JUST LOST MY MIND. Thought I knew about pre/post fader metering but i guess not!

[RecordingMaster]

I have PT9 on a mac.

Here's the preface (problem in para below). AFAIK Pre fader metering show the track volume regardless of where you move it's fader. Post fader metering shows the volume of the track after you move the fader up and down. Guess what? After 2 years of using PT and somehow creating successful and saleable mixes (for myself and clients), I JUST found out about the pre/post fader METERING. Mind you, I am all aware of what a pre SEND or post send does to a parallel fader.

The reason why I never thought anything about it was this (and I guess this is my problem)...When I mess around with the volume of a plugin (insert) on a given track while in pre fader it still shows the volume change on the track meter if te plugin makes it louder (but apparently it shouldn't). WHY??? That is why I always thought everything was cool. Why would I have ever have changed the way I metered if the track was a TRUE representation of the track's own volume? I know if I lower it's level that my send level will go down (because my sends are post as they should be) and same goes for what I see on the master fader. I have been mixing too long this way for me to suddenly change how I meter pre/post. Because what if I am clipping a plugin? now that I am in post fader, if the volume is low on the track fader I may not see what the plugin is doing. But the thing that gets me the most is everywhere I read online says with pre fader metering, no matter what you do to the track via inserts, SHOULD NOT change the track volume. Well mine does and always has (which I used to my advantage and found extremely useful). WTF!

So why does my track volume change in pt when I mess with a plugin's output volume while in pre fader metering??? Riddle me that.

Next question, whether in pre or post fader metering, it appears my busses (eg drums bus) volume stays the same visually. If I raise up the snare fader, yes the bus will raise too, but no more or less than if I am in pre fader.Gah!!!

So if I flip to post fader metering, my question is this...how the f%$# do you monitor clipping of plugs? surely pro mix engineers dont dick around clicking with a mouse on menus to check metering all the time!!! It should be set it and forget it. As it should be and has always worked for me. It was only today that I noticed a send on my kick drum was clipping like mad but the track volume was under control and gain matched so I don't think my plugs are doing "better" things due to increases in loudness from the plug. But the track volume was lower. Depicting pre fader apparently, even though that meter rises when I mess with plugins. But it rises more incrementally (faster) when post .

Someone please help!

 

[Steenamaroo]

That sounds right to me.

I think the chain is

1. signal
2. inserts
3. pre send point
4. pre meter point
5. fader
6. post send point
7. post-meter point
8. final output

The pre/post fader metering options are both post insert.
I think the way to get post fader inserts is to use a post fader send and put the insert on an aux track.

So if I flip to post fader metering, my question is this...how the f%$# do you monitor clipping of plugs? surely pro mix engineers dont dick around clicking with a mouse on menus to check metering all the time!!!

I think they do, if they need to. Good tracking and a knowledge of what you're doing (not a jab) would mean you don't have to check all the time though.

Some people track in pre-fader metering with no plugs so they see the level of the raw audio.
Then they might mix in post fader. They do this because they are safe in the knowledge that the raw audio is in the right range, and they want to know the absolute final output level of each track.
It is possible to balls up your gain staging and not realise (plugins clipping), but you'd need to go to town I guess.

I recently switched to pre-fader metering because I was having this problem once in a while and not realising.

Next question, whether in pre or post fader metering, it appears my busses (eg drums bus) volume stays the same visually. If I raise up the snare fader, yes the bus will raise too, but no more or less than if I am in pre fader.Gah!!!

Your track metering options have nothing to do with sends.
If you click on your send the little individual fader will pop up. It has its own "Pre" button in it.
The is pre/post fader send, and it means the send will be tapped from before, or after, the main track fader.(still post insert, just like the metering options.)
If you set it to pre fader then pull the main track fader down, nothing goes via the send.


Is that useful?

 

[bouldersoundguy]

I have PT9 on a mac.

...

So if I flip to post fader metering, my question is this...how the f%$# do you monitor clipping of plugs? surely pro mix engineers dont dick around clicking with a mouse on menus to check metering all the time!!! It should be set it and forget it.

Pro Tools has had 32 bit floating point processing since PT9. If the master bus isn't clipping then nothing is clipping.

The only time you have to worry about overdriving a plugin is with hardware emulating effects that have level-specific behavior. With PT10 they added Clip Gain which lets you easily correct recording level errors as long as nothing was actually clipped on the way in.

 

[Steenamaroo]

The only time you have to worry about overdriving a plugin is with hardware emulating effects that have level-specific behavior.

