# A question about Mr Bergersen



## Dan Mott (Oct 13, 2010)

I couldn't find any information, but does he mix his own music, or send it to an engineer?

I feel stupid for asking this, but..... I'd like to find out somehow.

Thanks.


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## bryla (Oct 13, 2010)

Many if not most of the things you find online (the mock-ups) is mixed by himself - TSFH I'm not sure if they have a dedicated engineer or Nick and Thomas do it.


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## Peter Emanuel Roos (Oct 13, 2010)

When I bought the first public TSFH CD, I thought I read that Nick and Thomas did at least the mastering, I will check later what the liner notes say.
I can also ask Thomas about it if we can't find it out here.


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## wesbender (Oct 13, 2010)

He left this comment on his blog a few weeks ago -

http://nemesis2.wordpress.com/2010/09/1 ... omment-686

So it looks like he does, which isn't terribly surprising given that everything he seems to do ends up being brilliant.


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## Dave Connor (Oct 13, 2010)

If you have your general volume levels correct in your template so that a soft oboe sounds correct with say soft 1st violins (and so on with loud brass dominating other loud instruments etc.,) i.e. real world balance in your midi orchestra, then you have half the battle won. From there you have to emulate the behavior of real instruments so the inherent deadness of static samples doesn't call attention to itself.

If you reference the balance, panning, distance and other factors that make up the total sound of an orchestra (from a good recording) and try to match that with your virtual instruments then you will be helping your sound a lot. I would ask someone to help you because you will learn a lot and go faster.

Workflow wise I am always going forward as much as possible while continuously polishing the last thing I did. You have to know when you are slowing yourself down if you try and get too detailed at the expense of getting the job done. You can always polish so keep going - a pro has to.


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## Animus (Oct 13, 2010)

Dan-Jay @ Thu Oct 14 said:


> That's pretty sweet.
> 
> His mixes sound great.
> 
> ...



Mixing and writing are one in the same. You write well it mixes itself.


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## Dan Mott (Oct 14, 2010)

Thank you to all for the replies.

Thanks Thomas. The reason I asked about you inparticular is because the mixes on the TSFH stuff sounds so nice to my ears. I suppose mainly because there's alot of real orchestras in there and drums and nothing can beat the live sound, but I just love the mix. The sounds are nice a bright and powerful.

I struggle to get it perfect since I am more obseesive compulsive than a perfectionist. Finding the right sounds is tough aswell I suppose. Seems as though the sounds I'm using a good, but require alot fo work maybe... or I'm doing something wrong.

It's tough to get inspired if it doesn't sound good right away, but nice to know you mix as you go, I thought I was crazy for doing that.

Ahh.. nice to know what you do.

Cheers.


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## rpaillot (Oct 14, 2010)

Dan-Jay @ Thu Oct 14 said:


> Thank you to all for the replies.
> 
> Thanks Thomas. The reason I asked about you inparticular is because the mixes on the TSFH stuff sounds so nice to my ears. I suppose mainly because there's alot of real orchestras in there and drums and nothing can beat the live sound, but I just love the mix. The sounds are nice a bright and powerful.
> 
> ...



Dan you know what your problem is ? Seems to me you dont write enough music. You dont "think" music enough ... You think too much about the sounds, what articulations you have to use, the midi controller, and not simply about the notes you're going to use, the orchestration , chord voicing , modulating.... this is pretty important to get a good sound !! Way more than the libraries. Thats why TJ stuff sounds so good, they're originally well written !!! There's no secrets.


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## Peter Emanuel Roos (Oct 14, 2010)

[quote:d7630ef238="rpaillot @ Thu Oct 14, 2010 3:46 pm"][quote:d7630ef238="Dan-Jay @ Thu Oct 14, 2010 2:30 am"]Thank you to all for the replies.

Thanks Thomas. The reason I asked about you inparticular is because the mixes on the TSFH stuff sounds so nice to my ears. I suppose mainly because there's alot of real orchestras in there and drums and nothing can beat the live sound, but I just love the mix. The sounds are nice a bright and powerful.

