Quick Logic question re: levels

[vivalastblues]

Something that I never thought to ask - if I'm recording into the DAW and the levels are not individually peaking but peaking only in the output meter, is that a problem? Does it just mean it's peaking on output but not actually clipping on input?

This is something I've always been confused about. It seems as though Logic deals with individual levels differently to PT, where in PT the output won't peak if the individual channels aren't, but Logic sort of takes the signal cumulatively which can be quite annoying.

[Scott Greenberg]

If the output track is clipping, but the input of your recording track isnt, you must have some kind of effects running that are boosting the level after being recorded. Or you have several tracks playing back already, and the new one one you are recording is pushing the output to clip (but that individual track is not distorted). I guess if theres any doubt just listen back and make sure everything sounds clean.

[ricey]

Check your Pan Law in the Project settings....

[Gentleman Jim]

Respectfully, I think you guys misunderstood the situation.

To the OP: No big deal if you're recording multiple tracks that are all safe as far as levels, but the output is peaking. Just bring the master fader down so it isn't peaking anymore. Or, if you want to monitor what's going on, you can do a quickie pre-mix within Logic to bring the aggregate level down. (Turn down guitars, drums, etc. Turn up vocals, piano, etc.)

[ricey]

Respectfully, I think you guys misunderstood the situation.

To the OP: No big deal if you're recording multiple tracks that are all safe as far as levels, but the output is peaking. Just bring the master fader down so it isn't peaking anymore. Or, if you want to monitor what's going on, you can do a quickie pre-mix within Logic to bring the aggregate level down. (Turn down guitars, drums, etc. Turn up vocals, piano, etc.)

Gentleman Jim's advice is spot on. i would also check your pan law in the project settings to see if the mix bus is adding 3 dB to each side.

[vivalastblues]

Respectfully, I think you guys misunderstood the situation.

To the OP: No big deal if you're recording multiple tracks that are all safe as far as levels, but the output is peaking. Just bring the master fader down so it isn't peaking anymore. Or, if you want to monitor what's going on, you can do a quickie pre-mix within Logic to bring the aggregate level down. (Turn down guitars, drums, etc. Turn up vocals, piano, etc.)

Thanks. So pulling down the output meter during tracking won't mess with the signal at all?

[finleysound]

Thanks. So pulling down the output meter during tracking won't mess with the signal at all?

It will "mess" with the signal in the sense that it will change your mix! If you're happy with your mix, pull down all the channel faders until the culprit isn't clipping anymore.

[lionaudio]

There are plenty of posts on Tapeop about gainstaging that you may want to check out. In a nutshell, you want to track quieter so that you don't run in to this problem in the future. Track individual tracks quieter so that when you have 20 tracks going at once, you don't create a bottleneck at your output. That is what is happening right now. Bringing your faders down in logic does change the sound. If you can, insert a gain plug in on your tracks and turn them down that way while leaving your fader at unity.

[vivalastblues]

Thanks for the info guys.

I read this recently, thought it was bs though (I say that because I tried it and the mix didn't sound any better to me): http://www.gearslutz.com/board/so-much- ... tored.html

But...I guess not? Maybe I just misunderstood it. I had all my levels at -18 and the mix sounds like a big mess, where I thought it sounded pretty good before but not quite good enough.

Track individual tracks quieter so that when you have 20 tracks going at once, you don't create a bottleneck at your output. That is what is happening right now. Bringing your faders down in logic does change the sound. If you can, insert a gain plug in on your tracks and turn them down that way while leaving your fader at unity.

would bringing the faders down on my desk have the same effect? Or is it better to practise to have them at unity?

[lionaudio]

The link that you posted is completely true. Gain-staging is difficult to understand at first because it is against our nature to see less as more. What he was referring to is using a trim plugin BEFORE using say, a compressor plug in. That is to make sure that you are feeding that compressor the proper amount of signal. You want to feed your DAW the right amount of signal as well. There are "sweet spots" in every piece of gear, your computer included. Your mix will be easier if you feed your computer quieter levels. Moving your faders down after the fact does not solve this. There are reasons that you do not want to move the faders down that I cannot explain, because I don't know the proper terminology, but it goes something like this. When moving the faders down, the volume decreases in an inconsistent way. You also lose quality of sound by moving them down. This doesn't matter much with one track, but it does when you have 30 tracks that are all sounding slightly worse because you've moved them all down. When you can track a 20-30 track song, and still not hit red on your output, you're definitely getting there. Search for a few posts from Joel Hamilton on here and his enviable knowledge of gain staging, or maybe just ask him directly. He broke it all down for me at one time, and it made a world of difference in how I approach recording

[vivalastblues]

cheers, I'll do that. Thanks for your post.

[captaincarpet]

I also new to Logic and some things, metering for instance irritates me a bit. You want DBFS with a clear relationship to the zero to know what's going don't you? Perhaps that's what it is but it just doesn't feel very clear to me.
I think the pan-law lowers by 3 db, if I'm not confusing it, because of the statement that something that is panned outputs more energy into one speaker and gets more "intense". That is a choice that should be up to the person recording and not chosen for us by default. I also don't understand the input and output meters, the only thing that would make sense to me is what goes into the DAW (in dbfs) and a master meter (channel meters during mixing if you've clipped something without noticing I guess). And yes, from what I've read, using the faders does math on the soundfile and degrades it a little bit, but I've only so far got the idea of that. I guess you could compare mixes where you carefully record the levels and don't touch the faders to mixes where you do it like you would be mixing in the analog sense.

[calaverasgrandes]

Logics metering is kinda funky. I just make sure my levels are in the
-12dbfs area or so when recording. To my thinking pulling down a master fader when its alreday clipping isnt doinf much for your headroom. You need to regain that headroom by pulling back your cahnnel faders or the outputs of your plugins. usually when this is happening I will find a couple tracks that arent very hot by themselves but are interacting to build up at certain freqs. Especially that 100-800hz region.
Common culprits are bass, synth, vocals and guitar.

[ricey]

I also new to Logic and some things, metering for instance irritates me a bit. You want DBFS with a clear relationship to the zero to know what's going don't you? Perhaps that's what it is but it just doesn't feel very clear to me.
I think the pan-law lowers by 3 db, if I'm not confusing it, because of the statement that something that is panned outputs more energy into one speaker and gets more "intense". That is a choice that should be up to the person recording and not chosen for us by default.

for sure - i think the default is 0 but there are three choices:

0
-3, which is -3dB in the center
-3 Compensated, which is -3dB in center and +3dB on the sides

that's where people might be seeing and hearing +3 when recording/mixing. i leave it at 0 but can't remember what default was. setting is saved per project like SR, tuning, sync etc so i make sure i have it at 0 in all my templates.