Great vid, but the advice on -14LUFS mastering is incorrect... -14 is not a target for mastering volume. Try this: upload a track you mastered at -14LUFS, and then upload the same track at -8LUFS (you can do this to Spotify, or use loudnesspenalty.com for a test). The louder track will sound louder and better, even though Spotify has turned the volume down to normalize volume from one track to another. DO NOT MASTER TO -14LUFS!!
Wrong. This is a new standard. Read up on it. Always master for your platform. -13, 14,16..etc... Or they will turn you down and it's not pretty....cheap processing.
The Ableton Limiter has no oversampling, no lookahead, no selectable algorithms, no multi-stage transient vs. dynamics limiter stages, and in general it dulls transients and produces very audible distortion at much lower levels of gain reduction. It's not a professional caliber limiter. That would be a bit much to expect from a native DAW plugin.
WHAT ???? You have it but haven’t used it yet? That’s like having a hot wife that you haven’t boinked yet.... A great car you have yet to drive... A triple scoop ice cream cone just melting away... A pool in the back yard, yet there you sit watching tv... An airplane, yet you still drive your car... A bike that you’ve never ridden !!!!! Lololololololol
@@SteveStockmalMusic I bought a bunch of Fabfilter plugins as a bundle, and I've never used a limiter until now. I'm finally trying to fine tune my mixing & mastering. I'm used to using an external multitrack, and not doing much. I'm amazed at how much better things sound with EQ. My old demos could've been even better! Now I'm using Reaper, and expanding my music making skills. 🙂👍
That's awesome man !!!! I'm fairly new to this game as well, and I'm just super enthusiastic about it. I spend at least 2 hours a day studying, and then at least 4 more practicing mixing, recording, etc. Hooked for life !!
Why do they limit their tracks to -1db instead of 0? Any thoughts on that? Also, you did not cover the channel link and transient link knobs. Can you give some practical examples where you would want to use those controls?
It’s because there are overs when steaming algorithms convert tracks to the service’s file type which can cause distortion/clipping... So -1 is a protection against that as there’s a buffer zone in case of overs.
Great video! I have a question. When I have finished adjusting the limiters gain slider with unity gain on, do I turn off unity gain and then adjust my output volume?
Hey hey. Yes, when you're done getting the limiting amount set you would disable unity gain. At the very end I then adjust the output gain of the limiter to allow the desired margin. For example if I'm mastering for streaming / audio data rate compression for lossy formats, it's common to leave 1-1.5 dB of margin below digital zero. Cheers!
Okay I think I've got it now. So let's say you have a kick and an 808 and you want those to be the loudest elements in your drum bus. They peak at -8.4 db. So you'd put the limiter last in your chain on the drum bus, put the output at zero, and then put the gain slider at 8.4db, right? The whole adding gain / gain slider threw me off, initially. Is that how you would do it though? The amount of gain to add would be what you _want_ the loudest elements in your mix to peak at, right? And then anything else would get its peaks cut to that level?
You always want ur loudest elements to peak at around 0db (true peak). It‘s not the same as 0db but that‘s a different topic. it doesn’t matter how much you put the gain. Eg in your example you can also make the gain 15db, as long as the output is set to max 0db true peak ur 808/kick will always be 0db still. the limiter just compresses everything that you gain above the 0db. So if you want ur song to be perceived louder but still be at the same 0db just boost this. It compresses the peaks over it and ur track feels louder. But also it takes away the dynamic range and some transients of the sound. So use it to a level that you still think sounds good. You can also hear the lost transienst with the headphone button at the output knob in L2. Yeah
If you gain your -8.4 db mix by +8.4db it‘s basically the same as if you just make your mix be at 0db from the beginning. Only thing it also does is remove the peaks that might occur over 0db more precisely than you can see by just mixing to about 0db. My tip is to just turn on the true peak option in the L2 and also oversampling to like 4x or 8x and put the out knob to like -0.2 tp for safety. Then boost in the gain (makes ur track louder as without limiter) as long as you think the sound of the track is still good enough (not too many transients lost). again to check this just listen or press the headphone button next to the out knob
I choose -0.2db tp and the oversampling and true peak option to make sure, when it‘s exported and played back on speakers, the intersample peaks that might occur aren‘t going over 0db and don‘t make your song clip on analog speakers (all speakers)
Since they occur even when the meter says 0.0db. The true peak option and oversampling does take these intersample peaks into account but still -0.2db tp to make sure even small undetected peaks aren‘t clipping
I completely disagree. I've tested this many times myself, and without fail - every single time - the less compressed master sounds louder to me after normalization of levels. My clients have all observed the same.
