I'd really love to see a video that shows how to hit both targets of -1db tp and -14 lufs. Maybe coupled with some kind of mix review where you master someone else's home recording for someone struggling to hit those targets and explain the approach behind the whole process.
@lance moule...streaming targets are a secondary compliance issue...master the song using artistic outcome first...then do a stream compliant version That is why this vid is disinformational
I am at the end of some mixes that I am releasing in December and usually use SPAN to check spectrum , levels and balance. Downloaded Sonible True Level and True Balance to try out. To my surprise all 4 tracks were 90% on the money and the plugins really helped me to identify the other 10% of any issues. Very useful stuff .Keep up the good work. Love your channel.
This is actually a gem of knowledge thank you. As a solo artist, producing and mastering my own album this plug-in might be the saving grace I need to feel more confident launching on music platforms like spotify etc. I thought I would have to settle between distortion or a mix that's too quiet!
I think there's a lot of confusion on loudness. There are no loudness targets in force currently and the AES guidelines now correctly describe it as a “Distribution Loudness”. It’s just a loudness you need be aware of because if you upload above it, you’ll be turned down 'if' normalisation is enabled by the end user or the app enforces it by default. If it's turned it off, your track will be played at the loudness you mastered to. Only TH-cam actually enforce -14 lufs to their stream from my testing with no way to turn it off i nthe app or browser. YT Music seem to enforce -7lufs which is in line with a typical modern mastered Tidal, Spotify. Apple Music track with normalisation turned off.
@@digitalduch1111 They don't have loudness normalisation afaik. Simply anything above -14 gets turned down to -14 on youtube and anything above -7 gets turned down to -7 on YT Music.
Guys, please do not do -14 LUFS without knowing what you're doing. The best way is increase the loudness until you hear unwanted distortion, then decrease bit by bit. That is the song's best LUFS! And for the -1dBTP, I think it's fine to do it right now, but historically speaking, a lot of good songs that dont have it.
The quality of the song does not drop even if the peak would be above zero. It is the quality of the audio or data depending of how you want to look at it. Those good old songs with 0dB true peak would sound better and more consistent with -1dB true peak. Using inconsistent hardware/software limitations on hardware/software that is NOT part of making the song, is just bad and nothing more, but none of that decreases the quality of the song itself.
*Video Idea.... because you said that you compress your voice differently to not compress the music ect. It would be interesting to see how you do that when you edit the videos. For example, how do you edit the video? You edit the sound separately? In the video editor? You extract the audio separately? Thanks! And I love your videos!
I enjoy your videos.... I bought the Smart bundle (EQ-3, Comp-2, Limit-2, Reverb) on sale, and got the metering bundle for 40 euros. True Level allows you to add reference tracks, and Smart Limit-2 doesn't, so I think it is worth getting for that.
I was wondering what the point of getting true:level was until you said that. 😂 I just wish smart:limit could import references as a compact package on its own, then true:level would be for people that used other 3rd party limiters instead. But that would probably reduce its market share.
@@KaroLexMusic Perhaps that is something that Sonible might add in the next update to Smart-Limit. It is a nice feature to have, but I am never adverse to simplifying my FX chains!
Ok, Ill do a video about when and where stuff is encoded and Ill talk also abou this normalizarion process from Spotify. I hope to desmistify those matters. Unfortnetly, the video will be in portugueses, altough you will be able to follow it within the auto-subtitle. See you!
The problem is that the loudness matching feature for Apple Music is OFF by default. And also there is „Spotify loud“ which is at -11LUFS I think. And do you do the, let’s say, -14 LUFS before or after the -1dB true peak? It’s still pretty confusing.
On normal (-14 LUFS) Spotify will push the volume until there is still at least 1 dB headroom. The limiter will not reduce any peaks. For example: A song has -21 LUFS and -3 dBtp (true peak). Spotify will raise the volume to -19 LUFS to keep -1 dBtp. When it is at -18 LUFS and -4 dBtp it will raise it to -15 LUFS and -14 LUFS when the true peak were -5 dB. On Loud spotify ignores the true peak headroom and push the song to -11 LUFS and applies a Limiter with 5ms Attack and 100 ms decay. I think this sould be avoided. So in most cases I would try to hit at least -11 LUFS. But this could be a problem at very dynamic tracks.
Didn't watch yet, but I was waiting for this release since they announced it and I bought it without thinking straight away haha. Great tools and great company!
