[LAU] metering, mixing levels was Re: Ardour: exporting woes

jonetsu jonetsu at teksavvy.com
Tue Apr 12 14:04:16 UTC 2016


> From: "Jörn Nettingsmeier" <nettings at stackingdwarves.net> 
> Date: 04/12/16 08:26 

>> That's it.  Why would 3 weeks of work on 25 tracks be thrown to a
>> mathematical function that will move one fader ?
 
> ???
 
> That still sounds like you're confused about it.
 
> If you normalise the master output, it does not affect your mixing 
> balance at all. All the mysterious "mathematical function" does is:
> 1. play the song through a "peak hold" meter.
> 2. look at the maximum peak level, say it's minus n dB FS.
> 3. play the song again with the master fader at plus n dB FS
> 4. save the result

Something is affected nevertheless.
 
> If by "tracks", you actually mean "songs", well then, yes, if you have 
> one song per session, normalizing each one individually can upset the 
> loudness balance from one song to the next, but I doubt you'd get that 
> one perfect anyway. For this kind of workflow, when switching songs 
> means loading another session, I would recommend to export each song, 
> then create a new ardour session with as many stereo tracks as your 
> album has songs, arrange the songs one after another, but each on an 
> individual track. Then you can fine-tune the relative levels with the 
> channel faders and even throw in some extra "mastering" processing like 
> EQ if the songs don't quite match yet.

I think I mentioned that.  Not just now, but earlier.  Comparing with commercial tracks of the same genre.  This is what I started doing.  First steps.  Much later on, developing a uniform experience from a series of original pieces.  I still do not see why I would throw anything at a 'mathematical function' at this stage of learning.  I might stick with that for a long time (there's at least one 'big guy', Bob Katz, that does not consider normalization in a good light, as can be read in a recent link posted here, so it might not be a uniform accord).  For now I much prefer to do all by craftiness, by observation and experiment and that all and every changes are made explicitly.





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