sound card as an amplifier for it. That was like $50. And I use Garage Band to record stuff because it came with my computer. Nothing beats Apple in-the-box software. Total cost $110.

I use iTunes to convert my songs from AIFF to MP3. It goes up to 192Kbps and I can edit ID tags and everything.

Vangelis kicks ass.

Thanks I was getting so confused Just like you said, all my meters were close to maxing out but when I played it in comparison to a professional recording it was like half the level! I haven't tried a limiter yet. I've done tons of EQing and that hasn't helped. Compression just kills my dynamics. I always end up making the drums too loud so I tried to back off of them but I'll see what I can do. Thanks so much! If anyone else can give me more tips that'd be great!

OK, I'm using Garage Band and EWQLSO Silver. I have written this song but I can't for the life of me master it at any higher of a level than it is right now. What am I doing wrong? Does Garage Band suck that bad or is it me? It's probably me. Anyway, here's the song: http://www.cerrax.com/Your%20Return.mp3 It's probably the song itself that's the problem so any advice is much apreciated. I'm just so sick of all my songs having such crappy volume.

I have Sound Track Pro because it came with Final Cut. Don't use it. If you know anythign about music, get Logic Pro.

Don't make me hurt you..... I love this remix. The beauty is in the simplicity. It doesn't need an intro, it slides right into the tune and keeps rolling with a great beat. Ambient, upbeat but still just a good chillin' piece of music. While other remixes on here can easily overpower Terra Black Crystal with sheer complexity and effects, none can topple it's incredibly addictive sound and catchy style. 10/10 Best. OCR song. EVAR. And Bloody Hell?..... Second. Best. OCR song.......ever

Amen. And don't forget something I have read and heard numerous times form people on this site: Sometimes I find that people focus too much on the sound instead of the actual arrangement. The reason we love video game music in the first place is because of the arrangement, not the sound!

Yeah, sorry. I'm only 19 and its hard enough paying the bills never mind getting $700 sound libraries. EWQLSO will do fine for me. I'm using Garage Band and Music Generator and I can't afford to shell out more than $200 for some decent sound. I don't even have speakers for my computer. I have it runing through my stereo reciever to a couple of giant JBL's from '72. The only thing I have that's actually worthy is my G5 and there aren't a lot of cheap programs for OS X. Reason 3 would be my dream come true, but for now I'm just hoping that my family will just give me money for my birthday so I can get Logic 7 Express.

Nothing.... But my birthday is soon *dreams of Logic 7 and Quantum Leap Silver Orchestra Library...... *