Musicians Collaboration Studio
How To => D.A.W. Help => Topic started by: jeff on January 12, 2009, 08:12:04 AM
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I finally got around to testing my newer DAW yesterday. Sounds much better :)
I noticed that everything is set up to record at 48kHz. Was built by a 3rd party with Video Production in mind, so that makes sense.
Is there any reason I should change to 44.1 for music collabs? Or am I safe using the default 48? Should I export to 44.1 for collab purposes...or leave it as is?
Thanks for any input you may have.
Jeff
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Thanks for posting this Jeff,... I am wondering about the 44.1 and 48 kHz thing also.
Jay
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Maybe, Jeff ::)... Most of the standard stuff wont read 48 Khz... And anyhow, if you're going to burn it to CD, you'll have to do 44.1 Khz, 16 bit.
Anyway, I always record may original stuff at 96Khz and 24 bit... Just post it in a way I know everyone cand read.
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For standard audio projects (i.e. not going to be for video) 44.1k is the best. For video soundtrack work 48k is the best. Sticking to the native format for the final output media gives the best results (cd's/web audio are 44.1, DV based video is 48k). This comes up again and again, it's good that it has it's own thread now.
To put it in terms that i know you'll understand jeff ... it's similar to working in native colorpsace ... you don't want to do RGB for things destined for CMYK output, and vice-versa. It equates to about the same thing in the end game, going from 48k -> 44.1k at final output is like converting CMYK to RGB, it's going to lose something in the translation every time.
Mark
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Cool. Thanks! :)
Jeff
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If u want to produce audio for collabs and are not doing film work 44.1 is perfect.
48 to 44.1-use a dither plugin on master channel and then render.
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Yeah, I wonder about that. Its hard to know how something might be used in the end. It would be good to have all options available.
Is there some sort of trick for converting 44.1 to 48? If some track eventually ends up on a DVD...like my uhmmm "music videos" ;) how should that be handled?
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i think only downsampling requires a trick :)
44.1 to 48 won't result in increase or decrease in quality.
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48hrz & 24 bit works for me,the 48 makes my cymbals a bit brighter.
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48hrz & 24 bit works for me,the 48 makes my cymbals a bit brighter.
Not sure how it would make your cymbals brighter to have more samples per second honestly ... but hey whatever works for ya.
As I say this is a big debate, do some googling about it .. there are tons of discussions about this and different people feel very differently on it, but I remember reading something from Bob Katz on this (think it was in his book on mastering) and I'm sticking with what he says -- which makes perfect sense to me -- to avoid dithering/downsampling where at all possible. Even when i do higher bit rate recordings I don't do 96k, I do 88.2k (because 88.2 / 2 is 44.1 so it doesn't have to do any audio dithering when downsampling).
Mark
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Ok then...how do major studios handle things?
Label artists have CDs, Music Videos and songs included in Films.
Or is that more a mixing thang?
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The quality of the convertors will make more difference to the sound than the sample rate.
You can buy some fantastic sounding 16bit 44.1k Dacs and cheapo ones that can do 24bit 48k or more...but sound worse....the specs won't tell you what sounds best just your ears.
I'd say it's worth recording in 24 bit so you get a better signal to noise ratio, but beyond that you'll probably find other things in the recording or mixing chain will make more difference than switching to 48k from 44.1.
CD
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Yep exactly CD. 24bit is a very good thing.
If you can afford high quality converters then 48k->44.1k is fine. If you're doing just software conversions you will lose quality downsampling without a doubt.
Mark
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Ok then...how do major studios handle things?
Label artists have CDs, Music Videos and songs included in Films.
Or is that more a mixing thang?
Yep that's a probably a mastering time thing. Larger studio setups are recording at much higher sampling rates anyway and have high quality conversion hardware to do their downsampling. For us poor folk that pay for our own gear I prefer to record in the native sampling rate where possible :)
Also it's most likely that the audio for a video is mastered separately for the audio for a CD.
Mark
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I put the 88.2 is good because it's double 44.1 argument forward on a board and got a lot of people saying that it's not the same. That the precision of the downsampling process is a lot better now days etc. and you that's not a valid claim.
