High quality tracks. Advice please!

Dab is probably one of the humblest members here. I learned alot from him when I first appeared on these forums. But if he wants to show off his car, thats ok. He made a move in the music biz and I can respect that. I would brag too if I bought my dream car.

On a last note, having a degree in recording arts and production means sh!t without hands-on experience and the know-how in the studio. Your best teacher in this field is constant experimenting and learning you're mistakes.

Peace

Hi all -

I've had problems getting on here to write a reply, and months later I finally can - thanks to
all the contributions here, there are obviously some disagreements, but actually I've taken equal relevance in all the opinions here, which is really good. I've taken from all sides.

I've learned a lot from this thread. I understand what DB level I should be working at now,
and I realise that I should leave headroom in my beats for after work on a computer. I've started using a little program I found called TT DR offline meter. It's great help for comparing RMS level between my beats, and reference beats (although I don't always exactly agree with the difference it gives me..!)

The problem is still, that however great my beats sound coming out of the monitors, they definitely sound quiter on the computer than most other tracks. I realise I need to get a computer (or use my standard laptop), and an audio interface.
This should help a great deal, although I have a few more questions regarding this...

1. I still am unsure technically, of the difference between recording out of my MPC into a computer soundcard/interface, as recommended, and recording the beat within the MPC as a WAV file and transferring it to the computer via USB. Am I losing sound quality because of this? What's the main difference?

2. If I compress a song and the quieter parts become relatively louder, does that mean that I can do part of the work in the mixing process myself, by mixing for a lower dynamic range, turning quieter instruments up? Obviously that contradicts mixing for dynamic range, if it's going to be compressed..

3. After mixing a lovely sounding beat, and then applying compression and gain to say 0db, why would my beats still have a low RMS? Also, some of my beats have the same RMS as a Reference song, but would still sound quieter. Is this just the limits/faults of the meter software, or a fault in my mixing?

4. Finally, and most mind boggling, If my MPC samples at 16bit/44.1khz, does that only refer to instruments I'm recording into the MPC? Can the MPC handle samples over 16bit/44khz? In other words, if I record in some instruments, use some 32bit song samples, 32bit drum samples, and make my beat, once I save it as a WAV or transfer it to the computer, can it still be a 32bit/96khz beat? I can feel that this is a stupid question which again shows my lack of understanding - I am just wondering if I can generally output a beat of higher bit depth and sample rate, if my MPC only samples at 16/44.1?


By the way, I'm ready for a thrashing...


Thanks again for all the help so far. I'm not sure whether an old thread like this would show up anymore after so long so if nobody's reading this I might end up making a new thread!

Thanks in advance and best regards,
E

My God what a thread!!!!!!
It takes some wading through. And all you want is the track to sound loudish from an MPC.

DUCKING IS THE ANSWER

I found that the sneaky trick is, after years of this very problem, to use ducking on a compressor sidechain. I've got a hardware compressor but it works in software too.

The things you want loud are usually the Kick & Vocals I've noticed. But to get the levels you want of these, everything else seems to be relatively quietened. But no problem. Get everything fed into the compressor except Kick & Vocal then into a mixer. Put the Kick into a separate mixer channel & send some of it to the compressor sidechain via fx/aux send to duck out some of the main, then a practically unaudable hole is carved out of the main track for the Kick to drop in. Similar with vocals.

to illustrate: if your main track is volume=10 and you want a add a kick at volume=7 then volume=17 - if the main track is briefly turned down to volume=3 for the length of the kick then volume=10 still - But because of psychoacoustics, you don't notice any change in volume of the rest (unless its overdone) and the track sounds louder when it isn't. I've had the lamest Kicks sound massive, you can use this technique to literally trick people into hearing the loudest pindrop they've ever heard.

Once you've known about ducking then you'll hear it on just about everything.

After that, a little bit of saturation to delicately shave off those transients, normailise and jobs done. Whether the music is any good or has a good spectral balance is another thing, but it'll sound much much louder for sure.

http://sonictransfer.com/side-chain-com ... rial.shtml

I've tried ramming tracks trough limiters & maximizers, it adds a little of volume but starts going sh*t very quickly as you try to crank it up.

