The Steel Guitar Forum

I'm finishing up a CD project and mixed it down to the PC from a standalone Fostex VF160 hard drive recorder. After I got it on the PC, I brought each song into Sonar and then added a couple of "effects" to each song - the Cakewalk FxReverb (set at 20% mix) and the Cakewalk FX Dynamics Processor (using the default Final Mix Compression). It brought the songs to "life" and although this is not real "mastering" the songs sound like they came from a "commercial" studio.

This was the first time I did any "real" processing with Sonar. This was the last project I had left that was on the standalone recorder and I plan on migrating to 100% computer based recording, using Sonar.

Jack, Sonar 7 is great! I've used their stuff for years. There is a plug-in called Boost11 in there and you should take a look. It's great for mastering and the Sonitus plug-ins are the best around. Especially take a look at the Sonitus Compressor. You will love the sound!
Take care,
Kevin

Kevin, Thanks for the info. I'll keep those in mind as I get more into Sonar. I just recently bought it and have a long way to go to even remotely get proficient with it.

Jack, if you have sonar 7 se I'm not sure if it comes with boost 11. I know sonar 6 se didn't they only included that one in the pe version. Check and see if it's un der the plugin menu.

Bob

Bob, I have Boost 11. I played with the different default settings and the "Squash" was too much. The "Final Mix" didn't change anything from what I had done with the effects I mentioned in my original post.

This was a "unique" project as it was a Bluegrass singer doing a "country" CD. And a "true" Bluegrass singer as he worked for a year in the mid 70's for Bill Monroe as the guitar picker and singer and then had his own Bluegrass band for about 20 years after that. He used Bobby Johnston, a Bluegrass Fiddler from Indiana on about half of the songs so it had more Bluegrass flavor to the "country" songs. He did his own rhythm guitar with his D-28 Martin. It did have my steel and a Strat Lead Guitar on it, along with Bass and Drums.

Well thats great because when you keep playing around with it and figure out a few more tricks you will find that it warms stuff up a lot as well as bringing up the perceived level of all instruments and vocals. It took me about a year or so to get use to it but I'm a little slow

By the way while I'm on here I just got a chance the other night to listen to your music from the Fostex and man it was great. That little unit kicks but. I think you find more use for the computer daw but I thought your stuff sounded great especially your playing. I loved the tic-tac Luther stuff it had me convinced if you had not told me Now I want to hear something from sonar LOL.

Bob

Bob Martin wrote:Jack, if you have sonar 7 se I'm not sure if it comes with boost 11. I know sonar 6 se didn't they only included that one in the pe version. Check and see if it's un der the plugin menu.

Bob

Bob

Can you post your Boost11 settings? I'm just using the default and it really works well!


bob

Bob, thanks for the positivie comments on the CD I sent you. When I was working with Tommy Cash he heard that recording with the Luther stuff and liked it and told me "I had Luther down pat".

I may post one of the cuts on my web site and then post the link here. I don't want to convert it to MP3 as some of the quality is lost.

A side note, when we finished the tour this year with Tommy he told me I should join R.O.P.E. and he is sponsoring me to join. I've sent them the fee but haven't heard if I was accepted.

Here is one of the songs from the CD project that I mentioned. "Holding Things Together". I added a little Boost 11 to it on the "final mix". This is the full wav song file, it's 31MB, so it's a large file. I didn't want to post an MP3 as it's not full fidelity.

Click For Song

Hey Bob, the main rule of thumb that I use on b-11 is less is more. I find that if you can hear the compression it's to much remember that it really isn't a pro grade mastering and is intended for beginners. It is great for quick quasi-mastering references. I never set it for more than 2 to 3db of boost and of course theres always a chance of making the over all volume of the trks to loud and then either b-11 clips and pumps or the master bus does. I usually insert it on the master bus and sometimes on live drums on the snare and kick to tame volume spikes and a few other instruments that need taming. I use it very very sparingly especially when I use it on individual tracks along with the master bus. Try putting it on the master bus and adjust the compression level until you can hear the pumping and over squashing of the trks and then turn it down about 1 to 2 notches until the dynamics come back.

Remember that most times the dynamics of a tune are very important and if you use it to much it will be the same volume/dynamic level all the way thru and unless you are going for that sound like on guitar or rhythm instruments it doesn't sound musical. There are some instruments that reallky benefit from squasing just a hair like acoustic rhythm instruments that need to be down in the mix underneath the lead and vocals all the waqy thru the song.

The reason why I didn't just post particular presets is because I have none b-11 is so dependent on each track that you put it on and each song that you use it to master that its futile to try to use the duplicate settings on different songs

Bob