Hey guys, in this video we’re going to cover the audio effects and options available for
mixing in Cakewalk by BandLab.
If you haven’t checked out the previous videos in this series for how to use Cakewalk,
I recommend doing that before continuing.
In this video we’re going to talk about some of the basic tools for mixing, as well
as the ProChannel.
The first step in the mixing process is to open up the console.
It’s currently available in our project, but it’s minimized at the bottom, so just
click to open it.
If you accidentally close it, go to views at the top menu and select console.
This is basically our mixer for all our tracks.
It displays most of the information we had before when we were recording, but also includes
the pan and volume controls for that track The first control is for the input gain.
Use this to make small adjustments to the track, before the fader.
Below that, we can open the ProChannel.
We’ll cover this more in a few minutes.
Next is an equalizer.
There’s a power button to turn it on and off, and a pre/post button for whether it’s
before or after the effects rack.
If you mouse over the equalizer, you’ll see a few different colored dots.
Pull these up and down to change the EQ on your track.
After that we can set up a send.
When a track is going to a send, it gives us additional options for pre and post fader,
volume, and panning.
I usually leave these alone.
Keep in mind that by using the send this way, the entire track will still get sent to master
as well, so this is more of an auxiliary send that’s good for effects like reverb.
If you just want to group all your tracks, change the output of that track to the bus
instead of Master.
This is nice to group your tracks together and edit them, like for your drums.
Press the plus button and select New Stereo Bus.
Now we have a few buttons, but all of these are the same the track view and we covered
them in a previous video.
Below that is the pan knob to set the stereo position of the track.
Then there’s a fader to set the volume level.
Finally, we have our input and output controls.
The input should have already been set, and you shouldn’t use it in this view anyways.
As I just said, you may want to change the output here to send to a bus.
The next part of othe console that we need to look at is the Pro Channel.
This is basically a channel strip available from the console with a lot of high end plugins
available.
The first part at the top is the compressor.
When used on a channel, it features an input gain, attack, release, and output.
The ratio can be set to 4, 8, 12, 20 or infinite.
Finally, there’s a dry/wet knob, but I usually keep it turned to 100% wet.
If we have it applied to a bus instead, we get more options like threshold and high pass
filter.
You can use either one on different types of tracks, you just have to delete one first
since it won’t allow you to have two different compressors on one track.
Then we have our equalizer.
This is the same equalizer from the console, but it’s expanded to have more controls.
The first selection is between hybrid, pure, e-type, and g-type.
Hybrid has an unsymmetrical curve, meaning it doesn’t respond the same way when it’s
cutting or boosting frequencies.
This mode is recommended for the controlling drum resonance and problem frequencies.
Next is pure, which is just a very smooth EQ.
This can be used on anything, especially for mastering.
E-type is designed to mimic a vintage hardware equalizer, and the G-type is made to mimic
a modern equalizer.
The first control for each band is the frequency.
Next is the Q, which basically sets the width around the frequency over which it acts.
How that is shaped depends on what mode we put it in.
Then there’s the level control to boost or cut frequencies.
The low and high bands both have a switch at the bottom to control whether they are
a regular band like the others, or a high and low shelf.
We also have high and low pass filters that can be enabled with the buttons at the bottom.
There’s a frequency cutoff for the high pass filter, and a slope knob for how gradual
or strong the filter is.
The last button for the EQ is the gloss switch, which is just used to add presence to high
end without additional harshness.
Next up is the tube saturation module.
First we have a mode switch at the bottom right.
Mode I is for tube emulation, and mode two provides tube emulation without processing
the high end, so you’ll get a warmer tube sound without any distortion to the high frequencies.
Input sets the input gain level, drive sets the amount of tube saturation, and output
sets the output gain level.
The next tool we have is the console emulator, which makes the audio sound as if it were
running through an analog console.
This will improve the sound quality of your recordings and give it a high end, polished
feel.
The three different buttons at the top are for the types of console they’re designed
to emulate.
Just switch them and see how it affects your sound.
The trim sets the input gain, and drive sets the among of saturation that is applied.
Finally, the tolerance button allows it to simulate slight differences between channels
that would be experienced on a real-world console due to differences in the electrical
components.
When using the console emulation, it should be added to every track and bus on your entire
project.
Now we’ve covered all the effects that are available from the ProChannel by default,
but there are quite a few more to look at.
To add more effects, scroll up to the top of the ProChannel, right click, and add a
module.
The next one for us to look at is BREVERB 2.
This allows us to create hall, plate, room, and inverse reverb.
There’s also a lot of presets that can be selected from the preset menu at the top.
For each of the reverb types, there’s a few knobs.
They’re not all the same for each reverb, but in general they let you control the size
of the reverb, the length, and the tonal properties.
Like all reverbs, it also has an option for dry/wet mix levels.
The other reverb tool we have is called Rematrix, which is a convolution reverb.
This basically means its simulating the sound of an actual room using an impulse file that
was created in that room.
At the top we have a few presets we can choose.
After you choose an impulse you can see the waveform and get an idea of what kind of reverb
you’re dealing with based on the reverb tail.
There’s a control for time which sets the length of the reverb, delay to control the
response time, and stereo to adjust the stereo width.
Below that we have a few EQ controls, and a dry/wet mix slider.
Next we have a tape saturation tool, which makes it sound as if the recording were done
on analog tape instead of digitally.
Our first control is noise, which adds tape hiss to our track.
Next is the Recording level.
When you have a higher input level on tape, it creates more tape saturation and compression.
The PB level is the output level after the effect.
Tape speed can be set to slow or fast.
Slow creates a warm tone without as much high frequency, and the normal sound is obtained
from a fast tape speed.
Finally, we have bias, which can be set to Over to reduce distortion.
The Saturation knob by Softube is used to increase harmonic content of your sound.
This can be used to improve your bass tone and your vocals, as well as a lot of other
tracks in your mix.
There’s only two controls to consider here.
The type controls which frequencies are most affected.
On keep high, it doesn’t affect the high frequencies.
Neutral keeps it the same across all frequencies.
Keep low prevents bass distortion, and is used on drums or vocals.
The FX Chain can also be used to add VST effects not normally included within the ProChannel,
to the ProChannel at any point in the signal chain.
It basically acts as a container for our other effects.
The last set of tools is the Style Dial FX.
These are single knobs that are added to your signal chain, and each of them has a specific
purpose.
There’s tools to adjust the stereo space, drum dynamics, vocal harshness, and much more,
but they’re all well explained here so you can see what they do.
Thanks for checking out this video on mixing audio with Cakewalk.
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