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Audio Mixing is Actually Brilliant
So I’ve been into X for about a week or so.
Today I decided to prepare my audio strategy for the series of spots I’ve started in it.Quick background – I’m also a musician and audio producer. I’ve built several studios during my career starting with big tape machines and 48 track consoles to all MOTU digital facilities, sound rooms, great monitoring, bla, bla.
So if anyone was leery of changing from a track based, sit behind the console and mix paradigm, It was me.
But I was also waiting to move beyond the OMF export, mix and master in DP and return to FCP, at this point in creative production. I’ve been waiting for a FCP that would allow me to finish audio internally, and grading too, so I was a prime candidate for this.
Obviously the lack of tracks à la 7 and the lack of bussing à la all DAWs perplexed me but I figured I’d get a rough cut together as I usually would, and figure out the audio strategy once I had film and graphics roughly mapped out.
It’s all in the Compound Clip strategy, and Story Lines and combining those into other Compound Clips. If that sounds complex, it’s not at all, it’s really intuitive and once I got comfortable with the concept, I put a great mix together way faster than I could in 7 (and at a whole other sonic level) and faster than in Digital Performer (and I’m fast with that).
I was initially frustrated over the lack of a mixer – the mixer in 7 is mostly useless, but with the great stuff from Logic, X really had the potential for complete audio post. But if I can pull together a great sounding mix after one evening of experimentation, I’m pretty much giving the X team a big nod here. Forget about STP.
So, this particular spot has three actors, a VO, stereo music track, stereo ambient track, and 6 stereo SFX. In a traditional post situation I’d set up my studio mixer for 4 mono voice tracks and 8 stereo tracks. In mix I’d add parametric EQ, an LA2A, etc. as needed to each track and then buss and sub buss everything as needed to a Master Out where I’d finish with multiband compression and limiting.
I was able to set up X to do all of that and with everything in discrete tracks. It’s killer once you get it. I came up with a simple way to have all three actors synced with their clips so that they could be moved using the benefit of the magnetic timeline, while locking the stereo tracks I wanted fixed to a 30sec timeline.
As you refine the mix, you group the elements just as you would on a big console but faster and with the ability to pop back out as necessary. In the end I had 12 discrete audio tracks under the primary storyline named, Tara, Izzy, Jackie, VO, Music Bed, Wind, Water, etc. Many of these were composite tracks (the actors takes) where applying master EQ and FX is a one step process, faster than bussing on a physical or GUI console. They stay connected to their primary clips until it’s time to buss everything to the master and then they go into their own discrete tracks for FX and bussing to the Master Out
From an external DAW perspective this eliminates the process of setting up FX busses – in X they exist as part of the Compound Clip.
So lastly I created a group/buss called Master Out by selecting my 12 discrete tracks (Tara etc.) Option/G and naming it. I then had an instant stereo Master Out with discrete volume, pan and, really nice Logic mastering tools.
And all of it can be stepped back quickly, tweaked as necessary and all the mastering remains in effect. At first I didn’t get that function in the timeline but once you work like this, you realize this was really well thought out. It’s different, but it’s good different.
In one of my studio incarnations we ran Logic for music production so I know how great the sound quality of the plugins are, and it is just that in X. The EQ , Convolution Reverb…I’m just getting around in it but it’s top shelf stuff.
The Compound Clip concept, at least as far as audio goes, blows away the track concept in 7. Anyone with audio chops could post in X much faster and with every bit of the quality of going OMF out to a dedicated DAW. Also using this approach with Roles and Audio Stems, if you need to send to post, will be super efficient.
You simply can’t do in 7 what you can do in X with audio, the meters are great, you can even select the audio “destination tracks” the way I worked it so that it’s much quicker than in 7 – and I hated the selecting tracks process in FCP 7
The audio in X is next generation stuff for an NLE.
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68 Replies
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Great informative post Jim.
FCPX really does work well when you start using the tools – such as compound clips – to in many ways subvert the conventional workflows.
And as you say it’s easy to undo and step back.
The logic filter I use the most is Channel EQ. It’s vastly superior to the Legacy FCP EQ filters. It has an analysis function which can quickly highlight problems such as background noise or hums.
I hope that in future updates that visual and audio effects are given separate dropdowns to make it easier to access specific effects / plugins.
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Awesome post. It’s fun isn’t it?
