Thread: How are you metering your mix?

Here is a free metering plug-in:
http://www.solid-state-logic.com/music/X-ISM/index.asp

Excellent tutorial by Fab Dupont on metering and more. Its costs a few bucks but its well worth it.

Recording Levels - PUREMIX

Originally Posted by bigtree

.....
RME gives The Totalyser to us for free ......

Sorry, gives it to whom for free?

I believe you need their driver and I'm assuming an RME interface. See DIGICheck
RME: Downloads

The issue with the visualization is when some engineer decides that the whole spectrum needs to be utilized at all times like that so called "mastering engineer" that we threw out of here a couple years ago. If the analyzer looks like brick then it isn't going to necessarily sound good. Of course this is just my opinion.

Audition has this feature built into it's mastering tools. I do utilize some of the generated information especially when combined with the phase display.

Well, its a good opinion John and one I definitely am much more aware of now than I was last year. Thanks to you indeed!

I never did follow that thread, was that part of the JP22 thread?

I use my meters to stay around -18dBFS and/or 0dBVU so the transients have plenty of room. I never used to but do now no matter what style of music.

But the world of Rock and Roll and Electronic music is so different when it comes to preserving the transients eh? The transients are valued less and actually get in the way. In fact with my experience, a snare designed for a lot of Pop music works better brick walled than one with all the transients unscathed.
If I am mixing a pop track and don't take those transients out of a snare, I will never get a pop sound and the track will never make the cut or grab the attention of the pop ear. You would have to turn the snare completely down in order for it to work and get any level out of it.


I definitely think everyone should spend time recording classical music. It is a serious reality check on transients and very educational.

The loudness war is forcing us to do terrible things to audio but on the other side of the coin, its part of our current sound, thus why the Transient Designer is such a useful tool.

I feel for the ME. I'm guilty of this all too and it wasn't until I spent time recording classical music like you, John, Wow, do I realize how important those transients are now!

I'm on a deep learning curve to better understand this all and how different kinds of music ( or sounds) need to preserve them and how others not so much. I used to think transients were our enemy and the more we could remove them the louder the track would be, thus, better Mastering and a better sound. But I have been in the Techno world for most of my life so this is all new to me.

Volume impresses people. A sure way to get a referral is to get a track louder than the kids on the block can do. So, these metering tools should help get as close to the mark no matter what style, I guess. Sequoia 12 has upgraded their metering so I'm doing some home work.

Things I'm discovering:
The less complicated music, the louder you can get it without it sounding like crap. Where as Rock and Roll, much more a challenge. And something I'm trying to understand but think I get it, is, electronic music can get really loud and it doesn't sound like the transients are even clipped off. I guess there isn't much of that information in electronic music but I didn't realize that all these years. And what a challenge blending acoustic music with electronically designed music. So we look for glue to blend this all together.

Digital music isn't very complicated in comparison the acoustic music. There are so many more colours to acoustic music and therefore, much harder to play the loudness war without us knowing something very wrong is happening. Wow...

Our current state of music is evolving this direction for a lot more reasons that maybe we are paying attention too. But I think I'm getting it. Maybe the new generation is actually following the club sound because it does sound better, brick walled at low amplification compared to complex acoustic music struggling to compete in the online world. Electronic music sounds much better compressed than acoustic music does. The digital world is really effecting more than we know.

that's my daily rant.

I have found the metering and analyzers in Adobe Audition to be more than adequate. You have the phase scope. You have the spectrum analyzer. You have numerous ways in which to tweak and view those along with the waveform display or spectral display. That along with your Peak and hold responding meter and metering. Why anyone needs more than that, I have no idea? So for just a couple of hundred bucks you not only have great program to utilize you have thousands of dollars of analyzers to view. I still have my 100 MHz Tektronix scope which I no longer need to use for phase display. I don't even need inexpensive real-time spectrum analyzer. I have VU meters on my console and peak meters in my software. It's all any engineer really needs even mastering engineers.

I have mastered just about everything in the recording realm.
Mx. Remy Ann David