@miked and @blairhall1974 and I shamefully went off-topic on @DeRebel’s Nail the mix thread and started talking about dueling mixes and contests. Then Mike suggested we should have something like Dueling Mixes here (Graham’s and Joe’s mixing tutorial thing), or at least resurrect some mixing contests. Then I said it was a great idea and would enjoy that. Then we realized it was too late, and Jelle’s thread had been completely hijacked. Now Jelle won’t speak to us and his thread is destroyed, and we still have no mixing contests. Been a tough day.
On a more serious note, it was actually Jelle’s suggestion that we possibly start a mixing contest here. I thought I’d start a new thread and see if there’s be interest in something akin to a dueling mix thread, led by some of the more advanced mixers here (is there any kind of intellectual property stuff for borrowing their idea?). Or interest in resurrecting some mix contests?
If so, what would need to happen to make that happen? I’m not even concerned about prizes (though it’d be cool!), but just the learning experience. Any interest? Any thoughts?
Thanks, Jelle, for getting our creative juices flowing. I’m hoping there is more interest.
My guess is that Bryan may not have time to manage something like that (just my impression right now), but in the past I think he was okay with informal ones being done by one person who volunteers to manage it on a thread. I’m not sure what Category you’d post under, except maybe BTR, or maybe Bryan would at least be willing to create a category for it. There would have to be some kind of rules/guidelines posted, and some kind of judging or voting (a poll?) perhaps.
With a small number of people it could probably be quite manageable on a thread, just post the rules and a download link to the mix files (I don’t think Bryan will let you host them on the forum), and ask each contestant to create one post with their final mix. Then anyone can vote in the poll for their favorite mix. You might have to think of some kind of tie-breaker if that comes up, or maybe not if it’s all in fun. You might have to have critiques on another thread, referencing which mix is being evaluated.
The last IRD did contests like these was prior to my tenure here. So, how were votes cast? Were there buttons to cast your vote?
On DM (Dueling Mixes), they had contests on several levels.
One level just involved Joe and Graham mixing a song of the month. They showed videos of how they did their mixes, and mp3s of their final mixes, and members voted on which they liked best. Kind of strange, but at least when I was doing it, they never posted who won.
Another level had to do with what they call “dueling members.” Basically, any member could challenge a member to a duel. Each duel was managed on its own thread. They’d agree to a song and both would start with the same tracks and upload their mixes anonymously (mix A, mix B). There were buttons to vote for mix A, mix B or “tie.” People would cast their votes but then make comments on what they liked and did not like.
Last level wasn’t really a competition, per se, but each song of the month had it’s own thread for members to post their best mixes. On DM, thoses mixes were not voted on, but were critiqued by the community, much as is done here.
I like the “song of the month” idea. I would love to see some of our more seasoned mixers featured each month, and to hear how they went about their mixes. Being able to compare mixes would be awesome. And it really wouldn’t need to be monthly.
#2 would also be cool. Might not need much work: just post the duel and have voting buttons. IDK how easy that is to do though? Does IRD have that capability already. So, it could be something as simple as, for example, me messaging, say, @Cristina, and challenging her to a duel. If she accepts we set a deadline, and then create a thread where we post our mixes for bashing and voting. No prizes or anything. Just for fun and challenge. Again, I have no idea how much time would be involved in setting up voting buttons. I would imaging there’s a plugin of some sort that tallies them automatically?
@miked, you have more experience over there. Please correct any of the above if it’s not accurate.
How feasible would any of the above be for us? How much interest?
re: No.2 - basically, someone posts that they’re looking to do a duel, say on that month’s song, then others chime in and say they’ll do it. Then, the two or more duelers figure out WHO is going to “host” the duel, i.e. put the mixes up on DropBox or Google or whatever and WHEN they will finish. Then they post a thread with the mixes and a poll so you could go in a vote for the one you liked best and leave a critique.
re: No. 3 - the idea was just to complete a mix each month. So whatever state your mix is in, you could post it on that thread and Joe/Graham would pick a random winner each month for a $200 gift card.
Might be fun to have a side-section like “Bash” for duels if there is any interest. The Cambridge site has plenty of tracks to choose from…
Maybe another alternative would be to pick a “Cambridge track of the month” then have whoever wants to, submit their mix. Then maybe others could vote on their favorite and/or critique. (?) I’ve got to tell you though, going through a whole bunch of mixes of the same song gets really really tedious…
Not sure this is the forum for this type of thing, but it could be fun. I think the Bash is where this forum shines, but if there’s enough interest in something like this could be fun too. A nice thing about the “duel” is that it is “moderated” by the duelers, so there is no additional work for the Master Of The Forum.
I’m up for hosting another contest! I’ll read through your ideas and we’ll come up with a game plan. I don’t mind drumming up some prizes also, but I’d appreciate some help getting the word out if we do that. Helps a ton!
I actually meant to reach out to Mike and see about partnering up with them on something along these lines, but I just haven’t so far. I believe @ColdRoomStudio knows him fairly well, so maybe between the 2 of us we can see what can be done, if anything.
Awesome. This would be fun and helpful (re: as a learning exercise). I like the track of the month thing, as @miked suggested; whether a Cambridge track or tracks from any of our writers here.
I like, in addition to that, the option for members here to informally set up their own duels. I don’t “think” that would require much maintenance after ground rules are spelled out (but I could be very wrong!).
That’s a good idea. Mike at Cambridge has his own forum for the mixes there. I’m not sure how “busy” it is, but I could really see THIS forum as being a logical partner and a good extension of the Cambridge site!
…Well, Mike got back to me. As I understand it, he’s pretty busy overhauling his site at the moment. Here is what he said about using multitracks from his site for the contest:
Basically, they’re free to use whatever they like – it’s all effectively educational use, as far as I see it. However, I would ask that the full artist and title are both used when posting mixes of the multitrack, and that a link to the artist’s listing in the library is also included (you can get this URL by clicking on the ‘Direct-link URL’ text alongside the project on the listings page) so that people can follow up on the music by supporting the artist through their sites