The plug that brought this to my attention was Waves IRL.
For whatever reason it's output was clipping but cos of Post fader metering, my ears told me before my eyes did.

I've had the same problem with addictive drums. I'd been clipping its master but was only aware of it because the kick drum crapped out.

 

[RecordingMaster]

I think i have cooled down now and everything is making slightly more sense to me.

Steen, how did I know I'd see your reply pop up in here?! You're a very helpfull and knowledgable friend (especially with the pt technical stuff that might not be so obvious) and your help is always greatly appreciated.

That sounds right to me.

I think the chain is

1. signal
2. inserts
3. pre send point
4. pre meter point
5. fader
6. post send point
7. post-meter point
8. final output

The pre/post fader metering options are both post insert.
I think the way to get post fader inserts is to use a post fader send and put the insert on an aux track.

Yes this makes sense to me and is what I have always been in agreement with.

I think they do, if they need to. Good tracking and a knowledge of what you're doing (not a jab) would mean you don't have to check all the time though.

No offense taken. And I guess you're right...you don't need to check all the time. I just always figured "Why would I want to see that individual track's meter go up and down when I raise the fader, when i can easily just refer over to the bus it outputs to and see it there?" Because if I set up a new plugin and am gain matching it, I just feel it would be a little less precise if I were in post fader mode and my fader was anywhere other than unity gain "0".

Some people track in pre-fader metering with no plugs so they see the level of the raw audio.
Then they might mix in post fader. They do this because they are safe in the knowledge that the raw audio is in the right range, and they want to know the absolute final output level of each track.
It is possible to balls up your gain staging and not realise (plugins clipping), but you'd need to go to town I guess.

Yes, I track in pre fader with no plugs. The only time I'll use a plug is on a bass guitar if going DI. I'll get the level and make sure the loudest note he'll ever play is down the the green zone with a touch of yellow on peaks. Then I'll put a compressor so he can here himself playing more levelled and not overcompensate by trying to really dig into the strings just to get some volume. But I digress.

As for ballsing up (I like that as a new term!) my sends and not realizing it, that's sort of what pisses me off, or rather just baffles me and the way I've always done things, seemingly with no issues but I guess I was probably causing something to sound odd and not know why. For example, I have all my levels in the mix going well and I am 3/4 through a mix, snare and kick being loudest peaks in the mix, no higher than -6 dbfs on master fader. I can't really mess around now as every level is counting on everything else being where it currently is and it is sounding just right. This includes reverb sends, parallel compression sends, etc. So let's say I pull up a new send on the snare track for a reverb (pretend I haven't sent the snare to a verb yet but everything else is already sent to the verb at their own optimum levels to taste). So I raise the send fader. Can't hear the verb yet, let's raise it some more, and some more until i get the big verby sound I am looking for (just for example). Thing is, I had to raise that send fader almost maxed out in order to get it to the level i wanted in the mix. Now when i go over to post fader metering I am seeing that the reverb plugin is clipping like mad! So what to do now? I guess now I lower ALL of the sends to that reverb individually. Let's say I lower them all like -5 db. So they are all still at their own relative level, so now EVERYTHING has too little of verb so i go to turn up that master reverb fader? This seems very mickey mouse and like a HUGE waste of time. Wondering how else you'd go about a scenario like that.

I recently switched to pre-fader metering because I was having this problem once in a while and not realising.

Mhm! That's why I couldn't ever imagine mixing in post.

Your track metering options have nothing to do with sends.
If you click on your send the little individual fader will pop up. It has its own "Pre" button in it.
The is pre/post fader send, and it means the send will be tapped from before, or after, the main track fader.(still post insert, just like the metering options.)

Yes, see i knew this. The only time I would ever use the "Pre" button on a send is for say, a headphone mix that has it's own individual faders on everything for that submix, regardless of what i do in the main mix window. Or I will use it to send it to a side chain. Like if i want the bass guitar to duck everytime the kick hits, regardless of how loud my actual kick fader volume gets.

If you set it to pre fader then pull the main track fader down, nothing goes via the send.

I think this one is backwards. When a send is in "pre" mode, that send doesn't care what you do the the main track's fader. Just like I described how I use it above. If "pre" is NOT selected on the send, then the send level will go down in proportion as you lower the main track fader.

 

[RecordingMaster]

The plug that brought this to my attention was Waves IRL.
For whatever reason it's output was clipping but cos of Post fader metering, my ears told me before my eyes did.

I've had the same problem with addictive drums. I'd been clipping its master but was only aware of it because the kick drum crapped out.