If anyone has appreciated this information then can you add to this thread
viewtopic.php?f=19&t=142009
That would be most excellent.

dabmeister wrote:

Shostakovich wrote:Ooops! Is that yours? Nice ride.

Thanks man!

I love the attention it brings.

This comment I'm about to say has nothing to do with this thread.

After owning the ride for over two years now, I take back that quote about loving the attention my car brings.

It draws idiots like flies on sh!t rather than pretty ladies. Though I don't need it to do that now since it picked up a nice sexy tall one back in late '09.

But the morons that pick these crazy challenges & you burn their a$$es by miles, & they seem to don't wanna quit either, are just zoned in another world or something....geezzz

edit: Oh, my speedometer tops out @ 200 mph. The ride is still stock and it will do every bit of 190, so there you go.

Hehe, thanks Dab, though I must say, I've been thinking of exactly the questions I need to ask on here for months. I really hope someone can answer them for me. Although after a bit of thought, I think I've answered some of my own questions..

The MPC samples at 16/44.1, but I can still load a 24+bit/96khz sample for example and still work with that. However if I sample my track back through the mpc via MAIN OUT though, I am resampling the whole track at 16/44.1. Thats why my beats dont sound so good when I resample them then transfer it via USB.

So for this reason, if I record from the stereo out into a decent audio interface/soundcard and then into a computer, I can preserve the quality and maintain headroom. Am I getting this right...?



By the way LZ, your post about ducking lead me on a whole other route of thought. I have a compressor to do the job (no mixer). So basically I would be sending tracks via the assignable out to the compressor, and resampling back into the MPC...

My question is here is - I would have to send every track that I want to duck to the compressor for sidechining, basically most of the rest of the song, and I'd be resampling that whole song back into my mpc as one track, so I'll be losing individual track information, I'd just be left with a kick drum track, and a rest-of-the-song track. And it would all be resampled at 16bit/44.1khz. Have I got something wrong here?

Or do I have to resample every track one by one for the whole song, with kickdrum sidechain? Doesnt seem right...



Pleeease if anyone still has patience with this thread, please help me with some of these questions. I know they seem daft but the answers to these will help me to understand a whole load more, and I'd really appreciate some knowledge from you pros

Thanks in advance

Hi Dreadful,

Your right, you'd end up with most of the song re-recorded as sidechained as one track & just a Kick & Vocal Track as the other tracks.
This is bad if you want to do any further editing to your tracks, but if its a Mastering stage at the end of everything then thats not such an issue. Perhaps create a new folder and Save All just for this mastering stage.

In theory you'll end up with the track sounding much louder but with the Kick & Vox still having a lot of definition.

I'll have to keep an ear open for tracks that illustrate this.
Perhaps, off hand, Rudencko - Everybody : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FAtW0hua9rE

The Kick it at Max100% so how can the vocals sound loud on top of that, except that the Kick has ducked the 'rest' of the track & the Vocal then ducks the 'Kick & rest' after that. A kind of ducking cascade.
You may notice this if you can take your eyes off the Hot Russian Babes in the video.

From my experiences, if you've got your material in 24/96 and then take that back to 16/44.1, you're going to loose the dynamic range originally captured especially if it's done through ad/da conversion.

Dithering down the 24/96k source to 16/44.1 is more of what you want to do if you use a decent dithering program.

Your so right Dab


The extra subtlety of the bigger bit depth, especially in reverbs, is quite noticable.
I've heard good & bad dithers too & the difference is remarkable. The stereo image really shows it.

However, the phrase Dynamic Range to the untutored may be counter intuitive.
When the man in the street here's the word Dynamic he's thinking LOUD. What it actually means is the depth between quiet & loud, the sort you'd get with classical recordings, from the faintest breath of the flautist to the full on whump of an orchestra set on stun.

To get a track to sound loud then the dynamic range is very reduced, from LOUD to F**K THAT's LOUDER. Sorry, but that's the CD/Digital Loudness Wars in action, it was never a problem with vinyl as you just turned the volume up. But if you look at the meters on a louder CD recording, they just aren't straying very far from the top.

You'll probably know all this Dab, but to others, the word dynamic sends people up the wrong avenue.

