timaeus222   Members

The somewhat bitcrushed synth that comes in right away feels weird. It doesn't seem to have a pleasing tone. To me it feels like the kick is clashing with the bass. Maybe EQ out some of the sub frequencies on the kick (just a bit), and sidechain if you haven't already? Overall, it sounds slightly muddy, but probably fixing that up and doing soft knee compression on the master will be the only thing that is needed to fix this up. I know for sure that you used hard knee compression.

Thanks a lot! EDIT: There we go, now everything's edited and set!

Alright, sweet! I think I'll also address an issue I believe I have with dynamics. I remember how you said when sounds stack, they might additively create a louder waveform, so I'll see if I can fix that up keeping that in mind.

It's actually too quiet. I ripped a short clip of it at a section where it should be at its loudest, and it's actually peaking at about -4dB-ish. You need to get that up to or near 0dB. Another thing is that this mix probably has too much reverb going on in total. The majority of it seems to be in the strings. The rest of it "appears" to be there because of the quietness of the instruments and possibly the dry signal being too low at times.

Well, basically gather new, better sounding ones and replace your old ones. Listen to what kind of sound you actually want and try to determine which sounds better, and choose the better one.

You should try soft knee compression before you finalize it. It'll make a huge difference.

Okay, I'm sure I've addressed lots of issues now! Everything should be much clearer (the bell lead is the most evident), more powerful and wide, now soft knee compressed, and more awesome. There are some new drum samples, too (like the TR-808 snare at 2:11) and smoother transitions between dynamics. I tried something completely new: purposefully duplicating a note so that there are 6-8 notes in the piano roll layered in the same spot. I did that to "create" a new, louder cymbal sound (i.e. at 1:35) from one of the softer RR samples from EWQL. I'm hearing something I didn't hear before, on my own mix no less, at 0:11-0:12 (the weooohhh). xD Also noticing that the kick might need to be louder at 1:11 - 1:41 and 3:07 - 3:15, and the piano reverb might need to be adjusted. Ready for mod review! https://www.box.com/s/pa8az3lhy0mhegj6kf2z - V5 https://www.box.com/s/y52h5refxuc8381z1vxs - V4 https://www.box.com/s/nwc9c2a97t1mksy96edm - V3 https://www.box.com/s/51902283176a34f60bbe - V2/V1 - Source Mirror 1 - Source Mirror 2

Did you know... my math professor wrote "use your p and geometric series mad skillz!" on the board when he wrote down strategies to test for series convergence. xD

Well, I just assumed Kanthos wanted a degree. But of course, most if not all people who get an online degree are far less credible than people who get a real degree.

I've tried both extensively now, and I'm wondering what situations people here use each for. I personally use hard knee on drums and percussion, and soft knee on the master. Just recently discovered that soft knee seems to work way better at handling supposed overloads when I switched from Fruity Limiter to TLs-Pocket Limiter on a packed DnB track (still have been using TLs for a long time though; just haven't seen a drastic improvement until now).

Resonant saw wave run through a cross modulation filter with overdrive, with an LFO on the cutoff, and a large amount of glide at opportune times.

Not much I can say other than upgrade the samples. That'll change balances up, so I'll stop there for now.

Hm, that makes sense. I also think it's because of the words in some of the songs. Sometimes the words are catchier than the melody itself. ...Or, the melody is so repetitive that it gets stuck in a person's head, and since words are more easily memorized with notes to them, when the notes get stuck, the words get stuck, and it becomes *tada* catchy.

Well, you don't have any problems with things being too quiet. Drums are mixed well in general. The only thing I would look into is the timbre of certain instruments, the repetitiveness of the current arrangement, and the mechanical playing on the piano. Here's what I have: 0:23.620 - 1:06.257 --- The piano plays the exact same four notes repeatedly for 42 seconds. That's quite a long time, about 16% of the piece. Definitely fix that. Change it up a little, maybe a new arpeggio every four instances? Or maybe link those with more happening after every other arpeggio instance? Overall, in the entire piece, the piano could use some more personalization on the writing. It seems to play nearly the same arpeggio. Instead of putting slight variations on the arpeggio, try adding your own notes to that part of the source tune that work well with it. 0:39.927 - The open hi hat could sound even better with a little less in the mids. Not too much less, but it should feel more airy, not acoustic, in this type of a soundscape. Kind of like the ride at 0:39.119. As the open hi hat was completely exposed there, definitely watch the tone of it. 1:04.474 - Same with the cymbal. It's nice, but it could also be better. Maybe more like the instance at 2:16.291? That might just be a lower velocity round robin, but that sounds better, to me. Personally, the bass (fretless?) tone could be crafted a little bit more. It could benefit from slightly less bass and a little more in the low mids... just a little bit. A good amount of the timbral character of a (let's say fretless) bass comes from the low mids, and the presence comes from the bass, at least from my experience with basses. Since you use it throughout the entire song, you might want to take a look at it. And the last thing is to have an ending. You really just ended the drums and left it there. See if you can create an ending!

Be open to starting from the basics, choosing a DAW that you like, and learning some sound design if you have to so you can get the type of sound you want. Maybe a really good way to make music is to know how it's made, fundamentally. It sounds like what you said, but it really isn't. What I just said is actually defined as "learning how to create a timbre of sound using various methods of sound synthesis", or figuring out "What makes that sound sound like that?" or "Why is that instrument so cool-sounding?".

