Best Recording Levels

M

mattkw80

New member
Before I ask the question... I did search this, as I know it's probably come up lots, but did not find a thread for this. I worded the search three different ways. I apologize in advance if this is a repeat thread from years gone by.


What level should I be looking at averaging when tracking? (In 24-bit digital)

The meter's I am using (in Reaper) read as follows :

54 - 42 - 30 - 18 - 6 and - inf


I've been told by some people to try to average hitting -12.

Some others have said -18.

I have been trying for just under 0, but wonder if this is wrong.

I know in 16-bit you've got to hammer as much sound as you can in, but in 24-bit your suppose to be able to back it off quite a bit.


What do you guys think ?

What is a good recording level when tracking ?
 
Matt,

You don't have to 'hammer' in digital, 16 or 24; the thing is that in post you will have 'more' left for clean processing of any kind if you do it in 24 bit.

If you bring it in clean in 24 bits, with good pre-amps, the overhead allows you to 'live' a bit and enjoy the fact that, once done with effects, it still will sound half-way decent.
I will admit I am just an old tape head, and I do believe 'good in' is 'good out' so with that, I have a Tascam 2488, and I do enjoy that plus my Studer 807, but the basic idea is still the same.

Best,
C.
 
Okay, thanks for the reply.

I've got the ART TPS II Pre-amp, and the Electro Harmonix 12AY7. I know they are not $2000 pre-amps, but hopefully they will get me by for now.

So should I be shooting for the -12 to -18 mark when I am recording?

Will this leave enough head room ?




Cosmic said:
Matt,

You don't have to 'hammer' in digital, 16 or 24; the thing is that in post you will have 'more' left for clean processing of any kind if you do it in 24 bit.

If you bring it in clean in 24 bits, with good pre-amps, the overhead allows you to 'live' a bit and enjoy the fact that, once done with effects, it still will sound half-way decent.
I will admit I am just an old tape head, and I do believe 'good in' is 'good out' so with that, I have a Tascam 2488, and I do enjoy that plus my Studer 807, but the basic idea is still the same.

Best,
C.
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Farview said:
YOu are looking for an average signal level of -18. The peak level can be anywhere it falls.
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If I record to -18 I can raise the playback fader until the cows come home and won't be able to hear it at all. The waveform on the track will be almost non-existant.
 
7string said:
If I record to -18 I can raise the playback fader until the cows come home and won't be able to hear it at all. The waveform on the track will be almost non-existant.
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Make sure it is an average level of -18. Hit a note on an electric guitar and let it sustain, it should hover around -18 for a little while. Peaks should go no higher than -6.

Turning the track fader up about +9 to +12db (obviously not letting it clip) should let you hear it just as if it were normalized.
 
7string said:
If I record to -18 I can raise the playback fader until the cows come home and won't be able to hear it at all. The waveform on the track will be almost non-existant.
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Turn up your monitors. Your recording level and you playback volume have nothing to do with each other.

There is also a zoom control for the waveform so you can see it.

And Danny was right, the AVERAGE level is supposed to be -18, not the peak level.
 
The waveform on the track will be almost non-existant.
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Who cares? Since when does the waveform - Especially on one individual track mean much of anything anyway?

On top of that, I've not seen a DAW that can't vertically zoom in on a waveform in over a decade.
 
record at a moderate volume. whatever that is. not too hot, not inaudible.

listen back at a good volume. not distorting the sound by slamming the compressor/limiter, but not having to crank. your stereo

the reason he doesn't want to record really low is obvious. signal to noise ratio.

on home systems of various cheapness, there'll be noise even on 1 track.
 
cello_pudding said:
record at a moderate volume. whatever that is. not too hot, not inaudible.

listen back at a good volume. not distorting the sound by slamming the compressor/limiter, but not having to crank. your stereo
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There is a reason for the meters. You just have to know what they are telling you and what to do with the information.

cello_pudding said:
the reason he doesn't want to record really low is obvious. signal to noise ratio.
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-18dbfs is not low. It is line level, the level that all the equipment in the chain was designed to work at. That is where you get the best signal to noise ratio.
 
Most everybody unerstands and generally agrees that when recoridng in analog one should keep their average levels somewhere around 0VU, as this is where most gear is designed to operate (0VU = line level). There may be a few exceptions by a few dB here or there depending upon the individual personalities of some analog gear, but in general you know your safe if you are averaging somewhere around 0VU.

