Ableton Forum

Listen to mix from another room. this will give you an idea of what's too loud.
Burn a cd and listen to it on as many play back devices as you can.

bcwarlock wrote:What about leaving at least -6 db below zero for the whole mix to be mastered at, is that a necessity?

Tarekith wrote:Not at all, just a safety net to ensure there's no accidental clipping.

This^


Not a necessity... a best practice.


I highly recommend it. The first time someone mastering your track gives you kudos for it you'll be so glad you did. The last thing you want is a mastering engineer being forced to struggle within your parameters.

Tarekith wrote:Not at all, just a safety net to ensure there's no accidental clipping.

Oh,okay. I just wasn't sure because I read a guide to mixing earlier and it said to do this,but then I watched a couple of mixing guides on Youtube and some of them had the levels right at zero, so I wasn't sure....thanks!

H20nly wrote:

bcwarlock wrote:What about leaving at least -6 db below zero for the whole mix to be mastered at, is that a necessity?

Tarekith wrote:Not at all, just a safety net to ensure there's no accidental clipping.

This^


Not a necessity... a best practice.


I highly recommend it. The first time someone mastering your track gives you kudos for it you'll be so glad you did. The last thing you want is a mastering engineer being forced to struggle within your parameters.

Yeah it does seem like it would make things easier all around I just wasn't sure if it was like a strict rule or had some wiggle room to it...but yeah I'll definitely be doing this.

Its easy to make a mix sound exciting by boosting frequencies and volumes. this quickly turns into a mess of midrange noise without any clarity or power. i compose, arrange and once I have got the time line sorted I pull down all the levels on all the tracks.I then loop up one of the more loaded sections and bring up the levels, one track at a time. this helps me get the balance between tracks right without having to rely on frequency boosts and heavy limiting to keep a mix in line. Cutting frequencies on tracks that are not contributing to their key role within a composition is also a good idea - speakers only have a limited capacity to play given frequency bands and so that 'mixspace' shouldn't be wasted on stuff like the sub harmonics of a guitar - unless there isn't anything else using that frequency range.