Reading Meters

[rfssongs]

I kind of remember reading somewhere that on playback if your meter occasionally dips into the red that it not so bad. Is this correct or has my memory really gone ?

Should I be setting things so that I never see red ?

(Again - only on playback not on recording)

[Byron Dickens]

In the digital realm red is bad

[John]

Bdickens is right. Don't allow clipping on the track or the bus.  Also you don't ever need to be that loud. 

[Mark Morgon-Shaw]

You can always put a limiter at the end of the signal path ☺️

[John]

46 minutes ago, chimkin2 said:

You can always put a limiter at the end of the signal path ☺️

Right, the only problem is some plugins don't like to be over driven. Its better to have all tracks at a level that fits the mix without pushing things to hard.  One way I like to start mixing is putting all tracks at infinity. Then raising each one at a time to fit the mix. 

[Mark Morgon-Shaw]

25 minutes ago, John said:

Its better to have all tracks at a level that fits the mix without pushing things to hard. 

It's a good notion but not always true as it depends on the genre. Hip Hop for example often relies on clipping the drums for more punch and aggression.

So very much horses for courses ☺️

[Byron Dickens]

Digital clipping? As in overloading your converters? Somehow I think not.

Edited August 18, 2021 by bdickens

[Bill Phillips]

17 hours ago, chimkin2 said:

It's a good notion but not always true as it depends on the genre. Hip Hop for example often relies on clipping the drums for more punch and aggression.

So very much horses for courses ☺️

I believe it's always true that over driving converters (output > 0 dBFS) produces undesired results except when harsh digital distortion is desired.

The clipping you're referring to might be  provided by "clipper" or "soft clipper" plugins that add harmonic distortion in the signal processing chain inside the DAW. 

[Bristol_Jonesey]

Clipping at track level really makes no difference as you are not clipping your converters **

You can prove it by boosting the input signal to  a ridiculous level, and as long as it's brought under control BEFORE it hits your mains, it will not sound distorted

Clipping at the main outs is bad and this is what you need to avoid

** nothwithstanding the fact that clipping is bad for gain staging and the effect on plugins further down the chain

[Bill Phillips]

1 hour ago, Bristol_Jonesey said:

Clipping at track level really makes no difference as you are not clipping your converters **

You can prove it by boosting the input signal to  a ridiculous level, and as long as it's brought under control BEFORE it hits your mains, it will not sound distorted

That's not clipping. Clipper plugins produce harmonic distortion emulating analog clipping. Here's a free version. Early in the demo video you can see the clipping effect it's emulating. There's also a drum loop example toward the end of the video. 

https://www.kvraudio.com/product/free-clip-by-venn-audio

Edited August 19, 2021 by Bill Phillips