My room mic is the furthest mic from my drum kit. Pre AA2, the room mic is the last to pick up sound because its the furthest away.
However, after using AA2 and setting the snare to the performance time, the room mic is ahead of everything.
This is only happening when I hit the snare. The room mic is aligning with all the other mics for kicks.
I’m using logic, and I dont have any fades on my audio.
How can I get the room mic to align with the other drum tracks?
Thanks for your message and welcome to the Sound Radix forum!
Auto-Align 2 allows you to use alternate correlation points. If you’d like to preserve the distance between your drums and the Room mic, here’s what you can do:
You can also use the A/B/C/D preset slots to easily compare the initial alignment with any alternate options.
If you have any questions, let me know.
Best,
Oran
Thanks for the detailed info Oran!
I have played around with the delay value so the room mic isn’t ahead of everything.
Do you know why AA2 made the room mic go in front of the other microphones, because I’d like to avoid this in the future?
I would like the sound waves to line up with each other.
Are you using Auto-Align 2 as ARA, or did you capture the audio into it?
If you’re capturing, make sure you capture the whole song into Auto-Align 2 to get the best results.
Also, click the Auto-Align 2 logo to make sure you’re using the latest version 2.2.1.
If you’re using an earlier version, download and install AA 2.2.1 from the Downloads page.
The best way to avoid this in the future is to quickly go over the alignment before bouncing in place.
Best,
Oran
I’ve had this issue, as well… where a room mic is moved actually in front of the direct signals as the first choice . Odd.
What seems to be missing is a way to work in stages on a drum kit.
Whenever I do the kit as a whole in one pass with AA2, the OHs are never aligned in an optimum way on their own to themselves. It seems we should be able to refine the OHs, stereo rooms and maybe even top and bottom snare as separate standalone units; and then lock those and do an alignment across the whole kit.
I know we can work on those early stages separately and then render them; but that kind of takes away the whole point of AA2 being a fast workflow. I can do that multi-step process in AA1 almost as quickly.
The way I would like to see it, is that I can load up 3 or 4 SEPARATE groups and stereo link them. But then have AA2 take a shot ad refining the phase coherency of these pairs individually. Then add in the mono tracks and have another layer of Grouping that does not break the internal Grouping of the stereo pairs. Then process the whole kit, and at THIS TIME, preserve the stereo linked files as a single unit against the whole. Make sense?
I think this really needs to be addressed, with the understanding that the majority of case uses for Auto-Align is indeed aligning a drum kit.
Hi @jrshirakbari,
Thanks for the detailed write-up, this is very helpful feedback.
What you’re describing can indeed happen in certain setups, depending on mic balance, levels, and room acoustics. For example, a bottom snare mic can sometimes capture more kick energy than expected, and depending on its frequency response, that can influence the alignment and pull the overheads earlier than feels optimal.
We’re aware of this behavior and have it on our research bench. While your idea of staged grouping makes a lot of sense conceptually, our preference is to keep Auto-Align a fast, single-click “it just works” workflow rather than introducing a more complex linking structure.
I’ve added your feedback to the relevant issue ticket on our side. Thanks again for taking the time to share this. It’s the kind of real-world input that helps us make Auto-Align better.
Best,
Nir
Hi Nir,
Thanks for your response.
The problem is… it doesn’t really work. At least not that often. It fixes some problems while causing others.
Sure, it does work in these controlled video demonstrations. But that is not real world. For instance, I am currently mixing a record produced by Tony Visconti with Steve Ferrone on drums recorded in a nice studio. So these are not shabby tracks. However, they still need some phase alignment touch up. And so far on 12 of 14 tracks, AA2 is not nailing it. To the point I am ditching AA2 and hand aligning and nudging as before.
Please hear me on this. Fast and one-step is not the ultimate goal. Results are.
Please re-read and take to heart what I am saying… we need to be able to work in stages to get it right, especially on drum kits. AA1 did not provide for the newer, very cool Group alignment in one go. Great! But that is not the whole story, either… and that’s where we find ourselves now.
We need to be able to treat the stereo (or multi-miked) instruments like OHs and snare as a unit first; before treating the kit as a whole. Otherwise, you are chasing your tail. I know that makes sense to many.
In every single case on this record (recorded on multiple days with different kits and miking… so I’m not just having a specific issue x 12), the overall kit sounds different with AA2 Group Align; not necessarily better, though. And the resulting OHs, stereo rooms, and 2-mic snare sound in isolation are actually worse. And for Room mics to be moved ahead of direct signals should just not happen as the first choice. Ever. That is not the result we need.
I believe in Auto-Align, and I know this can be improved. I WANT it to work! But let’s be realistic about how this stuff works professionally and what we need. Believe, me… if I could group my stereo units and run a pass and lock them; and then highlight all the drums and run a 2nd pass and be done I’d be thrilled! Do that. :^)
Thanks you for listening.
Rob (Shrock) Shirakbari
Hi Rob @jrshirakbari,
We hear you loud and clear. And I do want to say up front, those videos were not artificially manufactured. If you only knew how many days and nights we spent analyzing real-world sessions, tuning and retuning Auto-Align 2 across very messy recordings…
That said, your point about results coming before speed is completely fair. Our preference for a one-click workflow is not about dismissing real-world complexity, but about trying to solve as much of it as possible without pushing users into a manual, multi-step setup by default. Clearly, there are cases, especially with drum kits, where the current approach can fall short.
Your description of treating internally coherent stereo or multi-mic sources first, then aligning the kit as a whole, does make sense in certain cases. At the same time, there are other situations where that approach could actually make things worse. For example, if a stereo overhead pair is already well spaced and balanced in the recording, further aligning it could potentially compromise the stereo image rather than improve it.
That balance is exactly what makes this a hard problem to solve automatically. We’re not dismissing your idea at all. On the contrary, feedback like yours is what pushes us to rethink how far the automatic approach can go, and where it may need support from additional options.
We do have this class of issues on our research bench, and your detailed explanation has been added to the relevant ticket on our side. We’re actively exploring new ideas to address this without turning Auto-Align into something overly complex, but that does not rule out adding features alongside the automatic algorithm if that’s what it takes to get the results right.
I really appreciate how clearly and constructively you laid this out. You’re not wrong to expect more, and we’re taking that seriously.
Kind regards,
Nir
Hi Nir,
Thanks for your reasoned response. Looking forward to future developments.
Let me know if I can be of any help as you go.
Cheers,
Rob
