I am working on an EP production that I produced in 1987.
The aim is to divide the songs into: Vocals, Guitar, Bass and Drums (Kick, Snare, Hi-Hat and Cymbals).
Method:
Unmix song (5 layers)
Get good levels on each of the layers so I can Unmix Song for each of the layers I have now to look deeper into the songs. Here I use the level fader for each of the layers.
Unmix song for each of the files: Vocal, guitar, bass, drums and other (25 layers = 5 Vocal layers, 5 Guitar layers, 5 Bass layers, 5 Drum layers and 5 Other layers)
I now want to sort out so that all the Vocal Layers are placed in the Vocal Group, all the Guitar Layers in the Guitar Group, etc.
Clean all the layers with impurities - and then adjust the volume down on each of the layers so that I get Unity Gain.
Merge all the layers in each group.
Here I run into problems: When I merge, the layers are not merged, but the layer replaces the layer above. Could this have something to do with how Spectralayers 11 perceives group affiliation?
What is the “Level Fader”? Do you mean “Volume Slider”?
Are you saying you run Unmix Song again on each layer after your initial Unmix Song? Personally, I haven’t witnessed multiple subsequent Unmix Song procedures yield any better results than the first pass. Maybe try Unmix Components like @Marc_von_Bredow was recently sharing? Did you watch @Unmixing video tutorial he shared last week? His tricks were FFT size around 8000 smp and magic wand plus using L/R as guide. I think @Unmixing video might help you find a work flow…
I will have a look at this later today…personally I tend to not re-merge the layers in my separations because I need to mix wanted sounds or mute unwanteds.
Further, I have spent very, VERY little time working on music in SL11. (8% of my work has been NR on speaking interviews and FX/ Room Tone/ Ambience…I feel music is a completely different animal.
Further to that, in your original music from 1987, what are the sound sources? Are the drums drum machine? Is the bass from synth? I find the Unmix Song module really does not know how to treat synth generated sounds…The Unmix Song module works pretty well on acoustic sounds of Bass and Drums. I’ve also got some homegrown music recorded and mixed in 1987 I’ve been working on in SL.
Sorry, I can’t be of more help…I’m just not working on music and probably work work on any music until next year
Thank you @ctreizell for coming back to me.
(how to make your name as grey link?)
Yes, I mean the Volume slider on each layer.
Yes, and I increase the level on the five layers to act as a magnifying glass in hope that SLP will seek deeper in the files.
I have seen the video from @Unmixing. He worked fast and I have to digest it slowly. As you, I did not understand how he deselected from the selections…
I did move the layers around to get all the Vocal layers in the Vocals Group etc. and therefore separated them from the Group they originated from. By doing so; maybe that broke the possibility to collapse all the information in the five Vocal layers to one Vocal layer, which contain all the information…
All the recordings are organic electric instruments and a vocalist - not even a synth. They are mastered on a 14-bits/32 kHz converter recorded to Sony Beta.
The tunes are thrash metal in the style of Metallica; Master of Puppets. The band both wrote and played the instruments.
What I would try in your case is to make a copy of your group of five layers and compare
I usually use different colored layers, then use volume slider to adjust brightness of unmixed layers to show a guide where sound remnants of unmixing might be
Thanks very much to @Unmixing for that video…I know I gave him some harsh criticism, but he is trying to help and making tutorial videos is not as easy as folks might think
to make a good tutorial; pauses in sections and on screen gfx are invaluable but can be extremely time consuming to produce…also, basic tasks that highly advanced and experienced users like @Unmixing know by heart can get left unexplained in tutorial videos…making videos is an artform for sure
you could also try a similar thing where you compare Unmixed layers against the full mix copy and then reverse phase to investigate if layers are actually different compared with a merged layers layer
@solstudio not sure what you did wrong but it seems to work as expected here, here’s a 1:30 video reproducing your process (without layer volume adjustments) - at the end each group is merged into a single layer and the result is as expected (please let me know when you watched the video so I can delete it, it’s pretty big on my drive) : layer merging.mov - Google Drive
Yes, that’s right. I did the exact same thing until 1:02 in the video.
Then I would clean up all 5 layers and Merge Up layer 5 to layer 4, check the catch carefully with the whole Group in Solo, continue to Merge Up layer 4 to layer 3, etc. - one layer Merge Up at the time
Maybe a lot of OCD, but I really want to learn SLP thoroughly, and experiment to find good routines that give me the best result that I can achieve… I have many old recordings that I am thinking of restoring
Yes, that is a smart way of keeping control. I can check if the quality and separation improves by reversing the phase of the original Gruppa to the one I’m working with. Thank you @ctreitzell
Use “Add To Selection” at the top left (same as holding down the “Shift” modifier key when making selections…
Use “alt” modifier key (Mac) to deselect… You can use any select tool to make a selection, and you can use the same or other select tools to unselect…
right on! thanks for sharing that. I did not previously understand what those Replace, Add, Subtract, Intersect settings buttons meant…now it is much clearer!
try 