I struggle to get it perfect since I am more obseesive compulsive than a perfectionist. Finding the right sounds is tough aswell I suppose. Seems as though the sounds I'm using a good, but require alotò+Q   ë„é+Q   ë„ê+Q   ë„ë+Q   ë„ì+Q   ë„í+Q   ë„î+Q   ë„ï+Q   ë„ð+Q   ë„ñ+Q   ë„ò+Q   ë„ó+Q   ë„ô+Q   ë„õ+Q   ë„ö+Q   ë„÷+Q   ë„ø+Q   ë„ù+Q   ë„ú+Q   ë„û+Q   ë„ü+Q   ë„ý+Q   ë„þ+Q   ë„ÿ+Q   ë… +Q   ë…+Q   ë…+Q   ë…+Q   ë…+Q   ë…+Q   ë…+Q   ë…+Q   ë…+R   ë…+R   ë…+R   ë…+R   ë…+R   ë…+R   ë…+R   ë…+R   ë…+R   ë…+R   ë…+R   ë…+R   ë… +R   ë…!+R   ë…"+R   ë…#+R   ë…$+R   ë…%+R   ë…&+R   ë…'+R   ë…(+R   ë…)+R   ë…*+R   ë…++R   ë…,+R   ë…-+R   ë….+S   ë…/+S   ë…0+S   ë…1+S   ë…2+S   ë…3+S   ë…4+S   ë…5+S   ë…6+S   ë…7+S   ë…8+S   ë…9+S   ë…:+S   ë…;+S   ë…<+S   ë…=+S   ë…>+S   ë…?+S   ë…@+S   ë…A+S   ë…B+S   ë…C+S   ë…D+S   ë…E+S   ë…F+S   ë…G+S   ë…H+S   ë…I+S   ë…J+S   ë…K+S   ë…L+S   ë…M+S   ë…N+S   ë…O+S   ë…P+S   ë…Q+S   ë…R+S   ë…S+S   ë…T+S   ë…U+S   ë…V+S   ë…W+S   ë…X+S   ë…Y+S   ë…Z+S   ë…[+S   ë…\+S   ë…]+S   ë…^+S   ë…_+S   ë…`+S   ë…a+S   ë…b+S   ë…c+S   ë…d              ò+S   ë…f+S   ë…g+S   ë…h+S   ë…i+S   ë…j+S   ë…k+S   ë…l+S   ë…m+S   ë…n+S   ë…o+S   ë…p+S   ë…q+S   ë…r+S   ë…s+S   ë…t+S   ë…u+S   ë…v+S   ë…w+S   ë…x+S


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## Animus (Oct 14, 2010)

Ashermusic @ Thu Oct 14 said:


> Animus @ Wed Oct 13 said:
> 
> 
> > Dan-Jay @ Thu Oct 14 said:
> ...



Let me elaborate what I meant. The arrangement is a big part in determining the mix. Each instrument occupies it's own space,frequency spectrum and interval. If an arrangement is built thinking about how they fit together the mix will come together a lot faster. If not you will have to do a lot of painstaking "mixing" if instruments are trying to occupy each others' "space"; carving out with eq's, compressing etc. In the writing process I try to say more with less. IMO the reason Thomas's mixes are successful is in the way he arranges and any post mix processing is just for color like he said. I learned this the hard way after years of trying to shoehorn shit together and now I am getting much better results. It's like painting on canvas. A painter chooses colors, shapes, tones etc with the intention of forming the final image they have envisioned. They just don't slop paint on the canvas and at the very end expect to see the Mona Lisa.


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## Ashermusic (Oct 14, 2010)

Animus @ Thu Oct 14 said:


> Ashermusic @ Thu Oct 14 said:
> 
> 
> > Animus @ Wed Oct 13 said:
> ...



Agreed.


