Just for the record.


I never... well let's just say, rarely.... I rarely use numbers to determine my levels. I record the track and look at the wave forms.

This is my normal looking track view. The waveforms are 75% or more of the track. If they are more like straight lines, they were too weak and get recorded again after I adjust the input level up. It's rare that I overload anything I record because I have the max input levels set in my interface's software control panel front end.



DUST ON THE FLOOR



This is a screen shot closeup of the vocal from another studio. Notice the "overs" starting around the center and going to the right (forward) from that point. The interesting thing is that listening to this, the over's don't seem to wreak to much havoc in the tune. I try to avoid this kind of thing in my studio, but there's very little control over stuff that comes in the door.




IN A WORLD WITHOUT YOU

I included the links to the songs I referenced so you can hear the results.


The way I determine my levels is by looking at the wave forms and also by observing the meters as I'm in playback mode and record mode. I adjust levels to stay out of the red. An occasional red blink is OK but I do not want to have constant red showing up in either mode. I look at the outputs and then after a render or export, I look carefully at the final wave to see how many peaks are touching 0dB both in the original wave and in the converted MP3 file.

Just for grins, I set my levels up a bit and exported this. This is what I don't want to see.


You can find my music at:
www.herbhartley.com
Add nothing that adds nothing to the music.
You can make excuses or you can make progress but not both.

The magic you are looking for is in the work you are avoiding.