LoudMax Limiter. help

J

jay Burd

Member
Working with rock n roll songs here, (guitars, bass, drums, vox) in case that changes anything. so i record on a tascam dp 32 i mix my song i record the master on it using the built in compressor ( no normalizer) then i bring my stereo wave file into reaper and in order to add a little volume/ punch to it I am attempting to use the LOUDMAX limiter. i mess around with the settings of the plugin but am not sure what the threshold/ output settings really do. are there any general guide lines to go by when using a limiter? (how to tell what to set the threshold/ output at based on info from the song your working with)

any other steps you would recommend besides compress and limit?

i want to use the least amount of FXs as possible, my goal is getting my master to a reasonable volume and thickness without slapping plugin after plugin on it.
 
The output setting will adjust the maximum output level it will allow.

The threshold setting adjusts both the level the limiter starts to act on the audio and it adjusts how much gain will be added to the audio. The gain part is not on every limiter, but most brick wall, mastering -type limiters will be like that.

Generally you would set the output at -.5 and just lower the threshold until it is as loud as you want it or it starts sounding like crap, whichever comes first.
 
Like Farview said, the threshold setting is the db level at which the limiter will start kicking in. If your track is peaking at -6db and you set your threshold at -8, you will completely cut off the peaks by 2db thus allowing you to raise the overall gain by 2db without clipping. This will make your track sound 2db louder, at the cost of dynamic range.

You usually want to set your overall gain output at -0.2 db, because on some CD players, clipping will occur at -0.1 due to physical limitations of the medium.

Some limiters have many more additional settings, like look ahead, attack and release settings, and even tone shaping.

Experiment with the limiter and get to know how it reacts. Generally the idea is: Louder is always better; too loud is bad.
 
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I'd start by NOT using the DP32's built-in compression when doing the master mix, unless you really think it works well for your mixes.
 
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