How to create space in a mix

[Dusk]

Visualise your mix as a 3D room that you wish to utilise in full:

Right to left is controlled by pan and stereo width

Top to bottom is controlled by keeping elements as separated as possible in their own freq space

Front to back is controlled by relative reverb and delay amount (wetness), relative volume, relative freq content (sounds lose high freqs over space) and relative amount of transient energy (transients are often a higher pitch than the sustain and decay parts of a sound, so as sounds get further away the attack decreases relative to the decay)

Deep and spacious mixes dynamically use all 3 dimensions to keep elements apart and thus provide cues about an imaginary sonic space.

For instance there's alot of talk about not overlapping freqs - but this is unnatural as sounds are never separated in real life - instead we pick up cues that separate them based on the other dimensions involved. it's possible, for example, to have a guitar and piano in the same freq range as long as one is slightly louder, dryer and more percussive than the other.

[Opuswerk]

Thanks for all the replies !!

I'm currently trying a few of the tips here, but it's damn hard. I mostly achieve placing the elements of the mix at their right place, however it seems more as if they're in a room rather than creating that room. Will keep at it either way

The more i search for it, the more it seems that sounds need somehow to be pissing all over the place without eating the others headroom, so as to feel the more natural as possible. Hard equing doesn't seem to help as it sterilizes the sounds more than help them "expand", if that makes sense.

Might also try and use another reverb than live built-in, as its a bit too digital I feel.

[tone-def]

Use some bit reduction on your verbs

thanks for the tip.

that made my verbs more noticeable if nothing else.

[SHAP]

Sometimes I use very deep bass altough I cant really hear it. I only notice the difference when I turn it off.

[livecollective]

3-point delay, if you want your mixes to have depth, 2d is easy, 3d is skills.

[victorgonzales]

3-point delay, if you want your mixes to have depth, 2d is easy, 3d is skills.

? what kind of delay and where?

[livecollective]

3-point delay, if you want your mixes to have depth, 2d is easy, 3d is skills.

? what kind of delay and where?

a simple delay, lets for example take the idea of creating 3d space with vocals (or anything that you usually want to have a spacial sense to it)


3 dry channels, 1 down the middle, 1 panned right 1 panned left
3 wet channels, 1 down the middle, 1 panned right with a <45ms delay and the 1 panned left with a <45 ms delay, (probably some verb on the wet channels for depth), you wouldn't use bus/auxs for this. This is a very standard way of creating a 3d environment in proper mixing.

In mixing, the use of delay <45ms (under this because around there the human mind cant distinguish seperate notes) creates the 3d field. Experiment.


Obviously you don't need to use 6 channels, but thats just how a normal professional sessions vocals would be done to create the space desired.

Waves has some plugins (S1-imager) that in all practical purposes do this, but its not the same as doing it yourself with a simple delay and your ears. Waves is great but they make it a bit to simplified.



Essentially you can take an instrument pan it one way, utilize another channel toss a delay on it and have it perceived as a stereo image. Its a great way to open up the room in your mix and/or utilize all of it.


I feel like i am not explaining myself correctly, but I would look into 3 point delay and even 6 point delay.

[Roqqert]

eq L and R different. Ull notice u get a weird panning situation. Btw phase can also make some nice rooms