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Old 11-01-2021, 06:36 AM   #1
darjama
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Default reaMIXed: The Reaper Mixing Contest - November 2021 - Engraved Bouquet

REAPER CONTEST - November 2021
(ONLY REAPER PLUGINS ALLOWED)



OFFICIAL WEBSITE: reaMIXed.com


MIXING: 1-16 November
VOTING: 20-26 November
RESULTS: 28 November
FEEDBACK: 29-30 November



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This month's track, chosen by last month's winner LCM!, is "Engraved Bouquet" by PremRock & Willie Green. It's a hip hop track with a bit of an old soul feel, have fun!

Please remember:

-NO GLUING OF FILES
-ONLY NATIVE REAPER FX -or- non-Native JSFX files that you include with your submission.

Also, I'd recommend taking advantage of the new normalization settings in the reaper rendering dialog to meet the LUFS and dbFS requirements. My suggested workflow would be:

1. Normalize to -14 LUFS.
2. If your mix peaks at or under -1 dbFS, you're done!
3. If your mix peaks over -1 dbFS, rerender it normalizing to -1 dbFS.

MixCheck (https://reamixed.com/mixcheck/) is still beta, it can help you by analyzing your .rpp files before you upload to:
- Make sure your they don't contain disqualifying audio files
- Make sure your they don't contain disqualifying VST/AU plugins
- See what non-native JSFX files you need to include in your zip file
- See what non-native impulse files you need to include in your zip file

NOTE that Mix Check DOES NOT upload your mix, only checks your project file on your local machine.

Once Mix Check has been tested I may not require you to send in the mixed flacs, just the project files, jsfx and impulses. I'd like to hear your thoughts on that.

You can download the multitrack from the website or clicking on this link.

Again, no prize this month, aside from the customary track-picking privileges for the next month's contest.

Happy mixing!
-Daryl

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Old 11-02-2021, 01:45 AM   #2
TomekSmilok
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Cool, I will do it !

Two questions :
When you talk about - 14 LUFS, I presume most of the entries are "mastered" right ?
Are all the "in the box" JS plugins considered as Reaper plugins ?
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Old 11-02-2021, 06:45 AM   #3
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Quote:
Originally Posted by TomekSmilok View Post
When you talk about - 14 LUFS, I presume most of the entries are "mastered" right ?
"Mastered" in that they have effects on the master bus that often include limiting and compression, yes. All processing should be done in the project file you submit.


Quote:
Are all the "in the box" JS plugins considered as Reaper plugins ?
Yes, and any not "in the box" JS plugins can be used as long as you include them with your submission. Mixcheck can scan your project file and determine which JS files need to be included.
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Old 11-02-2021, 09:01 AM   #4
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Ok thanks, if I can use native JS plugins that should be enough

Nice song, the chorus kicks sooooo smoothly.
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Old 11-10-2021, 09:12 AM   #5
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Hi there, mix sent !

Wow, actually so much of my JS plugins are non-native, and definitely needed them ...

Have a good mixing everyone
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Old 11-10-2021, 12:27 PM   #6
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Submitted mine a couple of days ago! Fingers Crossed, for sure not my style of music, but great practice.

It would be cool to see how long each submitter worked on the mix. I have no idea how long I spent but this one was fairly short, maybe I'm learning to trust my ears, monitors and room better. Hard to say. Probably not possible in Reaper to put a timer on how long the project is actively being looked at. Might be a good feature though for studios that charge by the hour....
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Old 11-11-2021, 02:14 AM   #7
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Quote:
Originally Posted by REDTone Studio View Post
It would be cool to see how long each submitter worked on the mix.
Each project takes me around ten days, an hour and a half each one (on average). Put aside looking for references in the beginning and monitoring in the final stage. Many trials, often some new techniques to practice... I could deliver a mix in less time if needed though.
This particular month vocal alignment has taken way too much effort (due to my lack of expertise, I'm afraid).
I'm up to send my mix later today, after some hesitation regarding my aproach.