I guess the key against the loudness war is awareness of how much squashed a mix would sound by tracking dynamic range to the max reduction and the other part of loudness is the true peak level at -1 dB to avoid digital clipping. True peak is really the part to catch of the edge of the peak area ("ceilings") I guess the streaming services specification does not matter at all. Important is just the step of normalization by certain codecs like mp3, mp4, aac etc. Which could cause clipping if the true peak settlement is not applied. In other words dynamic range target is some flavor dependent on genre not so much about specification of a streaming service. However going after specifications a low dynamic range is required to limit a mix into the lufs target without causing moderate clipping distortion. This becomes harder with classic genres because they use a wider dynamic range in other words the difference between the loudest and quitest measures.
it seems to me that a lot of people here forget to actually listen to the music and instead are lost in meaningless numbers. Master the music to where it sounds good. Skrillex would sound awful at -14lufs. Norah Jones would sound awful at -6lufs. Spotify normalization is still a mess, and not to mention changing by the minute. One song can be at different loudness levels depending on the context and the device it's played back on. Not looking to pick a fight here but frankly i think this kind of content is extremely misleading. Serve the music, not the streaming services. Check any released song that people are actually listening to. None of it is at -14lufs and -1dbtp. Creating a good master couldn't be further from a numbers game imo. Creating a good master that serves and translates the music is art. the art of listening.
Agreed. This kind of info floating around now about LUFS is going to hurt the audio community in the long run. We already have an overload of crappy music out there. This is just going to make it worse.
@eccentricworx @Dave Johnson Audio All (above comments) true but its (eg -14 ) miles ahead of the loudness wars and the silliness of no dynamic range. As mentioned dont confuse dynamic range with loud. Peak to rms ratios are still key to a great output suited to the genre...tbh im still stuck on ksystem...works for me :-/ Its really a new disinformation but its nowhere as damaging as when evrrything was expected to be -6...'that' metallica album now sounds tiny against a jack johnson track on spotify...proof is in the pudding
@@iam-music i mix and master mainly Rock and Metal Stuff, trying to keep Peak to Short Term Dynamics always between 10 and 8db. If i would rely on Sonibles "new" Algorithm, which is PSR based as the manual suggests, everything i would limit due to their "standards" would turn out ~6db PSR/DR in reality and sounds squashed, which makes no sense at all and renders their new Metering that they introduced with smart:limit totally useless as it´s simply letting the Loudness Wars continue. I already contacted them months ago and got some positive feedback, but i guess it´s just a waste of time to wait for sonible to change. I will stick to MAAT DR Meter, it´s much more reliable and useful for keeping decent/natural dynamics. ...Haha ... just noticed, the last new metal song i have in mastering right now... smart:limit says 1.7 db too much dynamic range, but it will be taken down by spotify by 3.3 db. Maat says it is at ~9db PSR/DR and peaks at -1dbfs. My 2 cents: This whole -14LUFS mastering is utter nonsense. Let it sound good, keep natural dynamics and just let the Platform you put it on do their own LUFS stuff.
All in all, it's all about using our ears, as always. Visual cues and numbers are a great help but they shouldn't be the main focus. Also it's good to keep a consistent loudness level across releases of a same artist. For example, I've tried to keep my stuff between -11 and -9 LUFS for the loudest part of each song, and keep the dynamic range almost intact unless it's really too much. Sound and consistency matter more than going by industry standards IMO
Point is, use your ears, and if you don't trust them yet, hire a professional. Check out the top 10 singles chart from the last year in a true peak meter, most if not all are shooting well above 0dbfs with ISP, sometimes by 2 db. Your masters do not need to peak -1dbfs... the intersample peaks created by converting to MP3 sound better than the -1db of headroom you left on the table in most cases (at least according to whoever is mastering the weekend). Pro mastering is often clipping the converters, then limiting, then export. Again, all I'm saying is dont let Sonible tell you how your music should sound. Use the force Luke, and if you dont have it hire some force instead.
Does the sonible true level has issues? I used a limiter and clipper prior the sonible true level demo to limit/compress the shit out of a track and raise to 0db. Simply for testing purposes. The lufs show -11,2 (Should be in the range of 0 to -2, or similar) When bypassing the comp and limiter the lufs show about -11,0 as well. And several ppl having the same issue. Read in the comments in sonible vids. What is wrong here? Thank you..
What is yhe diffrence between Sonnible true level and the one found in Sonnible smart limiter? Or is is this just an alternative if one cannot afford the snart limiter? Sonible are really, really good but I hope they don't start clustering up.
Hi, i can get the ballance but I can't get the levels it's doing my head in.. id love to see you do a video ballacing the mix, then getting the levels in the mix then go back and look at the ballance.
no not at all bro this is the left section of smart limit on bigger size ,,,,,, when he says i respect the specs to get a better sound thats bull sh its the industry that require those specs sou thats just specs of loudness and limiting stage is not mixing you get better tracks by mixing better time after time using your ears that wont make you mix better it will just make you spend money use the smart limit
@@valgimorais602 Aye. It kind of surprised me that they made this TBH. It's not like it's a cheap/alternative thing. Absolutely on the ears thing ... Except that there ARE spec requirements out there, and ignoring them can get your carefully mixed and mastered music all chewed up by their auto-levelling devices ... I wonder if This Level Metering has features that Wyste didn't cover. Like Surround metering or something like that ... ??
