FX Sends levels

[uab9253]

Are there any rules of thumb as to what levels you should send to your FX channel?

[brandondrury]

Yes,

The Brandon "Rule of thumb" is you can beat your woman with any sized stick you want to (I'm kidding ) and you can send as much or as little to your effects as is required to realizing "the vision".

Maybe sending -50dB to a reverb is enough. Maybe you need to send +6dB and then use a compressor with a makeup gain on the actual effects track with 30dB of extra gain. You never really know until you start mixing.

As long as your gain structure is solid, I don't have much advice on this one. In other words as long as you aren't boosting the crap out of the FX track somewhere and then sending a tiny signal to it or some other duct tape, jerry rigged trick you should be fine.

Good question, though.
Brandon

[uab9253]

Thanks Brandon - that explains somewhat why I haven't seen any strict guidance on this aspect.

[brandondrury]

Yeah if there were any "strict" rules on aux sends, I'd just break them anyway.

Brandon