Wavepad questions

personally I would not "normalize" the project, but use compression and limiting tweaking to get the volume levels where I want them.

I have a couple of T-racks plugins and I like to use them, but personally I prefer using ozone for final "home mastering" myself.

I tend to export my final MIXED project to a stereo wavefile at 32bit/44.1kHz, then import into a NEW project in sonar and use final compression, limiting and reverb as desired for "mastering" - but ever since I got Ozone, I tend to use it pretty much exclusively for that purpose and not t-racks or other "mastering" type plugins.

I am not saying that normalizing it is wrong, either, tho.  it's just not something I think is necessary.  I prefer to control the volume with sliders, compression and limiting.

Bobby, 

Do some research, and get a few good books to read and study. Knowing what is happening to the music as you adjust a knob or a slider on a piece of hardware or even in the software versions really helps you to understand what is happening and more importantly why it even needs to happen. 

Most folks know that you can use a compressor to increase the volume of a given track. And that is true. But understanding exactly what it is doing to the wave to make the volume increase is what really matters. 

With everything in life, to get one thing, you must be willing to give up something else. Very rare to encounter a "have your cake and eat it too" sort of situation. And this is especially true with digital music. You can get the volume, but the question is, do you know what you are giving up to get the volume? And then is it worth the trade off? 

Compression, EQ, Reverb, you name the effect, this also applies to gear... monitors, subs, big, little with, without.....there is always a dark lining to every silver cloud. 


A good book I recently obtained and read is : Mike Senior's book, Mixing Secrets for the small studio. 

He treats the subjects with a bit of humor to keep it interesting. And he starts with listening.... the monitors we all use, benefits and drawbacks... on compression ...Chapter 9 Compressing for a reason....  10 beyond compression  11 EQ for a reason  12 beyond eq.... I found this book to be very useful. 

I've been in and around music and have known much of this stuff for years..... but I learned and relearned quite a bit from reading it. 

Now... I start again reading and studying the chapters.  First time was a quick read, now, go slowly and squeeze the juices out. 

Not just this book.... there are many out there to explain the same stuff...... point is,  get a good one and study it. 


The first 4 chapters are all about listening to your mix....and focus primarily on the monitors we ALL use in home studios. I learned things in those 4 chapters that I really had no clue about. I now look at the listening aspect totally different. I now understand more of the dynamics that are going on in the listening environment.