In today's in-the-box digital music DAW, it's easy to make mistakes with signal flow. Here are four ways to get your signal flow in order and improve your recording, mixing and production process too.
2. Don’t be Confused by Send & Return Hookups
3. Don’t Mix Up Pre- & Post-Fader Sends
4. Don’t Forget to Think Outside the Box
Go With The Flow
Joe is a musician, engineer, and producer in NYC. Over the years, as a small studio operator and freelance engineer, he's made recordings of all types from music & album production to v/o & post. He's also taught all aspects of recording and music technology at several NY audio schools, and has been writing articles for Recording magaz... Read More
Discussion
The Aux is indeed fed from the individual tracks—but through a bus. All the tracks you Send to (an effect in) an Aux are summed together into the chosen bus, which is the pathway between those Sends and the Aux/effect. There are many buses available (in a physical console these are actual internal (ribbon) cable connections), and if you have several effects in several Auxes, each one must be fed from its own bus, to insure separation.
For example, if you had Bus 1 feeding a Reverb (say, a Room), and you wanted to set up a second Reverb (say, a Plate), if you accidentally assigned the new Reverb 2 to the used Bus (1) that was already feeding Reverb 1, then all the tracks you meant to feed the Plate would also accidentally be fed to the Room as well. Assigning a different, unused Bus (2) to the new Plate Reverb would keep signals Sent to the Plate Reverb Bus (2) separate from signals Sent to the Room Reverb Bus (1).
Hope that helps (it's easier to explain with visuals)..
Cheers,
Joe
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