Old 09-01-2014, 03:25 PM   #1
BobF
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Default Record levels

Threads about record levels, rules of thumb and such always leave me wanting less information

I have a variety of things I connect my guitars to when recording. An amp with a mic, a Red Box amp output, USB ports or audio outs on hardware modelers and of course, ITB sims.

So, what setting(s) do I make to my Reaper meters and what levels do I aim to record at? And are the levels peak, RMS or peak RMS?

Do I really need to get my sliderule and Farmer's Almanac out to set levels?
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Old 09-02-2014, 08:57 AM   #2
Bristol Posse
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Nope........

Plug in, play, record. If you like it you are done.

If it sounds like clipped to hell, full of THD garbage, you may need to dig deeper
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Old 09-02-2014, 12:43 PM   #3
whiteaxxxe
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Quote:
Originally Posted by BobF View Post

Do I really need to get my sliderule and Farmer's Almanac out to set levels?
can you set levels with these? :-))

joking. I have too a bunch of stuff I record guitars with, some Line6, some Vox, some Yamaha, some Zoom ... what comes together and has survived the last 40 years. whatever. so I dont use that many tricks, I do what was said before: if it doesnt clip ... engage. simple as that. a lot of this discussion is obsolet because some people make a religion out of something and some people jump on the train and attack the religion. (I am sometimes one of the latter ...)

its digital. if it doesnt clip, its ok. you only have to be aware that you do not hit your plugins too hard or hit them where they want to be hit. example: if a compressor compresses even if the threshold is 0, then there is something really too hot. no problem, take the level down, so that your compressor is comfortable and can do his work. a little bit more complicated with for example some old steinberg plugins: they dont want to be hit at all sometimes, they do only sound right if you pad the level before it to about -12 to -18db. that is where they set years ago the 0, taken from analog. oversimplified rule: the analog 0 is the digital -18db. so thats for levels. what doesnt mean, that you must follow this rule, only sometimes.

point is: you hear when there is something not ok. then turn down.

and there is this genius thread here, that brought me here: why your mixes sound like ass.

there is everything explained, what I put into 3 sentences above.
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Old 09-02-2014, 02:31 PM   #4
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Doesn't it depend mostly on what kind of music and played how?

For me, it is never an issue, because I don't play that stuff that way.
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Old 09-02-2014, 09:29 PM   #5
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sure it depends.

example: deathdoomdarkmetal, the kind where it starts at 0db, goes on at 0db and ends at 0db. when there is no dynamics in the music and its loud from start to end ... well, then its loud.

another example: the song is in its main part a low, dark, wuit string-sound. that you will have at -24db for example. there are too no dynamics, but you want it low.

a samba-percussion group is a completely different thing. lots of dynamics and transients. you want to find a sweet spot where the dynamics are contained, all the peaks are untouched but you want it full and rich. so you end up with rms of -12db.

sure it depends. and it depends on what you want for a sound. its about to find the balance between retaining the dynamics and to get fullness and punch.

as said, its a technical rule of thumb and it depends not only on the music but on the used plugins.

in the end you can push up the volume if needed in the master with a limiter to the desired level. so there is no need to get in the mix into trouble with too hot levels.

I turn everything down in the mixer only to be sure and have on the master FreeG that gives me at first +15db to get in a reasonable range.
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Old 09-09-2014, 10:05 PM   #6
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For this specific application (high-gain guitars):

1. Make your guitar and amp sound the way you want it to sound. This is really important. All of that stuff about redbox out and USB etc is bullshit. If you cannot get your guitar to sound the way you want it to sound while playing it, then all is lost. It doesn't matter whether you are playing through a POD on headphones, or through a vintage full-stack cranked to deafening volumes, or through a little battery-powered amp, you have to get a guitar sound that you are happy with. You can't leave it up to the gear or the mics or the preamps.

2. You're the one playing the fucking spank-paddle, it's your job to make it sound good. "Record this strangled goat and make it sound like a chorus of harps and orchestral strings" just doesn't work. The first job is to make music that sounds good, the second job is to record it properly. "Recording", by definition, means making a record of the sound you produce. It is extremely difficult to make a good-sounding recording of a bad sound.

3. Assuming you are creating a good sound with your guitar, and that you are recording to a computer or other digital medium, the first rule of digital recording is to record lower than clipping, and then to record about 10dB lower than that. Because the analog front-end of a digital recording interface is still analog, and will distort well before the "clip" LED lights up. You can always turn it up later. Digital gain is free.

Step zero to recording a good guitar sound is HAVING a good guitar sound, to record. If your guitar sounds like a hashy, noisy, atonal, woofy, fret-buzzy mess, then there is no magic knob or mic-position that will make it sound like a punchy, chuggy, screaming-cool guitar. Step zero is that the guitar has to sound good.

Some general advice, in no particular order:

- A good setup goes a long way. String noise and fret-buzz are not your friends. Bad intonation is bad.

- Dial up your gain until it sounds good, and then try backing off the gain by half, and increasing the volume, if necessary. Most guitar-players use way too much gain/distortion as a substitute for volume. Gain/distortion should be used for sonic texture, harmonic color, and sustain, not as a way to make the guitar seem louder. Use volume for loud. Use gain for texture and quality.

- Good use of amp reverb or delay should allow you to back off the gain by almost half. Use gain/distortion for sonic texture, and use reverb/delay to increase sustain.

- Excessive gain/distortion is counter-productive. Instead of making the guitar sound bigger and more powerful, it makes it sound flat, clipped, and nasal. Muscular palm-muted chugs come from half-clean sounds with punchy dynamics, not from hi-distortion farts. Screaming, howling leads come from half-gain sustain, not from fizzy flatlines.

90% of unsatisfying guitar sounds can be traced to improper amp-settings or playing technique. The other 10% are people using the wrong gear. Virtually none of it is a recording issue, because a good electric guitar sound is one of the easiest things in the world to record: just stick an SM57 in front of it.

That doesn't mean that it's impossible to improve upon the "stick an SM57 in front of it" school of guitar-recording, but it does set a kind of baseline of 50-some years of recording guitars. If you are blaming the SM57, the problem is not likely in the mic.
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Old 09-22-2014, 02:32 AM   #7
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Yeah. I've seen this before. It's hilarious. I like their kind of humour.
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