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## Dan Mott (Oct 14, 2010)

Thanks guys.

I was also wondering... Do you guys have a seperate verb for your Basses, or no verb at all? I've always wondered this considering that alot of verb on bass makes things muddy. Right now I have all my strings going to the save verb, but I'm wondering if anyone uses this technique on bassses.


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## Dave Connor (Oct 14, 2010)

Nothing pings the reverberation of a room or hall quite like basses so yes you should hear that. However they can get muddy with artificial reverb so you have to be careful. Listen to some recordings where the basses are doing pizzicato and try to match that in your setup.

You sound like a candidate for some of these new string libraries like Hollywood Strings or LASS where they sound very good out of the box and don't need complex reverb setups and lots of EQ. A purchase like that would save you a lot of time and headaches.


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## Tanuj Tiku (Oct 14, 2010)

TJ seems to be running a very well thought out template with some brilliant sounding settings. 

But the central idea is always the music and orchestration. I have to agree that the reason his demos sound really good has a lot to do with his music chops. 

If your voices are not correct, its not going to sound right. I find voice distribution and weight is extremely important in orchestration.

Of course, when trying to learn it does not help that MIDI orchestration is a bit different and you would write a little differently for a real orchestra - but I have no experience in this yet. 

I think a simultaneous understanding of audio and music is important. I really relate to what TJ has mentioned above. I work in the same way - you kind of orchestrate as you go and make it sound the best. But he does it amazingly well!

Having said all that, of course it does matter what EQ settings/reverbs you are using.

But I remember TJ talking about natural instrument volume etc. I think that and dynamic range are also extremely important - it is what makes the orchestra dynamic - so when the 'Fat'part comes in, it really blows you away and the softer passages are sweet and not too upfront. 

Sometimes, you need the woodwinds to just give an air and hang in the air so to speak - for that you have to approximate how a solo flute will sound in an empty hall and then adjust your reverb and eq settings accordingly. 

And finally, you need to experiment a lot!! And keep on writing material and learn from each piece. I have written 100's of demos over the years and I have learnt more from them than on the job or something. You need to keep writing to learn and really experiment. This is not a mechanical process where you just get some settings and push them in. 


Write as much as you can and try to experiment!!



Best,

Tanuj.


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## JohnG (Oct 15, 2010)

wise words, Tanuj


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## Dave Connor (Oct 15, 2010)

I recently had an orchestral track I did with samples mastered by a real pro. He took some muddiness out of the bass and added some highs and I think that was it. So mastering can be very subtle as well.


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## bryla (Oct 16, 2010)

Dan-Jay @ Sat Oct 16 said:


> Maybe I do get a good mix going, but it still doesn't sound anywhere near as good as the professional one and I think it's because there's a difference between final mix and a mix been mastered.


I think there are some good points in this thread why that could be.

Also a mix should be as complete as possible. I've also had mastering engineers just raise the level 3dB because there was no problem at all. So you should compare to mastered tracks


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## Tanuj Tiku (Oct 16, 2010)

If its not sounding very good before your mastering then you need to fix it at the source.

Mastering is mainly clean up and just surgical corrections and finally technical fixes. 

Again, your template is going to be very important in how your music sounds.

You need to understand dynamic range first. 

Import some tracks and use a Waves analyser or something similar to see how the track is behaving. 

Then you need to sit for a few hours section wise in your template. But first individually, see how each instrument sounds - is it good to your ears? If not, dont be afraid to EQ the Dry sound, The reverb or the group channel (Aux) in the end. 

I have a complex chain of plug ins running. If there is mud in the reverb, do a sweep and analyse it. Lower it. 

You need to be in a reasonably good room with decent monitoring. If you are hearing wrong things, its never going to help. Unless somehow you are tuned to your room.

check your mixes at your friends studio, in your car, on your mp3 player. 

Once you are done with individual sounds, then get the right balance of ER and Tail. So that it seems whole not two seperate sends.

