"If I Didn't Care" semi-open collaboration project

[freightgod]

Project SoundCloud page:
https://soundcloud.com/if-i-didntcare

Publicly viewable project Dropbox page:
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/c352er5246go ... mp3la?dl=0

If anyone is interested in observing or participating in the development of a song recording from beginning through final mix, AHornsby and I are going to give it a try. We both have lots to learn and look forward to seeing what happens. It might get messy, but hopefully it's the fun kind

I'll be sending a few invitations to participate to the few really active posters here (you old timers know who you are) but if anyone seriously wants to get hands on, feel free to PM me. It's my song, yes, and I love my babies, but I intend to be really open minded here and go with the flow.

Comments, criticism, participation welcome!

[freightgod]

First version is up, very rough vocal and rhythm guitar.

https://soundcloud.com/if-i-didntcare/if-i-didnt-care

[outteh]

Very well done, looking forward to this.

[freightgod]

So far so good, M@rkus has expressed an interest in joining in when he finishes a couple things and outteh (Tom) looks to have too much time on his hands as well

AHornsby (Harry) has bravely volunteered to attempt some percussion, so I guess the ball's in his court for now.

Pressure's on, Harry!

Thanks for the interest, guys!

[outteh]

First cut dropped to the dropbox location (If I Didn't Care(Tom'sCut).wav. Attempted some leveling and EQ/panning to bring out the mix. Added a small string solo. Just trying to get a feel for the song and the direction we would want to go. Really recorded well and sounds good. Comments?

[freightgod]

I am surprised how many 'issues' come to mind almost immediately after launching a collaboration project like this, almost all of them organizational, some technical, and some artistic. I think it's part of the point of this project to discuss this kind of stuff here so we can learn the pluses and pitfalls of collaborating this way with Mixcraft.

1) the mix you posted. Wow, super cleanup job for a couple tracks that I know I'm going to be replacing anyway. Almost hate to see your efforts wasted there, Tom, but it also makes me want to go back and give you some 'real vocals' to work with. I can see I'm going to have to keep you busy!

2) did you not save your work? I know you were just 'getting a feel' but you didn't save any of the changes to the .mx7 file. Did you save a separate .mx7 to your local PC? My original thought was that we'd all work on the same file incrementally.

3) DANGER DANGER WILL ROBINSON! We're going to have to figure out a way to 'hand off' control of the .mx7 file so that two people aren't working on it at the same time!!! This is going to be a biiig problem! For example, I was thinking of going in to record a bunch of vocal takes to give you something to work with, but that would take me hours, during which time you or Outeh or Markus could be working on something else. The last person to save changes wins, wiping out the other work!!!

4) Artistic control and hurt feelings. As in, I'm going to have to play executive producer and nix a lot of stuff. For example, there is no way in Hades there is going to be a string solo where you played one. OK, there might be (no, there won't lol). I don't mind saying that now because I know you were just getting a feel (nothing wrong with the performance, either). But I think you get my point. At many points during a project like this a lot of efforts are going to be negated. Just something I hadn't really thought about, and it's worth talking about up front.

5) Mixcraft projects are going to get huge and messy. Due to the nondestructive editing feature Mixcraft keeps lots of .wav files around which are of no use. In my opinion Mixcraft needs a 'cleanup' button so that a user can choose to 'get rid of all unwanted takes'. For example, right now I've got two tracks, vocal and guitar, one lane each. But the project folder retains 12 .wav files. I can easily see myself doing 10 takes of the vocal alone, probably 5 good ones, comped down to one. It's going to be interesting to see how the project folder balloons in size.

6) Rough mixes and naming conventions: rough mixes to .wav seems like overkill, definitely bandwidth wise, and will make them harder to post. Definitely should save as .mp3's , in my opinion.

For example, in order to post your effort on the project SoundCloud page, I have to open the .wav file you saved and convert it to .mp3 first. I will, because I want to let people hear it, but it's a pain.
https://soundcloud.com/if-i-didntcare/0 ... didnt-care

Also, we could end up with forty "Tom's Cut"s or "Pauls Mix" files. I suggest using the format:

01242015T If I Didn't Care.mp3

Which is simply the date as a prefix, followed by an initial. Also going to need a way to differentiate between multiple mixes if done on the same day. Hmmmmmmm. Maybe

01242015T (101).mp3
01242015P (102).mp3

(T for Tom, P for Paul, etc.) and so forth would work? No point in typing in the song title as we know what we're working on. I know this sounds like a PITA but I think we've got to decide on something if 4 or more people will be doing rough mixes.

*************************

As you can see, there is a LOT to think about here. I hope discussing these things doesn't slow things down too much, but I think it's useful for the long term, and the whole point of doing this is to learn how collaboration can work. For certain we'll have to figure out a way to avoid multiple people having the same file open at the same time, and soon. Other people must have run into this problem with Dropbox before, I will go do some research.

Thoughts anyone on any of this?

[AHornsby]

Thoughts anyone on any of this?

