Gain staging?

[Johan Madsen]

Just a few questions about gain staging here: I record instrumental acoustic guitar for YT purpose,basic mixes, and no real separate mastering step. I've finally managed to achieve a satisfying overall output level without clipping, mainly with low cuts on every take, on the reverb , and by manually reducing the peaks to allow for increasing the overall volume without clipping (I just manually cut the clip before and after the peak and just drag its volume down with the little handle on the event, to avoid using compressors). I decided to give Nebula a try , and as they strongly recommend to hit the input at -18dbfs (0 dbvu If I understand well), I was wondering which was the healthiest way to gain volume back at the master output? Should I just move the main output channel fader up over the 0 dbfs? (Though the meters are still below while doing that). Sorry if my question may sound dumb but I obviously lack some knowledge about those kind of stuffs,
Thanks for your help!

[ere2learn]

A gain tool before & after Nebula should do the trick,so you can adjust levels going in & out.

[Moosy_Moose]

Yup, put a trim/gain plugin before Nebula and adjust the volume to -18 dbfs.
Adjusting the master fader volume will not change the signal that is going into Nebula.
A nice, free trim and VU meter plugin in one, that you could have a look at is this one:

https://www.kvraudio.com/product/mvmeter-by-tbproaudio

You'd kill two birds with one stone. You'd see the VU level of your input signals and could adjust it as well.

[ATN69]

Here are 2 very nice free plugins that can help a lot. I use them all the time,

https://www.sonalksis.com/freeg.html

https://youlean.co/youlean-loudness-meter/

[Chris-S]

Normally there is a limiter at the end of the master fader chain and you can use this to raise the level to desired loudness.

[do_androids_dream]

Just use a limiter. That -18dB figure is an average level - not a peak level btw (just in case you didn't know).

When you're making those peak lowering edits you're essentially doing what a compressor does.. Just use a nice transparent sounding compressor for the task - limiter on the master to make sure you don't go over 0dB - Job done.

[clangorous]

Definitely don't use the master fader to increase the volume. Using clip gain to level out the peaks is great (crossfade your clips!) but I would think about some light compression after that IF you need to adjust the transients or sustain or add some color, etc. Compression is not a bad thing as long as you are using it to accomplish something specific. For example, accentuating the transients can help your mix balance. You can lower the volume fader on the guitar to allow room for the vocals or another instrument without losing the guitar in the mix.

As for the overall volume, yes use a limiter. If it has an input volume knob you can use that to increase the volume into the limiter. If not you can use a trim or gain plugin to raise the volume going into the limiter.

BUT if you do not like the way it sounds by just pushing the loudness, try using multistage compression to further smooth the volume before the limiter. Use two or three compressors in series to add 1-3 Db of compression each which can sound better than just squashing it with one compressor or the limiter.

[Johan Madsen]

Thank you for your answers , I'll give those tools a try, I don't use a compressor as it tend to squash the peaks , while lowering the individual peak's individually, though being a bit time consuming, preserves the peak's shape and doesn't alter the tone (once again it's just instrumental guitar and I try to keep the sound as natural as possible). I don't feel comfortable with the attack and release settings either on the compressor that's also why I prefer to avoid it as I've never managed to get natural results haha ! Anyway the peaks are not a problem, I was just wondering what's wrong with just raising the master output fader to compensate the -18 db loss?

[ATN69]

Thank you for your answers , I'll give those tools a try, I don't use a compressor as it tend to squash the peaks , while lowering the individual peak's individually, though being a bit time consuming, preserves the peak's shape and doesn't alter the tone (once again it's just instrumental guitar and I try to keep the sound as natural as possible). I don't feel comfortable with the attack and release settings either on the compressor that's also why I prefer to avoid it as I've never managed to get natural results haha ! Anyway the peaks are not a problem, I was just wondering what's wrong with just raising the master output fader to compensate the -18 db loss?

What you have to watch out for when you raise the gain is distortion and clipping. This is why the input signal to any FX, EQ, etc, has to be correct. A too high gain into an FX, EQ, etc, might cause clipping and distortion. If the gain is too low you face another problem and that is you need to increase the gain as the final step on the master bus in order to reach the output level you are looking for. If the needed gain increase is too much then you risk clipping and distortion at this stage. A well balanced gain thru out the "chain" is what you want. Raising the master output fader to compensate for as much as 18dB seems to be over the top

[imrae]

I don't feel comfortable with the attack and release settings either on the compressor that's also why I prefer to avoid it as I've never managed to get natural results haha !

You may have tried this workflow already, but here's what works for me to get an initial setting:
1. Set attack and release to fast
2. Adjust threshold and ratio to get the amount of gain reduction you're after. Don't worry that it sounds bad at this stage, concentrate on getting the amount of levelling or fattening that you're after.
3. Open up the attack slowly until the transient sounds right. Don't worry about the tails sounding distorted.
4. Open up the release until you're happy with the compromise between distortion and pumping.
5. Level match and compare with bypass. If it isn't doing roughly what you hoped for, go back to 1. and try a different threshold/ratio combination.

If the acoustic guitar has different parts of picking and strumming then one compressor setting may not work well for all of it; you may need to break the track up into parts and treat them separately. Transient designers are a lot less sensitive to playing dynamics and you may have more luck there.

[jancivil]

Before you start getting crazy with multiband compression and all this, you need to focus on the level, to give whatever you're plugging in to enough gain. There's a very astute thread on this in Effects, 'proper gain for guitar input' is probably in the topic title in some variation. It's for electric guitar but I think it applies per se at least as a conceptual reference.

[sin night]

[...]That -18dB figure is an average level - not a peak level btw (just in case you didn't know).[...]

Quote. This is really important. It's an average and it requires some time to calculate the average. And if the sound is really short (for example a percussion sound) you can have a pretty loud sound while being still under the -18dB mark.
Anyway, use it as a rough reference, but don't be obsessed by it...