final product sounds amaturish

[gregerly]

Ok, I'm a total newbie to the mixing and mastering game, but I do have one question. I recorded some stuff to a digital 4 track, 2 being live takes in a concert hall at school, and one being a home recorded song with multiple tracks. They all sounded good alone, however when I put them on CD I noticed that all the volumes for each song were different, so there was no feeling of continuity. It just sounds amaturish. How do I make it so the volume of each song is the same and there is a good flow? I use Cool Edit, Cakewalk, and wavelab. Thanks for any help.

greg g.

 

[ambi]

That's what mastering does.
Just push the master fader up a little, or down a little and try to match them the best you can. If you use a Limiter you can get the volume up without clipping.

But generally that's what mastering does. Just do the best you can and don't worry about it too much.

 

[Tukkis]

In Cool Edit Pro use the Group Normalize function which makes the songs more consistant in volume.

Tukkis

 

[Blue Bear Sound]

Get your mixes right and the mastering usually takes care of itself........

Read THIS, then THIS.........

These should give you some tips and ideas..........

 

[gregerly]

thanks

Thanks for all the tips. They are much appreciated.

Greg G.

 

[littledog]

In Cool Edit Pro use the Group Normalize function which makes the songs more consistant in volume.

Tukkis

Absolutely wrong. Group normalize will only make the peak transients of each song as loud as possible, which does nothing to make them appropriately balanced as far as average volume.

Even assuming that the average volume to peak transient ratio is the same on each song (which is a huge and usually incorrect assumption) group normalizing will make your soft ballads as loud as your ass-kickers... the result being that your ass-kickers now sound wimpy.

 

[Tukkis]

My mistake littledog. I guess I shouldn't believe everything I read in the manual.

If you’re getting ready to master an audio CD, using Group Waveform Normalize is a great way to make sure that all tracks on the CD have a consistent volume.

Tukkis

 

[camn]

Definately don't believe everything Syntrillium says..

greg.... Are you using Wavelab for your CD layout and burning?? If so... your answer is simple.
In the Audio Montage window...Adjust the volumes of each track , till its all where you like it... and Listen to the whole thing. Jump back and forth from one song to the others to check your levels. Use compression and limiting as indicated. Adjust your track order, crossfades and spacing to achieve good "flow".

Wavelab is a full-featured layout program. Read it's manual, and practice a lot.

xoxo

 

[volltreffer]

Some CD burning programs will adjust your RMS volume for every song to the same 'percieved' volume, but it may be an EQ problem, too...

aXel

 

[Blue Bear Sound]

Actually, it doesn't matter WHAT the manual says -- there is no "formula" that s/w can use to determine the perceived level of a track....

Normalize functions will use RMS (average level) or Peak levels in its processing, but one of the reasons Normalizing is NOT useful for level balancing is precisely BECAUSE the process can't adjust for PERCEIVED level.... "perceived level" is a factor of the human ear and as such, requires a human's listening ability.

This is one of the reasons why a mastering engineer will NEVER be able to be replaced by s/w.........

 

[F_cksia]

Hey Bluebs; that's a really nice article (about mixing). Very good to read and with loads of usefull tips etc. Strange I didn't read this earlier. Thanks!

 

[Blue Bear Sound]

Hey Bluebs; that's a really nice article (about mixing). Very good to read and with loads of usefull tips etc.

Thanks!

 

[gregerly]

I am really glad I found this forum. You guys are a wealth of information and I appriciate all your help. Thanks again.

Greg G.

 

[Son of Mixerman]

If I may add to the discussion another decent place to read about...Mastering.

http://www.nthelp.com/mastering/faq.htm

SoMm

 

[littledog]

In Cool Edit Pro use the Group Normalize function which makes the songs more consistant in volume. Tukkis

I certainly can't blame you for being confused, Tukkis, given that the manual would make a statement like that. I only hope the people who actually designed the product knew more than the ones who wrote the manual, who apparently know nothing at all.

This would make for an interesting thread:

"Stupidest or biggest falsehoods ever published in an owner's manual."

I nominate yours for first place until someone can show me a better one.

 

[volltreffer]

Actually, it doesn't matter WHAT the manual says -- there is no "formula" that s/w can use to determine the perceived level of a track....

Normalize functions will use RMS (average level) or Peak levels in its processing, but one of the reasons Normalizing is NOT useful for level balancing is precisely BECAUSE the process can't adjust for PERCEIVED level.... "perceived level" is a factor of the human ear and as such, requires a human's listening ability.

This is one of the reasons why a mastering engineer will NEVER be able to be replaced by s/w.........

SURE!

I only wanted to state that it might be a step in the right direction... I recieved a disk from a tiny indie label some weeks ago that would have immensely profitted from a simple RMS fitting... Like I said, the auto-EQ is also no substitute for a well-thought EQ, but it may help as a first step... (OTOH, you may easily end up with this method, as you don't learn how and why to use EQ and to train your ears...) Nevertheless, I sometimes used this method at the very end before burning to disk, and have to say that the changes in spectrum are small, but there seemed to be some room modes in my spectra that were always underrepresented and that this process gets back... It sometimes gave more precision to my low end. Same thing to the high end... I often seemed to cut a little too much high end, might have been my recording technique, too... Everytime I tried to correct these things manually with mastering EQ, it did not work... The most difficult thing was to find a song-spectrum that would not spoil my mix...

Don't get me wrong - I don't see this as a silver bullet... It simply helped me understand a lot about what was not ok with my mixes/'DIY-masters'.


OTOH, on my last mixes there was a lot better freq balance, so maybe I have improved a little...


aXel