Gain Staging - MAKE or BREAK YOUR MIX

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[Snaps]

There's another issue: if you dramatically raise the gain on a track that was recorded at a very low volume, you're also increasing its noise floor by the same amount. If you do that on several tracks, noise will add up in your mix.
(maybe it's explained in the video and I missed it, in that case I'm sorry for wasting everyone's time).

[chrisbottoms]

I shoot for an average of -18db in my converters and DAW. According to a fair amount of documentation that I have read, that is what is considered the equivalent of analog unity for all analog emulation plugins. What that means is that the analog emulation's optimal starting point is -18db, and then you can push it or pull signal out to get the gear to act like the real thing. It also gives me a lot of headroom for musicians, especially singers, doing something wonky that is suddenly quite a bit louder than what levels are set for. I used to record pretty hot, but it bit me in the butt a couple times.

[therockhour]

Amen! I have only seen two engineers in my entire journey who think a gain knob is a fader. One of them was a church sound engineer who was surrounded by more feedback than angels, and the other was simply a mix engineer working with material that was already recorded. Gain is not volume, it is voltage between a source and a pre-amp, and it can work for you or against you. It should be viewed as an artistic tool, because gain is cool. (see... that rhymes)

[marcuslawson]

GS is actually so important. Took me years to realize this even after going to full sail I still couldn’t get it right for a while. Cheers everyone

[willmontgomery]

30 years ago at the University of Miami I remember learning how important it was (from Ken Pohlmann) to record digitally as high as possible without clipping due to exactly what you're saying...getting the most resolution. In those days I think it was much more important due to the lower bit depths but that always stuck with me. Same for analog because of signal to noise ratios. In recent years I have to say I've enjoyed tracking a full band and bringing it home and the levels are near perfect at fader unity so I see both sides for sure.

[RocknRollkat]

Hi Colt, excellent presentation.
Little known fact, 'converters' typically have brickwall limiters built in that are never mentioned.
That's why people think they can run a little 'hot' and get away with it.
I tested Cakewalk with some really overblown (+6 dB) signals and my meters measured a little over +1 dB.
In the digital world I NEVER allow clipping, ever.
I've heard digital clipping without a brick wall limiter and it's a sound you will never forget.
This was years ago overdriving a D.A.T. machine by 1 dB by accident.
Sure, you can overdrive analogue gear and get 'warmth', but digital is another story.
Best regards,
Bill P.

[cylershaw]

There's never a problem recording everything at a moderate level. Should be common sense but not everyone understands this concept. Thanks for the video as always. <3

[jwtubification]

This is the gain staging talking to I’ve been needing for years. Good chat. Thanks.

[Brian-Hansen]

Lately, I’ve been aiming for peaks right between -18 and -12. That seems to be giving me enough headroom in my context.

[henryhuynh]

I literally have been tracking in all different levels from quiet to clipping and then mixing and I finally came to this exact conclusion. I’m glad I did it but I also wish this video came out a year or so earlier lol. But thanks for the video and I’m sure it’ll help the next noob as it would’ve for me.

Always great content.

[audiodude]

If I was your audio Dad and you were my son I would be very proud of you because you listened and learned well. Even us older engineers did the same approach when dealing with signal to noise ratio when recording to tape

[Mrdalejo]

“If it sounds good, it is good regardless what you see! Well said!!

[Guttalaser]

-6db while tracking is my go to. It's a good compromise between the "go loud school" and the "go quiet school" and has the best benefit from both the policy and works best in post with every good plugin or hardware.

[BradlyNHelm]

YOU are a demigod of teaching. I am thankful to have discovered your channel.

[SylvanPaul]

Good to know we use the same approach and think about it the same way :)

[ScottsSynthStuff]

I aim for -12dB on everything, which is more than enough headroom to account for unexpected peaks or transients, and uses enough of the bit depth to give excellent resolution. And of course, it is also enough to be targeted by compressors and other effects.

[TheNoiseFloorav]

Guys, gain staging is like tying your shoes. It's not that hard, and while you can't run an effective marathon with untied shoes, we learn how to tie shoes super early on and don't obsess over it as the make or break point for improving your stamina.

It's overhyped as some sort of lynch pin that separates good mixers from bad mixers. Monitoring is a MUCH MORE critical part of the equation, but we all obsess over decimal points when it's absolutely not necessary.

All we need to do is know what's happening at different input and output levels, know when we're clipping and when we're not, and know if we've got a low Signal to Noise ratio. That's it. As youtubers, we need to stop overcomplicating a very simple audio 101 topic.

My video - Gain Staging: What to know, and why you shouldn't stress out about it.

[yanudol]

Just want to share a trick that I use, especially for sessions that have to go fast: I split the signal in 2 or 3 different tracks with three different levels to attack my converters: -12, -6, 0 (0 or clipping sometimes) then I choose later on and sometimes mixes the tracks, especially in case of big dynamic changes. ;)

[BoDavisMusic]

Thanks for the video! I shoot for peaks at -9db on most things during tracking especially on vocals which I always consider to be the main instrument with allowing the occasional loud spikes to always be under -6db. Drums I like to shoot for peaks at -6db and loud spikes to always be under -3db. This works for me to have the vocal sit in the mix right out of the box. I also never touch my faders and do clip gain automation for each track as I go for any adjustments needed and this gives me a really nice rough mix as I'm tracking and producing. So when the song is pretty much finished and I'm ready to actually start mixing, I fire up my mix bus chain and its like the aroma of freshly brewed coffee on a cold winter's 🔥

[masonbeard]

dang, i was just thinking that i need to figure out how to do proper gain staging. perfect timing!