@@warpacademy I'm not the only one who say what I say and I'm talking about people who knows more than me like Luca Pretolesi and David Gnosi (David's channel is Mixbustv) pardon me for doing some spam here, I'm just dropping some sources here.
Hey hey. It really depends on where the master will be sent to. For example, if you're uploading the master to Soundcloud, it'll get compressed and crushed down to 128 kbps stereo mp3. This will add anywhere up to about 1.5 dB of extra compression noise. So you'd want to use a -1.5 margin on the limiter. But in other scenarios you may want to go louder. In general you'll always want to have TP engaged, but you may go right up to -0.1 or even 0 dB TP. An example of this is if you're rendering for Beatport or to play in a DJ set where it's going to be a .wav file.
@@warpacademy ok now this makes sense! We had a library we submit music to ask us to have it peak at -0.1 db and we had no idea how to do so or where it was! They basically said set the ceiling but on PRO L2 its called the output?? I think?? Thank you so much for the reply and the help! We love your vids and the great value you share! Thanx again!
sorry, I was shocked at the end when you said if you get a reading of -11 LUFS pull the gain down 3 dB?? so all of your listening to the processing, finding the perfect amount/kind of limiting, and then just throw it out the window 'cos the LUFS are wrong?? surely there's a post limiter gain control to fine-tune the LUFS without affecting everything you've done??
That part’s wrong though - DO NOT master your music to -14 LUFS, it will sound quiet on Spotify. Try mastering the same song at -14 and -7 LUFS and uploading to www.loudnesspenalty.com and you’ll see that the -7 track is louder.
Warp Academy 200 for a limiter seems crazy but I have a bunch of guitar center gift cards I think I'll shell out for this. I already have pro-Q and a good mix bus compressor. I'm targeting plugins that I'll use on the whole mix first
When I'm mixing drums, I manually adjust the output level if I'm using a limiter. The unity gain feature is more for A/Bing your processed and unprocessed signal.
Mastering to -14LUFS will make for a quiet-sounding track in Spotify as compared to other tracks... -14LUFS is not a target when mastering. Try uploading the same track mastered at -14 and -8 to loudnesspenalty.com and compare. Great vid otherwise though!
On Skrillex's recent upload of his track Mumbai Power and the youtube video he posted of the Ableton session, he shows that he's running at -3 LUFS. Just curious, why do that if you really only need to top out at -14?
Hey Julius. Good question. This is actually a very large topic that's essential to understand. I encourage you to read our blog article, "Current Trends in Mastering" here: www.warpacademy.com/current-trends-in-mastering/ IMO, as an engineer, -3 LUFS is an unnecessary level of loudness for most producers in nearly all situations. It's arguable that this insane level of loudness is part of Skrillex's "sound" but many good arguments can be made for a more dynamic master. What I can tell you unequivocally is that the number of -14 (or numbers around that) are due to streaming audio sites like Spotify, Apple Music, and even TH-cam. A loud track will be turned down so it matches the perceived loudness of all other tracks. So if that -3 LUFS Skrillex track was on Spotify, it would theoretically be turned down by around 11 dB to compensate. Now, that master in the Mumbai Power video is mostly likely the one they uploaded to download sites like Beatport and for club/festival play by Skrillex in his sets. They may have created a separate master that's lower in loudness for streaming sites. When I master, I create different variations for the different destinations I know it'll be played on. This typically includes: 1) Soundcloud master, 2) Streaming sites master (for Spotify, Apple Music, TH-cam etc.), a loud "club" master (for live shows and DJ download sites that don't adjust loudness). Depending on what label you release on, they may or may now allow this type of "destination specific" mastering and only allow you to submit one single master. In this case, I usually shoot for around -10 or -9 LUFS. It'll still get turned down by Spotify a bit, but remain loud enough so it's not super quiet in comparison to a track mastered for max loudness. Let us know if you have more questions on this. Cheers!
There is so much misconception on the internet about streaming loudness. Actually Spotify gives the user the OPTION to normalize loudness during playback on premium version. But in normal operations it doesn't e.g. on the free desktop player. So mastering to -14 lufs. Is so stupid LOL :) You don't have to follow that. Your music will be so quiet because most people don't even enable that normalization option when using Spotify they just hit play. That's if they have spotify premium to begin with.
-3 is mastering for clubs but it would be terrible for headphone listening. Especially on sites that dont have loudness normalization (soundcloud) p.s. I wouldn't probably go to that club without earplugs.