,loudness is just the output stage i got masters at -10 -8 lufs and - 14 lufs clean and proud but that comes after the mix sou the secret to. get loud masters its all on the mix has for ,,,,. Except that there ARE spec requirements out there, and ignoring them can get your carefully mixed and mastered music all chewed up by their auto-levelling devices 3 things 1 turn off the ai mode and. adjust manually when that happens 2 maybe you re mixing to hot and 3 you may need more than one limiter for mastering sou they will not go working crazy and distort because plugins have sweet spots in terms of loudness
@@valgimorais602 Interesting. Personally I don't have a problem, I've been at this game for some decades, but thanks for the tips. My comments were out of technical curiosity.
-4LUFS is pretty loud, but most likely, the reason it sounded like shit was because you didn't have a low enough crest-factor on the mix itself. That is what determines how hard you can push into a limiter and still retain the quality.
Thank you for the explanation of the relation between true peak and codecs. But is there also a difference in interpretation of true peak between plugins? I used the PA true peak limiter on my mix and set it to -0.4db but trueLevel still showed me a max true peak at -0.2db. Where does the difference come from? Perhaps I‘m not understanding how that specific true peak limiter works. But my interpretation is, that the limiter shouldn’t allow peaks above the set limit. Now I don‘t know who to trust when it comes to limiting my mix. But now I have at least a second opinion in trueLevel. 🙂
@@TheGARCK bx_limiter True Peak, Is a limiter that is meant to capture intersample peaks, as that's what true peak limiters are for. At the release of the plugin though, there was a controversy regarding how well bx_limiter TP did its job, which may allude to the difference in the true peak readings. Then again, I've experienced this difference using smart:limit and MTM Levels, so there may always be a difference in how these plugins either process or read these values, which further raises the question lol
Great overview. I think some progress has been made in terms of making better masters with more dynamic range, but as someone else pointed out, dynamic range is bad in genres like pop where people don't listen critically. A classical recording with no dynamic range would be laughed out of existence.
It's the same argument in the comments of every video of this type, but I just don't agree that having poor dynamic range is the goal or superior in any type of music. It's not an inherent characteristic of music that makes it more enjoyable. Sure, most people who aren't savvy are probably listening on headphones or iphone speakers or whatever, but that doesn't really mean that you have to make a bad underlying master. Rather, it means they probably can't tell the difference either way, so there's not a good reason to do a poor technical job intentionally.
@@aryehwiznitzer9060 I think that having poor dynamic range is definitely a goal in modern pop. I also think it's a terrible goal - limiting dynamic range is sort of like dumbing music down, but in pop, that is part of the goal. Music that requires multiple listens to appreciate won't make it on the pop charts - they want music that has a sing-song quality (like a nursery rhyme) and has relatable lyrics and limited range. It's possible to write a great song in those limits, but most pop is disposable.
This lufs thing still doesn't make sense to me. When I buy the songs from iTunes or Amazon mp3 they are all higher than 14 lufs. When I reference while aiming for 14 lufs my tracks are always way quieter and less cohesive.
Saturating on every channel can potentially make you go as high as you like, without losing dynamic range. You might destroy the crest factor by the end (common for louder music), but your LU (the perceived dynamic range), shouldn't be significantly affected, depending on what's done in the arrangement by the musician/artist and the mixing engineer/artist in the mix.
How about printing the shirt with the numbers left blank, but include a fabric pen of the correct colour with the sale, and then folks can fill it in themselves?
LUFS standards are stupid and will constantly change anyways, as noted with Apple here. Just mix the damn song. If the streaming platforms do away with loudness specs altogether in the future, all your old mixes will sound weak. If you have a good mix with controlled dynamics, you can get away with a higher ceiling than -1dBtp. Don't use true-peak limiters either, it messes with the low-end. Just monitor your true-peak levels with a utility like this.
the only problem i have with the -14LUFS is in Techno genres. There you have already the streamtarget of -14LUFS after mixing without any Limiter on top. But all the other productions has one what means its kind of part of the sound character to have a compressed tune. Same goes for psytrance and hardstyle. on dark/hard techno you want that " under pressure " feeling anyway. Would go so far to say you have that case on almost every electronic dancefloor music.
Taylor Swift is around -9 and -8 LUFS and sounds awful, also Billie Eilish is around -7 and -6 LUFS and also sounds awful. The problem also is that new music has not many high frequencies but it's another issue. I agree that -10LUFS is the ideal.
-16 LUFS ? :D That makes mixing a creative process only. I mean all of us use some kind of master bus limiting, and not hitting -16 with just a tiny amount of character from that limiter is kind of hard.
This deviates from genre to genre though, I dont think I've heard a good sounding dubstep track under -7LUFS, since the nessesary distortion and overcompression inherent to dubstep's sound design already push you into those ranges, duck your mix for the drums correctly and you'll get to -5 without even putting on a mastering limiter. The spec of -14 is a recommendation for dynamic range but if your track sounds bad at such a low level, don't force it. Overcompression and distortion are often aestetic choises.
