Gain staging in Reason question

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mcatalao
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20 Oct 2021

NMN wrote:
15 Oct 2021
I'm working on gain staging a song at the moment and wondered if there was really any difference between adjusting the volume of the Rack Instrument vs adjusting the Gain (edit: not volume) on the mixer. It's all digital so I figure there isn't but I thought I'd ask.
Not in the case of an instrument outside of the channel.

There is an important difference if we talk about effects inside the mixer channel, gain in the mixer, defines the level that enters in your effects chain, the mixer eq, comp etc. So gain is pre everything, the fader is post everything. And the gain in a device, well it depends on if it is an input gain or an output gain. But that's imho the main difference. So gain will have an effect on what a compressor does, because of the threshold. Imagine you have a threshold of -10 and a signal clips at -13, if you want to compress 1,5 db, you could set up the threshold to -13 and a ration of 1:2. Or you could add 6 db gain, and keep the ratio at -10.

That being said, I prefer to use gain to set an initial level for each device in the mix, and control the final level with a selig gain in the end of my chain. I rarely touch the device's input and output levels and use selig gain for this. Usually I'll set the initial gain so that each channel peaks at -12 to -18 DBFS and work my mix from there. I like to mix clean and I try to have a cohesive clean sound from the beginning.

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Ottostrom
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20 Oct 2021

selig wrote:
20 Oct 2021
Ottostrom wrote:
20 Oct 2021

The Gain knob at the top of the mixer changes the volume BEFORE it goes to the insert fx, so this results in the same problem as adjusting the volume directly on the instrument itself. What you should do is to add a dedicated volume device (like Selig Gain) at the end of your insert fx chain and do all your volume automation on that device instead. This leaves your mixer faders open for adjustments throughout the mixing process.
But this only works if inserts are post dynamics (luckily the default). If you change this routing you’re back to the same problem as before. but the “fix” is to simply set levels (which is technically NOT “again staging”) BEFORE you add processing. ;)
True, but this is not a problem if you never use the dynamics section on the mixer!
I still think it's good practice to not do volume automation on the mix faders themselves. As you stated in another reply you could of course just raise the automation values when doing adjustments, but this could be a lot of clicking around if your automations are not just one singular clip which is rarely the case for me since I want to more easily see where the changes are happening in the sequencer. But to each their own :)

MuttReason
Posts: 339
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20 Oct 2021

selig wrote:
15 Oct 2021
NMN wrote:
15 Oct 2021
I'm working on gain staging a song at the moment and wondered if there was really any difference between adjusting the volume of the Rack Instrument vs adjusting the volume on the mixer. It's all digital so I figure there isn't but I thought I'd ask.
You're going to have to be more specific since there is more than one gain stage on each mixer channel.
You really don't have to gain stage as such in a digital mixer because each gain stage has exactly the same (huge) amount of headroom, unlike analog where each gain stage could have different noise floor and clip point.

With that in mind, these days I prefer to use a consistent PEAK level for all tracks. I emphasize PEAK because you can't do this using VU meters (like the channel meters, sadly). Important details: must use peak meters, must keep consistent peak level between all devices at all points/gain stages in the signal path, choose a peak reference level that works for you.

I use -12 dBFS peak level because it's the standard in Reason and it works with my average track count. If you routinely clip your mixes, use a lower number. If you routinely work with very small track counts (vocal/guitar demos, for example) you may choose higher levels.
There are three goals with this approach: avoid clipping audio when recording (by recording with the highest peaks hitting around -12 dBFS), leave headroom in the mix bus (you can't add a bunch of 0 dBFS files together and not expect the results to be over 0 dBFS), and always already know the level of every individual audio signal in your mixer (because it's peaking around -12 dBFS - always!). The first point is self explanatory, the second keeps you from chasing the master fader when adding tracks into the mix, and the third point lets you work quicker because you don't need to spend a lot of time setting up compressors etc because the levels coming into them are always the same. Make sense?