Last edited by LCM!; 11-11-2021 at 03:37 AM.
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Old 11-11-2021, 03:12 AM   #8
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My mix is in. I have no excuses to provide, unfortunately.
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Old 11-11-2021, 07:53 AM   #9
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Quote:
Originally Posted by REDTone Studio View Post
Submitted mine a couple of days ago! Fingers Crossed, for sure not my style of music, but great practice.

It would be cool to see how long each submitter worked on the mix. I have no idea how long I spent but this one was fairly short, maybe I'm learning to trust my ears, monitors and room better. Hard to say. Probably not possible in Reaper to put a timer on how long the project is actively being looked at. Might be a good feature though for studios that charge by the hour....
There is a script someone developed for that purpose: https://forum.cockos.com/showthread.php?t=167883

haven't tried it myself
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Old 11-12-2021, 03:47 AM   #10
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Submitted my mix! Great fun, not my standard genre, but I really like the song. Will be interesting to hear how others have tackled this.
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Old 11-12-2021, 03:49 AM   #11
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Quote:
Originally Posted by darjama View Post
There is a script someone developed for that purpose: https://forum.cockos.com/showthread.php?t=167883

haven't tried it myself
If that doesn't work, Hofa have a vst for this. A freeware and a premium version. (I haven't tried it)
https://hofa-plugins.de/en/plugins/4u-projecttime/
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Old 11-13-2021, 10:21 PM   #12
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Well my mix is in. Too old to be doing hip-hop, but its all experience right?

rob
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Old 11-14-2021, 06:18 AM   #13
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Quote:
Originally Posted by REDTone Studio View Post
Submitted mine a couple of days ago! Fingers Crossed, for sure not my style of music, but great practice.

It would be cool to see how long each submitter worked on the mix. I have no idea how long I spent but this one was fairly short, maybe I'm learning to trust my ears, monitors and room better. Hard to say. Probably not possible in Reaper to put a timer on how long the project is actively being looked at. Might be a good feature though for studios that charge by the hour....
You need to be able to keep track of time spent working if you want to avoid losing track of time spent working on a project. That is, if you plan to work for clients. HOFA has a plugin that does this and I haven't looked at that script yet. But basically you need to be able to pause time and resume during a project so that you can keep track of total time and individual session time. Having said that, I never do that on Reaper Contest mixes. But I should start!

BTW just submitted my mix. Also not typically my genre. But fun!
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Old 11-15-2021, 07:22 AM   #14
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Just uploaded my mix...and wanted to say thanks to LCM! for choosing this nice song.
Very nice.
Enjoyed (my attempts) to mix it
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Old 11-15-2021, 10:57 PM   #15
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Didn't have much time to mix this month, but I still managed to get my entry in, a whole 10 minutes before the deadline!

The entry deadline was a couple of hours earlier than I was expecting, so my mix was actually unfinished. Did the deadline change? I seem to remember it used to be 2am CST, and this time it was midnight CST.

Still, fun song! Very well-recorded tracks (in my inexperienced opinion), which was nice to work with.
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Old 11-15-2021, 11:22 PM   #16
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It should have been midnight Pacific time as usual, send me a link to your submission if you got shut out.
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Old 11-16-2021, 02:25 AM   #17
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Quote:
Originally Posted by westie07 View Post
Too old to be doing hip-hop
Age is no excuse hahaha; back in the eighties I had a tape with the original soudtrack of "Colors". Hip hop in not a newcomer. 😁
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Old 11-16-2021, 02:30 AM   #18
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Dex View Post
Very well-recorded tracks.
I think working with loops and this sort of tracks makes a difference.
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Old 11-20-2021, 09:25 PM   #19
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Apologies, I'm going to have to put off the start of voting for a day.
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Old 11-22-2021, 06:49 AM   #20
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Voting is open: https://reamixed.com/vote
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Old 11-23-2021, 12:03 PM   #21
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Voted!!!

