Tracking Out From The Mpc to Pro-Tools (Volumes)

Discuss the various methods you use in music production, from compressor settings to equipment type.
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Re: Tracking Out From The Mpc to Pro-Tools (Volumes)

By SimonInAustralia Sun May 12, 2013 3:37 pm
Adam78 wrote:And concerning to the burned stake theory ,I dont think he mean that the audio is distorted at that stage but when you start to add plugins and pushing the levels up harder during mastering its going to be noticeable.

And lower the track faders is not going to help so much if you dont go really really low. Its all mathematical and theres is no benefits at all to record so hot .
The bit usage is also meh .., I think you can record lower than -40db and still remain the full 16bit spectrum.
I guess we all have different ways to get our sound right so i can just speak for myself and sometimes quote from professionals :-D

If he is adding plugins and pushing the levels up during mastering, and that is causing distortion, then I would not hold any respect for him being a 'professional' mastering engineer, as he is causing those problems, it is not due to using the available headroom during tracking.

Sure, record at 24 bit, but only use 16 bits, that makes a lot of sense, it still doesn't mean that using the available headroom is going to cause distortion and a skewed noise floor, and it does not mean in anyway that a mix you send for mastering is using all the headroom in the mix.

You can speak for yourself, and quote from professionals that have no idea if you want, that is your choice, I am not stopping you, but if you are going to use nonsense analogies that really do not relate to the topic, someone will most likely call you on it.

Re: Tracking Out From The Mpc to Pro-Tools (Volumes)

By Adam78 Sun May 12, 2013 4:45 pm
SimonInAustralia wrote:Sure, record at 24 bit, but only use 16 bits, that makes a lot of sense


I meant if i sample from an 16bit source in 24bit.

There is always going to be 2 sides of this subject and the only way to know which one is the best for you is to try mixing with different recording levels. But i doubt you dont get better results with slamming the recordings near clipping.

Re: Tracking Out From The Mpc to Pro-Tools (Volumes)

By m56p87 Sun May 12, 2013 4:53 pm
+1 to Simon,

**** be talking about headroom like it can't be created later? Seriously it dosnt take a genius to pad track -12db, there is gain, padding, faders, and the master fader... Read up on gain staging...

You can use the full bit depth, then pad and have the best of both worlds. Which makes more sense to me than recording at -30db because I was told that by someone somewhere. If somebody wants to tell me how lowering a fader is worse than a really quite recording, by all means drop some knowledge. I don't see why destructively recording at a low volume is so fantastic.

WTF are you guys doing where you need 30db of headroom on each stem anyways!?

Re: Tracking Out From The Mpc to Pro-Tools (Volumes)

By m56p87 Sun May 12, 2013 4:56 pm
Adam78 wrote:
SimonInAustralia wrote:Sure, record at 24 bit, but only use 16 bits, that makes a lot of sense


I meant if i sample from an 16bit source in 24bit.

There is always going to be 2 sides of this subject and the only way to know which one is the best for you is to try mixing with different recording levels. But i doubt you dont get better results with slamming the recordings near clipping.


In digital there is no "near clipping",you are either clipping or your not. Black and white

It's even worse if you took this MO and tried it on real gear, you might as well layer in noise from the start. Worst signal to noise ratio ever!

Re: Tracking Out From The Mpc to Pro-Tools (Volumes)

By Adam78 Sun May 12, 2013 5:19 pm
m56p87 wrote:In digital there is no "near clipping",you are either clipping or your not. Black and white

It's even worse if you took this MO and tried it on real gear, you might as well layer in noise from the start. Worst signal to noise ratio ever!


What noise, its 24bit and headroom is not your enemy. Real gear? Recording near 0dbfs is the same to recording into an analog tape to+20db, in theory at least.

Re: Tracking Out From The Mpc to Pro-Tools (Volumes)

By m56p87 Sun May 12, 2013 5:43 pm
Adam78 wrote:
m56p87 wrote:In digital there is no "near clipping",you are either clipping or your not. Black and white

It's even worse if you took this MO and tried it on real gear, you might as well layer in noise from the start. Worst signal to noise ratio ever!


What noise, its 24bit and headroom is not your enemy. Real gear? Recording near 0dbfs is the same to recording into an analog tape to+20db, in theory at least.


