General leveling of Volume

[Ed.ahs]

Hiya Ninjammers,

I think everyone knows the problem: When you're jamming someone enters the server, but has his volume too loud or far too soft. I noticed this can be a problem esspecially for people who play away from their computers like live drummers.
I thought of this problem, and I founded it a difficult one , because in public servers there is not one person who controls the jam or something, who could control the global volume for each jammer, leaving the other jammers to swallow the descisions of one 'masterjammer' :P.
Making a global volume that everyone can change per jammer, such that every jammer in the room can edit this general/global volumelevel for himself and at the same moment for his fellow jammers, is maybe a better solution, but, has it's problems too. For example, won't you get people who want to hear themselves more, or something, and you get discusions about the volume and that kind of stuff you don't want to have.
But what if you could check per jammer if you want to use the 'general' volumelevel, that everyone can edit for you or you can edit for the otherjammers, or your 'personal' edited volumelevel, which won't affect the volumelevel for the jammer you edited it for. Then you won't have this kind of problems I think.
I don't know if this is a good solution, and if you guys have other ideas about it, but solving this 'problem' can give the jam more quality in my opinion.

greets,
Ed

[AndyMc]

Lo Ed,

What would be nice is a loop back server for people to pop in to do level checks, then we could just say to anyone loud if they could pop into the loopback server and get there volumes setup correct.
I think I may be a offender sometimes with volumes. Or maybe a loop back test in a future release of REAPER?
I suppose with a bit of setup it would be possible to test loop back on reaper now.

[misterC]

I think it's a matter of not knowing what the heck you're doing. With some audio know-how, you should be able to get your gain structure and levels correct before you even connect to a server. You shouldn't need a loopback to test it.

In some cases, I've gotten on a server and I'm the loud one because everyone else's levels are waaaay to low, to the point where the line noise on their crappy input is louder than their guitar, etc...

OH well. Enough ranting. Just my .02

[AndyMc]

I can get my levels exact but then people join and say too low or too loud. With being able to loop back test people can get there levels better set.

I run through asio so inputs and outputs all controlled with in my DAW so I can see my peaks but others will only be able to tell there peaking from others telling them.

I noticed that ninjam and reaninjam seem to default persons channels at different levels.

But anyway I don't think users can be solely blamed for this and I think n00b bashing only results in devisions.

[misterC]

If they don't know they are clipping, then it's their fault. I'm not going to walk softly around this, it's just a fact. Noob bashing is required to whip people in to shape. Being ignorant to it is not an excuse.

Getting ninjam out to the masses is great, but unless there is some user education in the area of gain structure and setting levels, it's always gonna be a problem.

And yes, I've noticed the newer version of ninjam (reaninjam) does set all incoming levels at 50% when someone joins, so that they don't inadvertanly blast you.

I'm not saying it's not a problem, I'm just saying, having a loopback server for people to test with doesn't mean jack if the person doesn't know how to do it in the first place. And even if they did know how, you can see your levels in ninjam on the meter before you even connect, so whats the point of having to connect to a loopback? If your sending into Ninjam, you hear what you play real-time regardless of connection status, which is exactly what gets sent out, and is exactly what you would hear if you connected to a loop-back server. Once again, whats the point?

[Alex18]

If you're testing sound for live drums (myself) it is difficult to hear what is being sent out even with ear muff headphones cause its so loud on the outside too i think loop back would help alot. I test my sound alot of the time just by myself and ninjam before i enter a server i use delay and set it so that it plays a note back right after i hit so i can get the volume right

[pljones]

Drums are hard to get right.

Say you're in a channel where a distorted electic guitar is running at -12dB (with next to no dynamic range). You want your general levels to be just around the same. But when you crack down on the snare, you can be +18dB or more above a gentle hit, quite easily... Equally, the difference between the toms and crashes can be pretty large. Drums have an enormous dynamic range and getting the balance between being heard and clipping is a struggle.

(Actually, you'll often find the guitar is at 0dB, barely avoiding clipping...)

(Oh, and isn't this thread in the wrong forum? ;))

[Jurgen]

Well, it's just a clipping protection but we found it to be practical in use.

www.imuzz.com, it's based on Ninjam