I Don't Use The Mixer Because

As the topic states, I don’t use the mixer - because normally I work with most of the sounds at the area of -15db. If I play with the volumes on the mixer, if I want to have any volume envelope in the track I have very little space to play with, namely between INF and -15db.
Now that’s problematic, you can’t have good sounding envelopes that way.

That’s why I use the in-channel volume setting (not the mixer setting).

That’s where I wanted to ask, why isn’t THAT volume being used for the mixer? for example in Cubase and Logic, the mixer settings don’t effect the envelopes, for example I can lower the track volume on the mixer to -20db and on the channel’s volume envelope I can still play with the volume from INF up to +3db and the actual sound will be lowered relatively.

Anyone follows me here?

Have you tried working with the POST mixer instead? The post mixer does not affect any of the volume controlable elements in the envelopes.

The problem with post faders is that they’re not accounted for when you use send tracks. The send device comes before them and everything is routed to the send track before the post settings are applied.

Now, if the send device went behind the post faders in the device chain… [developers hint] ;)

the volume settings on the channels in the DSP effects section of each channel are linked to the “PRE” mixer settings. if you automate those, switch to the mixer view and press play when you have the “PRE” mixer setting selected, you’ll see them move. so, in essence, you may not be using the mixer view, but you are using the mixer ;)

Or just use the send-track’s fader in the mixer instead if it is the last device on the chain ;)
Point is:Send-track is controllable by effect commands and envelopes, the deal with the post fader is that it should not affect absolutely anything specific in the chain but the whole chain.

Another point with send-track is:you can mute the original track; in this case you adjust the post-fader of that send-track in the mixer and you are there as well. So for this situation your argument only counts for the visual aspect, not the functional aspect. Improvements on how the chain should look in terms of colour when a sendtrack is used might be debatable (when the track source is muted, the track is coloured darker or marked differently in the mixer-view so that it is obvious a sendtrack is outputting its signal)

If you keep the source you will have to level the original source as the sendtrack seperately in the mixer anyway since both original track and sendtrack produce a different and distinguishable sound. So in that case, your argument does not prove serious improvements on all areas.

…which indeed makes the post volume fader useless. And let’s not forget the panning post-setting, which is completely lost when you route to a send track. Yes, you can always use a Gainer right before the send device. There’s always a workaround. But why resort to workarounds?

I’m not sure if I understand correctly, but I presume you mean the Mute Source/Keep Source option in the send device. But then again, it’s exactly when the source is muted that the post faders become useless. So, hm… may be I didn’t understand after all. And if you meant muting the original track itself, then nothing would go to the send track and none of this would matter. So this could not be what you meant… I’m really lost with this, sorry. :)

Sure, there are times when the source should be kept and then the post-fader works. However, the signal is routed to the send track without the post panning applied, so we have a 50% functionality loss of the post-settings here.

Things get even worse when multiple tracks are routed to one send track. One may spend a lot of time to find a good balance and stereo positioning and they will be lost when you send them all to a send track.

I really can’t think of an example that justifies the way routing and post faders coexist the way they do now. I’m still convinced that routing should come after the post faders.

If you “keep” the source then the post faders will affect the track, but not the send-track. This is not hard logic i presume.

If you mute the source then the post fader becomes useless, we both agree this situation is not logic.
You might have a good point afterall, but i’ld rather have a seperate routing table instead where more possibilities are open. (sendtracks, line-in, ReWire, hardware routing, routing from one track directly to another)
But i do not exactly have a good idea how this should change, yet roughly placing the send-tracks behind the post-mixer is just some sort of patch to fix a workaround idea.
Perhaps Pysj can or already had posted some good ideas about this.