9 Ways You Could Be Using Your Plugins WRONG

hey guys in this video we're gonna cover nine ways that you could be misusing your plugins in your daw it goes without saying the daw plays the most central role in today's music production workflows but so do plug-ins but there are let's say a few no-nos you should watch out for when working with your plugins which we're going to touch on shortly now if your mixing habits accidentally let a few of these plug-in faux pas slip through then there's a strong chance you'll need to tackle a few unwanted stressful niggles as you progress through your projects also some of the ways you could be misusing your plugins may very well be holding you back from getting the very best results from them now before we kick off i want to make clear that the points featured in this video are not exclusive to working with waves plugins i will of course use them to illustrate the points but please know that these tips are universal and will help anyone at any skill level within any daw using whatever plugins they choose also these points are based on some of the ways that i used to incorrectly work with plugins when i was a kid starting out as well as what i've seen over the years when clients and collaborators have sent me mixes to work on for them so let's kick off with plugin blunder number one neglecting your plugins input let's face it when we load any kind of plugin across any kind of track we just want to get going with it making things sound as good as we possibly can often as quickly as we can it's one of the most exciting aspects of production am i right but how about this instead of rushing into sculpting sound learn to take just a fraction of time to consider what your input meters are telling you two reasons for this many plugins have a sweet spot in which they perform at their best and this is true when using plug-in emulations of tube-based hardware drive this style of plug-ins too hard on the way in and you may find that your tracks end up sounding too saturated for your taste also a plug-in driven too hard at the input may limit the amount of wiggle room you have available with the controls take an eq for instance with a very small amount of headroom available at the input say we want to boost the lows by a considerable amount but we immediately run into a problem even just a small 3db lift has pushed the output level of the plugin to clip which isn't what we want push this eq even harder and you're going to get some really noticeable internal clipping which sounds terrible input level can easily be set within most plugins if no such control exists fear not use a generic game plugin before your plugins to lower the level feeding into your plugins chain or use daw specific waveform controls such as clip gain in pro tools which will help you get sufficient headroom for your plugins to work better let's now move on to plug-in oops daisy number two and we're going to continue the theme of plug-in meters this time talking about the effects of neglecting your output meters and output level control and there's two side effects here to know about like with the previous point you'll also want to make sure there isn't any clipping but more importantly you want to make sure that when working with eqs and compressors especially that you balance the strength of the output as close as you can to the input level this is known as level compensation and it's very important if you want to be able to objectively judge how your processing is sounding now a compressor is going to attenuate so turn down the level of your tracks as it controls strong peaks that's great that's what we want but the before and after comparisons are wildly different in level [Music] with this difference in level how are we able to truly compare our is work in a way that tells our brains that louder is better so to my ears the compression i've just applied doesn't sound as good as the original but if i compensate the difference by making up the gain at the output to something close to the dry input stage i'll be able to objectively compare [Music] most plugins give you all the information you need to easily dial in level compensation effectively in compressors look for gain reduction meters if you're getting something in the region of 6 db reduction you'll want to raise your makeup gain by around 6 db other styles of plugins don't usually give you this kind of easy feedback so you'll need to compare input and output level meters to get a ballpark figure and fine-tune by ear if necessary next let's cover plug-in boo-boo number three pointless plug-in duplicates okay so i've got a backing vocal arrangement here made up of several tracks where there's [Music] i've just shaped one of the voices with eq compression and reverb but i want all of the vocals to have the same tone let's just duplicate all of those inserts across all the other vocals [Music] surely that's the best way to mix this vocal right wrong two issues here that may catch you out fairly quickly the first being if you decide later to change any of these settings and you want those settings across all of those other tracks you'll need to go through and copy and paste all of those changes across to each plugin which is a huge boring waste of time secondly and for those working on older computers this is going to be an important reason for avoiding this approach altogether is this way of using plugins can quickly gobble up your computer's raw processing power so you may get a few of these warnings pop up and interrupt your workflow quite frequently now the best alternative to this is to root the output of all these tracks via the same bus mono or stereo the choice is yours and pick