Hello all !
I’m mixing down my first project in N-Ttracks and I’m finding I loose several dbs from what I hear if I play back my song through N-Tracks editor to what I hear when I play my wav file.
Any ideas on what can I be doing wrong here ?
Quote:
...to what I hear when I play my wav file. ...
...through which app?
Check volumes at all places -- check all playback defaults -- check windows mixer volumes. There's MANY reasons the volume could be different.
The only real test to see if the resulting mixdown file is not what you mixing down is to import the mixdown file into a new n-Tracks song, set all volumes at 0 db and play it out the same device as before.
Different volume from different apps is normal.
Should have guessed that … thanks man !
Now, how do I know I’m getting around normal CD volume when hearing through N-Tracks ?
At that point you probably won’t be able to, no matter what. Commercial CD’s are usually professionally mastered and are hard limited and squished to death to get the most volume possible, even at the expense of clipping and distortion.
What that thought in mind, what is normal CD volume? If your mix hasn’t been mastered to be squished to heck and back then it won’t sound as loud as most CD’s. n-Tracks isn’t a mastering app (though it can host some mastering plug-ins). You’re probably better off mastering in some other app.
There are a LOT of reasons a mix will be lower in volume. Some are uneven overall EQ, unlimited peaks, and even sub-audible frequencies.
It’s a black art to get even close, depending on the music type.
gosh… thanks again… I wish I could just concentrate in my music and someone else could do the magic…
well, I’ll give it my best shot any way.
As a last one, since you mentioned it, is there an easy way to describe the difference among “limiting” and “compression” ?
Limiting is an extreme case of compression. Usually compression works by setting a limit above which your compressor kicks in and brings down the level of the signal by a specified ration (e.g. if the threshold is -10 dB and your signal is -6 dB with a ratio of 2:1, you will compress your -6 dB signal down to -8 dB because you have your ratio set to only allow the signal to get to half of its original level above the threshold).
A limiter is where you set a threshold and anything above that threshold is squashed down so that it does not exceed the threshold. This is commonly called a brickwall limiter. It is used in mastering to avoid clipping the signal, which results at 0 dB. Of course, when they slam the music up, they are introducing distortion most of the time anyway, but the distortion from clipping is a lot more harsh and a lot more grating.
Hope that helps.
Thanks Rip, more than enough to get me goning !