Loudness is about tonal balance. The numbers are meaningless. Use the number as a loose guide just to check, but focus on a clear pronounced midrange with clean lows, and the loudness will take care of itself
I still think LUFS is a hoax aka misleading as i think it´s nothing more than a better (digital) Volume Knob for Music-Platforms. Dynamic Range isn't. And i guess the PSR dynamic metering of sonibles tools are still off by 2.5db like in their limiter. I have the feeling they just want to establish a new standard that is based on their own methods/algorithms.
Ok, so all you need to do in analyze actual tracks from others that you like. If you do this enough, you'll learn all you need to know AND you'll be surprised. Most streaming music has peaks over 0dB, especially if it's an MP3. Just go figure it out; it's not that hard. Also, learn about something called crestfactor.
-1db and -14 lufs??? really? that depends solely on the genre u are making forget what streaming platforms suggest... electronic dance music or dnb for example is faaar louder mixed in my experience ... the streaming might lower the volume a bit but -14lufs of dynamic range will never work with electronic dance music that is 80% subbass and kick xD
Nahhhhhh forget these specs just make it sound good cus this doesn’t apply across all genres plus, TH-cam is NOT making these videos all match as I’m sure I’m not the only one who’s experiencing the constant volume up down motion from video to video
Better yet... Stop competing with loudness wars to begin with. It's been decades and yet still going. I am tired of seeing this advice like these target loudness values of whatever genre this is. Music requires dynamics from soft to loud. Like really... turn up the system volume if you want loud. Personally... I shoot around DR8-9 or even higher (depending the source material) which I find it good compromise between loudness and dynamics and I can just turn it up my sound device if I want loud. (Ik this comment will get pushback from modern producers/engineers about this so... 🗿🍿)
This is useless. All level targets are meaningless and nobody is following them. We all know that a master must just be as loud as other tracks from the same genre. If you follow these numbers you will end up with a master quiter than the competitors.
-0.3 dbTP
-9 LUFS (Around -11 & -8 could work too)
+ a ''healthy'' dynamic range
It works every time x me!
I'd really love to see a video that shows how to hit both targets of -1db tp and -14 lufs. Maybe coupled with some kind of mix review where you master someone else's home recording for someone struggling to hit those targets and explain the approach behind the whole process.
@lance moule...streaming targets are a secondary compliance issue...master the song using artistic outcome first...then do a stream compliant version
That is why this vid is disinformational
It would be very fun listening to...
@@iam-music Second this comment for sure!
I am at the end of some mixes that I am releasing in December and usually use SPAN to check spectrum , levels and balance. Downloaded Sonible True Level and True Balance to try out. To my surprise all 4 tracks were 90% on the money and the plugins really helped me to identify the other 10% of any issues. Very useful stuff .Keep up the good work. Love your channel.
This is actually a gem of knowledge thank you. As a solo artist, producing and mastering my own album this plug-in might be the saving grace I need to feel more confident launching on music platforms like spotify etc. I thought I would have to settle between distortion or a mix that's too quiet!
i got the Sweetwater combo deal of true:level and true:balance for only $99 🤗...thanks for a great review 😎👍🏻
I think there's a lot of confusion on loudness. There are no loudness targets in force currently and the AES guidelines now correctly describe it as a “Distribution Loudness”.
It’s just a loudness you need be aware of because if you upload above it, you’ll be turned down 'if' normalisation is enabled by the end user or the app enforces it by default. If it's turned it off, your track will be played at the loudness you mastered to. Only TH-cam actually enforce -14 lufs to their stream from my testing with no way to turn it off i nthe app or browser. YT Music seem to enforce -7lufs which is in line with a typical modern mastered Tidal, Spotify. Apple Music track with normalisation turned off.
But strangely TH-cam didn't put up the levels of too quiet videos / audio
@@digitalduch1111 They don't have loudness normalisation afaik. Simply anything above -14 gets turned down to -14 on youtube and anything above -7 gets turned down to -7 on YT Music.
@@SamHocking That's what I meant. They only turn down, not up. In the past (11-12 years ago) they did normalisation, but also bad limiting.
I am in the mood for M&M's for some reason.
Guys, please do not do -14 LUFS without knowing what you're doing. The best way is increase the loudness until you hear unwanted distortion, then decrease bit by bit. That is the song's best LUFS! And for the -1dBTP, I think it's fine to do it right now, but historically speaking, a lot of good songs that dont have it.
I know for a fact that at least Germanies biggest Mix and Mastering Engineers in the Rap world don't do -1 dBTP and don't give a shit about -14 LUFS.
The quality of the song does not drop even if the peak would be above zero. It is the quality of the audio or data depending of how you want to look at it. Those good old songs with 0dB true peak would sound better and more consistent with -1dB true peak. Using inconsistent hardware/software limitations on hardware/software that is NOT part of making the song, is just bad and nothing more, but none of that decreases the quality of the song itself.
definetely would never ever master a song to -14 LUFS. Totally agree.
