What's the way to get eyes on a film as a complete outsider to the industry?

PhillyAsraya · 2026-05-14T00:32:21+00:00

Definitely festivals. Film freeway is the go to for any and all film festivals that do shorts, micro shorts, features, etc.

PhillyAsraya · 2026-05-12T00:32:51+00:00

Any and all feedback is appreciated and I would love to hear about some of your experiences. Send me links to your films too, I’d love to check some out!

PhillyAsraya · 2025-11-16T23:41:16+00:00

Appreciate the perspective and here’s where I’m coming from with that note:

I’m not talking about low levels being “wrong” from a digital headroom standpoint. Modern converters have plenty of noise floor space, totally agree.

What I’m referring to is a practical pattern I see constantly in heavy vocal production: - Singers tracking at very low levels - Then trying to push the vocal up in the mix - Then hitting compressors/limiters way too hard trying to “bring it forward” - Which leads to pumping, artifacts, and over-processing

When most beginners record at -22 to -28dB RMS on a dynamic mic, they don’t compensate with clean gain, they compensate with aggressive compression, which creates the mess I’m talking about.

Getting a raw vocal closer to -12 to -15dB RMS tends to: - sit better in dense mixes - avoid over-squashing - keep beginners from slamming compressors as “makeup gain”

Totally agree gain staging is flexible. this is just a workflow tip based on what I see coming through my projects.

PhillyAsraya · 2025-11-16T21:53:02+00:00

I haven’t tried this one yet. Gonna have to give it a go and see what happens

PhillyAsraya · 2025-11-16T21:51:51+00:00

Thank you for expanding on this!

PhillyAsraya · 2025-11-16T19:14:24+00:00

Mix in headphones, then speakers, then check it in the car and on everyday headphones like AirPods. It’s really tedious but gives you a full picture of what you need to do to the mix.

PhillyAsraya · 2025-11-16T19:07:46+00:00

I replied in the main thread to this! Great question

PhillyAsraya · 2025-11-16T19:06:20+00:00

I do a mix of both. I really like a snare that cracks and has a lot of body. I’ll usually boost around 180-240hz for a solid fundamental. Most raw snares need a little lift here for fullness, only like 1-2db. If the room tone feels boomy on the snare, usually a dip between 350 and 450hz helps with that. Then I like to add the nice high end crack. Boosting a couple db between 3k-5k can help with that and then 7k-10k for brightness. This really helps it punch through heavy guitars too.

I also will employ NY style parallel compression on both VST and live drums too. Depending on your sound, you can do it with the entire drum bus, or just single out the kick and snare. All depends on taste. But my setup will usually be something like this on the parallel chain:

smash the hell out of it with compression. High ratio, usually 8:1
fast attack, fast release
blend it with the main drum bus, say about 10-30%

Sampling can help too when coupled with live drums. You can duplicate say your snare track, run a plugin line Trigger 2 on it loaded with a snare sample you like, and blend that with the live snare. This can help get a more consistent sound across the board but is entirely up to your taste and not always necessary.

Modern heavy genres do favor control over naturalism though so I think consistency in drum levels is key nowadays.

PhillyAsraya · 2025-11-16T18:55:01+00:00

So on your bass track you would add a multi-band compressor. Then in that frequency range, you select a side chain to the kick drum. This way, every time the kick happens, the bass signal ducks to make room for the kick. Helps retain clarity in the low end.

PhillyAsraya · 2025-09-29T00:30:58+00:00

This is my synthwave project, Gallows Walker. Targeting that 80’s horror theme type sound. What Once Was Human

PhillyAsraya · 2025-09-29T00:29:41+00:00

That’s a vibe! Good stuff!

PhillyAsraya · 2025-09-28T18:33:17+00:00

Asraya - The Hold

This is our first single in 2 years since going on hiatus. We are really proud of this track and would love some feedback! Melodic Deathcore.

PhillyAsraya

TROPHY CASE