Recording Vocals

[chris carter]

At 24bits, tracking at -18 is using 21bits. That’s a lot of bits in fixed bit storage. It’s also an insane dynamic range (126dB) and signal to noise ratio (120db). Bits is not the problem. When recording at 16bits, then it DOES become an issue because -18 is only 13 bits, which is 1/16th of the resolution and also a dynamic range of only 78dB and a signal to noise ratio of (gasp) 72dB.

So it’s not the bits.

The problem, without getting toooo far into things is.
1) The converters. You lose linearity toward the top of the converter on both A/D and D/A (but more so on A/D). That’s obviously not good. As well, the analog portion of the converters tend to crap out there. It’s not uncommon in cheaper converters to have the analog stage clip BEFORE you even hit -0dBFS. It’s becoming less of a problem as time goes on, but older converters are culprits and cheaper converters are culprits. Certainly an Mbox is a big culprit.

2) A lot of plugins don’t handle those levels very well. This is slowly changing and it’s less of an issue these days, but unless you have gotten under the hood of every plugin you are going to use, you can run into problems.

3) If you plan on incorporating outboard gear into your mixes, you can get screwed tracking hot. If you are tracking at -6dBFS that’s +12 in the analog world (!!!!!!). A lot of analog gear starts to get a little crunchy up there even if it specs for that hot of an input level.

4) If you track everything that hot, then you are going to have to pull every fader down when you mix, which although it isn’t a super big deal with floating point DAWs, it can cause other headaches in more complicated mixes with lots of routing. You would have to apply a trim or do a gain process on all your tracks when you mix, which is a silly waste of time when you could just do things right in the first place.

Bottom line, it sounds better to track at the lower levels. The recorded parts will sound better and the mix process will sound better.

Tracking “hot” was something that was absolutely necessary in the analog tape days. It was less important during the 16 bit recording days. And it’s pretty much pointless in the 24 bit recording days. But old habits die hard….

[mojobone]

Have we asked the OP if his meters are reading peak or average?

[chris carter]

Good point.

I'm personally referring to peak readings "in context". In other words, I don't worry about a few rogue transients that might hit -6dBFS once in a blue moon for the most part unless they cause audible problems.

Honestly, the first thing I do when I get a record to mix that wasn't done by a good tracking engineer is go through and trim every dang track down. Understanding gain staging was something that people were FORCED to learn back in the analog days because pathetic s/n ratios were so dang unforgiving. With the flexibility of modern digital systems, it's not quite as mission critical as it used to be, but it's still very important and too many people have really fallen asleep at the wheel - and then they wonder why their can't make their recording sound like the latest wiz-bangery on the radio.

[rnrmachine]

That's what I said and meant... as far as the peaks go... a few rogue transients. The absolute peaks. He isn't compressing during recording so there is no doubt a few.

At least we got that cleared up... because I was like.. how friggin quiet do you record?!!! Back in the old tape days it'd barely leave a mark on the tape from what I was thinking you record at.

There is NO way anyone is getting a constant signal at -18 if your peaking at -15 and forget compression you would need a friggin brick wall limiter or an awesome compressor set to emulate a brick wall limiter. ROFLMAO... unless you're recording something SLIGHTLY more dynamic then a sine wave. HAHA Chris, if Mojo hadn't jumped in I would have thought you were a B+llsh+ting idiot to be completely honest. SO in other words a few rogue transients at -6 is exactly what Kieth was implying as far as I am concerned, because that is the peak... and what we both meant.. the highest rare moments peaking around -6 is good.

And Mojo... I presumed he meant peak... no one talks in RMS when talking about the highest level being up near -15 to -6. But what I am saying as far as getting the best recorded signal possible you want the RMS as high as possible on digital. But I am NOT implying you should squash it. I am talking normal light compression recording. Anyway, thnx for jumping in here.. you saved us a lot of grief.

Chris, I completely agree with you that too many people record entirely too hot when they have a compressor or a limiter to use. BUT turning a recorded track down when you go to mix is something that you should commonly come across when someone has recorded a strong clean professional signal. Unless of course it is something extremely quiet... RARE occasions when the source was too quiet to boost anymore and still have the optimal clean signal with proper gain staging like you mentioned. Sounds to me like we're on the same page, you just left out the fact that you weren't allowing for rare peaks which I am sure Kieth, and I know I was factoring in. That caused the misunderstanding.

Rob