That was tough, I think with all the sampled instruments it was harder to screw up and everybody got really close. It was little things for most mixes that made me rate things up or down in order.
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Old 11-24-2021, 06:00 AM   #22
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I voted this morning...some really great mixes and some that just missed the mark. We were provided some pretty big challenges however in my opinion. The snare is more of a rock snare than a hiphop/rap snare. Odd to have an acoustic snare with this type of track. I would have thought that an 808 would have been a better choice. So I felt that a lot of the mixes were just spitting out what was given instead of trying to make it fit the genre.

Also a lot of us are probably not familiar with or don't normally mix this genre. Overall I thought that everyone did a good job with what we were provided. There were a few with some zingers on the effects that just went overboard. But overall I think it was a great challenge and we rose to meet it!

I'm hoping that my mix does well this time around. But you never know. I haven't been a top 3 guy so far...so we'll see.
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Old 11-24-2021, 01:23 PM   #23
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Almost harder to vote than to mix this time. And I had a hard time mixing, would also give me low stars compared to the others. Yes, some effects may have been too much, but for me, more is better than less for this song, because out of the box it was bit boring, so you have to do something to keep the interest.

First time in decades I listened to hiphop/rap. Good job everyone.
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Old 11-25-2021, 04:18 PM   #24
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Sorry, I didn't make it this time for a qualified feedback.
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Old 11-28-2021, 06:48 AM   #25
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Congrats to the winner. And thank you all for the comments. I made above 1 point, wow.

Who was Voter 9? You left me a really good comment. If you have some spare time and are willing to help me, please DM me. I would be grateful.
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Old 11-28-2021, 08:27 AM   #26
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Man. I knew I would get poor scores after comparing my work to the other ones. The mix is too dark and muffled. Lesson learned. I'll write "make sure to compare your mix to commercial releases before handing it in" one thousand times all over the insides of my eyelids. I'm not giving up though. Looking forward to the next one!
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Old 11-28-2021, 08:35 AM   #27
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Thanks to all; I much did enjoy this month contest and your approaches.
Congratulation to LDdrums20 and Tomeksimilok; well done. Nice to see new mates (for me, at least) with different workflows. I will take a look into their projects, granted.
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Old 11-28-2021, 09:28 AM   #28
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Congrats LDdrums20, I'll contact you shortly about picking next month's song


download project files and see comments at https://reamixed.com/results
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Old 11-28-2021, 10:06 AM   #29
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Congrats LDdrums20! Well deserved.
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Old 11-28-2021, 12:23 PM   #30
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Congratulations LDdrums20!

I have absolutely no experience with this genre but I enjoyed mixing this song, especially since there is a nice mix on spotify for reference.

Looking forward to the X-mas session.

Cheers!
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Old 11-28-2021, 12:30 PM   #31
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Yup congrats Ldrums20 for that well balanced rawness you found !
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Old 11-28-2021, 04:15 PM   #32
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Well done Ldrums20 for the win, and to everybody else who had a go.

I really look forward to seeing the comments, and the input from others really does help.

I must confess that I didn't vote this time around as I know nothing about hip hop (or mixing for that matter) so felt out of my depth passing comment on anybody's mix. But after listening to all the entries I now know a bit more than I did before. I guess that's the whole point of reaMIXed.

Thanks Daryl for the time and effort you put in, much appreciated. Looking forward to screwing up the next mix. Lol

rob
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Old 11-30-2021, 11:18 AM   #33
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Hey folks! I'm LDdrums20, thanks! Weirdly enough I'm not a hip hop guy at all. I think most of you did a good job this time. Much more consistence in the general eq curve across all mixes. I've chosen a good old rocky one for the next one. Should be a good playground for the next month. Looking forward to listening to your submissions!
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