I mean I can see that in graphics when you have even numbers it would divide cleanly and you wouldn't throw away more than you have to.
I was working at 88,2 but it did cause a strain on my system and I was using up too much of my UAD resources. So I went back to 48k. Maybe it won't make my final product any better but I like working in 48k. I feel an extra crispness to the sound, even if it's a placebo effect, I'll take it.
If your making wma's (which is all I do) it doesn't matter any way.
Dither is only about bit depth, nothing to do with sample rate. (that's what I thought)
I started dithering the 24bit files down to 16 but leaving them at 48k. Does this play on other systems? This is something I was playing around with but it's a 48k wma. I didn't know they did that, I thought they automatically changed to 44.1 but anyway, does it play on a mac?
Thanks
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As I said it's a topic that you'll get a wide variety of answers to, and everyone typically has a strong opinion of their own solution!
I had a big, long winded explanation of how downsampling algorithms worked, but decided to not include it as to further complicate things. I'm a math geek, and somewhat of a "purist" when it comes to music ;) I try to even avoid using lots of plugins, etc when I can get away without them. One comment I will make about the graphics vs audio reference Tacman ... is that you're right, they are different things altogether. Audio is _way_ more complicated and contains a lot more data than graphics do! :D
For me I'd rather not require something to guess at what I recorded in the first place. I'd much rather have it output _exactly_ what I recorded without anything in the process messing with it after I've done all the hard work to get my mix sounding exactly the way I want it.
Mark
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For me I'd rather not require something to guess at what I recorded in the first place. I'd much rather have it output _exactly_ what I recorded without anything in the process messing with it
You don't like analogue gear then ??
CD
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For me I'd rather not require something to guess at what I recorded in the first place. I'd much rather have it output _exactly_ what I recorded without anything in the process messing with it
You don't like analogue gear then ??
CD
To be honest, not particularly -- at least not the analog gear that I could afford to own and operate!
Also I'm not talking about capture to playback here, I'm talking about playback/mix to final product (which was always a bit of a crap shoot with analog too depending on what you were mixing down to and how hard you "hit" it) :D Hitting an analog 2 track deck with another 0.5db could make a huge difference in the actual tonality of the final mix -- which you wouldn't hear until you played it back. In digital land, provided you have the headroom it's (mostly) just a half db louder. :)
Mark
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I used to have a lot of outboard gear but got rid of everything except one processor. The workflow/routing is so nice with everything in the computer.
That and I can add the outboard processor to 1 track where I can put plug ins all over the place. And I have to render outboard track down when I get it to do what I want where plugins can just be left till mixdown-usually.
This makes me think about the converter discussion. Some say there isn't that much difference when you get a decent mid priced converter like motu, RME, etc. and the high end models...
The thing that occurred to me when looking at getting a new card a while back is the DA converter. Having really good DA conversion would make it really nice to monitor your recordings but wouldn't add anything to your final product because it stays entirely in the digital domain.
Maybe I could make better recordings because of my ability to hear the music better? Unless you run it out and back into your really fancy converters or something.
Kind of put my shopping on hold. Wait for newer, better, Cheaper!
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Ok, here's my 2 cents on the whole sample rate debacle.
For purposes of this website I agree, keep everything at 44.1 (and possibly 24 bit till mixdown...but no higher due to some DAW's not supporting floating point). Having a standard here would be a good thing, to avoid multiple conversions as files are passed around...plus what Gerk said. If you stay at 44.1 at least you know that what you're hearing all the way along should translate directly into the final product without many anomalies.
The whole idea that working at 88.2 then being able to downsample to 44.1 for cleaner math is bunk. It's a complicated algorithm in any conversion..and a far cry from /2.
There is some legit math behind the cymbal frequency thing Thunder posted, if you're bored google the Nyquist Theorm and why 44.1 was chosen as the standard for CD's and that should shed some light.
