Equipment List:
FL Studio 11
Panasonic Stereo Headphones RP-HT225
Sony Stereo Headphones MDR-XB300
Sony Earphones (Model unknown)
Trust MiLa Speakers (Desktop)
I used FL Studio 11 to create both projects because it's the first DAW that I got when I really got into music and music production and it's also the first DAW that I actually taught myself to use at a sufficient level. Despite the fact I have experience on both Logic Pro 9 & Logic Pro X, I felt more comfortable using FL Studio 11 simply because I've spent much more time on it compared to Logic 9 and X combined.
I used the Sony headphones (MDR-XB300) simply because those happened to be the headphones I had at the time and they worked out really well for me. Seeing as I started off mainly producing hip-hop and the headphones mainly specialized in the low and mid range so I could hear the bass lines (low end) and other aspects of the song very clearly (i.e. melody/harmony, snare, etc).
However, I felt I couldn't really focus on the high end through the Sony Headphones, so when it came to mixing and mastering the track, I'd use both the Sony earphones and the Trust MiLa speakers to concentrate on the high end more. I would also constantly switch between each one of the three because in both projects, there would certain sounds I want to obtain and by rotating around the three, I can analyze the differences and create a balance between them until I'm satisfied with the sound.
I also used the Panasonic headphones (RP-HT225) for mixing & mastering purposes, however it overtook the Sony headphones simply because the wiring in the right ear of the Sony headphones burst and it altered how it picked up the lower and higher range of songs in a very unpleasant way. The Panasonic headphones work better than the Sony headphones in my opinion as it has much more of a balance between the ranges rather than having the low end being the main focus. Also when I'm mixing, there's a volume control on the wire and when I put it all the way down to 0, it doesn't turn the sound down to 0 but very close to 0 and if you're in the correct environment, you can vaguely hear it. This works to my advantage because I can accurately make out a hierarchy in the mix by hearing out what's the loudest and quietest element in the mix.
Recording:
Track 1: California Living
When it came to writing the MIDI, I personally found it easy because I had a sample which was driving the song and all I had to do was create my own drum line and I mainly relied on my sense of rhythm to create the drum line but the hard part was finding the right sounds I wanted to compliment the sample. So, to solve that issue I went through all the drum kits to find the hi-hat, snare and kick sounds I initially had in mind, make a drum line out of it and if I felt something was off, I'd keep the rhythm but change one of the drum parts I've selected and analyze the differences before finally choosing what to go with.
Track 2: Midnight
For this track, I chose to go with a sampled drum kit rather than MIDI drums because none of the MIDI drums I tried wasn't good enough to compliment the sample I picked out as they all sounded "plastic" and "fake" instead of the "live" and "real" drum kit sound I was going for from the start. One thing in this song is that there is a lot of automation from the start to the end of the song which I've manually made myself (via mouse) and I added automation to achieve transition which really affected everything in the track so I needed everything sounding good before I even mix anything, let alone think about mastering.
Mixing:
Track 1: California Living
For the mixing, I used EQ and Reverb mainly on the drums and vocals in the track but other than that I used the volume levels to create a balance because everything sounded close enough to how I initially wanted it.
On the drums, I didn't touch the hi-hats as I felt dissatisfied with all the plug-ins I tried (reverb, EQ, delay, echo, etc) so I left it how it was and just adjusted the volume on it. I used enough minimal reverb on the snare that there's a difference from the original but not very noticeable as I wanted to keep the snare very snappy but added reverb as I felt the original was too "snappy" for my liking. I EQ'd the kick so it had more range in the low-end (more bass) because it felt too "punchy" to me and played more of a dominating role instead of a role that supported the bass line throughout the song.
I also used EQ on the vocals in the track because some of the ambiance would be too noticeable and overtaking in the song so I decided to cut off all of the ambiance I could without affecting the vocals so the vocals would stick out much more.
Track 2: Midnight
In this track, I chose not to use any plug-ins to enhance any of the sounds and only adjusted the volume levels whilst relying on the automation that I put throughout the track because I felt that I achieved the initial sound I was going for from the very start.
Mastering:
Track 1: California Living
For mastering the track, I had to make it ready to be put on a CD and played through a good sound system so I used EQ and compression on the output to make the song sound much more complete and like a finished product rather than sound like a bunch of ideas just placed together.
I chose to do so rather exporting a WAV file and putting plug-ins on it because I heard a slight difference in the bounced version and the original version I was working on from the DAW and it kept annoying me so to successfully master the track, I ultimately decided to use those plug-in's on the output.
Track 2: Midnight
For the mastering on this track, it went through the same mastering process as "California Living".
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