"Always Leave 6dB Headroom For Mastering"
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- Опубліковано 26 вер 2024
- In which I explain why the video title is a myth, why you should leave some headroom anyway, and how best to achieve that.
If you like this type of content and you want to see it more often, consider signing up for Channel Membership: / @danworrall
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Mediocre teachers make simple ideas complicated. Truly clueful teachers, like Mr. Worrall, make complicated things simple.
Watch his mastering tutorial and you'll see Dan talks shit at Times, too.
@@sakegroelle3040could you name an example?
@@sakegroelle3040 Yeah, I would too like to see some substantiation on your otherwise empty words.
K
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@@redbigapplefloppa302 he can't, bc he believes in magic probably, like analog dogcrap.
Difference between Dan and other UA-cam teachers is that he’s not a gatekeeper, he wants people to have a proper understanding, beware of gatekeepers that will try to confuse you and make things seem more complicated than they are because they simply want to make the process seem harder and in turn make themselves seem more knowledgeable.
Exactly, look no further than most music theory. Instead of explaining musical concepts on the basis of C Major, where modes and other concepts are easy to understand through the piano interface (“white keys”, Lydian is just the same scale, but with F as the root etc), they go out of their and use examples on e.g. A Major, and thrn say Lydian is when you raise the 4th degree by halfstep) - now you seemimgly have to learn a ton of different scales, and the relation is unclear etc.
The difference between Dan and other UA-camrs is Dan actually knows what he's talking about, beware anyone who is content creator.
@@myyoutubeprofile-c3uand even when he doesn't know, he is humble about it and admits and corrects mistakes. The greatest teachers are usually also the ones willing to learn from others and in turn improve their craft and future teachings. Truly one of the best.
excellent observation
Reminds me Einstein’s quote: if you can’t explain it to a 6 year old, you don’t understand it either!
I've been arguing about this with people for YEARS and new people are still wrong about it. Especially turning down the master fader, I swear some people think their DAW is going to explode if they touch the master fader.
I tried it and have the scars to prove it. A week in hospital and months of rehab. Don't do it!
@@lambd01d I lost my kidney and right hand after doing it!
The trick is to map the master to a synth gain pot. Now you are “reducing the synth gain” to “cool down” the mix and everybody is back to pretending they understand.
Not the sacred fader! NOOOOO!
Meanwhile all the pros are not only touching the master fader, they are automating it too! xD
I'm a mastering engineer. Agree with everything. I ask for un-dithered floating point files and don't care AT ALL about level.
Literally the first thing I'm going to do is gain it up or down to hit my gear appropriately, even before i first listen to it with everything in bypass.
This could be a regular, short-form video series, where Dan calls bollocks! on popular audio myths 🤣👍
Yes, please!
it could even be called "Dan calls bollocks!"
It's amazing how many things are just repeated parrot fashion without thinking about it. I've had this argument with people multiple times, and they wouldn't accept the linearity of PCM audio, or that it could be dealt with by the receiver as long as it's definitely not distorted... which I've always been careful about. And most of these people were more qualified than me in terms of actual on paper qualifications.
I don't think 6db is going to make a difference. Theoretically, though, if you impose a reduced dynamic range upon yourself, you're effectively bit-crushing your mix. Downsampling in PCM is linear but downsampling followed by upsampling wouldn't be--except in the unlikely, program-dependent case of the source already being simple enough to be fully described in the lower precision space.
Again, 6db isn't going to make a difference but if you were really concerned about it, you'd also need to make sure to use 24 bits per sample instead of 16.
@@steamer2k319 ohhh thats a good point
I think knew all of this, but it's very comforting to hear the David Attenborough of mixing youtube confirm it for me.
I always wondered about those mastering engineers who are unable to adjust a simple gain control.
As a fellow Brit I love the use of the word “bollocks” it’s the perfect word to use lol. I’ve had similar discussions before about this and feel slightly vindicated lol. Magic as always Dan
Dan's delivery had so much conviction that I spit my coffee out in hysterical approval.
Not a brit, but I love that word, too, since the time I had an English girlfriend 😊
Bollocks is such a great word. I don't know whether the Sex Pistols had an influence on my delight with the word as a youth but I didn't forget to pack it when I emigrated !
