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Automation
Back when recording began, performers were all recorded with one microphone so there was no such thing as mixing. In the 1950’s, Les Paul came up with the idea of recording onto multiple tracks and the art of mixing began. The first machines were 4 track so mixing could be done by one person at a console. As track counts increased to 24 and then 48 and more, it would take several engineers to man a mixing board before automation and motorized faders came into being. Currently, automation has gotten to the point where not only can you program the volume levels of each individual track but the pan, aux send levels, eq setting, effect settings, etc. Depending on the equipment you have, there are several methods used to program automation. For hardware DAW’s, such as my Yamaha AW2816, there is a learn mode in which you arm the track you want to automate and then as the track plays, you adjust the level of the track. Then you go to the next track, etc. Very often, you will have to go back to a track you automated before and make minor adjustments because as the mix starts to take form, the relative levels of the tracks will change. It can be a very tedious process because you are only able to automate one track at a time. On pro boards, every fader is live as long as they are armed for automation. With software DAW’s, you can choose to manually adjust levels using an midi-equipped mixing board or as with Sonar and many other software packages, you can draw the automation in by defining the points where the levels increase or decrease and how quickly they change. As I mentioned before, you can automate every facet of the mix in order to get the end result you are looking for. I’ve worked with both hardware and software options and my own personal preference is to draw the automation in because I can be infinitely more precise doing it that way. Another option is to use a dedicated control unit that assigns different parameters of the mix to individual faders and knobs such as the J.L. Cooper unit pictured below. If you have to have the tactile response, this is definitely an option. They are designed to work with virtually every brand and type of DAW software and use midi to communicate with the computer. |
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