that same bus up via the input on an available blank auxiliary track this setup means all the tracks can now be fed through one eq one compressor one reverb or whatever plugins you want to use making it easier to get the sound that you want while demanding a whole lot less from your cpu this also gives you one fader for controlling the overall balance of this arrangement and if you need it one simple approach to automation next plug in misstep number four and we've all done this at some point admit it i know i did in my early years of mixing and that's mixing with your eyes plug-in uis are often very beautiful things to gaup at all the visual ballistics are extremely good at giving us a strong sense of what's going on in our mixes but it's easy to forget that everything you see in a plug-in such as a frequency analyzer in an eq game reduction meters in dynamics plugins even the numbers that tell us what value a control is set to is purely there as a guide never forget that we're mixing music at the end of the day all decisions should end with our ears calling the shots not a quick visual inspection such as okay i've got 10 db's worth of compression there a low cut set on an eq round about here because hey that looks right i think you get my point let's move on to plug-in slip up number five and this point is again a visual thing working with one plug-in open at a time channel strip plug-ins are brilliant when you need to sort out the tone dynamics and impact on a track that's often all the tools you need to get the job done are easily accessible within one window a lot of engineers prefer using single instances for say eq compression and whatever else they need but working this way often means they're only really manipulating one plugin at a time out of context with the plug-in chain which works okay but having multiple plugins in say a vocal chain open at the same time is much better for mixing productivity much like working with a channel strip let's move on to number six and this is more of a plug-in oversight never using the a b compare feature now let's say i've spent a decent amount of time dialing in a reverb sound from scratch on a vocal and hear me with one clean shot then i move on to other areas of the mix then later decide i want to try a different reverb sound maybe something from the preset menu so let's do that let me hear me with one clean shot how about another sound and hit me with one clean shot then i start to panic a little because i've forgotten the setting i dialed in at the start sure i could hit the undo button but a simpler approach which i should have done earlier which would have not only stored my first idea but given me the option to compare with alternative sounds would have been if i used the a b switch and it's super simple to use so don't overlook it when you have a sound that you like but want to try something different quickly hit b then make your changes and to flip between the two sound sets simply click the button again and hear me with one clean shot and hit me with one clean shot let's move on to number seven using complicated plugins when simpler alternatives can get the job done quicker as i said at the beginning plugins get us from point a to point b quickly that is if you're familiar with them and know how to get the most from them there are many plugins out there with all the bells and whistles you'd ever need to get a track sounding perfect but often you don't need most of its controls on offer to get the results you need now depending on the music having too many options laid out in front of you can cause choice paralysis which can slow your creative decision making down to a snail's pace top tip here is to get to know your meteor plugins in some downtime maybe even play around with an old mix without any pressure let's jump across now to number eight not manipulating automation within the plugin itself do you write automation in with the pencil do you find it a bit hit and miss a better way to get plug-in automation working is to use the controls in the plugin itself to set this up it will vary depending on your daw you'll need to put your tracks automation mode to right and depending on your dow you may also need to enable automation on the control within the plugin you want to set when those two steps are ready simply put your song into playback and manipulate the control tell me something that i don't know [Music] i got a lot to learn and a way to go and when you're done set the automation back to read and if needed use the pencil to draw in any fine adjustments you may have for your automation and the last but no means least number nine plug-in peril is well why don't you tell me in the comments below now this video was never intended to be a set of rules cast in stone that you should never do instead my intention for this was to help you guys get a lot more out of your plug-in workflows now from past personal experiences i know how easy it is to turn a blind eye to certain areas within my workflow where either i gloss over things or rush a bit so hopefully this video inspires you to have a little think about how you can tighten up your productivity at ads the next time you work on a mix anyways thanks for watching if you agree or disagree with anything i've highlighted in this video then you know where to find me i'll be in the comments below i'll see you next time [Music] you

Channel: Waves Audio

Views: 66,869

Keywords: How to mix with plugins, audio, EQ, compressors, compression, top mixing mistakes, how to use plugins in a DAW, home studio, mixing tips, music producer, production, mixing, mistakes

Id: 1iye0ZjpSP8

Length: 12min 5sec (725 seconds)

Published: Mon Jul 18 2022