Mix monitoring in Cubase

Mix monitoring in Cubase

Obsolete. I changed my monitoring setup

During mixing I find it important to be able to quickly switch my different monitors (Kali IN-8, Avantone mix cube, Sennheiser HD650 and other headphones). In addition, I want to be able to switch between the raw mix, a pre-master, and reference tracks. The so-called Control Room of Cubase provides the functionalities to setup a flexible monitoring eco-system together with my Behringer X32 digital mixer that also serves as my 32 in/out soundcard, and the Mackie Big Knob passive monitor controller. I have setup the monitoring system in such a way that I can also easily switch between the different monitors when I am not working in Cubase but, for example in Wavelab (for mastering) or other software.

Below I explain step by step how I have setup and configured by mixing monitoring setup. For an alternative setup used during recording of vocals of instruments see [here]. Note that I use Cubase Pro 11. Previous or other versions of Cubase may not provide all functionality that I have used.

Although the setup looks complex, you only have to do this once. After that you can easily switch in the Control Room between different inputs (mix, pre-master, reference tracks) and monitors that you may have and/or switch between monitors on your (digital) mixer and/or monitor controller.

Step 1. Setup the audio connections in Cubase Pro 11

In the Cubase Audio Connections Outputs (Image 1) there are two stereo busses (Stereo Out and Master) and one mono bus defined. The Stereo Out is the default mix bus that shows up in the Mix Console but I have not connected it to the X32 (digital mixer/soundcard) since I take care of this in the Control Room tab. The Mono out is also not connected and I generally don’t use this output since I can easily switch the mix to mono in the Cubase Control Room or on my Mackie Big Knob.  The Master is a seperate output bus that also appears in the Mix Console and is connected to channel 3 and 4 on the X32. The Master mix bus can be used for pre-mastering by adding plugins like EQ, Compression, and limiting on this bus. On the X32 and can then switch between the raw mix and the pre-master. However, in practice I now do this by using the cues in the Control Room (see below). All mix sub-busses (e.g., vocals, drums, bass, guitars, keyboards, etc) are send to both the Stereo Out and Master bus (Image 6)

Image 1: Audio connections of the Output busses. The default Stereo Out and Mono Out, and an additional Master bus.

Next, I setup the cues and monitors and corresponding connections for the Control Room (Image 2). I have defined two cues (MASTER and REF) for a pre-master and reference tracks respectively. These are not connected to the X32 but are routed to any of the monitors (Kali IN8, Avantone, HD650) from within the Control Room. These monitors are connected to the X32 on different channels. One pre-fader cue of the Stereo bus goes to the MASTER while another pre-fader cue of one or more reference tracks go toe REF (Image 6). This setup allows me to do a pre-master within the Control Room in addition to the Master that was routed to the X32 (Image 1).

Image 2: Audio connections of the Control Room. The stars indicate CUES. The speakers indicate different monitors.

Step 2. Setup the Cubase control room

Now we can have a look at the Control Room (Image 3, 4, and 5). At the top we see the MASTER and REF cues and a Monitors section.  In Image 3 we see that Monitor A is selected (this is the Kali IN8 monitor as defined in the audio connections; Image 2). In the Monitor A section, I have inserted the SoundID Reference plugin from Sonarworks. You also see the Mix is selected. Thus, in this configuration, the raw mix goes to Monitor A, which is connected to channel 1 and 2 of the X32.

At the bottom of the Control Room I have inserted several Metering plugins, but also the Reference 2 plugin from Mastering the Mix to compare reference tracks. I don’t use this plugin a lot since I deal with reference tracks in a different way.

Image 3: Control Room settings with the raw mix selected. Using SoudID from Sonarworks on Monitor A (Kali IN-8). At the bottom several metering plugins, and REFERENCE for switching to/between reference tracks.

In Image 4 we see the MASTER cue and plugins that I have inserted on this cue (EQ, Compression, Limiting, Stereo image). This MASTER cue will sound when instead of Mix I select C1. This master can then be routed to the KALI (A), Avantone (B), or HD650 headphones (C).

Image 4: Control Room settings showing the Master cue with several plugins inserted.

Finally, in Image 5, we REF cue is shown. When I want to hear a reference track I select C2 and route this to monitor A, B, or C. Note that all cues go through the Monitors section and, therefore, through SoundID. Thus, with this setup I can listen to the raw mix, a pre-master, or reference track on any monitor by clicking the corresponding buttons. However, as I explain below the setting is little bit more complicated since I also want to retain flexibility for monitoring when using other software.

Image 5: Control Room settings showing the Reference cue. No plugins inserted.

Step 3. Configure the Cubase mixer

In the Mix Console (Image 6), you can see part of the routing. The Stereo Out and Master busses (defined in the audio connections) show up in the mixer. The mix sub-busses (blue faders) are routed to the Stereo Out and Master (channel 3/4 on the X32). Note, that these sub-busses are the only channels that I control with the Softube Console 1 Fader. A pre-fader master cue on the Stereo Out is activated such to allow to switch to a pre-master in the  Control Room. Thus, here you see that the Master bus is completely separated from the Control Room. On the right I have three audio tracks on which I inserted commercial reference mixes. The faders are set to zero such that they don’t sound in the mix. Instead they are routed to the REF cue. In the Control Room I can then listen to a reference track and set its volume to match the raw mix (alternatively, I can use the Reference 2 plugin).

Image 6: Cubase Mixconsole showing the main mix buses that are routed to the Control Room output and the normal Output, and four reference tracks (not in the REFERENCE plugin) that are routed pre-fader to the Control Room reference cue.  The Stereo Out is routed pre-fader to the master Cue. The Master bus  can be used to make a pre-master and is routed directly to Behringer X32.

Step 4. Connections to the hardware

Image 7 shows the connection of Cubase to the hardware (X32, Big Know, and headphone amplifier). Control Room monitor A and the Master output are routed to the Kali IN8 monitors and the Yamaha HS8 subwoofer (that I can separately add in when I want). Monitor B is connected to the Avantone on the X32, and Monitor C is connected to another X32 mixbus that is routed to a headphone amplifier to which I have connected multiple headphones including the sennheiser HD650. However, the final routing to the Kali IN8 or Avantone mix cubes is not made in the Control Room, nor on the X32 but with the Big Knob monitor controller. This controller takes Monitor A and B as input (through the X32) and routes this input to the Kalin IN8 or Avantone. The Control Room and the BigKnob allow me to switch to mono, which is why I don’t use the mono bus in the audio connections.

The complete setup is rather complicated since I want to separate everything in the Control Room and on the X32, but in the end works very intuitively and fast.

Image 7: The complete mix monitoring eco system

Selection of plugins used in the Control Room

Below a selection of the (metering) plugins that I use in the Cubase control room.

Image. Dorrough peak and rms meter from Waves

Image. VU meter from Klangheim

Image. Acustica Sienna Guru for headphone mixing

Image. SoundID from Sonarworks

Image. Tonal Balance Control from iZotope