Overall approach and project organization
I decided to use the "dry" tracks instead of the "wet" ones to have a little more freedom in processing.
I separated the tracks in to 3 main groups: drums, bass, and synths and sent each group of tracks to their own bus.
I also created a "sidechain" bus that I only send the synth and bass busses to.
Finally the "sidechain" and drum busses are routed to the master bus.
All tracks
* Gain stage using a VU meter (0VU = -18dBFS calibrated) to provide enough headroom for comfortable mixing and to meet challenge requirements
* Use a high pass filter on all tracks necessary to regain headroom from unwanted low frequencies and to leave more room for bass and drum low
frequencies
* For eq moves on tracks not described below please refer to the attached screenshot
Mixer Screenshot
Drums
* D16 Frontier limiter on parallel "Beat" track limiting and boosting enough to push the peaks in to soft clipping.
* Boost Luftikus 7dB at 10k on Hi Hat
* Aggressive VCA compression to kick and snare via Black Rooster Black Ash slow attack fast release
* Boost Luftikus 7dB at 10k on Side Stick
* Drum Bus - fairly aggressive compression at 4:1 slow attack, fairly fast release via SSL G Comp
Bass
* Bass and Bass Polystab both gated to try to create a groove with the drum tracks
* All bass tracks treated with Cubase stock eq as illustrated in screenshot
Synths
* Pad Massive volume automated to decrease when Violins play to blend better and provide some listening interest
* Pad Sylenth stock Cubase comp with hi ratio slow attack and auto release
* Pad Air Waves s1 imager to widen the track in the stereo field with super tap 8th note delay to provide interest
* Pad Alchemy volume automated 8th note delay to provide listening interest in some sections
* Layer 2 Serum VQA154 EQ in M/S mode with side completely attenuated to remove stereo information for fear of phase issues
* Synth Bus - Fuse Audio Labs Baxandall boost high frequencies and add some saturation
Sidechain
* Magix Volume Former set to 1/16 and LPG Pump envelope to create space for the drums
* Pulsar Smasher 1176 all buttons in added to glue SC tracks together and add saturation
Reverb
* Only hi hat, snare, side stick, bass - poly stab, dd chop vocals and synth bus were sent in moderate amounts
* Copied Magix Volume Former with identical settings and insert before reverb
* Reverb is fg-2006 room lush 1.5 with 23ms pre-delay and boosted width
Mix/Master Bus
* VQA154 in M/S mode - cut stereo frequencies below 160Hz so all low frequencies are in mono only
Mastering the Mix Expose reports:
-20.2 LUFS INT
-2.75 dBTP
Thanks to all involved for providing this challenge.
MC068__Digital_Sound_Labs__Over_the_Rainbow__lackplayback