Also a well known term in New Zealand 😆
The fact that I understood every word of this, including the stuff about dither, is testament to how much I have learned in the past fifteen years (as an amateur producer, not a career engineer). And mostly it's due to UA-cam, particularly excellent channels like this one. Many thanks for the valuable guidance over the years, Dan!
Always made me confused when my teachers would say this in school. I’d think “why don’t they just turn it down? Or up?”
From one working engineer to another, THANK YOU FOR SAYING THIS.
"i tried lowering all my channel faders, but it changed my mix" "wich kinda makes me wanna scream".... im on the floor bruh😂😂😂
Geez thank you! I tried explaining this to so many people so many times... but folks tend to just repeat things without ever understand the "why".
Really good point !
I think you've forgotten the case of ProTools where, if you have processing on the master bus, the master fader is pre processing... So lowering it changes the sound for "non linear processing"
However, you can lower the output of the latest plug-in in the chain
"The industry standard" 😒
I wrote the same thing, deleted my comment to like yours instead hehe. A mastering engineer automated a fade out on a song of mine with the master fader in pro tools, it was immediately obvious when I got the master, transients and levels where changing as the volume went down 😅
@@RoomieOfficial Yep, the trick in ProTools for fade-out is to use a "Trim" plug-in after all the processing and automate the gain
That’s why you always set up your own 2Bus in Protools, and use mix bus processing on that track instead of the master
@@jonnyoh4731 yeah that, or Mikael’s option above with a trim plugin! There’s some jankiness with the delay compensation in PT when using layers of aux channels though, for that and other reasons I ended up switching DAWs
Aaaaaaaand that's settled!
I love your shorter video format as much as the deep dives, Dan! Keep'em coming!!
Many were spared hours of hassle in less than 3 minutes.
Thank you so much, Dan! Nobody, keeps it simple and to the point like you. And for this specific topic, for which many others have had videos run over 10 minutes at least, this is priceless.
I’ve definitely intuitively thought this was correct and never understood the logic of leaving a lot of headroom for mastering. Glad to hear it confirmed.
I enjoy when someone speaks intelligently and knowledgably about mixing! It makes it easier to learn!
Every time I watch one of Dan's video tutorials, I go back upstairs, check my last mix, try and think... yep he's right again.
what an incredible teacher, thank you Dan
Simple tip but timely (for me) and reassuring - Thanks Dan
As someone who has received mixes for mastering that leave plenty of headroom, I can attest that it does make my job easier if I know nothing is clipping throughout the mix
Same here. Without overexplaining, it definitely saves time
@@isc4915 Just turn it down. You can automate turning it down to any fixed db level. If the thing is hitting over true peak then ok maybe send it back if you can actually hear it
@@eithafol7742 it's much easier to establish -6 requirement once than to send it back every other time and explain it to clients, isn't it? Why do so many people not value their time?
@@checktheneckBecause it literally takes two seconds to find out if a submitted mix is clipping these days.
Anyway, part of mastering is essentially being a new set of ears on the mix. So actually you should be requesting changes if at all possible when necessary before going any further. Plus the chances that the mix is poor to start with when there’s clipping will be quite high.
So yeah, not sure what time you’re saving here?
@@eithafol7742 if it doesn't clip in dBFS, there's no need to send it back, even if true peak goes over 0dB. True peaks may get clipped at the DAC, and there's no DAC involved in digital files.
Always cringe when I hear this one. Glad somebody trusted in the audio space is finally addressing it!
What I do is I route my whole project to a 'Pre-Master' channel, which allows me to set up a bus to A/B compare against a Reference Channel, since applying EQ or other effects to the Master would color and change an already mixed/mastered Reference. But not only does setting up a Pre-Master bus at the same level as a Reference channel before the final Master give me a whole extra channel worth of FX slots to double up for mastering, but it gives me one additional volume fader on the mixer for gain control. I can pretty much always add easy headroom back to my final master output without even touching anything on the Master channel. It's been a really useful mixer bus option for me since adding to my template.
Thanks for setting the record straight.