Pretty interesting! ps love the nails haha. Matches good with your watch and the background
*Video Idea.... because you said that you compress your voice differently to not compress the music ect. It would be interesting to see how you do that when you edit the videos. For example, how do you edit the video? You edit the sound separately? In the video editor? You extract the audio separately? Thanks! And I love your videos!
Good idea!
I enjoy your videos....
I bought the Smart bundle (EQ-3, Comp-2, Limit-2, Reverb) on sale, and got the metering bundle for 40 euros. True Level allows you to add reference tracks, and Smart Limit-2 doesn't, so I think it is worth getting for that.
I was wondering what the point of getting true:level was until you said that. 😂 I just wish smart:limit could import references as a compact package on its own, then true:level would be for people that used other 3rd party limiters instead. But that would probably reduce its market share.
@@KaroLexMusic Perhaps that is something that Sonible might add in the next update to Smart-Limit. It is a nice feature to have, but I am never adverse to simplifying my FX chains!
We do have a LUFS screen going during the recording (Insights). Really handy for controlling recording no matter volume of monitors.
White Sea Studio, you was suppose to use this with reference tracks as that's what's mainly different between this and Smart limit.
Ok, Ill do a video about when and where stuff is encoded and Ill talk also abou this normalizarion process from Spotify. I hope to desmistify those matters. Unfortnetly, the video will be in portugueses, altough you will be able to follow it within the auto-subtitle.
See you!
The problem is that the loudness matching feature for Apple Music is OFF by default. And also there is „Spotify loud“ which is at -11LUFS I think. And do you do the, let’s say, -14 LUFS before or after the -1dB true peak? It’s still pretty confusing.
-11 lufs at -1dbtp is what i go for (basicly u can still smash it and it "ll be loud)
you can torn off the loudness normalization anyway which many users are doing anyways.
On normal (-14 LUFS) Spotify will push the volume until there is still at least 1 dB headroom. The limiter will not reduce any peaks. For example: A song has -21 LUFS and -3 dBtp (true peak). Spotify will raise the volume to -19 LUFS to keep -1 dBtp. When it is at -18 LUFS and -4 dBtp it will raise it to -15 LUFS and -14 LUFS when the true peak were -5 dB.
On Loud spotify ignores the true peak headroom and push the song to -11 LUFS and applies a Limiter with 5ms Attack and 100 ms decay. I think this sould be avoided. So in most cases I would try to hit at least -11 LUFS. But this could be a problem at very dynamic tracks.
Didn't watch yet, but I was waiting for this release since they announced it and I bought it without thinking straight away haha. Great tools and great company!
I have True Levels, and basically all Sonibil software. Highly recommended. Integrates well with Fab Filter as well.
I guess the key against the loudness war is awareness of how much squashed a mix would sound by tracking dynamic range to the max reduction and the other part of loudness is the true peak level at -1 dB to avoid digital clipping. True peak is really the part to catch of the edge of the peak area ("ceilings") I guess the streaming services specification does not matter at all. Important is just the step of normalization by certain codecs like mp3, mp4, aac etc. Which could cause clipping if the true peak settlement is not applied. In other words dynamic range target is some flavor dependent on genre not so much about specification of a streaming service. However going after specifications a low dynamic range is required to limit a mix into the lufs target without causing moderate clipping distortion. This becomes harder with classic genres because they use a wider dynamic range in other words the difference between the loudest and quitest measures.
Great very helpful, thanks!!
it seems to me that a lot of people here forget to actually listen to the music and instead are lost in meaningless numbers. Master the music to where it sounds good. Skrillex would sound awful at -14lufs. Norah Jones would sound awful at -6lufs. Spotify normalization is still a mess, and not to mention changing by the minute. One song can be at different loudness levels depending on the context and the device it's played back on. Not looking to pick a fight here but frankly i think this kind of content is extremely misleading. Serve the music, not the streaming services. Check any released song that people are actually listening to. None of it is at -14lufs and -1dbtp. Creating a good master couldn't be further from a numbers game imo. Creating a good master that serves and translates the music is art. the art of listening.
Agreed. This kind of info floating around now about LUFS is going to hurt the audio community in the long run. We already have an overload of crappy music out there. This is just going to make it worse.
yep. LUFS means loudness, not Dynamic Range which is definetely Genre-dependent.