Nope, because in FL's playlist window, you can use the brush tool to right-click-drag and mass delete. Well, good, but actually the statement was meant for the general public. xD True. That's why I just listen to a track in the morning and take notes on notepad on what sticks out to me, then when I check it out sometime after school it usually becomes clear what mistake I made. But yeah, GENRES! Yeah, let's.

Well, probably because the delete key would require left-clicking/drag-selecting at least once first to select an object, or right clicking, and THEN clicking again to actually delete something. It saves one click/step for anything you want to mass-delete. Tempo changes are with automation clips on the tempo (yep, you can do that). Key signature can be changed with the tuning slider at the upper left, next to the logo (in cents). You can mass increase and decrease velocities by doing Ctrl+A and Shift+Mouse Wheel. It's not smooth, but it can be "smoothened" to be more accurate by enlarging the piano roll. See, I take the rather unique approach of trying a whole bunch of keyboard shortcuts and taking note on what does what, and mapping it all in my head to organize it to remember later. Get a MIDI keyboard (I got one I'm happy with for $80), or FL's quantize can quantize specific notes when you highlight specific notes, to be completely pedantic. YEAH! ------ So... OP intent? Genres. I kind of mix genres sometimes, but I tend to do ambient, electronica, big beat, electronic, rock, or something completely new. If I were to say what I specialize in, I'd say ambient.

Before asking a saxophonist to collab, you should look into learning what sax VSTs can be modulated to sound sufficiently realistic, in case no one has time to collab. That could also improve your sound design skills and you could probably apply the concept of expression and realism with other instruments.

Yeah, I just like harmonizing with my voice sometimes. It's weird, but one time I randomly harmonized with the hum of the leaf blower guy's leaf blower as I was walking to my next university class. xD Seriously though, my point is that if you can hear a note and come up with one other note that creates an effective harmonic interval from the original note, you can begin to imagine chords in your head. Even if you don't know how they look, you know how they sound, and you can mess around pulling out specific notes and building the chord one note at a time until it sounds how you imagined it. zircon calls it "ear training".

Like what? You're quantizing, not using a modulation matrix. What 'options' are you expecting? I personally rarely quantize. I only do so when I play parts in live for specifically a video game OST or similar where instruments are expected to play in perfect rhythm. Otherwise I usually either play it in live and leave it, or sequence it in because I like doing it like that.

It appears that a lot of pop music is dance, trance, or house. Every now and then a big beat track shows up, or maybe some dubstep here and there. Sometimes you can find a pop song that just downright bugs you (corny and long machine-gun-like kick buildups, "gotcha" buildups that lead up to nothing extremely awesome, excessive autotune, tacky drum sequencing, etc.), and you might find it ridiculous that it somehow made it on the popular list. Any ideas why dance, trance, house, and similar genres are so popular? Could it be because of the musician's marketer, or people's partying habits, or that some people just think it sounds good and don't give a second thought because they don't compose music as extensively as OCR members, or...? What do you think?

I dunno, I've used FL for only a year and 7 months, and I've created this short song two days ago using patches I designed on Zebra2: https://www.box.com/s/uhzb3h309fcxnc4eg01q I guess it just depends on the person, but FL is rather simple to use for the most part. I just had to gather the right tools, like spectral analyzers, badass limiters, and flexible/all-around synthesis VSTs. IMO, being able to work well with a spectral analyzer to give your music dynamic contrast is a huge step up from less-than-adequate mixing.

I found my sister's old textbook, "Audio in Media" (pre-2007), and it turns out what you said was somewhere in that book. I wonder if you've read that before, because it's awesome. xD

You can change the time signature rather easily, but changing in the middle of a song is agreeably weird. If you learn the technicals of FL, it's not as restrictive as you might think. If zircon can use FL like he does, it's surely possible to kick ass on it.

Something you could also do is listen to certain chords and try to identify them on a piano or something that you can play and analyze what you played. That way you know how to get that sound or feel you want, and you'll know, for example, that a good jazzy chord is an Am6 1st inv (A minor 6th first inversion), written as C-E-F-A. Basically, learn the types of chords there are and find a pattern on how to relate them. Minor/Major, Diminished/Augmented, diads, triads, tetrads (rarely are there 5 note one hand chords), and find a system that helps you organize them, regardless of whether you know music theory or not. Memorizing and identifying terms isn't too difficult, as long as you're matching real concepts with real designations. For example, a root major chord (1-3-5, like C-E-G or F-A-C) with a flatted third (the E in C-E-G or A in F-A-C) is minor, and with a flatted third and fifth (E and G in C-E-G, etc.) is diminished. A root major chord with a sharped fifth (sometimes sounds ugly) is augmented. Diads, triads, and tetrads are simply any chord with 2, 3, or 4 notes respectively. Another thing you could do is take a simple song and try to recompose certain parts of it from scratch. Maybe that could help you see what note harmonies it has since it will be in front of you in MIDI form. OR you could just mess around and see what you could come up with. One time I tried that Am6 1st inv chord and created a progression by shifting up modes (shifting every note up a whole step) and, eventually, a 1:31 song out of it (with some modifications to the chords later on once I got inspired halfway through). It was really a patch bank demo for Zebra2 so I made all the sounds used (giving me an advantage in terms of inspiring sounds), but regardless, I wouldn't have come up with that song without a chord progression written first. Not to say making a chord progression first is an uber-good way, but it worked for me just then, though that usually isn't how it works out for me. This is that track: Timaeus - After Dark