export is different to track!
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- KVRist
- 80 posts since 8 Oct, 2003 from London/Manchester UK
Hi all,
I'm mixing an acoustic artist on Tracktion, and I am using the Waves L1, T-racks compressors/eq and Blue Tubes Brickwall.
The problem is this: when I'm monitoring it in tracktion it sounds a bit lifeless and dull, but there is no distortion. When I bounce to a wav file, it sounds much brighter and more natural and clearer (and slightly louder), but I'm getting some slight distortion in the vocals. The difference in sound between the monitoring and the bounce is sigificant, and I don't know why.
64 bit math is enabled. I'm monitoring on Tannoy Reveal Actives through a Tascam US-122.
Any suggestions?
Cheers,
Chris.
I'm mixing an acoustic artist on Tracktion, and I am using the Waves L1, T-racks compressors/eq and Blue Tubes Brickwall.
The problem is this: when I'm monitoring it in tracktion it sounds a bit lifeless and dull, but there is no distortion. When I bounce to a wav file, it sounds much brighter and more natural and clearer (and slightly louder), but I'm getting some slight distortion in the vocals. The difference in sound between the monitoring and the bounce is sigificant, and I don't know why.
64 bit math is enabled. I'm monitoring on Tannoy Reveal Actives through a Tascam US-122.
Any suggestions?
Cheers,
Chris.
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- KVRAF
- 10815 posts since 26 Nov, 2004 from UK
have you set your export settings to "normalise"?
thats the only thing i have noticed make a difference to the exported file?
also try exporting at 1x that should fix whatever is causing the distortion
Good luck
Subz
thats the only thing i have noticed make a difference to the exported file?
also try exporting at 1x that should fix whatever is causing the distortion
Good luck
Subz
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will.record.for.food will.record.for.food https://www.kvraudio.com/forum/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=47978
- KVRist
- 222 posts since 14 Nov, 2004 from TX
also, is your main volume slider turned down (not at 0)
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- KVRist
- Topic Starter
- 80 posts since 8 Oct, 2003 from London/Manchester UK
Removing normalisation appears to remove the distortion; I thought that normalisation was supposed to prevent distortion, not cause it! what does this say about my signal? that's its got peaking transients?
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- KVRist
- Topic Starter
- 80 posts since 8 Oct, 2003 from London/Manchester UK
i think also rendering at faster than 1x speed confuses the compressors; at a guess...
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- The Teach
- 8273 posts since 23 Jul, 2002 from flatness
IIRC the waves stuff can be troublesome ... do a quick search here for it (never paid that much attention myself since i dont have them) ...
slainte
rob
slainte
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- KVRist
- Topic Starter
- 80 posts since 8 Oct, 2003 from London/Manchester UK
OK I've found the best sound is to be had with normalisation turned off and the render at 1x speed turned on. But, it still sounds very tonally different from the mixdown. Maybe windows media player adds its own processing?
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- KVRAF
- 6490 posts since 14 Jun, 2004 from Rochester, NY
ive found this as to be true. render does sound damned different. its tough if you mix things down for a 2nd job.
RoNC
RoNC
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- KVRist
- Topic Starter
- 80 posts since 8 Oct, 2003 from London/Manchester UK
Do you have any suggestions for as how to fix it? is this a problem affecting tracktion or sequencers in general; in my opinion this is a very very serious problem and half negates the purpose of me investing in expensive monitors...
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- KVRAF
- 6490 posts since 14 Jun, 2004 from Rochester, NY
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- KVRAF
- 4644 posts since 28 Nov, 2002 from Chicago
when you say "very" what do you actually mean? Are we talking shifts in quality of low level audio (reverb tails and release periods), or full tonal differnces?
The former could easily be the result of either changing the bitdepth between 32/24/16bit, or appliued dithering.
The second case would generally be caused by altering the bitrate (as Ron suggests). Many filters simply sound different when working at 44.1, 48, 88.2, and 96KHz. This in turn means that anything that has built in filters (multiband comrpessors, instruments, and even delay/reverbs) can sound surprisingly different when rendered at different rates. Generally the effect shouldn't be enough to break a mix, and though it may be noticeable to you, your audience, not being familiar with the alternative, will never no or care. With a few filter designs the effect can be pronouced enough to actually alter cut-off behaviour significantly.
Personally I always compare plugs at 44 and 88k, and if there is a large enough difference I simply quit using the plug, 'cos I consider this a bug.
The former could easily be the result of either changing the bitdepth between 32/24/16bit, or appliued dithering.
The second case would generally be caused by altering the bitrate (as Ron suggests). Many filters simply sound different when working at 44.1, 48, 88.2, and 96KHz. This in turn means that anything that has built in filters (multiband comrpessors, instruments, and even delay/reverbs) can sound surprisingly different when rendered at different rates. Generally the effect shouldn't be enough to break a mix, and though it may be noticeable to you, your audience, not being familiar with the alternative, will never no or care. With a few filter designs the effect can be pronouced enough to actually alter cut-off behaviour significantly.
Personally I always compare plugs at 44 and 88k, and if there is a large enough difference I simply quit using the plug, 'cos I consider this a bug.
Someone shot the food. Remember: don't shoot food!
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- KVRAF
- 10815 posts since 26 Nov, 2004 from UK
dose the phazing sound different?
if yes then it could be a pdc render bug
to the untrained ere it could just sound thinner & more loose
could you list the plugins you use & if you use bussing in your edits? (EG; send tracks to another track)
also if you import a normal wav file & export that to a wav file dose it have the same difference?
Subz
if yes then it could be a pdc render bug
to the untrained ere it could just sound thinner & more loose
could you list the plugins you use & if you use bussing in your edits? (EG; send tracks to another track)
also if you import a normal wav file & export that to a wav file dose it have the same difference?
Subz
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- KVRist
- Topic Starter
- 80 posts since 8 Oct, 2003 from London/Manchester UK
I was rendering to 16bit 44khz, for cd burning. i've kept tracktion's iternal bitrate to be 44khz as well. The difference sonically comes across firstly in terms of EQ; the exported mix is definately brighter and more transient heavy. It sounds clearer. The difference is, while not horrific, certainly noticeable even to the lay ear. I would possibly suggest that the exported mix has different compression to my tracktion mix; probably due to t-racks messing around.
I am going to be investing in a presonus firepod in the forthcoming weeks; this will let me try to monitor at higher depths/rates. I hope that will help.
I am going to be investing in a presonus firepod in the forthcoming weeks; this will let me try to monitor at higher depths/rates. I hope that will help.
- KVRAF
- 25042 posts since 12 Jul, 2003 from West Caprazumia
the reason behind you problem is that you're using Tracktion!
Rule of thumb: don't render in Tracktion if you don't like the unexpected!

Rule of thumb: don't render in Tracktion if you don't like the unexpected!