@eccentricworx @Dave Johnson Audio
All (above comments) true but its (eg -14 ) miles ahead of the loudness wars and the silliness of no dynamic range. As mentioned dont confuse dynamic range with loud. Peak to rms ratios are still key to a great output suited to the genre...tbh im still stuck on ksystem...works for me :-/
Its really a new disinformation but its nowhere as damaging as when evrrything was expected to be -6...'that' metallica album now sounds tiny against a jack johnson track on spotify...proof is in the pudding
@@iam-music i mix and master mainly Rock and Metal Stuff, trying to keep Peak to Short Term Dynamics always between 10 and 8db. If i would rely on Sonibles "new" Algorithm, which is PSR based as the manual suggests, everything i would limit due to their "standards" would turn out ~6db PSR/DR in reality and sounds squashed, which makes no sense at all and renders their new Metering that they introduced with smart:limit totally useless as it´s simply letting the Loudness Wars continue.
I already contacted them months ago and got some positive feedback, but i guess it´s just a waste of time to wait for sonible to change. I will stick to MAAT DR Meter, it´s much more reliable and useful for keeping decent/natural dynamics.
...Haha ... just noticed, the last new metal song i have in mastering right now... smart:limit says 1.7 db too much dynamic range, but it will be taken down by spotify by 3.3 db. Maat says it is at ~9db PSR/DR and peaks at -1dbfs. My 2 cents: This whole -14LUFS mastering is utter nonsense. Let it sound good, keep natural dynamics and just let the Platform you put it on do their own LUFS stuff.
All in all, it's all about using our ears, as always. Visual cues and numbers are a great help but they shouldn't be the main focus.
Also it's good to keep a consistent loudness level across releases of a same artist. For example, I've tried to keep my stuff between -11 and -9 LUFS for the loudest part of each song, and keep the dynamic range almost intact unless it's really too much. Sound and consistency matter more than going by industry standards IMO
3:30 that's the crest factor, nowadays the Loudness Range is measured in LRA units (it's almost the same but using LU instead of RMS)
Point is, use your ears, and if you don't trust them yet, hire a professional.
Check out the top 10 singles chart from the last year in a true peak meter, most if not all are shooting well above 0dbfs with ISP, sometimes by 2 db. Your masters do not need to peak -1dbfs... the intersample peaks created by converting to MP3 sound better than the -1db of headroom you left on the table in most cases (at least according to whoever is mastering the weekend). Pro mastering is often clipping the converters, then limiting, then export.
Again, all I'm saying is dont let Sonible tell you how your music should sound. Use the force Luke, and if you dont have it hire some force instead.
5:38 - You might wanna check TC Electronic Clarity - a hardware with some of the stuff you've mentioned😀
Does the sonible true level has issues? I used a limiter and clipper prior the sonible true level demo to limit/compress the shit out of a track and raise to 0db. Simply for testing purposes. The lufs show -11,2 (Should be in the range of 0 to -2, or similar) When bypassing the comp and limiter the lufs show about -11,0 as well. And several ppl having the same issue. Read in the comments in sonible vids. What is wrong here? Thank you..
COLORS!! HEHEH. JUST clicked on your link to buy this
Loving the T shirt.
I use a tablet (iPad in my case) as an extra monitor primarily for metering, having touch control is also handy in some cases..-
great review
-10 LUFS works great for all streaming platforms as a mean value!
True imo. Thats the sweet spot, for now at least
I master everything to -12 LUFS because that’s loud enough. You truly don’t need to be louder. And -0.30 peak is good enough too👍
If you're printing to CD/vinyl, that won't cut it.
For me the DR meter from MAAT digital is still unbeatable, and it has standalone and offline versions which are important for a good loudness meter.
Someone else asked this as well, I see. The only value I see - which is a big value, is adding reference tracks, as SmartLimit doesn't, correct?
TC finalizer really was ahead of the curve on this, they just abandoned that s*** like all musictribe products lol
Your hyperactivity is contagious ;)
I really like using Mastering The Mix LEVELS. It really does what it says, and if you would be so kind as to "Snake-Oil" it for us?
Did you not keep the MP midi control, I use mine with the Sonible pluggins
Looks like a handy tool!
Are there competitive or free dynamic range meters?
@White Sea Studio any update on the MP Midi? curious if your still using it
can you tell me how loud in RMS or LUFS is SandStorm From Darude. For sure is around 8 Lufs, or louder...... check it out
What is yhe diffrence between Sonnible true level and the one found in Sonnible smart limiter? Or is is this just an alternative if one cannot afford the snart limiter? Sonible are really, really good but I hope they don't start clustering up.
Smart Limiter does not allow you to import reference tracks, true Level does.
@@marksimoni2937 Hi. I much appreciate your feedback. I now have a clear picture. Thank so much.
5:30 TC-Electronics Stereo-M is what you need.
Hi, i can get the ballance but I can't get the levels it's doing my head in.. id love to see you do a video ballacing the mix, then getting the levels in the mix then go back and look at the ballance.
If you already have Smart:Limit and Smart:Comp is there any real reason to have this ?
no not at all bro this is the left section of smart limit on bigger size ,,,,,, when he says i respect the specs to get a better sound thats bull sh its the industry that require those specs sou thats just specs of loudness and limiting stage is not mixing you get better tracks by mixing better time after time using your ears that wont make you mix better it will just make you spend money use the smart limit
@@valgimorais602 Aye. It kind of surprised me that they made this TBH.
