• SONAR
  • Final mix: Print vs Export? What do you do as the last step to get it ready for mastering? (p.2)
2016/04/12 20:14:16
John
mettelus
Although this should be obvious, even when exported the file should be reviewed. There have been posts where people obviously did not do this (and blamed SONAR for it). Doing a real-time bounce is more preference, but review of that final product is a must.

Yes it is obvious and I think most would do that. Even the fellow in the vid would. Or one would hope he did. LOL 
2016/04/13 07:13:57
subtlearts
TimV 
I also agree with subtlearts' point about always hearing something you'll want to change. It makes me think of a quote that I believe was attributed to da Vinci, that a work of art is never finished, it's just abandoned.



So true. But of course, some works of art are, how to put this, better abandoned than others. Most are abandoned too soon, some too late... the trick is to abandon it at just the right time!
 
Now I'm reminded of something: a wonderful dream sequence in the film Six Degrees of Separation: 
A BRIGHT WHITE LIGHT shines on FLAN who turns to see
A TEACHER, in her forties, very pure and happy, hanging
beautiful and brilliantly colored children's drawings in the
air. FLAN'S VOICE echoes in this vast space.

FLAN
Why are all your students geniuses in the second
grade? Look at the first grade. Blotches of
green and black. Look at third grade.
Camouflage. But the second grade --your grade.
Matisses everyone. You've made my child a
Matisse. Let me study with you. Let me into
the second grade! What is your secret?

THE TEACHER
Secret? I don't have any secret. I just know
when to take their drawings away from them.

 
... meaning, the kids naturally and effortlessly make beautiful paintings, but they can't see when they're finished. The only thing the teacher has that they lack, is perspective. It's always struck me as a particularly profound moment. 
 
EDIT to fix weird formatting... 
2016/04/13 12:14:46
bitflipper
Some of the confusion is just semantics, and some of that is a holdover from tape days. From a digital audio perspective, Print = Export = Bounce = Freeze, and there are probably some other synonyms floating around as well. They all mean committing something to a fixed and finished product, whether it's the final product or an intermediate stage such as a frozen synth.
 
If you're not using a computer for recording, "print" means to write something to tape. It implies something is "done", because you can no longer separate its component parts once they're combined and saved. "Bouncing" only differs from "printing" in that a bounce is usually printing to another track on the same physical tape.
 
"Export" only came into existence with the digital era. Conceptually, it's the same thing as printing except the destination is a file on the disk drive instead of tape. Old-timers still call it "printing" out of habit.
 
What Graham is talking about is evaluating the finished product as a composite. It's a VERY good point. Your perception is quite different while you're in the DAW because you're thinking in terms of individual tracks and busses and you can easily lose sight of the full mix. Being able to see waveforms messes with your perception, too - there are no surprises when you watch the audio scroll by. 
 
My technique is to export the full mix, convert it to an MP3 and copy it over to a portable player. Then I'll wait a day or two before giving it a critical listen. I'm always amazed at the flaws that become obvious when I listen away from the DAW. Lots of "what was I thinking?" moments ensue.
2016/04/14 02:33:26
Kalle Rantaaho
My procedure is:
 
I bounce the whole mix to a stereo track inside the project. There are usually some parts I find problematic, so I bounce two or three mixes with small differences, like "version 1 hihat dip",  "version 2 hihat boost" etc.
Then I archive all the work tracks and insert the mastering FX (Ozone, SPAN, + something) on the Master Bus, and
export 2 versions of each mix. These 3-6 versions I carry around and audition in different places and try to make up my mind.
2016/04/14 06:10:37
Sanderxpander
Exporting and printing are basically the same thing, just different terminology. PT for the longest time didn't have offline export, everything had to be realtime. So I guess for some people it's still part of the workflow. Also, I just helped to finish an album in a studio where we used an SSL disk for summing as wel as some outboard compressors on a few channels, there is no offline export in that case either.

Personally, I use offline export most of the time. But if I'm delivering the final FINAL version that has to go on an album or off to mastering, I have to listen through the export anyway to make sure everything went perfectly. In those cases realtime export is kind of a two in one and actually saves time.
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