Dont be afraid with radically eqíng stuff. Vienna for example is very pristing with all the frequencies recorded in a silent stage. But, it does need a fair amount of processing.

But whats amazing about VSL is that its very versatile because of this reason. I have been using it for 5 years but my sound has changed through these years - of course a big reason is composition and orchestration.

For your percussions of course, master compression on source and/or reverb. 

You can try a harmonic exciter on the master, a multuband comp. may be. 

Apart from EQ, all your compressing, multiband dynamics processor and Exciter must be subtle. This is orchestral music and it doesnt need so much. It will sound fake otherwise.


But, of course if its for a trailer or something, there are certain 'Industry' requirements. I dont blast my tracks though. Limiting is very nominal only on the loudest parts. 


Its not so difficult at the end of the day. Less highs? Add some more. Too much low end? Adjust ER and Tail, EQ the reverb, Eq the source to your liking. 

I almost always reduce the band around 250 Hz in my strings ER and tail because the Double Bass creates an issue otherwise.

TJ's Celli and Bass sound fantastic somehow. He must have figured out a way. 


Good luck!


Best,

Tanuj.


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## Dan Mott (Oct 17, 2010)

Cheers Vibrato. This thread has some nice info.

Sometimes I do think I might have a bad ear for a good mix, but then again at the same time I don't, because I know what sounds good and what doesn't and normally one that's not very musical wouldn't know the difference.

I just need to work and train my ear, and aslo experiment with some smaller projects which I think If I start small, I'll get better and mixing bigger projects and also more instruments.


Thanks again.


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## Ashermusic (Oct 17, 2010)

Dan-Jay @ Sun Oct 17 said:


> Cheers Vibrato. This thread has some nice info.
> 
> Sometimes I do think I might have a bad ear for a good mix, but then again at the same time I don't, because I know what sounds good and what doesn't and normally one that's not very musical wouldn't know the difference.
> 
> ...



I think you will find this is a less overwhelming way to tackle a larger orchestral simulation. Have you tried working with sub-groups? For example, mix your strings, then assign their output to a Bus or Aux that you can solo and mute. When they sound good, mute them and turn your attention to the woodwinds and do the same. Now try mixing the two sub-groups. WHen that sounds good, mute them and repeat the process for brass, then percussion and rhythm sections.


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## noiseboyuk (Oct 17, 2010)

Fantastic thread. Can't pretend to be an expert, still learning myself, but have to agree with all the template comments, and this hopefully addresses Dan's dilemma about the composing / mixing axis.

Especially on tight deadlines with absurd quantities of material, I just want a template that sounds right, with everything pretty much internally consistent, then press MIX. One benefit I've found of working like this is that it forces me to orchestrate better. I rarely thinking about pushing a fader to be honest... if I want a loud part I play it loud, quiet I play it quiet! Hopefully that sounds natural. It's a very fast and liberating way to work, and because its so simple it inspires compositional creativity imho, though I've no doubt I should take a whole lot more care in an ideal world. I absolutely bow to TJ's mixes, and reading how he does it was a bit of a thrill, really.

I've been spending a bit of time recently sorting out my template so that each instrument sits right with ERs and tails etc, can be dynamic and find it's place in each cue. Not quite there yet, but getting better.


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## adg21 (Oct 17, 2010)

Folmann @ Sun Oct 17 said:


> I dedicated over a year of my life solely focusing on mix in everything I did ... probably the best time ever spend in terms of educating my ear ... the old saying "fix-in-the-mix" truly stands the test of time ... it HAS to sound right at template level.



spending a lot of time building templates and working out how to fully mix the orchestra with all it's nuances is more fun then people give it credit. I'm really getting into it. I don't see this as a chore in any way, it's fun and really satisfying when you get mixes sounding nice.


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## Dan Mott (Oct 18, 2010)

Back again. Love this thread.

