TL Audio Fat Track - Manual (Page 20)

19
Summing via the Fat Track
One of the big audible benefits you will be aware of with the Fat Track is its ability to
sum your sounds together in analogue to produce a more detailed, open, rich, warm
and dynamic sound.
Summing is basically another term for what is essentially mixing, but in its most basic
form. Summing, as the name would suggest is the process of adding several different
signals together into one combined signal.
In software, the summing is done digitally using algorithms to mathematically add the
individual parts including all note, pitch, volume, control and effects information.
This large calculation can mean that the result is not always that accurate or that some
information may become lost, confused or blurred during this process.
Analogue summing has long been proven as a more reliable and pleasant sounding
way of adding signals together and the Fat Track lets you do this very easily.
The following is a basic guide as to how you can use the Fat Track to sum your audio.
In this example we presume you are summing from a DAW.
1. Once you have finished your mix in your software of choice, start to group
your mix via type of instrument (i.e. ‘vocals’, ‘percussion’, ‘rhythm’, ‘lead’
etc), grouping the individual channels to their assigned bus within your
software. This creates mixed stereo stems of all the components of your track.
2. For mono signals that you may not want to group (like lead vocal or bass
guitar) these can be kept in mono and either fed out from the channel or a
mono bus output.
3. You can then connect up to 10 (4 stereo and 2 mono) channels to the Fat Track
depending on the number of outputs you have from your soundcard / audio
interface. If you have ADAT connections on your soundcard, you could also
use the TL Audio DO-8 interface with the FAT Track to enable you to access
the outputs over ADAT (see details in operation).
4. Use the level controls for the stereo returns to make any adjustments in level
between the different groups of instruments.
5. If you want to add any dynamics, like compression to your mix, you can insert
them via the balanced inserts provided on the master section.
6. You can then take the output from the Fat Track back into your soundcards
inputs to record the Fat Tracks analogue sum of your mix back into your
software (beware to make sure you do not have the summed signal going back
in to your software, being fed back into the Fat Track – otherwise a feedback
loop may occur).