As long as we have the original vocal track intact somewhere, everything else is just gravy and ear candy. This is what makes "tracking" such a wonderful thing. -h

[freightgod]

As long as we have the original vocal track intact somewhere, everything else is just gravy and ear candy. This is what makes "tracking" such a wonderful thing. -h

Yes, except. Say you open the .mx7 file this morning and spend a few hours adding percussion or whatever. I can also have it open and work for a few hours on some vocals.

When you finish what you're doing and save your changes, whatever, great. But when I close my version of the same file, and save changes, my version of the file will replace yours, and all of your work will be gone.



See what I mean?

Dropbox is kind enough to say "Changes have been made to such and such" when a file is closed, but it doesn't let me know when you've got one open for editing.

I noticed this the other day when it just so happened that we were both editing the same text file. I popped in a note then saved the text file. You did the same thing a few minutes later. Your note was there, but mine wasn't because your version of the file overwrote mine.

[freightgod]

OK, here's a link that might help : https://www.dropbox.com/help/36

and the pertinent part:

One workaround that can be used to prevent conflicted copies is to move the file out of the Dropbox folder while editing it. Doing this causes the file to appear as deleted and doesn't allow other users to edit the file. Once you're done editing, you can move the file back into its original location in the Dropbox folder. It will reappear with your edits for all users who have access to that file.

Another option is to move the file into a second folder designated for "In Use" files. Other members of the shared folder can still access it if they need to, but will know not to make changes.

So here's what I will ask 'editors' to do. When you're working on the .mx7 file, drag the entire folder titled "IF I DIDN'T CARE" to the "WORK IN PROGRESS" folder, then drag it back to the 'root' folder when done. I'll update the 'Read Me First' text file with that instruction.

That way at least it will be obvious somebody else is 'getting his Mixcraft on'.

[outteh]

Well. Now I know - NO STRINGS! Part of any mixing engineers effort is knowing what the artist wants. I was experimenting, as I mentioned, seeing how things fit with the style and mood of the song and looking for feed back. Now on to the collaboration. I downloaded the MX7 project and worked on it on my PC. I think if we work our own MX7 project we avoid the conflict issue. I kept the original tracks, duplicated them in the project, and worked on the duplicated track. I kept my work local and can always post it up to the Master project when needed. I knew you had the intent to re-record so I kept it clean. As we build something or want to provide a sample for input, we should provide the file as MP3 ( although I think wav is better to hear the quality changes ). I'm assuming you want MP3 instead of wav to save space on soundcloud? If you as the artist think this is something to keep, we then update the Master MX7 project in Dropbox. This would entail importing the worked on track(s) into the Master project. All the rest is discussion and working together. Let's do it!

[freightgod]

Tom, I would really rather we work on the same .mx7 file so that we can see what's going on as part of the process. It's easier just to duplicate and mute tracks in Mixcraft.

For example, I really liked the work you did leveling out the sound at what I at first considered throw away tracks, and I was eager to see the actual 'moves' you used to do it, but I can't do that if it's only on your local pc. I really think it's less cumbersome in the long run to keep everything in the same place. If I like something you did (and you almost redeemed my scratch vocal there) I would have to ask you to import a track into the main file, duplicate any effect you used, sync it, blah blah blah. That's how I feel about it, but it's good to talk this stuff through. Learning! I have been wrong once or twice before, though... But not in the last quarter century, as I told my wife on our silver anniversary (just kidding, dear!).

As to strings, I was just using that as an example of how there's no way around stepping on toes once in a while with a group project like this, I just hadn't realized before the implications of actually 'owning' a project like this. I love strings and almost always use them in my songs, but they almost never work in a 'solo' situation. Again, I was just using that as an example, I liked what you were playing. I'd rather have the track sitting there muted though, because you never know!

So even if it slows the creative process down a bit, I'd rather you just drag the entire IF I DIDN'T CARE folder into the WORK IN PROGRESS folder while you're tinkering, it will actually keep things more cohesive in the end. If you have a moment of genius, which is how good music usually happens, it'll be right there for everyone to observe and carry forward. It's so easy just to duplicate tracks and mute them in Mixcraft, after all.

.wav's are just too large for early stages, I feel. But that's your call.

I'm guessing all this talk will seem anal to a lot of people, but I've always found detailed prep pays off in the long run. I'd much rather figure this stuff out now. The big payoff will be if this actually functions because we'll have saved others a ton of headaches on future projects. Hopefully.

[outteh]

Followed your instructions. Latest project change made. Also added an acoustic bass track.

[freightgod]

https://soundcloud.com/if-i-didntcare/if-i-didnt-care

Getting there, like the bass very much, a lot like I would do, very straightforward.

[freightgod]

Markus has joined the project (yay) and has noticed there might be a problem because he's running Mixcraft 6 (pro? I didn't ask). I wonder how this will work, short of an upgrade on his part? Part of the learning process, for sure. I still have 6 on my PC so I will have to experiment and see what problems he is running into. I hadn't thought about backward compatibility.........

[outteh]

I still have 6 also, but you can bring a 6 project into 7 so maybe there is a work around?