- TBProAudio has released a few days ago the MvMeter, a new free multivariable metering plugin designed to simulate the behavior of conventional level meters such as VU or PPM meters and offers several measurement methods such as Peak, RMS, EBU R128.
- Since UAD plugins use different internal operating levels (see page 69 of UAD system manual) a setting to calibrate 0 dBVU to various dBFS values would be great. There are tons of these thing for using in the DAW (Klanghelm, Brainworx, HoRNet, etc), but in the console we're stuck with the built in peak level meter.
- So, to cut this thing short: of you have a VU meter and the signal goes on into an AD converter, you have to account for the peaks that the meter doesn't show you. So if you are tracking drums, set them to - 18 dBVU on the analog side (!) to make sure you don't clip the digital side with the peaks. Note: - 18 is an estimate, depends on the.
The first question I got about my mixing and mastering blog is about gain staging, so here goes…
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Don't use your peak meter for gain staging.
In the digital realm the focus has been on peaks too much, that's because 0dBFS (FS = Full Scale, 0dBFS = maximum loudness of digital sound) and higher distorts while 16bit processing requires the highest level of audio possible to keep the audio far above the noise floor and digital distortion.
Plugins, especially plugins that emulate hardware, are not designed for audio that's really loud. Even if your peaks are below -3dBFS before processing, your audio will usually come out worse after processing. So just record in 24bit, it has a wider dynamic range, the noise floor and digital distortion will stay low while processing. Digital processing has improved, your noise will be lower then in the analog days, even when peaks are below -12dBFS.
Measuring peaks is only necessary to avoid clipping. Peaks say nothing about loudness, they are gone quickly, just causing tiny ripples. Some instruments can have peaks around -8dBFS and still sound softer then instruments with peaks around -18dBFS. It's what's around the peaks that matters, so what you need is a meter that measures more average loudness.
VU meters (VU for Volume Unit) were designed for that in 1942. It takes 300ms for them to rise to the loudness level of your signal and 300ms to fall. VU meters are often added to recording equipment so you get the right loudness from the start. Different VU meters give slightly different results but that's okay I guess. VU meters are usually calibrated at -18dBFS, meaning a test tone of -18dBFS will show as 0dBVU on a VU meter. That leaves 18dB of headroom for peaks! Peaks rarely go to 0dBFS if dBVU = 0, but VU meters need clipping indicators just in case.
Here's how you can gain stage: put a gain plugin in the first slot of your channel. If your DAW doesn't have a gain plugin, Blue Cat Audio provides one for free.
Put a VU meter in the second slot. I use Klanghelm VUMT or HoRNet VU Meter. The main advantage of the HoRNet VU Meter is that you can play a whole track and it will set the gain right for you. On my system it's less reliable though, I often get different results. Klanghelm VUMT gives the same result every time but it doesn't have a memory for the duration of a whole track. If you click on the led light, VUMT will show maximum dBVU values for about 2 seconds after they happen on the left of the led light. Available now png.
Loop the loudest part of your track. If the maximum dBVU level goes above zero, reduce the gain with the same amount. If you want a hotter signal, for more saturation and distortion in plugins that emulate analog hardware, you can allow maximum values of +3dB. It's easy to overdo that though. You can tweak the gain in VUMT or let the HoRNet meter do it by itself. Try again. If the VU meter doesn't go above the desired level and doesn't clip, you're probably done. Set the gain plugin at the same amount as the VU plugin and set the gain in the VU plugin back to zero. Run the whole track just in case you picked the wrong part and adjust the gain setting if needed. You can remove the VU meter, it's set-and-forget.
What you can also do, is automate the gain plugin to adjust the loudness per segment. Sometimes you want some segments to be louder or softer then others and sometimes it's the other way around: segments are too loud or too soft and you want them as loud as the others. You can loop each segment, set the gain of each segment to your liking and check if the VU level doesn't go above your desired level.
You can use gain staging for Virtual Instruments like you would set the input gain of your hardware before you start recording. Virtual Instruments are often programmed too loud, which results in audio that's too hot when you're arranging. Turning the fader down 12dB will still make plugins clip and ruin your bounces, so it's best to gain stage the instrument before you add it to the arrangement.
I created a short midi file that you can download at the end of this blog. It triggers 88 notes twice at maximum velocity. It starts with all 8 A's, B-flats, etcetera, then single notes chromatically. If the instrument is not full range and has key switches, disable or delete the notes in the midi file that are out of range first. You can play this file with a VU meter added to the channel and tweak the output level of the virtual instrument until it doesn't go above 0dBVU. Then you can save the instrument or the channel in the folder structure that I described in my blog 'the best way to organize your presets'. When you're done with the arrangement you can gain stage again before bouncing the instrument to audio to get optimal loudness.
That's all for now. If you've got questions, post them here!
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Download this guide and the midi file in rtf format:
What are VU meters and why should I use them?
VU meters are a measurement tool that shows the average level of an audio signal.
You need VU meters for two big reasons. One, they hear loudness the same way our ears do, and two, they force you to put headroom in your mix.
Headroom is so important it will take another whole article to tell you why you need it. Just trust me on this one, you NEED headroom.
Now, VU means 'Volume Units' and it was standardized in 1942 to use with telephone and radio broadcast equipment.
