Stems... Again

[MBantle]

Dear All,
I know the 'Stems' question has been asked before but I just wanted to check what is the latest 'best practice' approach chosen by more experienced members. Obviously, each stem can be mixed and mastered individually but it is cumbersome... The quick and dirty would be to leave everything on the master bus 'as is' and when bouncing stems just to mute what does not form part of the individual stem. But that IMO will be a pain for the editor trying to 're-assemble' the track.
Please let me know your thoughts.
Cheers,
Matt

[cosmicdolphin]

Hi Matt

Sounds like you have the right idea to me. Basically Master the track within the session by adding your mastering plugins to the 2buss and make your stems using mutes.

I find track folders really handy, so I can just drop each track into its correct stem folder. That way it's easier to mute regardless of routing.

Why would it be a pain for the editor ?

Mark

[MBantle]

Hi Matt

Sounds like you have the right idea to me. Basically Master the track within the session by adding your mastering plugins to the 2buss and make your stems using mutes.

I find track folders really handy, so I can just drop each track into its correct stem folder. That way it's easier to mute regardless of routing.

Why would it be a pain for the editor ?

Mark

Thanks Mark! It worked well.

[Russell Landwehr]

Hi Matt,

It really depends on what you mean by "stems" and what these "stems" will be used for.

If they are intended to be reassembled by someone, DO NOT render them through master buss processing.

Regards,
Russell

[eeoo]

Only way to know for sure is to ask. I just did a project and they requested that the stems be put through my mastering chain.

[MBantle]

Hi Matt,

It really depends on what you mean by "stems" and what these "stems" will be used for.

If they are intended to be reassembled by someone, DO NOT render them through master buss processing.

Regards,
Russell

Thanks Russell! That was actually the point I was trying to make. I usually leave a lot of headroom, so when removing the stuff on the master bus I would have to at least bring the individual stems (in my case the publisher wants each individual track as a 'stem' - it is a rather simplistic instrumental so not an awful lot...) a bit up in level before bouncing them. Do you think that's OK? Thanks again for your guidance.

[cassmcentee]

Just a thought...
If the tune is to be normally used as underscore or as a Cue I wouldn't spend that extra time since it's not "Headlining"
If the tune is up for a Big Commercial or a Main Theme then I would dig in deep and see if the independent mixes need any help.
2 cents
Cass

[Russell Landwehr]

Hi Matt,

It really depends on what you mean by "stems" and what these "stems" will be used for.

If they are intended to be reassembled by someone, DO NOT render them through master buss processing.

Regards,
Russell

Thanks Russell! That was actually the point I was trying to make. I usually leave a lot of headroom, so when removing the stuff on the master bus I would have to at least bring the individual stems (in my case the publisher wants each individual track as a 'stem' - it is a rather simplistic instrumental so not an awful lot...) a bit up in level before bouncing them. Do you think that's OK? Thanks again for your guidance.

Ah, then the publisher wants to mix the stuff to their tastes and make their own alts.

In a case like this, the term "stems" is a misnomer. "Trackouts" would be a closer description of what they want. "Stems" is a term meaning groups of tracks mixed together, like submixes... i.e. Vocals stem (all vocals mixed together), Guitar stem (guitars mixed together), Drums stem (drums mixed together). Unfortunately, so many people use the term "Stem" incorrectly that some people (and publishers) have just given in and go with it.

I'm aware of one library in particular who likes to get trackouts so they can mix the songs themselves. (I don't have anything in their library, and I would be hard-pressed to send them trackouts since many of the licenses for the sounds I use stipulate that they cannot be used in isolation, which then I would have to worry that the publisher may cause me to violate the agreement)

The question then becomes: Does the publisher want the trackouts "dry" or "processed"?

I would be likely to give them trackouts that include the processing on the individual tracks but not the master buss. I would also be likely to give them trackouts that when they import them into their DAW, would give them your mix when their track faders are at unity. If your master buss is peaking pretty low without master buss processing (like -5db), I would would probably try to get that up to at least -3db and possibly -1db with a simple master fader bump. The problem with running your trackouts through the master buss processing is that the processing reacts differently to a full mix vs individual tracks. For me, my goal would be to give them trackouts that are simple for them to work with. (I'm a mix engineer who gets trackouts from people, and it's really nice for me to have that starting point in the mix with all the track faders set to unity... it gives me the mix they envision before I start tweaking)


I understand your desire to get feedback on this here in the Forums. When dealing with new Publishers, we don't like to bother them with questions they may view as "hand-holding". However, the people who reply here (me included) cannot truly know what the Publisher wants unless we've dealt with them in the past, so it makes it just a bit difficult to give totally accurate advice on this subject.

Best,
Russell Landwehr

[andygabrys]

with all due respect to Russell:

Stems vs. splits vs. track outs vs. alt mixes whatever.....

If a publisher wants to quickly remix your track to render a custom mix for a client - something that you haven't provided in the list of ALT MIXES that are usually supplied with any track (narrative / no melody, DnB, Stinger, etc etc etc) then you will find that most publishers are not going to spend the time to remix your track from scratch.

So its necessary to bounce all the tracks with all fx and sauce including all insert effects, correctly panned and wet as stereo audio files. Even if its a mono bass track.

Then the question is to include all mastering effects or not. Most of them aren't going to bother with "mastering". Most TV applications are well below peak at 0 dB anyways. Except for commercials. You might be surprised at how simple most commercial music houses keep their mastering.

You can assume that if the publisher wanted you to supply the initial track mastered then all stems would be rendered as Cosmic Dolphin noted above - using track mutes. This applies with commercial agencies that need to quickly assemble a custom mix from stems.

If everything has been mastered and rendered with track mutes - then they can be sure there won't be any inconsistencies in any track, no digital overs, and they can lay up the stems in their session. Naturally the master buss is going to be in the red. Then they do a magic thing - they group all the stem faders, and drag them down the same amount until they have the necessary headroom to perform whatever they want to do to finalize their remix. Voila. Done.

Some publishers perform all their own mastering - In that case you can still use whatever mastering chain you used on the full mix (if any) if they approved it. Output your stems in the same manner using track mutes.

Some publishers also perform their own mixes and mastering - mostly super high end libraries. In this case call them "track-outs" or "session splits" you are going to be sending dry unprocessed tracks. This also happens if you work in house with a mixing engineer at a commercial music house. You likely will be sending a lot of actual live recordings, and won't be sending anything raw that came from a sample library as your cannot control how they are going to feature those sounds - and in this case I do agree with Russell.

Another question is whether your full mix is the correct loudness:

If it got accepted, its loud enough. Just mute tracks and burp out stems. Don't worry about bumping anything up in volume.

It doesn't need to be overcomplicated. I have only worked with one company that wanted dry mono/stereo splits (or track outs if you will) because they mixed in house. Every other publisher that wanted Stems wanted them wet and mastered.

The concept of headroom is all relative too - if you supply a track that peaks at -0.2 dB they can pull it down 10 or 20 dB and then there is gobs of headroom. We don't provide the end product in music for media. There is always somebody who has hands on shaping the final mix.

[Russell Landwehr]

with all due respect to Russell:

Yeah, Andy, I think we pretty much said the same thing, specially in light of the additional info the OP provided.

Of course you expanded on it a bit.

Russell