Buses and Aux Sends

[Nigel451964]

Hi,

I'm trying to understand the concept of routing (after ignoring it for several years) and while I know what it's supposed to do and I understand what a bus is for I can't figure out the difference between sending a track to a bus and sending a track to somewhere using an aux send. Aren't they the same thing?

I know I probably sound a bit dim but I need to get it clear in my head if I have any hope of using these mixing tools effectively.

By the way I use SONAR 8 .

Cheers
Nigel

[Danny Danzi]

Nigel, think of it like this....

You have a 16 piece drum kit. You get all the faders the way you want them and the kit sounds pretty tight all eq'd, compression where you need it etc. If you want so you don't have to mess with the individual tracks (though you still can if you need to) you create a buss in Sonar and send all the outputs of your drums to that buss and call it "Drum Buss". From there, when you need to tweak the drum kit, you can just use that buss fader to control your entire drum kit. If you need to control an individual instrument, you still can by tweaking it on it's track. You're just sending the outs of each track to the buss as a sub-mix, understand?

Now, the Aux stuff has a different purpose. With an Aux feed, effect send or whatever you want to call it, you create a buss in Sonar. From there, you insert an effect on that buss in the effects bin. Name that buss the name of the effect present in the bin. For shits and giggles lets say we put a verb in there, so call it Reverb. Next, go to the track or tracks you want this effect to be present on and "insert sends" on them. The send will control the amount of effect present on the track and the effect itself is controlled by the buss. The Aux send as well as the instrument buss you created can both be routed to your master buss if you have one, or just select your soundcard out that you use.

A note about Aux send effects: I like to run the effects in an AUX 100% wet with 0 dry signal present in the effect itself. This way you don't get any signal boost through the Aux and get full effect. You can adjust the level of effect present from the Aux level control you inserted on each track and if you need more effect or less effect, you can control the "Reverb" buss fader. Hope this helps you understand better....good luck!

[Danny Danzi]

One other thing....you can also use additional effects on your instrument buss. Like the drum buss I made you create...you may want to add a slight bit of compression on that buss to keep the drums a little tighter...or maybe a very slight room verb etc...you can put the effects right on the buss effects bin. Now, because this is an instrument buss, you don't run the effects 100% wet like we did with the Aux. The instrument buss is a totally different animal and anything put into this buss' effects bin should be used in moderation.

For the Aux busses, you should only use one effect at a time unless you need to put an eq in after a verb, flange, delay, phaser etc to control how it sounds. Most effects come with their own built in eq or hi pass/low pass etc. But if the one you choose does not, you can add an eq along with the effect...or even some compression if need be. Just don't put a verb and a flange in at the same because the Aux level you created on the track itself will control both levels of effects present and sometimes that can get ugly. You CAN do it for special effect purposes if you feel the need, but you have to really be careful.

[Nigel451964]

Hi Danny,

Thanks for your help. Just to clarify I've understood this correctly let me go through what I've just done.

1) Set up a drum bus called Drums; send the output of the drum track or tracks to this bus for adjusting level

2) Set up an aux bus called Reverb: send the output of the drum track or tracks to this bus via the insert send on the drum track or tracks

Cheers
Nigel

[tugito]

Yeap, that's about it.

[niglopte]

Originally Posted by Danny Danzi

Now, the Aux stuff has a different purpose. With an Aux feed, effect send or whatever you want to call it, you create a buss in Sonar. From there, you insert an effect on that buss in the effects bin. Name that buss the name of the effect present in the bin. For shits and giggles lets say we put a verb in there, so call it Reverb. Next, go to the track or tracks you want this effect to be present on and "insert sends" on them. The send will control the amount of effect present on the track and the effect itself is controlled by the buss. The Aux send as well as the instrument buss you created can both be routed to your master buss if you have one, or just select your soundcard out that you use.

But does that mean that for that Reverb Channel, we can deicide how much of that particular reverb we mix with our other tracks, but that they all have to have the same reverb setting of that one track (i.e. room size)?

I hope this makes sense i'm having a hard time explaining it.

[Nigel451964]

Yes that's right you can mix the wet reverb bus with the dry track but all tracks routed to the reverb bus will share the same reverb unless you decide to route certain tracks to a separate reverb bus. The ideas is route multiple guitar tracks for instance to a shared reverb bus or any other bus you would like to create.

[niglopte]

Originally Posted by Nigel451964

Yes that's right you can mix the wet reverb bus with the dry track but all tracks routed to the reverb bus will share the same reverb unless you decide to route certain tracks to a separate reverb bus. The ideas is route multiple guitar tracks for instance to a shared reverb bus or any other bus you would like to create.

Gotcha - Thanks

[brandondrury]

This whole thing gets complicated in modern recording software where the individual roles of aux sends and groups get blurred with added functionality.

I want to point out that GENERALLY SPEAKING, a bus is intended to used in series.

Snare Track > Drum Bus > 2 Bus

The aux tracks always work in parallel.

Snare Track to

Aux 1: Reverb

and/or

Aux 2: Parallel Compressor

and/or

Aux 3: Who knows.

Brandon

[newkid]

Originally Posted by brandondrury

This whole thing gets complicated in modern recording software where the individual roles of aux sends and groups get blurred with added functionality.

I want to point out that GENERALLY SPEAKING, a bus is intended to used in series.

Snare Track > Drum Bus > 2 Bus

The aux tracks always work in parallel.

Snare Track to

Aux 1: Reverb

and/or

Aux 2: Parallel Compressor

and/or

Aux 3: Who knows.

Brandon

+1
good observation that helps a lot
now if only the books said taht