Routing to the Mixer and Applying Automation

Once you’ve arranged melodies for your song, you can begin mixing. Mixing is the process where you combine instrument sounds and strategically blend them together. You need to be familiar with how audio is passed around the mixer (known as routing) in order to mix music efficiently, and in this chapter, we will learn how.

In order to use effects, we need to understand how instruments’ signals get passed around. This chapter is intended to show you how to configure your setup for any mixing need. The goal of this chapter is to give you a general foundation understanding of the mixer. In future chapters, we will apply our understanding of the mixer by adding effects to our sounds, such as compression and stereo-width effects.

In this chapter, we’ll cover the following topics:

• What is mixing?
• Routing audio to the mixer
• Navigating the mixer console
• Applying automation
• Freezing...

What is mixing?

Mixing is the process where you balance out the sounds of instruments with one another to allow each voice to be heard. You then apply effects to sounds to enhance them. Traditionally, this was done in a hardware device called a mixer control panel. These devices were very expensive pieces of equipment, selling for thousands of dollars. In a mixer console, you’d plug your instruments and microphones into the mixer’s ports and play sounds. The sound would be recorded on a recording device called a tape, which would store the audio information. The tape could then be played back and send the audio signals through the mixer. The mixer had knobs and buttons to finely adjust the volume, panning, and level of the input and output signals. You could then send the audio signals to effect plugins that manipulated the sound before sending the signal back to the mixer.

Digital audio workstations like FL Studio replicate a mixer console in looks and functions...

Routing audio to the mixer

Before we can mix our music, we first need to route audio to the mixer. The following is a screenshot showing the FL Keys and BooBass instruments in our channel rack, which we are going to route to the mixer:

Figure 4.1 – Channel rack and mixer

In the preceding screenshot, we can see four samples and two instruments in the channel rack. Our mixer has no information mentioning instruments or samples yet. Currently, all sounds are being routed directly to the master channel. When we’re done routing, all instruments and samples in the channel rack will have their own assigned channel and will visually show up in the mixer.

There are two ways to route an instrument in FL Studio to the mixer. The first way is using the channel rack, and the second is by using the individual instrument itself.

Let’s look at the channel rack method first. This is the shortcut way:

1. In the channel rack, select all instruments by...

Navigating the mixer console

I like to think of the mixer console in terms of three distinct components:

• The master channel: A channel that all other channels eventually route to. Audio exiting this channel is what gets exported as the final song.
• The insert mixer tracks: Where audio is routed to from each instrument.
• The effects rack: Lists effects that are applied to each mixer insert channel.

In the following screenshot, we can see the mixer and its components:

Figure 4.8 – Mixer

Audio signals flow from the channel rack into the insert mixer tracks. For each insert mixer track, effects from the effects rack are applied. Audio then leaves the insert mixer track and is either sent to another insert mixer track or the master channel.

The words track and channel can be used interchangeably.

Understanding the insert mixer track

It’s called an insert mixer track because, in the old days, these used to...

Applying automation

You can make effects and controls change over time. This is called automation. Automation allows you to have fine control over your instruments and effects. In the following example, we will look at applying automation in the mixer; however, it should be noted that automation can be applied to any effect plugin, the channel rack, the playlist, and any instrument plugin. This is a big deal, as you can have sounds evolving over time throughout a song.

Essentially, any time that you want to have a sound transition from one state to another, you use automation. Here are some examples of automation that you hear in music:

• Sounds gradually getting quieter or louder. Any time a sound fades in or out, it’s using automation.
• Any time in a film that you hear footsteps or a car sound appear to move from left to right, you’re hearing panning effect automation.
• Rising or falling effects can be created through the use of automation. A...

Editing automation clips

Once you’ve created an automation clip, you can edit the automation. Let’s see this through an example:

1. Right-click on any automatable control and create an automation clip in the playlist.
2. Double-left-click on the automation clip name in the playlist. The automation editor will appear as shown in the following screenshot.

Figure 4.17 – Automation editor

In the preceding screenshot, we made a bunch of random selections for the automation. The exact automation isn’t important; the goal is just to show you how to navigate to the automation editor.

In the automation editor, you can refine automation curves. You can play your clip in the playlist simultaneously to see how your song is affected by the automation.

In the automation editor, you’ll see a grid of points indicating automation. Higher points mean an increase in control value and lower points mean a lower value. The value will...

Applying automation to external third-party plugins

If you want to apply automation to an external plugin (not a native FL Studio plugin), you won’t be able to right-click to apply automation. In order to apply automation for third-party plugins, you need to use another method.

We’re going to explore two techniques to add automation. The first approach, MultiLink to controllers, is the easiest and most intuitive. The second approach of creating an editor thumbnail is more of a legacy technique but can still be used.

Using MultiLink to controllers to add automation

There’s an easy way to add automation clips for any plugin using the MultiLink to controllers feature. The plugin doesn’t have to be a native FL Studio plugin. It can be an installed Virtual Studio Technology (VST) instrument or effect. This technique also works for adding automation for hardware controllers’ controls.

As a brief overview of how it works, you first enable...

Freezing audio clips

You can render any audio into an audio clip. Rendering to audio is more commonly known as freezing. Like version control, freezing gives you a version of your sound that will not change. Rendering to audio or freezing means creating an audio clip sample out of any sound that passes through a mixer track. Freezing audio clips into samples has several benefits:

• It allows you to chop up the audio sample and access audio sample controls. You gain all the benefits of using a sample, such as being able to control sample envelope controls and use samples in other plugins, such as in DirectWave.
• A sample is less CPU-intensive than an instrument with effects. If you notice your computer lagging due to the usage of lots of plugins, you can speed up your computer by freezing CPU-intensive mixer tracks into audio.

Although you may not use freezing tracks at first, it’s something that will become important when you start to have tons of effects...

Summary

In this chapter, we learned about the mixer console. The mixer console is where you combine your sounds, balance and blend them together, and apply effects to them. We learned how to route audio and instruments to the mixer. We learned about the components that make up the mixer and what they’re used for. We also learned how to apply automation to our plugin controls to change them over time, and how to render audio in the mixer into new audio clips. We’ve just begun learning about mixing. We will return to the mixer and explore mixing techniques, starting in Chapter 6, Compression, Sidechaining, Limiting, and Equalization. In the next chapter, we’ll learn about sound design and audio envelopes.