Every tool can be used or abused. It's ultimately up to the person with their hands on the faders or the mouse.

I use Ozone all the time and have some great dynamic range in my music. It all depends of how much you lean on the compressors and limiters. Compression, like salt, in my opinion, goes a long way so use a little bit and keep the sound from getting squashed.

In recent years, after the infamous "loudness wars", the tendency is now moving in a more reasonable direction towards less compression and a wider dynamic range.

A good way to tell how much compression you are using is to use a wave editor that lets you see the wave "picture". Often it's hard to hear the compression unless you are really familiar with what it does to the music at the higher levels. So being able to see the finished wave can be very helpful. If the wave has flat tops... looks like a brick with very little open space in the wave and almost nothing peaking out if it, you have way too much compression. You want a wave that has peaks and valleys, and open space in it.

A nice limiting compression to smooth the stray peaks is fine to use. There is always a happy medium that can be achieved but it's up to you, the engineer to find that point.

I will often "print" a wave to see where my final settings are set regarding compression and limiting.

edit: You don't always need to use compression to get something loud. One of my louder tunes is not very compressed. Remember, the final product begins with the very first track you record. Be sure to get the process right, from the beginning and you won't need very much compression at the end.

Last edited by Guitarhacker; 08/14/17 05:53 AM.
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