-14 is not quiet. I just tested songs from video games, they have -24 LUFS, -18 in loudest part and have about 10 dynamic range. It doesn't feel quiet at all, but comfortable listening, there would be 0 benefit making it louder. If it had no dynamic range then it would feel quiet.
lol, mine is 2.3+ lufs, and I have no idea whether that's good or bad
4 ปีที่แล้ว
I make sure that my track has -14 LUFS and -1.3 TP. But when I listen my track with max volume on phone speaker and headphone (spotify), it still has little low when compared other professional tracks. Where do I make mistake? Is that related with mixing levels?
its because a lot of people dont actually mix to -14LUFS especially in harder genres like dubstep which is a big loudness war, some dubstep tracks actually get up to around -3 LUFS
The reason is because the loudness normalization that happens in spotify etc is basically another final limiter that makes your track sound fatter and fuller and louder when it‘s not actually at -14 already. At -14 it does nothing. But if you master it to -8 lufs or sth like this it will limit/compress another few db to add to the felt volume
Great vid, but the advice on -14LUFS mastering is incorrect... -14 is not a target for mastering volume. Try this: upload a track you mastered at -14LUFS, and then upload the same track at -8LUFS (you can do this to Spotify, or use loudnesspenalty.com for a test). The louder track will sound louder and better, even though Spotify has turned the volume down to normalize volume from one track to another. DO NOT MASTER TO -14LUFS!!
Wrong. This is a new standard. Read up on it. Always master for your platform. -13, 14,16..etc... Or they will turn you down and it's not pretty....cheap processing.
THIS VIDEO IS GOLDEN! So L2 to prevent Massive peaks pass -6 on the mix. which will in return allow you to better Master a song. GREAT JOB! MAN
0:45 just why
for the lols
For the dancehall dj's
how do you do, fellow kids?
i died laughing omg
:DDD
Great explanation and tutorial all at the same. Thanks a lot sir
You're most welcome. Cheers!
what makes it better than stock limiter?
The Ableton Limiter has no oversampling, no lookahead, no selectable algorithms, no multi-stage transient vs. dynamics limiter stages, and in general it dulls transients and produces very audible distortion at much lower levels of gain reduction. It's not a professional caliber limiter. That would be a bit much to expect from a native DAW plugin.
This video will motivate you to make a hit. Cheers! from ATL
Wow, thank you very much!!! I have the Pro-L2, but haven't used it yet. This was EXTREMELY helpful!!!
You're very welcome!
WHAT ???? You have it but haven’t used it yet?
That’s like having a hot wife that you haven’t boinked yet....
A great car you have yet to drive...
A triple scoop ice cream cone just melting away...
A pool in the back yard, yet there you sit watching tv...
An airplane, yet you still drive your car...
A bike that you’ve never ridden !!!!!
Lololololololol
@@SteveStockmalMusic I bought a bunch of Fabfilter plugins as a bundle, and I've never used a limiter until now. I'm finally trying to fine tune my mixing & mastering. I'm used to using an external multitrack, and not doing much. I'm amazed at how much better things sound with EQ. My old demos could've been even better! Now I'm using Reaper, and expanding my music making skills. 🙂👍
That's awesome man !!!!
I'm fairly new to this game as well, and I'm just super enthusiastic about it. I spend at least 2 hours a day studying, and then at least 4 more practicing mixing, recording, etc. Hooked for life !!
This video is absolutely worth tutorial video ever. just thumps-up for you warp academy. Thanks lot
Glad you enjoyed it!
Why do they limit their tracks to -1db instead of 0? Any thoughts on that? Also, you did not cover the channel link and transient link knobs. Can you give some practical examples where you would want to use those controls?
Probably to avoid potential distortion on streaming services that use loudness normalization, or something
It’s because there are overs when steaming algorithms convert tracks to the service’s file type which can cause distortion/clipping... So -1 is a protection against that as there’s a buffer zone in case of overs.
Great video! I have a question. When I have finished adjusting the limiters gain slider with unity gain on, do I turn off unity gain and then adjust my output volume?
Hey hey. Yes, when you're done getting the limiting amount set you would disable unity gain. At the very end I then adjust the output gain of the limiter to allow the desired margin. For example if I'm mastering for streaming / audio data rate compression for lossy formats, it's common to leave 1-1.5 dB of margin below digital zero. Cheers!
I came here for this juice 9:00 and to learn about LUFS. Thank you sir
Cheers mate. Thanks for watching.
The LUFS bit is incorrect... See my above comment. Do not master to -14 LUFS.
