Recording Sound Level

A

Amr Makki

Member
Hello friends,
I am recording my music at home and I know that my recording is not proffesional. I record my own composition for pleasure. I amplify the final mix to 0 db but it is still not loud enough "I think", so I would like to know your opinion about this issue, is it acceptable or should I do something with it.

I am sharing a youtube links for my 3 compositions.





Thank you all,
 
Not to Be : Seems quite loud enough, in my headphones using normal listening volumes compared to other material.

Fatigue : By far the loudest. This seems too loud, IMO.

Stranger : This one is in the middle of the previous two - just a little bit too loud, IMO.

I would go with the volumes on Not to Be.
 
Amr Makki said:
Hello friends,
I am recording my music at home and I know that my recording is not proffesional. I record my own composition for pleasure. I amplify the final mix to 0 db but it is still not loud enough "I think", so I would like to know your opinion about this issue, is it acceptable or should I do something with it.

I am sharing a youtube links for my 3 compositions.





Thank you all,
Click to expand...
 
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spantini said:
Not to Be : Seems quite loud enough, in my headphones using normal listening volumes compared to other material.

Fatigue : By far the loudest. This seems too loud, IMO.

Stranger : This one is in the middle of the previous two - just a little bit too loud, IMO.

I would go with the volumes on Not to Be.
Click to expand...
Thank you so much, I just compare my songs with other songs on YouTube and my songs are always quieter...
 
Most stuff will be softer than YouTube because of "the loudness war". Using compressors/limiters to squash the dynamics of their material, then pumping up the volume to compete with others doing the same.

You can just raise the gain for your final renders, but that will raise the peak levels and those may exceed max and result in clipping. That's where you compress/limit to raise the lower signals AND lower those peaks simultaneously to form a less dynamic waveform with a bit more volume. Then you raise that volume to just below clipping and you enter the loudness war. Well... something like that.
 
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I compared your posts to a few other acoustic guitar pieces, such as Jimmy Quango's ( he posts here regularly) and they are quite similar in volume to his pieces. I think the levels are fine.

Consider these two:



Its important to understand that a single guitar or a piano piece does not need to have the bombastic crunch of a full band with 4 or 5 instruments plus vocals.
 
Hi,

There's no definitive answer to this question since it depends on your own personal preferences and what you're aiming to achieve with your recordings. Some people prefer to record at a lower level so that they can later boost the volume during mastering without causing any clipping or distortion. Others may find that recording at a higher level produces a more punchy, full sound. Ultimately, it's up to you to decide what sounds best for your music.

That said, if you're finding that your recordings are not quite loud enough even after boosting the volume to 0 dB, then you may want to consider raising the gain levels during recording. This will ensure that you capture as much of the signal as possible without clipping or distortion. You may also want to experiment with different microphone placements and/or using a compressor/limiter plugin during mixing in order to achieve a more consistent volume level throughout the song.

I hope this helps!

_______
Jason Hook. Audio Enthusiast and Software Developer
Remove or Isolate Vocals from any Song 👉 https://www.UnMixIt.com/
 
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If he's recorded and boosted already so he's at or approaching 0dB then raising the gain during record and lowering it later changes nothing - without dynamic compression, the relationship between everything remains the same. I suspect what we have here is not a loudness issue in terms of recording level (that's fixed and can't go louder that 0dBfs anyway - but with how loud it sounds. We're into the apparent loudness wars. The reason people now start to look at LUFS. How loud the piece is based not just on level, but the differences between quiet and loud considered over the duration of the piece. Spotify are quite happy with my quiet recordings even when they are quite low in absolute level. Lots of people complain that Spotify and the others grab every bit of music and cleverly normalise everbodies music so they sound the same level. They don't - their clever software applies the adjustments depending on the genre. So my quiet, relaxing classicals get left alone, but introduce a repetitive drum beat and their system either rejects my music as being too quiet, or squashes it.

Microphone placements have nothing to do with dynamics, apart from less volume, they are a capture decision. So put a mic in a silly place and have to turn the wick up produces the same result as moving it close and turning it down - in volume assessment. Tonally it's wildly different. Compressors and limiters have a definite place, but surely theyre just part of the mix? Too many people do a static fader setting on every channel and then dial in the compressors to do it for them while they sit back for three minutes thirty seconds.
 
Hi there!

You've raised an interesting question - is it acceptable to record at a lower level than what is traditionally considered to be professional quality?

Everyone's idea of what constitutes 'professional' quality may differ. However, many people in the music industry would likely say that it's best to aim to record at a higher volume in order to achieve the most accurate and polished sound.

That said, if you're happy with the sound of your recordings and they are serving their purpose for you, then there's no real need to change anything. Every artist has their own unique style and approach, so do what feels right for you! Thanks again for posting and we hope you continue to enjoy making music.

____________________

Jason Hook. Audio Enthusiast and Software Developer
🎤 Remove or Isolate Vocals from any Song 👉 https://www.UnMixIt.com/​
 
It's really easy to take any track that is recorded at -15dB max and hit Normalize. It will bring that level up. If you boost it 12dB which still gives you a bit of headroom, you'll still have a decent noise floor, especially if you are in 24bit mode. Likely the mic will have more self noise than the preamp/interface. Definitely the ambient background level will be higher, and that ratio of max signal to background noise is constant, regardless of your recording level.

Digital distortion is nasty, unlike the old tape distortion which some people find desirable (tape compression and all that stuff).
 
That was indeed the case - but since 24 and 32 bit recording came along a large number of people have stopped the endless chasing the high point because the noise floor is so far down now that record levels can be way below the old nominal point we used to use. Even normalisation gets used less nowadays.
However, many people in the music industry would likely say that it's best to aim to record at a higher volume in order to achieve the most accurate and polished sound.
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It's simply no longer necessary or required, and many would suggest that the actual 'quality' has nothing to do with accurate or polished - accurate with a low noisefloor is a term applied to a HUGE dynamic envelope and 'polished' could be valid for recordings that are actually deficient in some way - after all, in the 60s and 70s, hiss free recording was pretty well impossible, yet polished certain applied to many.
 
Ever since coming over to the dark side {digital}, I have found a distinct difference in the sound of whatever I'm recording where the recording level is higher. I don't exactly know what it is and sometimes, the lower level recording sounds better to me. It's a kind of thickness to the sound, at a higher level. So for me, it's about the inherent sound, and that determines whether my recording level will be higher. When it comes to the mix, every signal is going to be balanced with every other signal, anyway.
As ever, the key is to not clip.
 
Yep - that's my view too. I'm never quite certain what the meters are telling me when you are close to the top, and if you look at the waveforms displayed they seem more 'pointy' closer to 0dB? I wonder if it's a non-linearity at the top, I don't know but recording quieter has so much leeway now. With 48K or more samples every second, will just one at 0dB get caught by the metering? the noise floor at 16 bit was so big compared to analogue, it's odd we now consider this unsatisfactory, and we've gone to 24 and 32 - so now the noise should only be there if we get levels very, very wrong.
 
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