NOTHING about that changes when you record to digital. We still want to generally keep our averaged analong signal somewhere around 0VU (line level). The question is what *digital* level should we record at. It all boils down to the calibration on the A/D converter(s) we're using. What digital level in dBFS does your converter convert a 0VU analog reading to? That conversion factor will automatically tell us what our averade digital recording signal shoud be.

A/D converters can be calibrated to convert 0VU to anywhere from -14dBFS to -20dBFS. The -18dBFS reading that Farview gives is one fairly common calibration. It also is a commonly-cited average reading to shoot for if one is not sure of their converter's calibration level; -18dBFS is at least going to be within a couple of dB of perfect, even if it is not exact. It's a good number to use.

What throws a lot of people about this -18dBFS recommendation is that it is not talking about peak levels; it's referring to average levels. Peaks will easily shoot beyond that level.

For more on how to set levels throught the recording chain, understanding the difference between meter readings (VU vs dBFS, average vs. peak, etc.), ways of determining your A/D calibration level, and more, head over to www.independentrecording.net and click on the "Metering and Gain Structure" logo.

G.
 
SouthSIDE Glen said:
What throws a lot of people about this -18dBFS recommendation is that it is not talking about peak levels; it's referring to average levels.
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I think another thing that throws people off is thinking that -18 is really low....They don't realize that it IS 0db. I think the "minus", with such a high number (18!!!!) behind it, scares them.:eek:
 
No doubt there. If they ever walked into a "pro session" (for lack of a better term) and watched how little attention is paid to the meters (as long as they're low enough) they'd be shocked. I don't do a lot of traditional tracking anymore - but I wind up getting thrown into a lot of live situations. As long as my peaks are above -30dBFS every once in a while, I'm fine. And I'm pretty freakin' picky about the sound.

I'd MUCH rather spend a few minutes planning on some creative way to execute an overall increase in volume (ho hum...) than spend an hour trying to reduce the distortion on the "hot" parts later.
 
RAMI said:
They don't realize that it IS 0db. I think the "minus", with such a high number (18!!!!) behind it, scares them.:eek:
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That comes from a fundamental lack of understanding of the decibell scale and the various reference levels. It seems ironic that for something that is used so widely in this field, so few people actually know what it is.
 
Yeah - I have no clue about the decibell scale.

I'll google it, unless you've got a good reference to learning it.



pezking said:
That comes from a fundamental lack of understanding of the decibell scale and the various reference levels. It seems ironic that for something that is used so widely in this field, so few people actually know what it is.
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RAMI said:
I think another thing that throws people off is thinking that -18 is really low....They don't realize that it IS 0db. I think the "minus", with such a high number (18!!!!) behind it, scares them.:eek:
Click to expand...

pezking said:
That comes from a fundamental lack of understanding of the decibell scale and the various reference levels. It seems ironic that for something that is used so widely in this field, so few people actually know what it is.
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I'm not picking on Rami here, because we are all guilty of this kind of thing at one time or another, but it doesn't help when we say things like "-18 IS 0dB", without specifying scales. I could also say that "-18 IS -4dB", "0 IS 22dB", "0 IS -4dB" and "-10 IS -7.8dB". All would be equally correct within their own proper reference scales, even though they don't make any sense and actually seem to contradict each other.

Newbs just look at that stuff and give up right out of the gate; figuring that metering is metering, and that "0" is ideal.

It doesn't help when that idea is coincidentally reenforced by equipment manufacturers who wrecklessly recommend it in their manuals to digitally record with one's peaks at 0dBFS, without giving regard to overall gain structure and real life operation.

mattkw80 said:
Yeah - I have no clue about the decibell scale.

I'll google it, unless you've got a good reference to learning it.
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Matt, that's all covered in detail in that document I linked to in post #13.

G.
 
SouthSIDE Glen said:
I'm not picking on Rami here, because we are all guilty of this kind of thing at one time or another, but it doesn't help when we say things like "-18 IS 0dB", without specifying scales. I could also say that "-18 IS -4dB", "0 IS 22dB", "0 IS -4dB" and "-10 IS -7.8dB". All would be equally correct within their own proper reference scales, even though they don't make any sense and actually seem to contradict each other.
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No, you're right. In fact, about 5 minutes before your post I was going to edit mine and say "-18, or whatever your equipment is calibrated to...", but didn't bother.

Funny thing is, my TASCAM 2488 is calibrated to -16, so I don't even know why I generalized with -18. I think that number came up more often in this thread, so it seemed to be the arbitrary number we were throwing around.
 
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