A new approach to the autonomous control of faders for multi-track audio mixing is presented. The algorithm is designed to generate an automatic sound mix from an arbitrary number of monaural or stereo audio tracks of any sample rate, and to be suitable for both live and post-production use. Mixing levels are determined by the use of the EBU R-128 loudness measure, with a cross-adaptive process to bring each track to a time-varying average. A hysteresis loudness gate and selective smoothing prevents the adjustment of intentional dynamics in the music. Real-time and off-line software implementations have been created. Subjective evaluation is provided in the form of listening tests, where the method is compared against the results of a human mix and a previous automatic fader implementation.

Authors: Mansbridge, Stuart; Finn, Saoirse; Reiss, Joshua D.
Affiliation: Queen Mary University of London, London, UK
AES Convention: 132 (April 2012) Paper Number: 8588
Publication Date: April 26, 2012 Import into BibTeX
Subject: Emerging Audio Technologies
Permalink: http://www.aes.org/e-lib/browse.cfm?elib=16226

Click to purchase paper as a non-member or login as an AES member. If your company or school subscribes to the E-Library then switch to the institutional version. If you are not an AES member and would like to subscribe to the E-Library then Join the AES!

This paper costs $33 for non-members and is free for AES members and E-Library subscribers.

Learn more about the AES E-Library

E-Library Location: (CD 132Papers)   /conv/132/8588.pdf

Start a discussion about this paper!