I'm sure you already know their warm glowing faces from all sorts of analog gear, and in the movies, and all over the place where people want to show a picture that says 'music in action'.
In digital audio it's more common to see Peak meters, which only measure the top volume spikes. That's great for preventing digital distortion, but it is not how our ears actually hear loudness. We don't react well to peak volume spikes because Ouch!
Peaks make us flinch.
Our ears hear loudness by feeling the average sound level over time, and this is what VU meters show you.
By the way, 'average level' is often referred to as RMS. You'll see that on the Ableton compressors and lots of other places.
RMS means 'Root-Mean-Square'. It was originally a mathematical average taken from the square root of the signal voltage over time. Don't worry about the circuit math. RMS means average, Peak means Peak and you need them both.
Why do you need them both? Because they do two different things.
Dbvu Meter Plugin Speed
Peak meters tell you how to avoid digital distortion. This is really important because digital audio has a hard limit and beyond that you get a particularly awful type of distortion.
Peak meters are simple to use, just keep the meter in the green and bring down the volume if it turns red. You already get this concept, it's obvious like a stop sign.
VU meters (RMS) show you how loud a sound feels in real life. You need them to compare how much space a sound takes in the mix.
Use RMS, or VU meters, to compare two sounds to each other and get a realistic picture of how loud they are. (A peak meter doesn't do this very well.)
For example
If you have a bassline that peaks at -5dB, and a drum loop that also peaks at -5dB, it does not mean they will sound balanced next to each other. They probably won't. Drums are a sound that peaks with very short, loud transient spikes far higher than the actual loudness of the whole kit -- but a bassline has low, fat transients that peak very close to its average level.
End result, a bassline will sound way louder than drums when you measure them with a Peak meter. But if you set both your bassline and drum loop to -5db using RMS/ VU meters, they will sound balanced to the ear.
VU meters react more slowly, like our ears, which gives you a realistic picture of the loudness that a sound is pushing. You can't really use Peak meters to compare the loudness of two sounds as they appear to our sense of hearing. And music has to appeal to the ear, right? https://coolffiles673.weebly.com/mac-miller-watching-movies-with-the-sound-off-free-download.html.
Cod world at war update. Right. So why do I need a plugin for this?
You need a VU meter plugin because the Ableton meters don't show RMS / VU level very clearly.
In Live, the light-green bars on top show Peak, and the dark green bars in the middle show RMS. I love it that Ableton added this function, but it's still not easy to read numbers for the average level.
If you want to see the numbers, you need to expand the tracks horizontally. but in a big session that can take up too much space.
Ableton fact: Each line on the side of the track volume shows -6dB
These lines are useful when the channels are minimized for horizontal space, but it's still kind of hard to see what the RMS level is doing. Sometimes I want to see a more precise and larger meter.
That's why I like this plugin from TB Proaudio. It gives you a big fat screen that you can park anywhere you want, and a needle that you can see without counting little lines. In fact I like to keep this VU meter in my peripheral vision and work without looking directly at it. A little like the tachometer when you're driving stick shift.
Here's the link to download it free.
http://www.tb-software.com/TBProAudio/mvmeter.html
HOW TO USE IT
Download the PDF manual along with the plugin. Set the meter to VU when it first opens. Click the word 'Peak in the center to see the options for VU and other standards of referencee.
When you first try to use VU mode on the master channel, the meter will probably be spiked in the red. That red light labelled 'OL' means OverLoad and it's telling you that your master channel is already way too loud.
But don't touch the master volume fader! You will not get anywhere by trying to lower your master volume.
The right way to use a VU meter is to leave your master volume at 0, and lower all the other channels in your session until the meter is bouncing near 0.
This will put your average mix level around -18db, and now we have arrived at the real reason you should be using VU meters.
VU METERS HELP YOU KEEP THE HEADROOM IN YOUR MIX!
Dbvu Meter Plugin Download
THIS is exactly what VU meters do to save your mix from four or five other disastrous problems all at once.
To get the VU meter working right, your master channel RMS level needs to be somewhere around -18dB. This automatically makes you mix a lot lower, keeping a lot more headroom, and avoiding that flat, lifeless, dead digital sound that people complain about.
HEADROOM. If you want to understand headroom, just think of a house party where people start dancing. What happens to the furniture? It has to get moved out into the other room, upstairs, into the hallway or even outside. You can't have people dancing in a room full of chairs and you can't have loud, clear music in a mix with no headroom.
We'll leave that topic here until the next article which will go into more detail on exactly what disasters come from losing headroom.
And now you know why mixdown is called 'mixdown'. You actually mix the channels DOWN, and make space for your mix to breathe.
Dbvu Meter Plugin Tester
ANNOYING QUESTION
Why do we need to mix down in the first place? Can we just start with quieter sounds?
Answer: No. For the best quality of sound you have to record your sounds coming in at the highest level possible. This is called a good signal-to-noise ratio.
Dbvu Meter Plugin Camera
The sound you want is called the signal, and the noise in the system is called noise. Sources of noise are things like background noise, static on the cables, fuzz from a pre-amp turned up loud, and the combination of them all together. It can really degrade your music. Think of tape hiss.
That is just to say, there is a very good reason for recording too loud and then mixing down later. It's how you get the best music in the end.
Before you go! I made a little cheat sheet for you that explains the Ableton mixer, its meters, and the VU meter.
Download it here.
