bouncing tracks do you lose fidelity?

versuviusx · Post by **versuviusx** » Fri Oct 26, 2007 5:48 pm

hi
ok so i'm just wondering when you bounce a track do you lose fidelity? do you lose anything? i know when you save a pic in photoshop over and over again you lose information. it's compressing and compressing it over and over again and you lose data when you do this. so i was wondering if bouncing does the same thing. if so is there a way i can bounce without losing information. it's something i'm really interested in.

squizo · Post by **squizo** » Fri Oct 26, 2007 7:18 pm

yes

that divisory math is dangerous shit!

"friends dont let friends mix in the box"
-Jack Rock

@?,*???&? · Post by **@?,*???&?** » Fri Oct 26, 2007 7:24 pm

Some will tell you this is psycho-acoustic. Some will tell you it is real. Flipping phase on an exact duplicate at exactly the same level should put your fears to rest- or perhaps not. If it's the latter result. Be scared. Very, very scared.

Ultimately use your ears.

I am in the middle of a fairly complicated mix right now and Audiosuiting tracks is one of my only options at this point without having to keep pulling one track out the session to bounce a track with multiple plugins and then re-import the just removed track. With this damn LE system, I've only got 32 available. I'd rather be mixing on an SSL, but the band can't afford it.

ashcat_lt · Post by **ashcat_lt** » Fri Oct 26, 2007 7:42 pm

You're talking ITB, no?

Most daws don't compress by default. A lot of them nowadays will let you, if you want. Usually when I bounce I'm bouncing to some form of uncompressed .wav file. That .wav should be the exact same thing you're hearing out of your DAC. Plugins and other processes which run floating point math are forced to round off at some point, but that's got to be at the mix bus at the latest, right? If your output wave uses less of the available bits then the original then you'll lose some resolution which won't be able to be regained.

All of this is still much better than the degredation of bouncing tracks on tape (which itself can be negligible when done correctly).

BTW - you shouldn't lose any information in photoshop either, as long as you're working with non-compressed files and not changing resolutions.

b3groover · Post by **b3groover** » Fri Oct 26, 2007 11:32 pm

versuviusx wrote:hi
ok so i'm just wondering when you bounce a track do you lose fidelity? do you lose anything? i know when you save a pic in photoshop over and over again you lose information.

What?

That would only be true if you were a) saving to a lossy format like jpeg and b) saving the file, closing it in Photoshop, then re-opening it and working to work on it again and closing it and re-opening it after every time you saved (to a lossy format). Which would be dumb and a waste of time.

Vogon · Post by **Vogon** » Sat Oct 27, 2007 3:46 am

But, AFAIK if you had *any* process - including a volume change of any amount you will get a cumulative (if at first - tiny) degradation.
I can not think of a scenario one would need to do *that* many bounces though - or the point at which one may be able to discearn a change.

One *may* be able to do a quick test by chaining a load of busses, alternating each with a small attenuation, then boost, 'till by the last one you match the original.
You may be able to either A/B and hear the degradation, or blend and flip the last bus's signal polarity to "highlight" the differences.

zesbez · Post by **zesbez** » Sat Oct 27, 2007 11:31 am

Forget science, use your ears and the answer is yes. Flip the phase and it probably cancels but A/B and you'll hear a lose of depth. There's more to sound than a sound wave.

inverseroom · Post by **inverseroom** » Sat Oct 27, 2007 12:39 pm

zesbez wrote:Flip the phase and it probably cancels but A/B and you'll hear a lose of depth.

I'm not totally sure, but I think just maybe that makes no sense whatsoever.

mjau · Post by **mjau** » Sat Oct 27, 2007 1:02 pm

zesbez wrote:There's more to sound than a sound wave.

It could be the muscle relaxants I'm on today, but I'm pretty sure this makes no sense either.

A-Barr · Post by **A-Barr** » Sat Oct 27, 2007 2:03 pm

You are probably recording at 24 bits. If you are lowering the volume and summing and bouncing them, you would think that you would be losing bit depth, but most modern programs reserve up to 40 bits for internal processes like these so I think you are ok. Wouldn't hurt to test though, bounce a track like 20 times and compare. Sounds like a fun afternoon...

zesbez · Post by **zesbez** » Sat Oct 27, 2007 2:12 pm

What I'm saying is that you can have two files that are identical enough to cancel each other but one might sound "deeper" than the other.

Jeff White · Post by **Jeff White** » Sat Oct 27, 2007 2:41 pm

zesbez wrote:What I'm saying is that you can have two files that are identical enough to cancel each other but one might sound "deeper" than the other.

Identical is Identical is Identical.

inverseroom · Post by **inverseroom** » Sat Oct 27, 2007 3:35 pm

ipressrecord wrote:
zesbez wrote:What I'm saying is that you can have two files that are identical enough to cancel each other but one might sound "deeper" than the other.
Identical is Identical is Identical.

Right. If they cancel, they're identical. If they're not identical, there will be artifacts. Right? That's just nonsense. If they're different, they won't cancel.

Vogon · Post by **Vogon** » Sat Oct 27, 2007 4:33 pm

inverseroom wrote:Right. If they cancel, they're identical. If they're not identical, there will be artifacts. Right? That's just nonsense. If they're different, they won't cancel.

OK, I hope I'm not misinterpreting everyone here, but:
The theory is, that you will hear the *difference* between the tracks, which is actually a process I've heard of being used a lot to varify audio-artefacts.
In this instance, any "rounding-errors" wiil be deviations along the waveform. Once the original is subtracted, you get just the deviation.
You don't just get cancellation or no cancellation. Sound or no sound.

So much for "forgetting science" Zesbez!

carlsaff · Post by **carlsaff** » Sat Oct 27, 2007 4:50 pm

The phrase "identical enough" is about as valid as the phrase "more off."

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