I'm so glad this video exists. As long as 20 years ago when I first got in to music I'd hear people utter this phrase all the time. I was perplexed. If there's no clipping, there's no problems right? And if it needs more headroom for the mastering tools to work correctly then you can just turn down the mix...right? After asking these questions no one could really give me a solid answer as to why I actually needed the mix to be at -6. Deep down I felt like I was right and I'm glad to finally have someone I respect like Dan chime in on this. I still mix to -6 to be on the safe side and to keep my interface outputs from clipping while I'm working, but I don't sweat it when I see the meter bounce a little high and I don't check for anything other than clipping when I send things to be mastered.
i guess we dont need to turn down the master if we stick to -6 db headroom
Thank you so much for this! Worried about this for ages and no answers till now!
Hi Dan. Lately i have heard and read some people confusing the terms of dB. They speak about dinamic range of a preamp (ej 140dB) and say that that is more than enough,because 120db is the threshold of pain. They are confusing the terms and i guess you are the right person to explain that. The difference between the dinamic range db and the spl db and the other dbs
I've only just begun to seriously try to learn how to track and mix through a DAW and although I do have some years of experience recording music as a musician I have only recently sat at the desk behind the glass as they say. I have always kept headroom on the master by turning down the master fader and when I saw over and over again people asking questions on the best ways to control headroom I started to think I was wrong in doing this! Thank you, thank you thank you! Just turn down your fader on the 2 bus folks!
I think I'm in love with this guy.
Dan, would love to see you tackle - if you haven’t already - the widespread notion that every mix/master should have a High Pass Filter knocking off app 20hz and below. I’ve seen one or 2 engineers make fairly convincing arguments, counter to the general online consensus, that this neither buys you more headroom nor bass clarity and due to the inherent phase shifting of EQing can alter your entire mix in unexpected ways. (And for clarity’s sake talking not so much cutting side bottom signals but mid, or full stereo, ones).
Thanks
If it's a stereo filter: yes it's probably unnecessary in most cases. But also, the phase shift is unlikely to do any harm either.
If it's a mid or side only filter, then that can change your stereo image and you need to be a bit careful.
@@DanWorrall thanks for the quick response! Fair enough answer. Cheers
I think this highlights the distinction between two learning paradigms: we can learn so that we know what the tool we're using does, or we can learn to understand _how_ it does it..
OMG, all this time I never knew that I could just turn down the master fader! It was like somehow my brain conditioned me to not mess with the master fader.
You gotta love these. Need to see SHORTS & REELS with tips like this! 👍🏾 awesome channel
Ah, thank goodness - I've had this debate so many times, despite cascading overloaded channels into cristmas tree light territory, then returning to 100% nulling off the master fader - yes, but......
It's like you read my mind. I was literally JUST looking up this info this morning to understand glad to hear this.
If the mix sounds different when you're lowering the volume you need to upgrade your listening. It could also be that your ears are used to a higher volume and the difference is just in your head. Thanks, again, for talking sense in this world. I truly appreciate your videos.
Thankyou so much Dan. You’re giving more people than you know the chance to make so much more music better. You’ll never have the chance to listen to everything youve influenced in this life from all of your videos, but your mentorship online is such a helpful tool for people like me! I recommend you to every sound nerd friend I have
I just like to pick "any limit" I like to peak between 3 and 6 dB because it's usually easy to visualize using default tools
it comes from the old days of getting sent DAT tape for cutting lacquers. Lots of the old players used to shit themselves if you pushed them above that. And it just hung about like a bad smell. We used to hit the old players at -6db to stop it.
I have been saying this for a decade or so. People still seem mystified and therefore delighted to pass the fibs around amongst each other. Thanks for lending your staid voice to this matter.
:-)
Short but straight to the point, no nonsense rambling for 10 minutes
Thank you Dan for encouraging the use of a mastering engineer.
Any other Audiorelated UA-camchannel would have made this a 10+min Video with a sponsored segment and plenty of repetition and unnecessary gibberish.
Thank you for keeping it short and to the point.
Mr Worrall... = All Audio Jazz Simply - Simplified...
Speechless.....! 👍🥇
Worship Dan, who not only providing the best audio engineering tutorials but also sending the most enjoyable greetings to the internet audio bullsh*t.
And THIS is why Dan is such a great educator: honesty, dry humour and scarcasm. The sheer terror of people touching the master fader is baffling. It's a bloody fader, both on physical and virtual mixer, why do you think it's there? To tempt you into touching it but if you do you go to hell? 😜
You’re a legend for this one
Amen. I feel that there are too many UA-cam "experts" who have learned things by rote and rumor, rather than personal experimentation and understanding.