Okay I think I've got it now. So let's say you have a kick and an 808 and you want those to be the loudest elements in your drum bus. They peak at -8.4 db. So you'd put the limiter last in your chain on the drum bus, put the output at zero, and then put the gain slider at 8.4db, right? The whole adding gain / gain slider threw me off, initially. Is that how you would do it though? The amount of gain to add would be what you _want_ the loudest elements in your mix to peak at, right? And then anything else would get its peaks cut to that level?
You always want ur loudest elements to peak at around 0db (true peak). It‘s not the same as 0db but that‘s a different topic. it doesn’t matter how much you put the gain. Eg in your example you can also make the gain 15db, as long as the output is set to max 0db true peak ur 808/kick will always be 0db still. the limiter just compresses everything that you gain above the 0db. So if you want ur song to be perceived louder but still be at the same 0db just boost this. It compresses the peaks over it and ur track feels louder. But also it takes away the dynamic range and some transients of the sound. So use it to a level that you still think sounds good. You can also hear the lost transienst with the headphone button at the output knob in L2. Yeah
If you gain your -8.4 db mix by +8.4db it‘s basically the same as if you just make your mix be at 0db from the beginning. Only thing it also does is remove the peaks that might occur over 0db more precisely than you can see by just mixing to about 0db. My tip is to just turn on the true peak option in the L2 and also oversampling to like 4x or 8x and put the out knob to like -0.2 tp for safety. Then boost in the gain (makes ur track louder as without limiter) as long as you think the sound of the track is still good enough (not too many transients lost). again to check this just listen or press the headphone button next to the out knob
I choose -0.2db tp and the oversampling and true peak option to make sure, when it‘s exported and played back on speakers, the intersample peaks that might occur aren‘t going over 0db and don‘t make your song clip on analog speakers (all speakers)
Since they occur even when the meter says 0.0db. The true peak option and oversampling does take these intersample peaks into account but still -0.2db tp to make sure even small undetected peaks aren‘t clipping
The thing is that the -7lufs one will sound louder when turned down to -14lufs than the -20lufs one when turned up to -14lufs.
I completely disagree. I've tested this many times myself, and without fail - every single time - the less compressed master sounds louder to me after normalization of levels. My clients have all observed the same.
@@warpacademy I'm not the only one who say what I say and I'm talking about people who knows more than me like Luca Pretolesi and David Gnosi (David's channel is Mixbustv) pardon me for doing some spam here, I'm just dropping some sources here.
Great explanation
Glad it was helpful!
What would be a good setting for your output level ? -1.0dbtp ?
Great and thank you for the help have a great weekend!
Hey hey. It really depends on where the master will be sent to. For example, if you're uploading the master to Soundcloud, it'll get compressed and crushed down to 128 kbps stereo mp3. This will add anywhere up to about 1.5 dB of extra compression noise. So you'd want to use a -1.5 margin on the limiter.
But in other scenarios you may want to go louder. In general you'll always want to have TP engaged, but you may go right up to -0.1 or even 0 dB TP. An example of this is if you're rendering for Beatport or to play in a DJ set where it's going to be a .wav file.
@@warpacademy ok now this makes sense!
We had a library we submit music to ask us to have it peak at -0.1 db and we had no idea how to do so or where it was!
They basically said set the ceiling but on PRO L2 its called the output?? I think??
Thank you so much for the reply and the help! We love your vids and the great value you share!
Thanx again!
sorry, I was shocked at the end when you said if you get a reading of -11 LUFS pull the gain down 3 dB?? so all of your listening to the processing, finding the perfect amount/kind of limiting, and then just throw it out the window 'cos the LUFS are wrong?? surely there's a post limiter gain control to fine-tune the LUFS without affecting everything you've done??
Yeah, bottom right, just before the lufs section, there’s an output gain that can take dBs off.
This was very helpful! Thanks bruv! Subscribed!
Awesome info, especially with the Spotify and TH-cam stuff at the end.
That part’s wrong though - DO NOT master your music to -14 LUFS, it will sound quiet on Spotify. Try mastering the same song at -14 and -7 LUFS and uploading to www.loudnesspenalty.com and you’ll see that the -7 track is louder.
very good info !! thanks man .
This was a lot of great info!
Great vid. really wanting this plugin
Go for it!
Warp Academy 200 for a limiter seems crazy but I have a bunch of guitar center gift cards I think I'll shell out for this. I already have pro-Q and a good mix bus compressor. I'm targeting plugins that I'll use on the whole mix first
should i turn off unity gain on the bus channel aswell after i mixed my drums?
When I'm mixing drums, I manually adjust the output level if I'm using a limiter. The unity gain feature is more for A/Bing your processed and unprocessed signal.
