recording level
- Thread starter B1n4ry
- Start date
miroslav
Cosmic Cowboy
It's cool....I'm relaxed....we're not arguing here.
Mark,
I think most DAWs today will Undo normalizing within the project, until you bounce it out to a WAV....so it's safe to play around with it and see how it works...though normalizing should be a last-pass process at final mix stage, and it should be avoided at track stage.
Farview
Well-known member
I don't know why, they work fine. Could it be that you misspelled Farview, like you did in the post?
bouldersoundguy
Well-known member
For the record, I've had no plays since August 13. Maybe they just haven't shown up in the stats yet, or maybe you didn't actually listen to anything. And I think Greg's mixes are excellent as well as being appropriate for the genre.
Bobbsy
Boring Old Git
My take on lots of this discussion in no particular order:
There's nothing inherently evil or bad about normalisation in itself. It has no more effect on your signal than pushing a fader up or down--but with the extra bonus that you can specify the maximum level you want things to go to--so even a single high level transient will not go into clipping.
Normalisation is ALWAYS reversable (until the final fix of course) even if you don't have an undo function. Since it's not making a permanent change to your recording, simply normalising downwards returns your recording to exactly what it was before.
Possible exceptions to the above are when you mix partly in the box and partly with external hardware. Depending on how your outputs are calibrated, normalising to nearly 0dB(FS) MIGHT result in your external hardware receiving a signal that overloads its input because it's at around +18dB(VU). However, since most commercial recordings are right around the zero mark, your sound card output is likely not to be giving an analogue +18 even when the digital levels are that high. You have to know your gear. Similarly, I've heard that some plugins (especially those that emulate analogue distortion) sound bad at higher levels. I've not personally encountered and plug in that has this problem...but I use very few 3rd party plugins.
Having said all that, normalising everything to LOOK the same is a fairly meaningless exercise. Raising the levels won't help you see brief transients, it'll just put those transients that much closer to clipping. If you really need to look for problem transients, zoom in on the horizontal scale and examine your file almost on a sample by sample basis. And, if you DO have one or two transients seriously out of line with the rest of the track, this is the time to pull out the compresser/limiter. Since (as has been said endlessly in this topic) you don't even hear level changes on transients under 200ms, limiting those slightly won't be audible but will give you a safety cushion. As always, how it sounds is most important with the metering being the most reliable tool to check levels against clipping. The graphic display is more useful in editing than mixing.
However, even that should be largely unnecessary. If you're working at levels where you have to be concerned about transients clipping then you're probably recording too hot.
The other disadvantage of normalising upwards is that, in the mix, you just have to pull down all the levels anyway. As you add tracks together, each one brings you a few dB closer to clipping on the final mix. Indeed, this is yet another reason to keep your levels reasonable when tracking. Indeed, I've been known to normalise downwards just to keep my faders or volume envelopes on certain tracks in the more linear section of things.
Finally, you can eliminate a lot of these issues by working in 32 bit floating point format.
Anyhow, my two cents worth on lots of things.
There's nothing inherently evil or bad about normalisation in itself. It has no more effect on your signal than pushing a fader up or down--but with the extra bonus that you can specify the maximum level you want things to go to--so even a single high level transient will not go into clipping.
Normalisation is ALWAYS reversable (until the final fix of course) even if you don't have an undo function. Since it's not making a permanent change to your recording, simply normalising downwards returns your recording to exactly what it was before.
Possible exceptions to the above are when you mix partly in the box and partly with external hardware. Depending on how your outputs are calibrated, normalising to nearly 0dB(FS) MIGHT result in your external hardware receiving a signal that overloads its input because it's at around +18dB(VU). However, since most commercial recordings are right around the zero mark, your sound card output is likely not to be giving an analogue +18 even when the digital levels are that high. You have to know your gear. Similarly, I've heard that some plugins (especially those that emulate analogue distortion) sound bad at higher levels. I've not personally encountered and plug in that has this problem...but I use very few 3rd party plugins.
