Mixing a Song in FL Studio

-and organising your project after a messy recording session

You have finished recording your song, and everything's set. Except, your song still sounds like crap! Here's how to fix that in FL Studio.

1.Assign audio tracks to effect channels
First you should assign all the audio tracks to effect channels. Do this by double clicking the wave file, if the "Playlist"-window is open, or by clicking the audio tracks in the "step sequencer"-window. You should assign the audio tracks to effect channels with similar recordings. For example, assigning all guitar recordings to one effect channel, all the vocal recordings to a different fx-channel and so on.

2.Name and color the fx-channels
Select the desired fx-channel, and press F2 to rename the channel. In the right of the little box that appears, there is a square, which probably is gray. Click on this, and choose a color that you might associate with the sounds in this channel. Then edit the text to suit this group of sounds (i. e. "Guitars", or "Vocals").

3.Organise the fx-channels
Next up, you should organise your playlist. Wheter you do this by grouping similar channels is your choice. But a neat little keyboard-shortcut is alt-left, and alt-right. These shortcuts move the chosen effect track one step right, or one step left.

4.Organise the playlist
Open the playlist-channel. There's a big probability that it looks somewhat messy after a long recording session with the band, or an experimental recording session. Now, organise the recordings, and group them more properly. Group the different instruments recordings together, and change their name into something that describes the recording better. Usually when I record songs I end with tracks named "voc2_2", "dsfsdddf_6" and similar. This was especcially true one time I let my band do the recording without their "technical supervisor" (me ;) ). I personally like to Have the name of the wav-file in the title. I do this by naming the tracks in a fashion similar to this: "Verse 2, vocals(voc2_2)" instead of the relatively confusing "Voc2_2". So do this!

5.Make send channels.
Send channels are golden. Especcially for older computers, as they can save you tons of CPU (which, for the novice allows your PC to operate faster). What send channels should you make? I think it is a good idea to have one or two reverb-channel, where you add the reverb- or reverb2-effect. A chorus, delay and sometimes a phaser or flanger/flangus channel may also come in handy. Bear in mind that you can add effects to the separate fx-channels too.

For the reverb, I like the cathedral, and small studio presets. Depending on what I want the song to sound like. Bear in mind that you can tweak the parameters as you pleace. Remember, Edison found 10,000 or so ways not to make a light bulb before he managed to. Experiment, and be patient! But the presets are pretty decent too. (Don't take things too seriously. Contradictionarily, that usually leads to a worse result in the end)

The chorus should be programmed to do whatever you want it too. Wheter it is to make the sound fuller, or a bit more "spacey" (though phasers in regular fx-channels do this better). I like the default, and the "fat clean" presets pretty well.

Delay is a good send-effect. When attributing it to a send channel, the presets ending with (send) are good for send channels.

The phaser-, and flangus/flanger effects are good for adding "spacey" sounds. I usually add these effects to the regular fx-channel. But they can be used to color the sound from send channels too.

Note: Send channels "duplicate" the output, and when you direct an fx-channel to a send-channel, you will hear a mix of the fx-channels output, and the send output. Therefore, certain effects, like distortion, equalization and filters are generally not suited for send channels.

6.(Optional) Automate panning/volume changes.
So, your guitarist manages to play the entire song, and everything is great. Except, he has made tons of noice between verse one or two (or whatever ;) ). Or maybe you want the sound to fade from the left ear to the the right ear. To do that, you should automate the tracks, by first opening the playlist, the clicking the tiny triangle on the top-left of the sound file. Then choose automate, and panning or volume.

Note: everything can be automated in FL Studio (not external VSTi's).(important) choose a "pattern" in the playlist-window that will be the track to automate whatever you want to automate. Then, just right click any knob, and choose edit events and choose how you want that knob to move, or just switch to recording mode, by clicking the button next to the play and stop buttons, and moving the knob like you want it to while the song plays.

7.Listen to the tracks individually. Add effects and eventually listen to the channels with a metronome to make sure that the sound is synchronised with the beat.
By right clicking on the small green "lights" in the mixer-window, you can listen to the fx-tracks individually. And if you right click at the same spot again, you will reactivate all the channels. Now listen to each channel. Add effects and send the sound to send channels by selecting the desired fx-channel and turning the round knobs beneath the send channels in the mixer to adjust the ammount of sound that should come from a given send channel. (the knobs are almost at the bottom of the window)

That's it :) I hope this article helped you!