Limiting vs compression

  • Thread starter Thread starter Blacklistkid
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Blacklistkid

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Ok I do a hip hop kind of thing. I mixed all the instruments, now do I compress or Limit it or wait till vox are put down. And what about individual tracks should I have compress or limit those prior to mixing?
 
I will give you the answer everybody else will give:

whatever sounds good to you. If you don't think it needs compression, then don't compress.
 
There's only one rule in music that I've found is always true: no rules

There's no cut and dried answer to what you're asking, and there's no way around using your ears and twiddling knobs.

Most of the time I need compression (more likely limiting) on vox, drums and guitars prior to mixing down, and when I mix down I use a Finalizer that has 3 band compression.
 
As above, but just to add...

Limiting = compression with a high ratio.
 
Seafroggys said:
I will give you the answer everybody else will give:

whatever sounds good to you. If you don't think it needs compression, then don't compress.
Click to expand...

I'll give you the answer everybody else who doesn't give the above answer will give in its place:

If your entire mix sounds like it needs to be compressed, then the problem isn't the entire mix - it's almost certainly individual tracks within the mix. Compressing the entire mix rather than the problem instruments with wide dynamic swings is just going to cause more problems than it'll solve.
 
Blacklistkid said:
what about individual tracks should I have compress or limit those prior to mixing?
Click to expand...

There's no big need to compress sampled sounds because there is not much change in dynamic going on that you need to control.

That being said you can do whatever you want, but what would be the purpose?
 
trust your ears, grasshoppa. :D

When an individual track needs compression, I compress it. Otherwise, nope.

I'll usually strap a limiter across the bus when I'm doin stuff for online or myself. If it's goin to an ME, I'll send him a mixdown without it.
 
Why are you digging up all these old posts? 28th July 2009?
 
And leaving stupid, one-line posts that contribute nothing to the threads...?


It's almost as if someone were trying to litter the place with links to something... Hmmm...
 
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