Sometimes it feels like a clip, sometimes it don't

G

guttadaj

New member
I have this one place in the song I'm working on now that sometimes clips and sometimes doesn't. When I go to replay that part, I rewind several measures before the spot just in case effects tails from way back are adding to the mix. I have a limiter on the Master bus, so it's really confusing. And it's always in the same spot, so it's not like some background process is kicking on at random times and screwing things up. Anybody have any idea why this is happening?

Thanks,
-Jeff
 
What are you using to judge the fact that it is clipping? The red light?

I suspect the accuracy of the light is not all it could be. Do your ears tell you it is clipping?

If the clip is occuring on the Master Bus, it is probably due to one of your tracks. Try putting a volume envelope on the most likely culprit and see if that helps.
 
Thanks for the response, dachay!

I'm using the red clip indicator light and the peak hold number on the Master Bus. Sometimes it hits up to 0.5 and other times it can come in as low as -0.8 on this same part. :confused:

There is a pretty nasty percussive in the main vocal track at that time, which is really the only thing that I thought could have been causing it. Every thing else there is pretty tame. I didn't do the volume envelope thing, but I did select the offending transient and compressed the hell out of it, but the odd behavior persists.

So my ears are telling me that there's a nasty vocal pop for sure, but I don't think that I hear digital distortion. I'll play with it some more, but I was just really confused as to why the meter could register a clip on some passes and no clip on others and wondering why this might be. I was beginning to question the accuracy of the meter as well, but, if those aren't reliable, then wtf are we supposed to use them for? a little light show maybe? :D Seriously, what is the accuracy level of these meters supposed to be? Could its accuracy be affected by soundcard, buffers, latency, any other factors?

I would like to think that I should be able to look at the Master peak hold at the end of the song and raise the trim on the Master by however much below 0 it is to basically do my own non-destructive normalization. But, if the meters have mood swings and change their readings from playback to playback,... well... that really would suck and make me question what other aspects of Sonar are unreliable as well. :(

Of course, it could be me being an idiot, which is a frequent occurrence. But I've checked things pretty thoroughly as far as I can tell. That's why I wanted to put the feelers out here and see if anyone else noticed this kind of thing or had any possible explanations.

Thanks! :)
-Jeff
 
-0.8 to +0.5 is a pretty wide swing. Might be something else going on, but I don't have any idea of what that might be.

AFAIK, the clip lights are probably set somewhat conservatively. I frequently can have them trip where there is no actual clip involved. I wouldn't however, call them useless, as they do alert you to "potential" problems.

As for the plosive, you might want to try eq on it rather than compression. You really only want to remove the "offending" frequencies. My recollection is that these mostly lie in the 0-150 Hz area for plosives. You might try a roll-off at 150 Hz on the specific area.
 
That's a great tip on the plosive! The juicy nuggets of wisdom you get on this bbs are definitely worth the price of admission. :cool: I'll have to try that and see if it helps.

So, dachay, when you say you "frequently can have them trip where there is no actual clip involved" how do you know that there's no actual clip involved when Sonar's telling you it thinks there is? Is it just by listening? If so, I guess I'll have to make myself some digital distortion for some ear training. :D :rolleyes:

Well, if I ever figure out what's going on, I'll let you know.

Thanks for all your help! :)
-Jeff
 
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