So yes, in this case while it is true "it's all digital" and you have a wide range of acceptable levels, you'll make your life a little easier if you are consistent (true for a lot of things in life). Spontaneity is great in lots of things in life, but if your mix bus spontaneously goes up to +100 dB it's a bad thing… ;)
Selig, isn't part of the problem here that Reason uses different (virtual) coloured LED segments in the various metering points across different devices and the SSL to indicate what are in fact the same levels? I'm away from Reason at the moment but from memory, don't some devices have green/yellow/red/clipping meters (eg line mixer) while the SSL mixer channels/other devices have green/red but no yellow and no clip light per channel/device? In other words, while the actual levels may be similar at each point in the chain, visually the metering representation is different depending on where you look? Apologies if I've not explained that clearly but I hope you get what I mean. I'm old school (green good, a bit of yellow OK, a lot of yellow too much, red bad) but that doesn't work uniformly across the rack and mixer IME. Net effect is I gain stage with my ears more than my eyes (as it were) and only really look for the clipping light at the final output stage (SSL main out in Reason DAW or Ableton Live main L/R out if using RRP in Live). Wouldn't this be easier if there was design consistency across the whole of Reason in using the same kind of metering LED colour design to signal the various different dB levels?

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Benedict
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20 Oct 2021

TBH I don't think I noticed that meters are different everywhere seeing this is how it is/was in the real studio environment. You choose what you trust and deem to be the god of meters and hinge everything off that. Ultimately everything is by feel as recorded music does not really exist. It is all illusion.

I really only watch my Masters (Big Meter on Peak+RMS). The other meters are fine and I'd probably not want them not there but they could be "not there" and have little to no impact in practical terms.

:-)
Benedict Roff-Marsh
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DJMaytag
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20 Oct 2021

MuttReason wrote:
20 Oct 2021
Selig, isn't part of the problem here that Reason uses different (virtual) coloured LED segments in the various metering points across different devices and the SSL to indicate what are in fact the same levels?
It's really no different than in a real studio back in the day, where the meters & levels might be different on the mixing console, outboard processing gear, and then the tape machines (or ADAT's). The job of the grunts in the studio was to calibrate everything they could to a reference level, back when X number of volts stood for a meaningful reference level.

MuttReason
Posts: 339
Joined: 28 Jan 2021

20 Oct 2021

DJMaytag wrote:
20 Oct 2021
MuttReason wrote:
20 Oct 2021
Selig, isn't part of the problem here that Reason uses different (virtual) coloured LED segments in the various metering points across different devices and the SSL to indicate what are in fact the same levels?
It's really no different than in a real studio back in the day, where the meters & levels might be different on the mixing console, outboard processing gear, and then the tape machines (or ADAT's). The job of the grunts in the studio was to calibrate everything they could to a reference level, back when X number of volts stood for a meaningful reference level.
Yeah, that’s true, and in fact some of the gear I used IRL back in the hardware days (first time round I mean… I’m going through a hardware renaissance phase at the moment!) didn’t have any kind of input metering. A lot of effects for example, even the high end stuff. The meters were your ears. If it sounded terrible, it was time to back off the levels, if it was more noise than signal then you needed to sort out the gain somewhere in the chain, and if it sounded good then all was good. I was also lucky to learn what little I know about audio engineering in BBC radio studios where all the equipment was maintained and calibrated to within an inch of its life by some of the best audio techs in the business. What the VU meters told you was always bang-on at every point in the chain, and once you understood where you needed to get the needle to peak to, life was pretty simple. I guess DAWs make people a bit lazy in that sense (well…. me anyway…) because I’ve now had to teach myself to avoid gain staging by eye, as it were, and effectively ignoring visual clues from a bunch of different meters (in Reason at least…. other DAWs are more consistent) other than the final output meter.

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Benedict
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20 Oct 2021

The visual is nice. EQing with a spectrum is way nicer than without. BUT the moment you cross from setting Tone, Feel, and Placement in the (emotive) Soundstage by ear/feel to by eye/meter you are lost. You can feel great that you are doing it "properly" but in fact, you are not doing it at all.

Trust your ears and the Big Meter. Everything else is a courtesy guide that is more like getting advice from your neighbor on your BBQing.

:-)
Benedict Roff-Marsh
Completely burned and gone

MuttReason
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Joined: 28 Jan 2021

21 Oct 2021

Benedict wrote:
20 Oct 2021
Trust your ears and the Big Meter. Everything else is a courtesy guide that is more like getting advice from your neighbor on your BBQing.

:-)
Easily the best analogy I've ever read about how to gain stage (and mix, and master).... very good! :thumbup:

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