I was just wondering if maybe someone could elaborate on how they've got their verbs set up in their template. This thread inspired me to make one and I've got everything into place such as articulation channel wise for strings/synths/piano. I'm still working on my drums set up though. All this is running from VE Pro which I still need to contact the guys about a CPU issue.

Anyway, I'm just not quite sure on how to set it up. I know I've got a couple of options here.

1. Save memory and such by sending one reverb plugin to the strings bus
2. Making more flexibility with a reverb plugin on all sections which would add up to five reverb plugins

3. Sending all sections to the same verb, but as a send rather on the strings bus it's self so I can manually add however much I want to the sections.

The thing I'm not sure about is points 1 and 3. Why? because if I had the same reverb plugin on 5 of my sections, then I could adjust the tails manually for each section. For example, I could add less tails to the basses considering it only makes things muddy, and in alot of cases the celli too. In terms of realism which is what I want, I suppose point 1 would be the best for this? Considering if I recorded the strings my self in a hall, the tails would all be the same which makes more sense. 

I'm wanting a sound for my demo album to be quite ambient, I love the sound like it's coming from a massive outdoor environment, kind of like a stadium, making a listening feel like they are in space or something, but ofcourse I need to compensate for other instruments. This is why I'm confused on how I should go about this. I know alot of you are experienced with the best way for realism with reverb.

Sometimes I may want the staccatos to have a longer tail and such, then I may not want that for the other sections, or maybe not through the whole track, but I suppose automating reverb would help me there.

Any suggestions would be great!


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## Ashermusic (Oct 18, 2010)

Dan-Jay @ Mon Oct 18 said:


> Back again. Love this thread.
> 
> I was just wondering if maybe someone could elaborate on how they've got their verbs set up in their template. This thread inspired me to make one and I've got everything into place such as articulation channel wise for strings/synths/piano. I'm still working on my drums set up though. All this is running from VE Pro which I still need to contact the guys about a CPU issue.
> 
> ...



I have gone back and forth on this a bunch of times, from using just one verb bus (which is still what I do for more intimate projects) to SvK's method for getting "THAT sound" and quite candidly, I have not noticed as much difference as I anticipated.

Mostly, I use a Todd AO early reflections verb for each section and then all go to a second verb bus that has a UAD EMT Plate 140 or 250. I think it sounds great. But I am starting to experiment with Peter R's Bricasti IRs in place of the Todd AO and I am starting to warm to that sound as it is a little more transparent, which pairs well with the EMT plates.


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## Animus (Oct 18, 2010)

Ashermusic @ Mon Oct 18 said:


> Dan-Jay @ Mon Oct 18 said:
> 
> 
> > Back again. Love this thread.
> ...



You should really try Relab LX480 Lite if you haven't.


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## Ashermusic (Oct 18, 2010)

Animus @ Mon Oct 18 said:


> Ashermusic @ Mon Oct 18 said:
> 
> 
> > Dan-Jay @ Mon Oct 18 said:
> ...



II did. It sounds really good but am not interested in any new plug-ins that are not 64 bit on the Mac. That is a deal breaker for me and I told them that. They seemed surprised and somewhat unaware that there are now 2 64 bit hosts on the Mac.


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## Animus (Oct 18, 2010)

Ashermusic @ Mon Oct 18 said:


> Animus @ Mon Oct 18 said:
> 
> 
> > Ashermusic @ Mon Oct 18 said:
> ...



The reason is that there is no 64 bit ilok for mac.


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## noiseboyuk (Oct 18, 2010)

Dan - I'm still experimenting too, resource use is a real issue for me. My current effort uses 2 aux chains throughout, the first for ER, the 2nd for tails (at the moment I'm using the LASS IRs). Have to say that for a lot of instruments I add nothing though - Symphobia, SO etc. I'm basically trying to make the dry libs match the wet.


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## Ashermusic (Oct 18, 2010)

Animus @ Mon Oct 18 said:


> Ashermusic @ Mon Oct 18 said:
> 
> 
> > Animus @ Mon Oct 18 said:
> ...