The last tip was very very helpfull, thanks a lot !!
Cheers Leo. Thanks for watching.
Mastering to -14LUFS will make for a quiet-sounding track in Spotify as compared to other tracks... -14LUFS is not a target when mastering. Try uploading the same track mastered at -14 and -8 to loudnesspenalty.com and compare. Great vid otherwise though!
@@jdonyc Totally agree tracks on Streaming services are definitely louder than -14 LUFS
On Skrillex's recent upload of his track Mumbai Power and the youtube video he posted of the Ableton session, he shows that he's running at -3 LUFS. Just curious, why do that if you really only need to top out at -14?
Hey Julius. Good question. This is actually a very large topic that's essential to understand. I encourage you to read our blog article, "Current Trends in Mastering" here: www.warpacademy.com/current-trends-in-mastering/
IMO, as an engineer, -3 LUFS is an unnecessary level of loudness for most producers in nearly all situations. It's arguable that this insane level of loudness is part of Skrillex's "sound" but many good arguments can be made for a more dynamic master.
What I can tell you unequivocally is that the number of -14 (or numbers around that) are due to streaming audio sites like Spotify, Apple Music, and even TH-cam. A loud track will be turned down so it matches the perceived loudness of all other tracks. So if that -3 LUFS Skrillex track was on Spotify, it would theoretically be turned down by around 11 dB to compensate.
Now, that master in the Mumbai Power video is mostly likely the one they uploaded to download sites like Beatport and for club/festival play by Skrillex in his sets. They may have created a separate master that's lower in loudness for streaming sites.
When I master, I create different variations for the different destinations I know it'll be played on. This typically includes: 1) Soundcloud master, 2) Streaming sites master (for Spotify, Apple Music, TH-cam etc.), a loud "club" master (for live shows and DJ download sites that don't adjust loudness). Depending on what label you release on, they may or may now allow this type of "destination specific" mastering and only allow you to submit one single master. In this case, I usually shoot for around -10 or -9 LUFS. It'll still get turned down by Spotify a bit, but remain loud enough so it's not super quiet in comparison to a track mastered for max loudness.
Let us know if you have more questions on this. Cheers!
There is so much misconception on the internet about streaming loudness. Actually Spotify gives the user the OPTION to normalize loudness during playback on premium version. But in normal operations it doesn't e.g. on the free desktop player. So mastering to -14 lufs. Is so stupid LOL :)
You don't have to follow that. Your music will be so quiet because most people don't even enable that normalization option when using Spotify they just hit play. That's if they have spotify premium to begin with.
-3 is mastering for clubs but it would be terrible for headphone listening. Especially on sites that dont have loudness normalization (soundcloud)
p.s. I wouldn't probably go to that club without earplugs.
@@izvarzone -3 LUFS short term not Average. There is a difference.
-14 is not quiet. I just tested songs from video games, they have -24 LUFS, -18 in loudest part and have about 10 dynamic range. It doesn't feel quiet at all, but comfortable listening, there would be 0 benefit making it louder. If it had no dynamic range then it would feel quiet.
TNX
Really nice exposure of this great plugin, I just wish that it was real instruments instead of a lot of samples, which has already been processed.
Which HAVE been...
grammatically better !!!
THANK YOU!
You're very welcome. Thanks for tuning in.
lol, mine is 2.3+ lufs, and I have no idea whether that's good or bad
I make sure that my track has -14 LUFS and -1.3 TP. But when I listen my track with max volume on phone speaker and headphone (spotify), it still has little low when compared other professional tracks. Where do I make mistake? Is that related with mixing levels?
its because a lot of people dont actually mix to -14LUFS especially in harder genres like dubstep which is a big loudness war, some dubstep tracks actually get up to around -3 LUFS
I do a lot of maatering for moderne genres. I master most to -8 LUFS which most ppl like :)
The reason is because the loudness normalization that happens in spotify etc is basically another final limiter that makes your track sound fatter and fuller and louder when it‘s not actually at -14 already. At -14 it does nothing. But if you master it to -8 lufs or sth like this it will limit/compress another few db to add to the felt volume
@@ap7390 nope....back in 2005 maybe... Not now..-3,sounds like crap ...-6too....
@@levondarratt787 you dont know what youre talking about lol, you obviously dont make bass music.
Wtf was going on for the aggressive setting soloed
Does everybody have this problem: your website is insanely slow (where others are just fast)
i think pro-L is in fact a single band maximizer
Pro-L is definitely a single band limiter. What would make you think otherwise?
stealth in better I guess...
Thank you !