It's not like it's a cheap/alternative thing.
Absolutely on the ears thing ... Except that there ARE spec requirements out there, and ignoring them can get your carefully mixed and mastered music all chewed up by their auto-levelling devices ...
I wonder if This Level Metering has features that Wyste didn't cover.
Like Surround metering or something like that ... ??
,loudness is just the output stage i got masters at -10 -8 lufs and - 14 lufs clean and proud but that comes after the mix sou the secret to. get loud masters its all on the mix has for ,,,,. Except that there ARE spec requirements out there, and ignoring them can get your carefully mixed and mastered music all chewed up by their auto-levelling devices 3 things 1 turn off the ai mode and. adjust manually when that happens 2 maybe you re mixing to hot and 3 you may need more than one limiter for mastering sou they will not go working crazy and distort because plugins have sweet spots in terms of loudness
@@valgimorais602 Interesting.
Personally I don't have a problem, I've been at this game for some decades, but thanks for the tips.
My comments were out of technical curiosity.
Just bought both $43 if you own other Sonible
Thanks to you
Once i made a song at -4lufs just for giggles
It sounded very not good but goddamn was it LOUD XD
😂😂😂 I bet
-4LUFS is pretty loud, but most likely, the reason it sounded like shit was because you didn't have a low enough crest-factor on the mix itself. That is what determines how hard you can push into a limiter and still retain the quality.
Thank you for the explanation of the relation between true peak and codecs. But is there also a difference in interpretation of true peak between plugins? I used the PA true peak limiter on my mix and set it to -0.4db but trueLevel still showed me a max true peak at -0.2db. Where does the difference come from? Perhaps I‘m not understanding how that specific true peak limiter works. But my interpretation is, that the limiter shouldn’t allow peaks above the set limit. Now I don‘t know who to trust when it comes to limiting my mix. But now I have at least a second opinion in trueLevel. 🙂
@@TheGARCK bx_limiter True Peak, Is a limiter that is meant to capture intersample peaks, as that's what true peak limiters are for. At the release of the plugin though, there was a controversy regarding how well bx_limiter TP did its job, which may allude to the difference in the true peak readings. Then again, I've experienced this difference using smart:limit and MTM Levels, so there may always be a difference in how these plugins either process or read these values, which further raises the question lol
Compared with free / $40-50 (pro) Youlean Loudness Meter?
Great overview. I think some progress has been made in terms of making better masters with more dynamic range, but as someone else pointed out, dynamic range is bad in genres like pop where people don't listen critically. A classical recording with no dynamic range would be laughed out of existence.
It's the same argument in the comments of every video of this type, but I just don't agree that having poor dynamic range is the goal or superior in any type of music. It's not an inherent characteristic of music that makes it more enjoyable. Sure, most people who aren't savvy are probably listening on headphones or iphone speakers or whatever, but that doesn't really mean that you have to make a bad underlying master. Rather, it means they probably can't tell the difference either way, so there's not a good reason to do a poor technical job intentionally.
@@aryehwiznitzer9060 I think that having poor dynamic range is definitely a goal in modern pop. I also think it's a terrible goal - limiting dynamic range is sort of like dumbing music down, but in pop, that is part of the goal. Music that requires multiple listens to appreciate won't make it on the pop charts - they want music that has a sing-song quality (like a nursery rhyme) and has relatable lyrics and limited range. It's possible to write a great song in those limits, but most pop is disposable.
I would like to see an dolby atmos version for heavy genres.
This lufs thing still doesn't make sense to me. When I buy the songs from iTunes or Amazon mp3 they are all higher than 14 lufs. When I reference while aiming for 14 lufs my tracks are always way quieter and less cohesive.
Verdade. Quem faz esse trabalho é a plataforma a gente tem que deixar a música da melhor forma possível em volume e não se prender a 14 lufs
Saturating on every channel can potentially make you go as high as you like, without losing dynamic range. You might destroy the crest factor by the end (common for louder music), but your LU (the perceived dynamic range), shouldn't be significantly affected, depending on what's done in the arrangement by the musician/artist and the mixing engineer/artist in the mix.
Most major labels request roughly -8 LUFS from mastering engineers. This is a competitive level especially if normalisation is not present.
@@AN7ON yup thats the number ive seen on most reference tracks
Try Decibel from Process Audio!!! And phone... :)
How about printing the shirt with the numbers left blank, but include a fabric pen of the correct colour with the sale, and then folks can fill it in themselves?
+1DB TP
-6LUFS
LUFS standards are stupid and will constantly change anyways, as noted with Apple here. Just mix the damn song. If the streaming platforms do away with loudness specs altogether in the future, all your old mixes will sound weak. If you have a good mix with controlled dynamics, you can get away with a higher ceiling than -1dBtp. Don't use true-peak limiters either, it messes with the low-end. Just monitor your true-peak levels with a utility like this.
the only problem i have with the -14LUFS is in Techno genres. There you have already the streamtarget of -14LUFS after mixing without any Limiter on top.