Having said all that, normalising everything to LOOK the same is a fairly meaningless exercise. Raising the levels won't help you see brief transients, it'll just put those transients that much closer to clipping. If you really need to look for problem transients, zoom in on the horizontal scale and examine your file almost on a sample by sample basis. And, if you DO have one or two transients seriously out of line with the rest of the track, this is the time to pull out the compresser/limiter. Since (as has been said endlessly in this topic) you don't even hear level changes on transients under 200ms, limiting those slightly won't be audible but will give you a safety cushion. As always, how it sounds is most important with the metering being the most reliable tool to check levels against clipping. The graphic display is more useful in editing than mixing.
However, even that should be largely unnecessary. If you're working at levels where you have to be concerned about transients clipping then you're probably recording too hot.
The other disadvantage of normalising upwards is that, in the mix, you just have to pull down all the levels anyway. As you add tracks together, each one brings you a few dB closer to clipping on the final mix. Indeed, this is yet another reason to keep your levels reasonable when tracking. Indeed, I've been known to normalise downwards just to keep my faders or volume envelopes on certain tracks in the more linear section of things.
Finally, you can eliminate a lot of these issues by working in 32 bit floating point format.
Anyhow, my two cents worth on lots of things.
I think it is trying to open in a new window, as some other player type. It hangs and times out. If I use compatibility view in explorer, I think it wants me to install quicktime.
I clicked to Storm project.
I looked and the undo tab does not undo the normaliszation. The projects have already been saved this way. There could be like a history tab, somewhere I do not know about, like photoshop.
I wasn't goingto respond to this.
YOu guys have poor social skills. I think you might want to work on that to build a community.
Jimmyhad great stuff the first one was gimme, miroslav had nice smooth instrumental buddy and page inspired, bould had some don guy in random projects, the " not me" guy from steen is on a stool playing a laid back acoustic emo song.
nut job, had fuck you texas.
Steenamaroo
...
Don't know about Reaper, but undo history is cleared in ProTools once you save and close the session.
That's not even what it's called. As usual, you DON'T get it. You don't get anything. You are a hapless buffoon that is out of his element.
Are you bi-polar? You seemingly keep bouncing around from emotion to emotion.
And theres the code word.
It really upsets you that my stuff is awesome, doesn't it? You really want to hate me, but you can't because I know what the fuck I'm doing.....and you don't.
No, praise is nice, but I prefer it when people talk shit. That let's you know where they're really at. And it's not just criticism that I like, it's how one delivers it. When someone talks noise as a reaction to getting butthurt, well, then that's the best kind.
I believe you are mentally ill. Please try to control yourself. Do not say things like this out loud.
Steenamaroo
...
Mark, I thought maybe you were having a bad day when you signed up but, with all due respect, you're not doing yourself any favours.
I can't enforce it, but my advice would be to get involved and get something out of this place/share something with this place, or keep walking.
You prove all of my points for me. Keep up the good work.
Greg, I am the one sharing pictures of the exact concepts of discussion.
If you meant because I played with the guy that made no sense, that was in fun.
The textbook thing , is to my crediblilty. I still have nothing in a retort proving that is wrong. YOU can get ROYALTIES from the revision if you can prove the publication is incorrect. So I absolutely am not full of it. I working with real information.
If you meant because I played with the guy that made no sense, that was in fun.
The textbook thing , is to my crediblilty. I still have nothing in a retort proving that is wrong. YOU can get ROYALTIES from the revision if you can prove the publication is incorrect. So I absolutely am not full of it. I working with real information.
Steenamaroo
...
You're missing the point, Mark.
You've entirely dominated someone else's thread with, in my opinion, irrelevant clippings from your book collection.
If they somehow contributed to the debate you might get a pass, but man....You're a dog with a chew toy.
Before you hurl the butthurt at me, keep in mind I've done nothing but try to help. This is an impartial opinion.
You've entirely dominated someone else's thread with, in my opinion, irrelevant clippings from your book collection.
If they somehow contributed to the debate you might get a pass, but man....You're a dog with a chew toy.
Before you hurl the butthurt at me, keep in mind I've done nothing but try to help. This is an impartial opinion.