Yeah if you passed the signal on without any attenuation. So that is moot. I have to agree with Simon using 24bits as 16bits with 8 bits of "headroom" is completely pointless. You still haven't said why you can't just turn the track down to create headroom.

I mentioned 30db because you said that creating headroom with faders would be difficult. So I assumed you considered it difficult due to the fact that tweaking a few db when the fader is extremely low is somewhat difficult because your at the steepest point of the faders curve to 0db. But even then you have the gain knob to pad your track then use the fader for fine tuning.

And yes noise, if your using an analog mixer your gonna get a crapload of noise by padding the crap out of the channels and turning it up later. And even more so, your not gonna get the best response from the analog gear if your only using half the range.

What your suggesting is just bad practice all around....

I have only used tons of headroom when I'm running a live show, because that shit is unpredictable and I don't want to clip the recording later down the road if the band gets way loud.

Re: Tracking Out From The Mpc to Pro-Tools (Volumes)

By Adam78 Sun May 12, 2013 6:26 pm
m56p87 wrote:You still haven't said why you can't just turn the track down to create headroom.


Well like i said am not an expert but i do get the basic of gain staging.

Moving faders doesnt only mean you're turning the volume up and down, instead imagine a fader as a gate...the lower it is, the more it's closed, the higher it is the more sound you're allowing. This is a debate that could go on for ever and am not just up for it no more. But good luck and just experiment what suit you mixing style the best.

Re: Tracking Out From The Mpc to Pro-Tools (Volumes)

By m56p87 Sun May 12, 2013 6:36 pm
Adam78 wrote:
m56p87 wrote:You still haven't said why you can't just turn the track down to create headroom.


Well like i said am not an expert but i do get the basic of gain staging.

Moving faders doesnt only mean you're turning the volume up and down, instead imagine a fader as a gate...the lower it is, the more it's closed, the higher it is the more sound you're allowing. This is a debate that could go on for ever and am not just up for it no more. But good luck and just experiment what suit you mixing style the best.


It's not really debate, one way provides all the the best of qualities of both methods. Full bit depth and headroom. While your way gives you baked in headroom for no reason with a destructive bit loss...

Also it's not like a gate at all. Gates in CV/DSP are a rectangular/square pulse that determines how long a signal is triggered and to what amplitude. But it's a completely linear signal. While a fader is more of an inversed exponential curve that gets steeper near the bottom of the fader. Notice on a channel it will start by +/-3db but end up at like +/-20db near the bottom...

I'm sorry to be so blunt man, but this thread has been bleeding misinformation since page 1..

Re: Tracking Out From The Mpc to Pro-Tools (Volumes)

By m56p87 Sun May 12, 2013 8:30 pm
Adam78 wrote:Its also misinformation that a louder recording level is better.
Damn i just cant let it go! :WTF:


How would having a better dynamic range be misinformation, all I see is cold hard facts.... if your recording at -1db or -20db digitally all your doing is changing the position of the noise floor in the recorded matieral (assuming you turn both up to the same volume after).. Theres no minute distortion occurring near the clipping point. Like I said when it comes to digital you are either clipping or your not... black & white. So why not make the most of modern day 24bit ADC?

I dont see hows theres any room left for dispute here..
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Re: Tracking Out From The Mpc to Pro-Tools (Volumes)

By SimonInAustralia Sun May 12, 2013 10:21 pm
Adam78 wrote:But i doubt you dont get better results with slamming the recordings near clipping.

Recording to near 0dBFS is not 'slamming' anything, and being near clipping is NOT clipping, there is no damage to the signal at all.

The word slamming may be dramatic, but really that is not what is happening, and does nothing to support your claims.


Adam78 wrote:Real gear? Recording near 0dbfs is the same to recording into an analog tape to+20db, in theory at least.

WTF, it is not the same at all, recording to +20dB on a tape is going to saturate the tape, providing some tape compression, recording to near 0dBFS in digital does not change the sound in a similar way to tape at all.


Adam78 wrote:Its also misinformation that a louder recording level is better.

The misinformation is what you quoted, what you are basing your theories and your side of the argument on, a claim that using the available headroom is the same as burning a steak, that the signal is somehow damaged, and can not be reversed, it is a load of cr ap.
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