But all the other productions has one what means its kind of part of the sound character to have a compressed tune. Same goes for psytrance and hardstyle. on dark/hard techno you want that " under pressure " feeling anyway. Would go so far to say you have that case on almost every electronic dancefloor music.
oh it's not just techno! there are lots of other kinds of music that sound best when dynamic range is much smaller. more aggressive genres.
A lot of commercial tracks peak at -2 dB and are around -10 lufs. What do you think of this ratio? Why would someone limit at -2?
Hot/loud mixes in the context of a whole album where they have to sit next to softer pieces.
Taylor Swift is around -9 and -8 LUFS and sounds awful, also Billie Eilish is around -7 and -6 LUFS and also sounds awful. The problem also is that new music has not many high frequencies but it's another issue.
I agree that -10LUFS is the ideal.
Is this a portuguese Fado version of sandrude?
Why not use decibel? You can put it an a phone or pad.
-16 LUFS ? :D That makes mixing a creative process only. I mean all of us use some kind of master bus limiting, and not hitting -16 with just a tiny amount of character from that limiter is kind of hard.
it just means it won't compress at that. For pop music yeah thats way too much dynamic range. For classical, jazz and soundtrack musi.....not so much.
This deviates from genre to genre though, I dont think I've heard a good sounding dubstep track under -7LUFS, since the nessesary distortion and overcompression inherent to dubstep's sound design already push you into those ranges, duck your mix for the drums correctly and you'll get to -5 without even putting on a mastering limiter. The spec of -14 is a recommendation for dynamic range but if your track sounds bad at such a low level, don't force it. Overcompression and distortion are often aestetic choises.
this has to be a rick&morty reference :D "true level" :D
Youlean loudness meter same thing!
sorry, what should I do?
Loudness is about tonal balance. The numbers are meaningless. Use the number as a loose guide just to check, but focus on a clear pronounced midrange with clean lows, and the loudness will take care of itself
Queue the EDM heads saying you should aim for -8 or more everytime.
John Hanes posted stats for Antihero from Taylor Swift and those stats are laughing at this plugin.
make your own plugin that detects snake oil!
I still think LUFS is a hoax aka misleading as i think it´s nothing more than a better (digital) Volume Knob for Music-Platforms. Dynamic Range isn't. And i guess the PSR dynamic metering of sonibles tools are still off by 2.5db like in their limiter. I have the feeling they just want to establish a new standard that is based on their own methods/algorithms.
Ok, so all you need to do in analyze actual tracks from others that you like. If you do this enough, you'll learn all you need to know AND you'll be surprised. Most streaming music has peaks over 0dB, especially if it's an MP3. Just go figure it out; it's not that hard. Also, learn about something called crestfactor.
GOT U FIRST Comment!
True peak in the mierder level ... in the oil ?¿
Comment for da algorithm
Streak count: 101
I prefer my songs at -4lufs 😉
-1db and -14 lufs??? really? that depends solely on the genre u are making forget what streaming platforms suggest... electronic dance music or dnb for example is faaar louder mixed in my experience ... the streaming might lower the volume a bit but -14lufs of dynamic range will never work with electronic dance music that is 80% subbass and kick xD
PS: sadly it is that way tbh... loudness war is something u cant just ignore in this industry anymore...
The elephant in the room why do you need this if you are using smart limiter!
Nahhhhhh forget these specs just make it sound good cus this doesn’t apply across all genres plus, TH-cam is NOT making these videos all match as I’m sure I’m not the only one who’s experiencing the constant volume up down motion from video to video
-4 LUFs master race be like
using specifications does not = better sound. master using your ears, not numbers
Better yet...
Stop competing with loudness wars to begin with. It's been decades and yet still going. I am tired of seeing this advice like these target loudness values of whatever genre this is. Music requires dynamics from soft to loud. Like really... turn up the system volume if you want loud. Personally... I shoot around DR8-9 or even higher (depending the source material) which I find it good compromise between loudness and dynamics and I can just turn it up my sound device if I want loud. (Ik this comment will get pushback from modern producers/engineers about this so... 🗿🍿)
Bot scam reply above me. Don't believe this 💀
playfair are gone. sad.
1st :)
This is useless. All level targets are meaningless and nobody is following them. We all know that a master must just be as loud as other tracks from the same genre. If you follow these numbers you will end up with a master quiter than the competitors.
audio software is so💩
Dude what’s up with the painted nails? Lol. Man up.
Nobody’s said that already…
Delivering at what platforms suggest will lead to no competitive material....
How about this statement: DON'T DO -14LUFS th-cam.com/users/shortsaO0dR0wOIkk?feature=share
Looks like smart Limit to me 🫣