As far as major studios go, almost none of them work at 44.1. I see far more work being done at 48, 88.2 and 96 than 44.1. I almost never see 44.1. Most of the guys I've seen working at 88.2 are under the false assumption that the math is cleaner (which like I said, is bull). The biggest difference I can see is this. The major labels/studio projects are all sent to A list mastering houses that want the higher fidelity so that they can work on preserving as much of that as possible in the final product (insert the usefulness for fancy converters here for those who hit analog in the mastering realm). The idea is that highly qualified professionals with ultimate top notch gear can make a 96k session converted to 44.1 sound better than if it was 44.1 all along. I've got Bob Katz's book, and I've read it and I'm aware of what would differ from the words in that book and what I'm saying. I'm just observing what I see on a day to day basis as a person who spends nearly every day in a professional recording studio. Funny thing is, we're all scratching our heads and wondering why so much effort is put forth to cram it onto a crappy mp3 for ipod...which strangely coincides with how many of the greatest recording studios in the world are being closed and sold off for condos, real estate..etc.
In any case, I feel safe to say none of us would benefit in any measurable way by working above 44.1 here...so keep it simple and keep it 44.1.
-Marc
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Funny thing is, we're all scratching our heads and wondering why so much effort is put forth to cram it onto a crappy mp3 for ipod...which strangely coincides with how many of the greatest recording studios in the world are being closed and sold off for condos, real estate..etc.
In any case, I feel safe to say none of us would benefit in any measurable way by working above 44.1 here...so keep it simple and keep it 44.1.
-Marc
I think you already answered that with your closing line.
44.1, 48, 88.2, 96, downsampling algorithms, rendering, intersample clipping, jitter, Nyquist Theorem, resistor thermal noise, slew rates, damping factor ........................................... and any other term you may want to insert here. >:D
Nowdays for most of us (grown up adults) , almost none of those terms really afect the quality of our recordings, except for bit depth ( and this is only if you do lots of post processing). Marketing experts just need to create needs on our side to keep us buying new toys ;)
Even if we can afford a high quality recording enviroment, acoustically speaking, the differences between "mid-priced" gear are so subtle that we can't really tell the diference (except for the placebo effect ;) as already stated). And most of us can't really hear above 16Khz (grown up adults).
I'm only speaking about "transparent" audio, I mean, no extra coloration added in the audio process (excluding enviroment and speakers). I think the differences perceved between mid priced and hi end pro equipment are "inserted" on purpose by the "high end" brands
this story about Bob Carver always comes to my mind when discussing this subject
Carver caused a stir in the industry in the mid-1980s when he challenged two high-end audio magazines to give him any audio amplifier at any price, and he'd duplicate its sound in one of his lower cost (and usually much more powerful) designs. Two magazines took him up on the challenge.
First, The Audio Critic chose a Mark Levinson ML-2 which Bob acoustically copied (transfer function duplication) and sold as his M1.5t amplifier (the "t" stood for transfer function modified).
In 1985, Stereophile magazine challenged Bob to copy a Conrad-Johnson Premier Five (the make and model was not named in the challenge but revealed later) amplifier at their offices in New Mexico within 48 hours. The Conrad Johnson amplifier was one of the most highly regarded amplifiers of its day, costing in excess of $12,000.
Of note that in both cases, the challenging amplifier could only be treated as a "black box" and could not even have its lid removed. Nevertheless, Carver, using null difference testing, successfully copied the sound of the target amplifier and won the challenge. The Stereophile employees failed to pass a single blind test with their own equipment, and in their own listening room. He marketed "t" versions of his amplifiers incorporating the sound of the Mark Levinson and Conrad Johnson designs which caused him some criticism by those who failed to understand the true nature of the challenge -- that it was possible to duplicate an audio amplifier's sound in two completely dissimilar designs. In light of this criticism, Bob Carver went on to design the Silver Seven, the most expensive and esoteric conventional amplifier up to that time and duplicated its sound in his M 4.0t and later models which sold for some 1/40th the price (around $600-$1500).
transfer functions, convolution, psychoaoustics, mp3s... oops not again ;D
This story is very very interesting because this was done back in 1985 and today we are centuries ahead regarding technology and audio processing. The only factor that remains the same is human subjectivity :D
All this just to agree with Marc and Mark: Keep it simple, keep it 44.1 unless it's intended for video.
Sorry for the lengthy post but I'm a tech geek >:D