Newgrounds.com — Everything, By Everyone.

At 8/25/12 01:19 AM, Omegeist wrote: Which is all around best?

inb4 it's how you use it

At 8/21/12 09:44 PM, Computer112 wrote: Human is fucking greedy. For fuck sake, the audio folks are the one on NG whom complain the most.

Well, it's certainly not the end of the world if the feature isn't available right now. I'm not complaining, just curious, is all.

I don't feel that it's a ridiculous thing to ask about, either, as it seems like more or less a basic feature; plus as I've already mentioned, others here would like to know about it as well. Not to demand it, just maybe find out if it's on the mind of Tom and friends.

At 8/21/12 03:24 PM, Breed wrote:

At 8/21/12 03:21 PM, Birdinator99 wrote: Do we have to unpublish it first to be able to rename it, and then publish it again?

As of this point, yes.

Ok, after confirming that no data would be lost in the process, I tried this, but I still couldn't find a way to rename the song in its unpublished state.

I understand we just got the "unpublish" feature, but I still don't see a way to rename an existing song.

Do we have to unpublish it first to be able to rename it, and then publish it again? I realize others have had the same concern on the official update thread, but I don't think any of them got an answer.

At 8/21/12 09:56 AM, adilovemetal wrote: Isnt the "research link" thing very waig? I mean I hardly did any research :| I merely picked up a riff, and went along with it, thought about acts like Children of Bodom (finland) and other metal acts, and I thought it would be great to incorporate metal as it is very prevalent there..... Honestly what is the whole idea of a research link :\

Here's a link to the rules in case you missed them. Check out rule #7 for a better idea.

Almost everybody seems to be forgetting their "research links"; can I just confirm that they are part of your overall score?

At 8/19/12 06:05 PM, NeXsard wrote: what makes me angry was that the other guy didnt submmint anything... it was like a cheap win.

Haha, doesn't make me angry.

Ok I'll shut up.

Congrats to OpenLight.

At 8/17/12 10:39 AM, seel wrote: How about actually posting a clip so people can give some tips?

It's already been taken care of via PM, and I have confidence in my mix again, but thank you for the words anyway.

At 8/16/12 03:10 AM, Step wrote: The 16th person who passes to the next round will be the highest-scoring loser from Round 1.

Trust me, it's a good feeling, man...

At 8/14/12 08:48 PM, DavidOrr wrote: Up to you! I'm happy to take a listen either way -- PM might be smarter if you're super concerned about leaks, but you'll also miss out on other opinions.

Well, I'd better play it safe, I guess. I'll send you the link.

Many thanks to the others that shared their thoughts as well!

At 8/14/12 03:56 PM, descara wrote: Just make a .zip out of it and you can upload it.

Know the feeling you're having, don't have any to offer though, except what's been said already!

Thanks mate.

I've got a .zip uploaded. Mr. Orr, do you want the link PMed to you or should I just share it here?

At 8/14/12 01:38 AM, DavidOrr wrote: -- Multiband Compressors tend to do more harm than good at the mixing stage, but are sometimes used in the mastering stage to fix issues that could have been avoided earlier in the mixing process. I wouldn't aim to use a multiband compressor if you still have control of the mix.

Alright, that makes sense.

-- What genre are you working with? This is really important!

It's a folk song, so it's new territory for me. Some compression on acoustic guitars and auxiliary percussion.

-- In general, when you're EQing, you want to "boost wide, cut narrow".
Also, you usually don't want to boost more than a few DB if possible

I am familiar with this philosophy, and I practice it. One boost is about 4dB, and the rest are 2-3dB I believe.

Would it be at all possible to upload the draft of the track in question? If we could get a listen (Even to an excerpt), it would be easier to pinpoint the problem and suggest ideas. Spectrum analyzers are awesome, but it's only a snapshot.

Good idea, but Newgrounds Dump won't let me upload .wav files. I never have to use file sharing sites, so could you point me in the right direction?

At 8/14/12 03:50 AM, midimachine wrote:

At 8/14/12 02:10 AM, boney-man wrote: Since when was music something people looked at?

this. a million times this.
birdinator, did you feel like your song was bright enough before you looked at that graph?

I was having doubts, and I was curious about a second opinion. I guess should take its "advice" with a grain of salt.

I appreciate the feedback, guys.

At 8/13/12 07:02 PM, SineRider wrote:

At 8/13/12 06:52 PM, Buoy wrote: DON'T aim for a level graph, it will NOT make your mix sound balanced, don't trust a spectrum analyzer over your ears. If you want something that looks flat on a spectrum analyzer, try white noise. Pleasant isn't it?

Holy shit, just add a ton of whitenoise to your song, Birdinator, and you're good to go!

Fuck that, I'll just upload 3 minutes of NOTHING BUT white noise, and call it "Experimental Dreamscape", then let the money flow into my pockets.

Seriously, though, the more commercial songs I look at, the more of them look like this, which is what I want to attain:

At 8/13/12 06:45 PM, Buoy wrote: If you feel that the high mid range is lacking when you actually listen to the track, you can usually get better and more natural sounding results by amplifying individual instruments with pleasing content in that frequency range (cut other frequencies as needed), than if you EQ boost the entire mix.

I feel like I cut unwanted frequencies well enough, although looking at it now, many (narrow) cuts are in that range, and I'm a little hesitant to boost more than I do (most boosts around 1-2 dB). Maybe I should look at boosting certain instruments a bit more to make up for my other cuts.

At 8/13/12 06:32 PM, LiquidOoze wrote: You could try to put an equalizer on the master bus and increase the treble

I usually do this at the mastering stage, but if I try it now, I need to boost quite excessively to get that section of the graph to more or less level out (like 10dB). I'm guessing it'll be a similar case while mastering.

