Peter Rabbit
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Bit Depth
If I'm working on a project where all the tracks have been recorded at a bit depth of 16, is there any point to mixing the project with a bit depth of 24?  Thanks, Pete
"Creating a bad song takes just as much time and energy as creating a good one. The problem is that you don't know it's a bad song until someone tells you, and by then it's too late." P. Rabbit
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Beagle
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RE: Bit Depth
2007/02/15 11:39:31
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If ALL tracks are recorded at 16 and you have no need to record any MORE tracks, then I would say NO, leave the project in 16. however, if you plan to add ANY more tracks, then I would change to 24bit and record the new track in 24.
if all tracks are already recorded in 16, then all you'd be doing is adding 0's to the top of the stack of each sample, then removing them when you dither down to 16 for the wave export.
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Peter Rabbit
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RE: Bit Depth
2007/02/15 12:12:25
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Thanks Beag, That's what I was thinking but I just needed confirmation. I never really studied much about Sample rate and Bit depth. Two years ago, when I first started learning about digital recording, I read somewhere that you should know what media your final product is going to be distributed on and then use those settings from the start. For example if your song is going to eventually be distributed on CD then you should use the settings for standard CD format which is Sample rate 44,100 and Bit depth of 16. I really don't remember where I read that but I definately remember reading it. So all this time that's what I've been doing. It wasn't until this morning when I was reading The Mixing Engineer's Handbook, and then reading a lot of posts in the Cakewalk forums, that I began to really understand more about Bit depth and the benefits of recording and mixing with a Bit depth of 24. I've been using my latest project, (the one I sent a rough mix to you a couple of months ago), as a practice project while learning new mixing methods and techniques that I've been studying. However all the tracks in that project were recorded at a 16 Bit. Oh, well. I'm not going to re-record everything for this project. I'll just continue as is and on my next project I'll start recording and mixing at a 24 bit depth. Anyway, thanks again.  Pete
"Creating a bad song takes just as much time and energy as creating a good one. The problem is that you don't know it's a bad song until someone tells you, and by then it's too late." P. Rabbit
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Beagle
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RE: Bit Depth
2007/02/15 12:23:29
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Wow! Yeah, I completely agree with the handbook, 24bit is best to record in, then mix down to 16. the place that you read which told you to start at 16 was in the minority! but it is a highly debated topic, nonetheless.
I agree with your conclusion, tho, don't change it now, but in the future, I'd record everything at 24 first.
did you make any more changes to that song? did you post it on soundclick? I never did go look...that was a pretty cool song.
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Peter Rabbit
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RE: Bit Depth
2007/02/15 12:53:49
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did you make any more changes to that song? did you post it on soundclick? I didn't make any changes to the original tracks in the song but I've torn the mix down and rebuilt it about 20 times. LOL I've really been studying the details of the "art" of mixing because, even though I held a basic concept of mixing, my mixes seemed to fall far short from the pros and I want to get really good at this. I haven't posted the song yet. I want to finish reading this book and experimenting with things first. Then I have to take some continuing education classes next week (not related to audio recording). After that I'll do one last mix and then post the completed song. Thanks again, Pete
"Creating a bad song takes just as much time and energy as creating a good one. The problem is that you don't know it's a bad song until someone tells you, and by then it's too late." P. Rabbit
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Beagle
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RE: Bit Depth
2007/02/15 13:14:47
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