I should add, a mentor of mine told me something long ago that sticks with me about learning new systems and techniques.
First, there’s a lot of “I don’t get it, I don’t get it, I don’t get it” then all of a sudden it’s, “I get it”.
You should post a pic of your timeline if you are up for it.
Jeremy
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Yes, very interesting Jim. I’d also love to see a screen grab of your setup. I’m skeptical of Compound Clips because I don’t like how they hide information, so I’m curious to see how you’re using them.
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David Lawrence
art~media~design~research
propaganda.com
publicmattersgroup.com
facebook.com/dlawrence
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David,
I’m not sure I understand your idea that they “hide” information in any sense different than a toolbox hiding the tools within. For the outside observer, yes, the full array is hidden. But for the single mechanic, AND the shop team as a whole, tool chests, bins, and even smaller sub units like the “socket set” stored inside the larger rolling box seems to be an accepted way to go as opposed to hanging every separate element on a wide array of individual exposed pegs.
All NLE software that I’m aware of does both discrete and grouping functions. (nested clips, et al.) but I do think X puts grouping into a bit of new territory with more possible connections reaching both in to and out of the essential building block of the clip.
As video programs increase in complexity, having the “connected clip” as an optional packetized chunk of prior decisions that can be manipulated as a whole seems one of the most useful concepts in X to me.
For what its worth.
“Before speaking out ask yourself whether your words are true, whether they are respectful and whether they are needed in our civil discussions.”-Justice O’Connor
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[Bill Davis] “As video programs increase in complexity, having the “connected clip” as an optional packetized chunk of prior decisions that can be manipulated as a whole seems one of the most useful concepts in X to me.
For what its worth.”
As David has mentioned in other posts (and using your tool box analogy), it would be nice to “open the drawer” and manipulate what you need in context, then close the drawer back up with everything inside. Also, the detach function is great, but there’s no reattach. Basically, it would be nice to be able to edit what’s in the compound clip in greater context of the over arching timeline rather than having to “step in” and open the compound in it’s own timeline. You lose the relationship to your timeline (the elements outside the compound clip) a little bit the way it is currently setup.
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Jim,
I’d be interested in more info too – specifically how FCPX deals with real-time volume graphing without a mixer (I assume you can keep several volume controls available?)
Also how you might speculate control surfaces might be integrated in future.
Franz.
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Sorry – I’ve ready your post a few times – but am not understanding how you are “mixing” on the fly – I’m assuming you are rubber banding and then grouping tracks as sub-mixes —
You also say you didn’t see the value of the mixer in FCP 7 – when in fact we use it every hour every day as a real time “lets listen – did we get this balance right?…let me bring the music up and down for dramatic impact at this point” mixes. In real time.
I can’t imagine you’ve found a way to do that in FCP X – or have you?
A video tutorial would be a tremendous help to all of us shying away from X for exactly that reason – no more real time mixes.
Andy Field
FieldVision Productions
N. Bethesda, Maryland 20852 -
[Jeremy Garchow] “it would be nice to “open the drawer” and manipulate what you need in context, then close the drawer back up with everything inside. Also, the detach function is great, but there’s no reattach. Basically, it would be nice to be able to edit what’s in the compound clip in greater context of the over arching timeline rather than having to “step in” and open the compound in it’s own timeline. You lose the relationship to your timeline (the elements outside the compound clip) a little bit the way it is currently setup.”
Exactly. Thanks Jeremy!
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David Lawrence
art~media~design~research
propaganda.com
publicmattersgroup.com
facebook.com/dlawrence
twitter.com/dhl -
[David Lawrence] “Exactly. Thanks Jeremy!”
Yeah, sorry to “step in” but I know we have talked about this a bunch. 🙂
As I side note, I know in those discussions someone mentioned that Avid does this. I can’t find anything explaining it, though. From what I have found, it looks like regular nesting to me. If you want to edit inside the nest, you have to open the nest in a new window, losing the context. You can of course, collapse a bunch of tracks, but you can do that with compounds as well. As far as I have been able to see, Avid works “no differently” than a compound in terms of contextual editing.
Jeremy
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That sounds very cool. I get the gist of what you are doing, but not quite the particulars. Maybe when I get a breath, I need to try to duplicate, but I would love to see some screen shots if you are client-authorized to do so.
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