My track that I'm working on seems to be missing some of this -- that is, after viewing a spectrum analyzer on the master bus (during a busy part of the song), it's the frequency range that is noticeably quieter.

It's important to note that most effects, including EQ and compression, have already been applied. This is a pre-master, of course, so I guess that has a role as well.

I've compared my spectrum graph to other songs', and they all have much more of this range than I do (they sound "airier"). Any tips on getting it up to par? I don't think that adding more instruments at this point would be a good idea, but I'm curious as to the solution.

Is this sort of alteration mostly done in mastering? Could multiband EQ help me out here?

Here's a pic:

At 8/13/12 05:17 AM, TroisNyxEtienne wrote: anyone who represents the Vatican well will have a title-clincher in his hands!

Oh, I didn't know The Pope liked dubstep.

Just kidding.

At 8/12/12 03:47 AM, HyperTrough wrote:

At 8/12/12 03:20 AM, Birdinator99 wrote: Not too far back, a fine gent posted some great soundfonts, including some string ones. If you dig deep enough, there are a couple of goodies in there.

Here's the link to his post!

I can't find a program that plays these files on a 64 bit system...

Any ideas?

Have you tried the different "modes" on sfz? I don't know what they do, nor do I need to use them, but they might help you...

If not, maybe sfz+? Sorry, these are total shots in the dark (I'm on 32-bit Windows XP).

At 8/12/12 02:49 AM, easydoom wrote: I was trying to delete the songs I had uploaded but couldn't figure out how...

We used to have that ability, but it was lost in a semi-recent site overhaul. They're working on bringing it back, so in the meantime, you might have to PM a moderator or something to get songs removed. Don't worry, it's not just you; it's been brought up before.

Not too far back, a fine gent posted some great soundfonts, including some string ones. If you dig deep enough, there are a couple of goodies in there.

Here's the link to his post!

At 8/6/12 08:01 PM, NeonProject wrote:

At 8/6/12 07:57 PM, Birdinator99 wrote: I'd like to do Canada, but I'm not sure if I'd be able to pull it off. Can a be a jerk and reserve it anyway, just in case?

What makes you think you can't do it?
I can reserve it for now... let me know if you can take part :)

It's really out of my comfort zone, but I want to try something new. Sign me up with the act name: Birdy

The genre will be folk (I hope), and I'll decide on the track name later.

I'd like to do Canada, but I'm not sure if I'd be able to pull it off. Can a be a jerk and reserve it anyway, just in case?

Hey man, I just want to say thanks for helping me wrap my head around this thing. You didn't have to help, but you did, and I really appreciate it.

At 8/6/12 03:50 AM, The-iMortal wrote: No, that's not what people usually do. Like I stated in an earlier post, protocol is exporting a .wav of your mix, with the peak in between -6dB to -3dB. The volume is then determined by factors such as your limiter, harmonic exciter etc.

Well, you see, my DAW renders mp3s really poorly sometimes, so what I could do is render an unmastered WAV (with the headroom), import it back into the DAW, do the mastering (including limiting) WITHOUT touching the master fader, then export to WAV AGAIN, and then convert that WAV into mp3 using an external convertor program.

That way, any additional volume that was added in the mastering process would be because of the mastering effects and not the master fader, as you have told me, AND my file would still be a relatively high quality.

Ok, last question, I swear ;)

I played around with and compared the two, messing with the settings and whatnot, and I actually prefer the sound of the first one (set with a threshold of -4.2 dB). It got louder, but I wanted even louder still, so I turned up my master fader, which had been set to provide about 3-6 dBs of headroom as per your suggestion, about 4 dBs (after applying the master limiter with the setting mentioned, of course), and noticed that it got even louder AGAIN, but there was no clipping (peaking at around -1 dB).

Is that what people usually do? Give headroom, then limit (and use other mastering processes), then raise the master fader back up for extra volume (provided it does not clip)? I'm doing all of this "mastering" on the master bus by the way, which I know is not ideal.

I did some looking around and found this nice and simple limiter. I found decent results (much louder) with the settings you see here in the picture, although I'm not sure about the release time -- It defaults to 200ms.

I assume that the "ceiling" is the same as "margin" or "peak"

Also, if I hear a little distortion here and there, should I raise the threshold to remove it?

At 8/5/12 11:01 PM, The-iMortal wrote: What limiter are you using?

http://www.kreativsounds.com/kjaerhus-classic-master-limiter /

I assume the meter on the right shows the peak, but it displays positive dBs, so how can I achieve -0.2 dB? Or, is that meter showing how much is being compressed (in dBs), and the actual value of the peak is not given?

At 8/5/12 09:15 PM, The-iMortal wrote: - Limiter: limiting is compression with a ratio of 10:1 dB or higher. Basically, what a limiter does is boost the volume of your track, but limits the peaks down to the desired volume. Therefore, your track will not clip at all. However, a track can sound very squashed without clipping. A mix exported at the proper levels for mastering can usually be hit with the limiter with around a -8.0 dB threshold. Set the margin to -0.2 dB (or thereabouts, depending what sounds best). You can also mess around with the other settings to see what you can produce.

The mastering limiter I use only has "threshold" as an adjustable parameter -- could you explain what the "margin" is?

Previously I have set the threshold at around -0.2 dB to prevent clipping, but that's where you suggested to set the margin. I'm a little confused.

A bit of a general question here. Anybody have some basic tips for simply adding volume to either individual tracks or the mix as a whole, in either the mixing or mastering stage? My recording volume from my keyboard won't go any higher without clipping, as well as most of my track faders and the master fader.

I have to max out my playback volume (speakers) to get to a comfortable listening volume, and I know that's not right!

Aw snap, I messed up and I knew it; now I gotta wait a whole year again.

Damn