When I was using autotune for the first time on the SQ5, I used it as a direct insert (via USB / Live Professor).
The singer was confused to “hear herself doubled” in the in-ear monitor.
Obviously I had the source option for all aux groups set to “post insert” instead of “post-preamp”. ?♂️
Any other ideas for skipping autotune for the in-ear mixes?
Another idea I had was patching each mic to two input channels at the same time, with one channel for the in-ears (unassigned to the main mix) and the other channel for the autotuner and main mix. But this can get confusing.
The ‘hearing herself doubled’ will be due to the latency introduced by USB transfer and processing.
If the singer does need to monitor the autotune (or any external effect) included, then you could look to Waves (with server) or Dante and low latency PCIe interface options.
To simply send them a signal without the external processing though there are two options.
Set the Channel Source point for their mix to post preamp, which is before the insert point. Note that this will also be before gate/PEQ/comp processing.
Double patch their input (as you suggest), you will then have a completely separate input processing channel to process and route independently. The only thing shared here would be the preamp settings.