Volume balance

A

Amr Makki

Member
Please help me with that...I have a volume control on my classical guitar pickup, and a volume control in my scarlet interface, and a recording volume in my DAW, how should I set them? what I do normaly is setting the pickup on the middle or slightly above the middle, and the recording volume in my DAW on maximum, and doing control with my interface to get a good volume without clipping. Is that right?

If I make mistakes in the forum please tell me, I am new hear.

Thanks a lot.
 
First, Imma leave this here -- Proper Audio Recording Levels | MASSIVE Mastering Blog | The Rants and Ravings of an Audio Mastering Engineer

Second -- At the instrument, I'd start all the way up on the pickup and wherever you get peaks at maybe -12 or -10dBFS on the interface (with everything in the DAW at unity). If that seems in any way saturated, squishy, dynamically compromised in any way, back down the guitar and bring up the interface.

You do want to get a decent usable level -- You don't want to even be in the same ZIP code as "clipping" --
 
That sounds like a reasonable approach - adjust the volume on the front of the Scarlett (is it a 2i2?) until the rings around the outside of the knob glow green - if they get to amber you've gone too far.

Recording classical guitar you may obtain better results if you record with a microphone as opposed to direct from the pickup.
 
Leave the DAW recording level at the default. Once the signal has become digitized it's too late to fix analog gain staging errors like clipping or noise. Otherwise do whatever produces the least noise while leaving plenty of headroom. Having the pickup somewhat above the middle sounds like a good starting point. All the way up might be another good option as long as the interface can accommodate it.
 
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For most things, you want to get your gain as early in the process as you can.

The idea is to get a good level as close to the source as possible, them set the controls to maintain that good level through the rest of the chain.

Start with the levels in the daw set at unity or 0. You don't want the daw to add or subtract gain/volume at the recording stage.

Set the input on the interface to unity or 0 to start as well.

Now plug the guitar in and turn it up all the way. Are you clipping the interface? If you are, turn the guitar down. If you aren't, check the recording level in the daw.

If the peaks are always bouncing around between -10 and -18dbfs, you are done. If the peaks are lower than that, turn up the gain on the interface until they are.

In reality, you should be good with the loud peaks hitting around -6dbfs or so, but it's good to be conservative when setting the recording level of a really dynamic instrument.
 
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