I think the source of my problems is something to do with the mpc sampling at 16/44. Can you clarify this for me - If I sample instruments into the MPC at 16/44, then I use some drum samples on the MPC Hard drive which were sampled at 24/96, and then I put a 24/96 WAV file onto the mpc from the computer, and then I make my beat... what bit depth/sample rate is my tune? It contains a mixture of 24/96 and 16/44 elements. obviously I want this to be as high as possible. If I resample into my MPC, everything comes down to 16/44. But If I stereo out of my MPC into a 24/96 soundcard, do I then have basically a 24/96 beat?

Im starting to believe my MPC is the cause of my problems and I should be using one that samples at a higher rate, or just use a computer... :(

Can anyone clear up my confusion here?
Will my MPC out to a good soundcard help me keep higher bit depth beats?

I've got a friend who is into uber-quality of recording and I think he gets a bit anal, he doesn't seem to give a stuff about the tune.

Basically, some of the best music in the world has been recorded with lower quality gear than a MPC can achieve (Public Enemy to Public Image Ltd). Phil Collins on the other hand would definitely choose a 192Kz/24 bit pristine recording system.

It can sound lo-fi & good - but lo-fi, loud'n good, better. If Loudness is your problem then bit rate & sample depth is not going to help any.

my original problem when I started this thread oh.. months ago... was that my beats sound too quiet. I have them sounding great on the MPC, great dynamics, happy with how it sounds... but then I resample into the MPC to get my song, and USB it over to the computer, and the tune is just quiet, compared to all the every day beats being uploaded to youtube.

I've had some great advice on here which I've used, and has helped, to make my beats louder. But I think all the beats I'm hearing on YT for instance, are done mostly on computer and are always working at maximum sample rates.

If I have a great sounding beat on the MPC, but I want it to be loud when I get it to the computer, I gather that I'd be better off recording out of the MPC into a soundcard which will sample at the higher rate.

I'm more bout how it sounds than I am about technicalities and being anal about sound quality, but I am noticing that my beats are considerably quieter when I resample them and USB them to the computer.

Do I need to get a higher bit rate audio interface so I can keep the beat at 24/96?

I'm sure I've just missed some bare essential point here, but if someone could point it out that would be great.

Thanks again for all this input
E

^^^ my personal beliefs is if you hit the initial recording on the head from the start, then keep things in the digital realm through out the process, you shouldn't have any problems working the rest of the process out providing it's done appropriately.

But it all depends on the knowledge base of the individual of course.

this is the knowledge I've been trying to acquire .. up til now its been making the beat sound good. I know its a stupid question - but how do I get my beats from the MPC, to a CD or wav file on the computer, while keeping it in the digital realm?

When I resample through main out, or record stereo out into an audio interface/computer, are these both AD/DA conversions? How can I avoid this?

Beatmakers who only use the computer dont have this problem...

Thanks

Dreadful wrote:this is the knowledge I've been trying to acquire .. up til now its been making the beat sound good. I know its a stupid question - but how do I get my beats from the MPC, to a CD or wav file on the computer, while keeping it in the digital realm?

When I resample through main out, or record stereo out into an audio interface/computer, are these both AD/DA conversions? How can I avoid this?

Beatmakers who only use the computer dont have this problem...

Thanks

I think if you re-evaluate your recording process, and try it from another angle, you'll get different & better results.

I personally wouldn't re-sample anything back into the mpc from the start because to me that's the first stage of loosing the initial quality you set out to get from the start.

I think you do have digital I/O's on the mpc you have, so why don't you bus out the sounds through that going into your digital inputs on your soundcard so you can keep the dynamic range you're looking for in the first place.

Is that where I've been going wrong??? I've never used the digital outputs - I always use the stereo outs or MAIN out up until now. I dont have a soundcard yet. So If I use the digital outs into a soundcard, I wont lose any dynamic range or volume or quality or anything. I never really thought about that - so I lose quality just from the conversions when I record from stereo out. I feel pretty dumb for not realising.

So if everything on the MPC is a mixture of 16/44 and 24/96 samples for example, and I digi out into a 24/96 soundcard and into my computer, what bit depth/sample rate does my track end up at on the computer?