Normalize or Compress First?

compression then normalization on the entire track or vise versa?

Really? OK I will try out compression only and try to put as much signal on the track as I can up front.

ORIGINAL: Al

just get close to the level that you need ( somehwhere less than 0db .. -3dB is fine if you are sending it to a mastering studio..if not - just use around -0.2 dB as your limit)

so that even with the master volume on the SC-55 turned up all the way as an input to my Delta 1010, I'm not getting as much signal as I'd like for the final wave file.

so I normalize to get it to 0dB then I back it off using -3dB increments to get some headroom

ORIGINAL: guitardood

THERE IS NO NOTICABLE DEGRADATION BY NORMALIZING!!!!!!!

See this thread, then call cakewalk and ask them to please post a stinking response and put this ridiculous issue to bed once and for all.





Sorry for the steam:)

- Guitardood

ORIGINAL: guitardood

THERE IS NO NOTICABLE DEGRADATION BY NORMALIZING!!!!!!!

See this thread, then call cakewalk and ask them to please post a stinking response and put this ridiculous issue to bed once and for all

ORIGINAL: daverich

hmm, I think you've got the wrong end of the stick here.

"First up, any digital gain change will introduce quantisation errors to the audio being processed. "

hmmm - you're not doing any samplerate changes or anything weird and wonderful, merely changing the volume - the problem with normalizing it you are also normalising the noise level - for no benefit.

"It is good practise to try and do as few gain changes as possible and, when needed, do it with the best tools available. But one shouldn't get to obsessed with this. At 24bit, a small gain change will not be noticable. A bit of compression well done will probably have more benefits than negative effects on the audio. Lets not throw the baby out with the bath water ..."

Im sorry but compression is going to destruct far more than normalising ever will - Normalising is merely a volume change, compression adds distortion and processes the signal in a much more complex way.

"Secondly, there is no real inherent difference between processing your sound with compressors/limiters + normalising at the end and using a plugin that combines these processes (Think L1, L2, L3, Elephant). They effectively do the same thing. "

Master limiters don't normalise - they compress/limit/distort - but in a fairly transparent way - the two processes are completely different. Normalising won't effect your dynamics at all.

"Another thing to consider is that high-end plugins that combine several functions will usualy keep the audio at the higher sampling rate or bit depth in between these processes. So there won't be unnecessary downsampling or bit depth convertion being applied in between. But as with the gain changes, try and use the best tools sound wise and don't get too obsessed as to miss the big picture."

True but again, has nothing to do with normalising.

"So back to the question, normalise as the very last step reguardless of wether this is done manualy or automaticly by a plugin. And try to normalise to something like -0.5dB. This will let (really) old CD players read the disks and will allow for overshoots in the D/A converters (often caused by clipped material)."

Normalising is not compression, nor is it limiting. It merely makes the audiowave louder so that the biggest peak is 0db.

Limiting will chop the peak so it can go louder.

Limiting and then normalising makes no sense - in that scenario you've used your limiter to crush the wavefile, and then normalised it up - just limit with a reasonable signal going in - if it's still not making 0db then it's set up wrong.

"If your material is going to be mastered by a pro, don't do anything. Just get as good a mix as possible and don't do any processing on the final mix."

yup true.

I hope you don't take offense at this but I remember being confused about the process myself years ago when I used to normalise every audio take right after recording.

I am not comparing to normalising in this paragraph. I am refering to all the gain changes that compression introduce and thus the quantisation errors. I am saying that with good tools, the quantisation errors are insignificant compared to other benefits. (Assuming the compression has benefits on this particular material. That all depends on what you are doing).

ORIGINAL: michael japan
you might want to consider doing a sub mix of the kick and bass (bounce them down first) and really tuning into the eq and fatten them up.

Which makes more sense, compression then normalization on the entire track or vise versa?

ORIGINAL: jardim do mar

normalization can be used for matching the volumes of two or more audio tracks,you must understand the differences between peak mode and RMS mode/power , using normalization in rms mode will achieve better results ,,,

ORIGINAL: Andy C

Sorry I may have got this wrong. I think Plugin's a (and hence Sonar ) use Double for there representation of float, so thats 11-bit exponent, 52-bit mantissa much bigger than I suggested.

Here is a simplified example: You have a sample with the following 16 bit FP value (yeah I'm lazy ;): 0.10000001 exponant 1. Now halve the volume of that sample. What do you get? 0.050000005 same exponant (1).

Again I don't think so. Excuse me if I get the maths a little wrong but your first number should be 0.10000001 Exp 0, the second is 0.50000005 Exp-1. It really depends on the accuracy of the internal FPU or procedure.

Andy