Old 10-18-2020, 09:02 AM   #1
fendorst
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Default FX bus question

I have 3 backing vox tracks, panned hard left, center, and hard right. I want same EQ on all 3. I create an FX bus with the EQ, and send all 3 tracks to the FX bus. What I hear is a mix of the unaffected tracks with the FX tracks. I hear all three EQd tracks centered, mixed with non-EQd tracks panned hard left, center, and hard right.

How do I make the FX bus sound like it sounds when I add an EQ to each indiviual track? I want to hear 3 EQd tracks, not mixed with unaffected tracks, and I want to hear them panned hard left, centered, and hard right, not mixed with all 3 centered.

Maybe a better way to ask is how do I stop sending the dry signals to the output so I hear only the EQd signals, and how do I preserve the panning of all 3 tracks?

Thanks!
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Old 10-18-2020, 09:17 AM   #2
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I have 3 backing vox tracks, panned hard left, center, and hard right. I want same EQ on all 3. I create an FX bus with the EQ, and send all 3 tracks to the FX bus. What I hear is a mix of the unaffected tracks with the FX tracks. I hear all three EQd tracks centered, mixed with non-EQd tracks panned hard left, center, and hard right.

How do I make the FX bus sound like it sounds when I add an EQ to each indiviual track? I want to hear 3 EQd tracks, not mixed with unaffected tracks, and I want to hear them panned hard left, centered, and hard right, not mixed with all 3 centered.

Maybe a better way to ask is how do I stop sending the dry signals to the output so I hear only the EQd signals, and how do I preserve the panning of all 3 tracks?

Thanks!
Turn off master send on all 3 tracks. And make sure your sends going into the bus are post fader/pan. That should do the trick.
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Old 10-18-2020, 09:18 AM   #3
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Maybe a better way to ask is how do I stop sending the dry signals to the output so I hear only the EQd signals, and how do I preserve the panning of all 3 tracks?

Thanks!
1. You un-select the "Master send" for the dry tracks.
2. Use a stereo EQ on the FX track and pan your sends.
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Old 10-18-2020, 11:25 AM   #4
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In cases like this, I put the BG tracks in a folder then put all the processing (EQ etc.) on the folder track. This is useful because I can then hide all the individual tracks to reduce clutter in the mixer, but I can still expand them to adjust panning and volumes if necessary.

However, I only do this if I never plan to create any sends directly from the individual BG tracks themselves (just from the folder track).
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Old 10-18-2020, 12:30 PM   #5
fendorst
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Default follow-up question, and thanks

Crashwagon and Fabian, thanks for your replies. When configuring the send for each track, do I adjust the volume and pan sliders to match the volume and pan set on the track itself?

Valy, terrific suggestion, love it! I'll do that if I can't get the FX bus working. I feel like I should learn how to do that correctly, but it's great to have options. Thanks!
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Old 10-18-2020, 01:10 PM   #6
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Think of the sends like patch cables.

You connected your source tracks to your fx bus.
Your source tracks and your fx bus track are all connected to your master mix bus track (presumably via the master send checkbox). Thus you hear the mix of all those.

But it sounds like what you really wanted to do was ALTER the source tracks with eq instead of ADDING the fx track along with the original sources.
So...

Send from the source tracks to the eq bus track.
Do NOT route your source tracks to your mix bus track! (You don't want to hear these raw tracks!)
Route only the eq bus track to your mix bus. You're not using this as an fx send to ADD to the mix. You are instead using this track as a subgroup to ALTER the source tracks with eq.

You can use the folder track feature in lieu of a send if you wish. It's all about patching connections from one place to another.

Stuff like ambience (reverb, delay, etc) that is an additional component of the mix gets added in addition to the source elements. When you want to eq something, that's usually an example where you want to alter the source and only hear the altered version in the mix.
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Old 10-18-2020, 03:48 PM   #7
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Valy, terrific suggestion, love it! I'll do that if I can't get the FX bus working. I feel like I should learn how to do that correctly, but it's great to have options. Thanks!
If you use a folder (which I would strongly recommend) you don't need to create any sends or do any routing. Each track within the folder is automatically routed to the master only via the folder.

You just slap the EQ into the folder FX chain, job done!
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Old 10-18-2020, 04:21 PM   #8
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If you use a folder (which I would strongly recommend) you don't need to create any sends or do any routing. Each track within the folder is automatically routed to the master only via the folder.

You just slap the EQ into the folder FX chain, job done!
Exactly, that's one reason I love it. Just drag the child tracks underneath the desired parent track until the highlight indicates that it will create a folder, then presto! It automatically disables the master send and routes the childs to the parent. Really appreciate that feature for situations exactly like this. I often find myself working to combine a bunch of tracks into a single logical sound in terms of the mix, and this makes it easy to process them as a single unit while still being able to process them individually later if I want.
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Old 10-18-2020, 04:39 PM   #9
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Exactly, that's one reason I love it.
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Old 10-19-2020, 08:50 AM   #10
fendorst
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Fabian provided a critical piece of the puzzle:

"Use a stereo EQ on the FX track and pan your sends."

Experimentation proved whether I used aux sends or the parent/child folder option, panning is preserved only when a stereo FX is used.

I now know how to accomplish the task two ways, and stereo FX are required to preserve panning.

Many thanks to all for your assistance. Helpful hive-mind collaboration and sharing is one of the positive uses of the interwebs.

Last edited by fendorst; 01-04-2021 at 07:30 PM.
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