Final mixdown - How to?

First off, you don't need to bounce to a stereo track if you're using all softsynths for your MIDI tracks. However, if you want to, its pretty much the same as in previous versions except the menu location is different. 

Mute the tracks you don't want in the mix
CTRL-A to select all the tracks and clips
Select Tracks-Bounce to Track (This was moved from the Edit menu to the Track View menu)

The rest is identical to previous versions. 

Hi Bill,

There a a hundred and one ways of mixing down to your "final" stereo track, and I'm not the best person to advise to be honest. I don't think you are a million miles away though.

I do this:-

Build my project, which will be a combination of MIDI driven soft synths and recorded audio tracks.
I will route some tracks through separate busses, in order to apply various effects.
I will listen, and listen again, and again, tweaking levels, applying EQ and dynamic compression as I think it is needed, if at all.
I'll leave the project alone for a few days, or a week or so.
I'll revisit the project, and listen again. I sometimes find that, after not hearing it for a week that I still need to tweak things.

When, and only when I am absolutely sure, I will export to a stereo wave file. I'll burn it to a CD so that I can listen to it on a few different sources. If I find that I've messed up the bass, or what ever, I'll go back to the project and tweak some more.

As for mastering... I generally do that outside of Sonar. I still like to use Sound Forge for that.

So, that's just my take on things, and as far as I can see, you are not really missing anything. The export function requires that you experiment a bit, and decide on what is best for you. You can export just selected tracks, or buses. I route everything, eventually, to my Master Bus, and it is that bus that I export. If I don't want anything to appear in the mix, I mute, or archive the track.


That's just for starters... an expert will be along soon :^)



(LOL... as per usual, I take so long typing, I'm beaten by two posters this time...)

Wookiee

The easiest is to freeze the soft-synths one at a time, you should note this will freeze the effects and any Pro Channel settings but you can still control level, Pan and sends. 

Yep, I should have mentioned that. Exporting a complete project, without freezing the synth tracks first, could push your system a bit. I'm okay at the moment because my system is quite powerful, but in times gone by, I had no option but to freeze synth tracks first

Thanks everybody for the great replies.  Looks like I have a couple ways to experiment with.  Still don't understand the "Freeze Track" business but I'll spend some more time with the help files.  I think I've got plenty of horsepower: Core I7 (8 engines), 8gb memory, Windows 7 (64) and 750gb harddrive.  I will also be adding some audio tracks using guitar through M-Audio Fast Track and ASIO drivers.  And final mastering with Cool Edit 2000.  Regards - Bill

cwhowell2


Thanks everybody for the great replies.  Looks like I have a couple ways to experiment with.  Still don't understand the "Freeze Track" business but I'll spend some more time with the help files.  I think I've got plenty of horsepower: Core I7 (8 engines), 8gb memory, Windows 7 (64) and 750gb harddrive.  I will also be adding some audio tracks using guitar through M-Audio Fast Track and ASIO drivers.  And final mastering with Cool Edit 2000.  Regards - Bill

Right, in that case there's no need to freeze anything before you export your mix.

The only time I freeze nowadays is when I am 100% convinced that the project is totally finished. Then I'll just freeze any soft synths in the project.

Note: this is totally different to freezing tracks and has a different outcome.