YES! And this is what told me something was wrong. The drums were starting to distort but nothing was showing that one ANY of the faders. Reason being is, on the drums bus I have a tape saturation plugin (URS) so it is probably compressing the drums bus slightly, keeping the peaks at bay. But if I open up that plug (even if in pre fader metering) THEN I see I am clipping that input due to drum faders too loud. You'd also think I;d have seen it on the master fader but alas I have a fairchild running as the mix buss compressor for this track. Very subtly. So I guess my only way is to backtrack and re-gain stage EVERYTHING from the get go. Starting with kick and snare which is not what I ever start with. Oh well, no pain no gain. no pun intended!

 

[bouldersoundguy]

The plug that brought this to my attention was Waves IRL.
For whatever reason it's output was clipping but cos of Post fader metering, my ears told me before my eyes did.

Perhaps there's some sort of hardware emulation going on. Could you have been overdriving the "Emitter" or something like that? Most good quality plugins I've used don't really care what level they are receiving, exceptions being the various tape saturation, guitar amp and analog compressor modeling plugins.

I've had the same problem with addictive drums. I'd been clipping its master but was only aware of it because the kick drum crapped out.

You heard clipping but the master meter didn't show it? Something funny is going on, or Addictive Drums uses fixed point processing.

Anyway, proper attention to levels while tracking should make this a non-issue.

 

[RecordingMaster]

Pro Tools has had 32 bit floating point processing since PT9. If the master bus isn't clipping then nothing is clipping.

The only time you have to worry about overdriving a plugin is with hardware emulating effects that have level-specific behavior. With PT10 they added Clip Gain which lets you easily correct recording level errors as long as nothing was actually clipped on the way in.

Thanks Boulder! Also an extremely helpful fellow!

If the master bus isn't clipping, you're right, nothing is really clipping. But internally I worry about clipping plugs such as parallel compression busses or any bus for that matter. Sure, I may be clipping a reverb aux and if that doesn't show a problem on the master fader, I guess I'm good. BUT, I still don't want to clip the reverb in the first place which will make it act funny. Same for a compressor in max crush mode where it is already acting a little wacky to begin with (like an 1176 all buttons in).

Another example is my drums buss. The outputs of all my drums tracks route to the "drums" buss. I'll sometimes have a saturation plugin there which acts as a form of compression. Let's say I am in pre-fader metering and I have NO plugs on the drums bus. I psh up the kick and all of the sudden the bus is clipping. I will see that on the bus even if I am in pre fader metering (so again why would I want post?). So then i put on a saturation plug and it compresses it a bit. Now, without that plug open, I can't tell if I am clipping the drums bus. Even though I am lowering the buss peak volume with the plugin (via compression), that bus is still clipping before it hits the plugin. So that makes me think that would not be optimal. Even thought the master bus aint clippin'. I hope I am making some valid sense here. :S

 

[bouldersoundguy]

So then i put on a saturation plug and it compresses it a bit. Now, without that plug open, I can't tell if I am clipping the drums bus. Even though I am lowering the buss peak volume with the plugin (via compression), that bus is still clipping before it hits the plugin. So that makes me think that would not be optimal. Even thought the master bus aint clippin'. I hope I am making some valid sense here.

Yes it makes sense. I don't think you are clipping or can clip the bus before the plugin. You could be overdriving the plugin since it's emulating hardware. It's not really the bus meter's job to help you manage the behavior of an emulating plugin.

 

[Steenamaroo]

Steen, how did I know I'd see your reply pop up in here?! You're a very helpfull and knowledgable friend (especially with the pt technical stuff that might not be so obvious) and your help is always greatly appreciated.

Cos I work as many days as Santa?
Thanks man.

I think this one is backwards. When a send is in "pre" mode, that send doesn't care what you do the the main track's fader. Just like I described how I use it above. If "pre" is NOT selected on the send, then the send level will go down in proportion as you lower the main track fader.

Yeh, fair play! I had to mix 'em up at some point.

I used to have your problem. Maybe I'd introduce a new aux for some effect and would have trouble placing it.
I've recently abandoned fader automation for clip gain and life seems to have gotten a whole lot easier.

Are you working too hot to start with?
I've finished up mixes and realised the master was peaking at -30 something.

That's not ideal but with master makeup gain I didn't hear any problems.
The last mix I did peaked at -11 (master). I think I'm finding the happy medium.

I guess with any plug working off a threshold (comps, gates etc), you just have to watch them.
If you're having to clip the plug in order for the effect to be heard, I'd guess the mix is just too hot.