Yes, I assume it is at least a part of it.


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## Dan Mott (Oct 18, 2010)

Well, to let you know what verb I'm using.... It's the Lexicon PCM Native. I really really like it.

I suppose I should read up more about ERs, it sounds like they're quite important. I know on the Lexicon PCM Native it has an ER fader. I'll show you. Generally I use the preset on the Random Hall 1, then I'll choose dark or normal and adjust from there. I do notice when I move the ER fader down, It sounds like it's coming from wayyyyyyy back of the room, so I have an idea for what it does, but maybe I should be adjusting this more often. I find it doesn't make a difference from -20 down, but a massive difference from the top to -20. I'm guessing the -20 is really pushing an instrument back which is cool. Pushing the fader way down I think is a bit overkill maybe because I tried pulling the Mix fader all the way up to hear a bigger difference, and as I said, I think -20 would be the farthest I'd ever push an instrument.


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## noiseboyuk (Oct 18, 2010)

I don't know the PCM... I guess there's no way to adjust the er for each instrument? Try experimenting with one instance that's just er and one that's none... Seems to be working quite well here...


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## Dan Mott (Oct 19, 2010)

noiseboyuk @ Tue Oct 19 said:


> I don't know the PCM... I guess there's no way to adjust the er for each instrument? Try experimenting with one instance that's just er and one that's none... Seems to be working quite well here...



Thanks man.

I'll give it a try.


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## Dan Mott (Oct 19, 2010)

I'm just wondering if ERs really do make a difference to a mix, even though you can just adjust the mix knob on the verb it's self.

I suppose this is needed if you are having verb on most of your sounds, that owuld be my guess.


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## Dave Connor (Oct 19, 2010)

The ER's place your instruments from front to back so unless that sense of depth is actually captured in the samples (i.e. the instruments were recorded in place on a stage) then giving them all the same ER will place them all at the same distance from the listener. An oversimplification perhaps but nonetheless you want an orchestra to have it's basic {expected} sound and one way to get that wrong is with a poor ER solution.


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## Dan Mott (Oct 19, 2010)

Dave Connor @ Tue Oct 19 said:


> The ER's place your instruments from front to back so unless that sense of depth is actually captured in the samples (i.e. the instruments were recorded in place on a stage) then giving them all the same ER will place them all at the same distance from the listener. An oversimplification perhaps but nonetheless you want an orchestra to have it's basic {expected} sound and one way to get that wrong is with a poor ER solution.



Ahhh. Thanks alot on that. I see now.


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## Ashermusic (Oct 19, 2010)

Dave Connor @ Mon Oct 18 said:


> The ER's place your instruments from front to back so unless that sense of depth is actually captured in the samples (i.e. the instruments were recorded in place on a stage) then giving them all the same ER will place them all at the same distance from the listener. An oversimplification perhaps but nonetheless you want an orchestra to have it's basic {expected} sound and one way to get that wrong is with a poor ER solution.



Yes, but as you well know, Dave, the way engineers set up the orchestra for a film score recording does not always mirror the way a symphony orchestra is set up and no scoring stage sounds like a big concert hall, reflection-wise. So "expected" is kind of a moving target, no?


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## Dan Mott (Oct 19, 2010)

For this matter. HS does need a little extra reverb, it actually sounds a bit dry to me which is great. It doesn't sound like it's in a hall which is why I'm talking verb for strings inparticular

I suppose all the instruments are panned correctly, but I'm wondering how someone would approach this matter. Jay.... any nice things you've come up with, with your templates?


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## Dave Connor (Oct 19, 2010)

Right Jay, I almost went into that but it seemed he was narrowly focused on the traditional orchestral setup. Of course anything goes if that isn't the specific goal in mind for reverb solutions etc.

Dan-Jay Hollywood strings is precisely designed to avoid having to deal with ER's which is a bit complex. It then becomes an issue of the wetness of the mix with all the instruments in the proper place on the stage already.


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