This is what I've always suspected. I feel such relief, by Daddy Dan Worrall talking about it.
Thank you thank you thank you for saying this!!! Too many artists don't respect much less understand what we mean when we say we need it to not clip for the best sound we can accomplish with your trackout!
Dan is the Plato of audio engineering.
This is absolutely not a technical requirement. It's just the easiest form to convey that the desired _dynamic range_ should have some headroom.
I see two basic scenarios: 1. The mix is already compressed to a sausage. Then the client just brings the master fader/compressor makeup gain to a level that satisfies this requirement. No harm done. 2. The mix has plenty of headroom. Then this requirement might prevent a client to reach for a limiter, thinking "Ok, it sounds fine but it's not ready as it's too quiet, let me limit it until It's loud enough."
Personally, I ask for -3dB in my "preparation" checklist, but it's not a hard requirement, just an additional safety measure.
Thanks for every upload you do, Dan! You're an inspiration of clarity and understanding in continually regurgitated landscape of UA-cam.
I am a mastering engineer and I tell people this all the time :)
Thanks Dan you just opened up my eyes
At the last one my instant guess was: TURN THE MASTER FADER DOWN.
I mean if we we'd be surgeries we'd probably not doing music.
Dan almost at 100k, so well deserved!
I believe the master fader in Pro Tools is pre insert ( for the master channel). So if you have any dynamics or volume dependent effect like saturation or analog emulatuon, that will change the sound of your mix. You can always use a Trim plug-in at the end instead of the fader. Maybr Pro Tools has created a post fader option on the master... right after the create a proper mid-side EQ that comes stock.
in pro tools the master fader inserts are POST fader.
@crismarxxx I think you are saying the same thing I am but just in a different way. I just double checked. The master volume fader feeds into the master inserts. Any changes in that fader's setting will change the levels feeding anything on the mastee bus. What I said was correct. I'm on Pro Tools Ultimate 2022.7.0 and have been a professional Pro Tools user since 1994. It has always been this goofy way for some reason.
Right Sir! Right! As always
Hi Dan
I don't really care about headroom. I care about the mix much rather. It should sound great! Always mix loud in order to check how it react at higher levels and did not collapse. Mixing with planty of headroom did not reveal all kind of problems the sound will get when maximizing. Great video! Thanks.
CTZ 🔥🔥🔥
@@Positive_Tea clip to zero! Oh yes! It's my boy Baphometrix. But no activity from him! I'm worried.
The sage has spoken!
YES! Thank you Dan. I thought it was only me who used the master fader.
I have two thumbs. I'd like to thumb up twice. But I can't. UA-cam should really give us two thumbs to click on. Even if it's alone for Dan.
Can't cry over spilled milk, but I REALLY wish I would have heard this wisdom 20 years ago. Regardless, thank you.
Ok. Fascinating, and very clear, thank you, i shall look for other videos by you explaining why/when we should use 16 bit, 24, 32 etc.
My two observations:
1: Yes, in ProTools pulling down the Master fader will change the mix IF YOU'RE USING THE INSERTS, since the master inserts are post fader by design ( unlike their analog counterparts), pulling the fader down will effectively alter the threshhold of any master bus compressor or other plug-in.
2: Yes, PCM audio is linear up to 0dBFS BUT the DAC is not, especially on cheap interfaces. For example if I mix for broadcast with an assumed reference level of -20dBFS=0VU=+4 dBu ( -18dBFS=0VU=+4dBu in Europe) and use the entire allowed dynamic range up to -2dB true peak then I need a DAC that has a max outputlevel of +22dBu, many prosumerlevel DACs do not meet this spec despite sporting pro-looking XLR outputs and can sound distorted on playback, depending on implementation.
If you leave 6dB headroom in a 16-bit file, congratulations you just worsened the noise floor (dither) by 6dB. This is why as a mix engineer you should always just send 24-bit dithered or 32-bit float files to your mastering engineer.
Thank you for saying this. I feel like I've been saying it for years but couldn't say it as well as you did.
The legend that is Dan Worrall strikes again!!! Thanks for this video!
I've always thought that if your mastering engineer can't trim down the gain of your mix, they shouldn't be mastering your mix.
Actually thinking it, not a good idea to debunk this, because it makes working out who -not- to work with so much easier.
