OTB vs. ITB - The Verdict
Monday March 17, 2008
Not surprisingly, the verdict among About.com readers was that mixing in-the-box was the way to go -- however, among professional users (who make up just under half of my readers), about half of those go OTB -- either with a summing bus or mixing board.
So for those of you going totally ITB, here's another thing to consider: can you hear the difference? Or is the wider soundstage and better frequency separation of OTB only a myth (or a marketing ploy by the makers of summing busses)? Your opinion, please!
So for those of you going totally ITB, here's another thing to consider: can you hear the difference? Or is the wider soundstage and better frequency separation of OTB only a myth (or a marketing ploy by the makers of summing busses)? Your opinion, please!
Comments
Hope this makes sense …
I use a slightly different technique that I’ve blind tested at a high-end mastering studio with great results. Mastering engineer John Vestman asked me to separate tracks into subgroups and mix them down ITB. The subgroups were drums (minus cymbals), cymbals, guitars, vocals, bass and keyboards. The subgroups were then imported into a project and mixed down again ITB to a stereo track. This was compared (A/B) to a stereo mixdown of the same song where all the tracks were mixed down at one time ITB.
The difference was very clear. I had much better clarity and separation in the mix that was first subgrouped ITB and then mixed down to a stereo track ITB, than a single ITB mixdown to a stereo track.
For critical projects, since I can’t afford an SSL board and have to mix ITB, this is what I’m now doing, and I’m getting very nice results.
As a bonus, if your mastering engineer can master at the subgroup level, this allow him to make changes to instrument groups that do not effect other instrument groups … i.e. if I want to effect the drums, it doesn’t effect the bass during mastering.
Thank you for that tip, Dave, that is really interesting and could prove to be very useful!
Hi Dave.
We made this test today with 3 different engineers and all I can say the bounce and the stem mix are exactly the same nothing changes… would be too nice to be true….