Ron’s Blog

Mixes have definitely gotten louder in recent years. Of course there is no way that digital audio can go higher in level than full scale (0 dBFS), but the closer and more often a signal approaches 0 dBFS, then the louder it will sound. The tools for this are compression, limiting, and very careful watchful eyes and ears for clipping. The reason why mixes have gotten louder is because the equipment and software to make them so has become more common and more affordable, and more people know about it. The second is that mixes compete with each other for loudness. Take radio for example. Within the terms of a radio broadcaster’s license to transmit, they have to agree to a certain transmission power level. There is nothing that can be done at the radio station to make a signal any higher in level. This is the radio station’s equivalent of 0dBFS. But if mixes can be made subjectively louder in the studio, it follows that whoever’s mix is subjectively the loudest will sound loudest on air. Other mixes will be quieter in comparison. And loudness gets attention. The same applies in clubs. The level of a PA system is set to comply with the limits of the equipment, and often decibel limits applied by law or property rental agreements. So if a mix can sound subjectively louder within the same peak levels, it will be at an advantage compared to mixes that are not subjectively so loud. But the downside to this is that all the processes that make a mix loud downgrade the audio quality. So if you don’t want to listen so loud, it won’t sound so good. There is no area where this is more significant than music for TV and film use. If I am asked to ‘master’ your mixes and ‘optimize’ them for loudness, then you are damaging your audio quality to no good purpose. Your music is probably only going to be background anyway. For a title theme, then the post production house will optimize the levels as it thinks necessary. Although mastering is a straightforward process to apply, it is impossible to ‘unmaster’ a track. Best advice is to make a mix without any compression or limiting on the stereo mix and maybe some EQ if you wish. Also, your mix should be about 3 db down from your highest peaks in the song. This is a good starting point that recommend to my clients prior to mastering there project. This way you always have a clean, unmastered version of the mix that is versatile and can be applied to any kind of use.

There’s been a bit of talk lately about acoustic room treatment and whether or not it makes a considerable difference. I will try to clarify this as best as I can, so we will start with a few simple questions.
Why should I acoustically treat my recording and mixing area?
There are four primary goals of acoustic treatment: 1) To prevent standing waves and acoustic interference from effecting the frequency response of recording studios; 2) to reduce modal ringing in small rooms and lower the reverb time in larger studios, churches, and auditoriums; 3) to absorb or diffuse sound in the room to avoid ringing and flutter echoes, and improve stereo imaging; and 4) to keep sound from leaking into or out of a room. That is, to prevent your music from disturbing the neighbors, and to keep the sound of passing trucks from getting into your microphones. Yes, it’s true! Not only can a room’s acoustics affect your recording, but it can also have an impact on how much sound is transmitted from and/or into the room. This is why it’s important to employ some form of acoustic treatment; to protect the sound you’re working so hard to create.
Once the sound is transmitted into your room, you’ll have two main considerations to address: absorption and diffusion.
What is Diffusion.
Dedicated diffusion panels will help to diffuse waves which might otherwise be bouncing around the room and cause early reflections and phase issues during critical listening periods and recording sessions.
Bass Absorption.
The thicker and more solid the walls are, the more likely you are to get a problem with bass frequencies (something to be aware of when sound proofing ). Reverberation, the ‘dying away’ of a sound, is natural to music. Most music is designed to be performed in a reverberant space – military band music being an obvious exception. When you make a recording, you need to be able to judge how much reverberation is on the recording. Excess reverberation in the room will color your judgment. Another problem with reverberation in the studio control room is that the frequency response of the room itself may not be flat. More than likely, there will be more reverb at bass frequencies. This will make you think that a recording has more low end than it actually does.
So where do you start?
A rule of thumb in basic acoustic design is live-end/dead-end. If you look around your room and all the walls have hard, live surfaces — that’s going to contribute greatly to a “boxy” sound. Pick a wall, whatever you might call the “front wall” and put absorbing material on at least 50% of the wall — especially in the middle section. The “material” could be anything from blankets to egg cartons to mattresses to carpet padding to bed padding to acoustical foam. One option I’d recommend is something like Sonex Classic. You can buy 2″ x 2′ x 4′ Panels. They come eight sheets to the box for $169, which covers 64 square feet. For a low cost bass trap, I’d recommend the Auralex 2” corner fills. All this takes a little bit of money and a bit of time and tweaking, but considering that the room is really the most important source of how everything recorded in it will sound — it’s worth spending a couple of hundred bucks [or less] and part of a day to get a good-sounding room. You’ll thank yourself in the long run, and your end product might reflect your efforts, and will provide me with great mix’s to master your CD from.
Ron

In many Professional CD mastering and recording studios you will see studio control rooms with full-sized loudspeakers. Some with 15″ woofer driven bi amped 3 or 4 way speaker systems. Many control rooms are very large and are designed to use this type of monitoring properly. This type of monitoring environment is still used today in professional recording and mastering studios. With current speaker technology, and the increase in home and project studio popularity, smaller speakers have become more popular. These so-called “nearfield monitors” are designed to be able to somewhat accurately recreate the sound of the music in a smaller environment with the speakers placed more closely to the “sweet spot”. That said, many commercial, home and project studios still do not use them properly. If one is going to go to the considerable expense of buying nice speakers one should also put out the comparatively small effort of using them properly and get the best performance from them.
Stereo Speaker Placement
Nearfield speakers, as the name implies, are meant to be listened to from a closer range than common speakers. Typically nearfields are within 6 feet of the listeners ears. The speakers, in an optimal situation, will form a perfect triangle with the two speakers and the listeners head. If the right speaker is 6 feet from your right ear, the left should be 6 feet from your left ear and the two speakers should be six feet apart. Once you have that situated properly, it’s time to deal with height. I am unsure if this is a rule or just my experience and habit, but I personally place the speaker upright tweeter over woofer and have the tweeter as close to level with my ear as possible since the tweeter is the high frequencies, as they disperse less and die quicker than the low frequencies. Now there is the small matter of what to set them on. I will get in to the details of what works best after I say this: Whatever you set them on, make sure it’s the same for both of them. As we all know, different substances have different properties for absorbing vibrations and sound. Therefore, you want them both on the same surface. Setting them directly on your desk or any furniture like that is usually what happens, and it does work, but it’s not the best answer. This is problematic because if the full bottom surface of the speaker is resting on the desk a lot of vibration is then transmitted through the speaker and into the desk and will throw off your monitoring. Try to isolate the monitor from the rest of the room by absorbing vibration before it creates a problem. You can do this by using speaker stands. Make sure you set them to the correct height and distance from your mix position. You may want to fill the speaker columns with sand to help with sound vibration and to keep them stabilized. I use lead pellets or “buckshot” that is available at a gun shop or at a sporting goods store. This may be a little less messy then using sand. There are some things you can do much quicker, and less expensive. Putting any sort of small “feet” on your speakers, rubber pads or the little felt sticky things people put on chair and table legs that sit on wood floors can help minimize contact between the speaker and the surface it’s resting on, as well as absorbing vibration. Try some of these techniques . I know that they will improve your speaker performance.