Gee, so much useful information in less than 3 minutes 🙌
Oh my god I was thinking "but how do I stop my tracks from being so close to clipping and keep the mix?" and then he answered it so simply lmao. The master fader is something I've never touched and I honestly didn't even stop to think why not hahahahah.
I thought using 32 bit all the way throughout the project right until making the final distribution bundle was standard for years
I just make sure I keep all the channels below clipping, and then gain stage to whatever level I need my chain to be, which differs whenever I need to go through analog gear or not
from my experience, do whatever sounds best to you; modern software is well beyond capable enough for most musicians to relax and do their thing
Well now, that's settled!!
Thank you! I've been saying this for some time!
Incoming 4000 UA-camrs making this exact video but with a click bait title and a shock face thumbnail
Thx for keeping on pushing out info Dan! I hope you could clear this for me. One of my former teachers always said that if you didn't hit at least -6 dB FS because of bit depth you could listen to the bit turning on an off with the MSB & LSB stuff. Honestly I still haven't been able to listen to something that I would call bit truncation because the file didn't hit thos -6 dB FS.
No. Each bit provides 6dB of dynamic range. If you leave 6dB headroom in a 24 bit file you still have 23 bits of data. That's plenty.
I've always just used the master fader. seemed simple. turns out i was right for once!
Dan - I spat out me tea at the word "Bollocks". Cheers, man.
sadly even this video won't convince -6 dB believers, it just stuck and get reciprocated again and again.
Thank you for such clarification Dan❤
Solid, clear and factual.
Personally I mix with a good amount of headroom and then start to push my console fader up towards the end of the mix, I often like how the console sounds when the mix bus is driven a bit (depending on the mix obviously).
If I’m mastering for the client I might also clip my converters deliberately. I have a direct monitor feed from my sound card main input back out to the EXT input of my desk so I can monitor my input back in to the system post ADC.
If it is going out for mastering I won’t clip the converters, if it’s going to someone I don’t know I might pull the fader down a dB when exporting the print to not scare them but as most MEs I work with know me and my work I’m not too bothered about them thinking I know what I’m doing. 😂
I actually have some really nice vintage variable line attenuators on order so I can play more with driving my mix bus while choosing how hard to hit the converters.
This is such good clear information
I enjoy all of Dan's videos but this one really made me laugh.
Make sure to preserve the noise floor and limit the dynamic range, you know, for ambience, and so we can hit that normalize button and feel good about making it louder nao.
I had no idea it’s fine to just turn down the master fader if there’s some clipping. I’d always be upset turning down tracks that would change the mix. It makes so much sense, now.
I have sent to many clients here for this video... :D
It should be mentioned that if you're going to simply turn down the master fader, to first recognize that your inserts on the master in Pro Tools are POST-FADER. That means fader comes first, then the insert slot. That means if you're using a compressor on the 2-bus insert, that turning down your master fader will turn down the signal going into your compressor which can change your mix. I suspect Reaper isn't like this. Mastering or not, you might still be using a bus comp for mixing so it's important to mention for PT users.
FWIW, another reason that people use a submix in PT is that when they do their fade out at the end, the fade out doesn't cut the signal feeding into the master bus compressor. The comp is on a submix and that is being fed into the master, which is being turned down. I know most know this, but these comments are for newer folks who maybe didn't understand why and just went along with it.
Straight to the point💯
And, who ever disagree with Dan on this topic, should ask A. Scheps his opinion on this 😛
Hey Dan could you make a video on “true peak” and where the best place is to set your ceiling on a limiter
Thank you, I was genuinely beginning to think I'd missed something here with the amount of times I've heard this. Many such cases in music production I suppose 🤷🏻♂️
Mind blown. Again.😵💫
Thank you Dan!
If it's a standard meter -6 dBFS is probably quite close to 0 dBFS on a Trupe Peak meter so it might be a good advice for unexperienced people.
Inter sample peaks are very unlikely to be that high, especially in a mix that hasn't been limited yet.
Thank you Dan, I guess I kind of always knew that and wondered WTF?
r u my new teacher? subscribed
The master fader myth surely comes from the analog era, or from decades ago, when software might not have actually used 32 bit audio internally, so the clipping was baked in to the master channel. My first encounter with a real DAW was around 16 years ago, and this already wasn't the case, even back then.