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Avid Audio: RTAs Compressor/Limiter
I am currently transitioning from FCP to Avid Media Composer and I need some help with the RTA Compressor/Limiter.
I am on a MAC on Mt. Lion. The editing i do consists of taking quicktime files from many different networks (promotional material, sizzle reels etc) and string them out to 30 minute shows. I put them in a format to unify it all. I usually do 8-10 shows a month. The audio in the files can be all over the place so in FCP i have been adding the compressor and lower the gain down to -12 to compensate. This seems to work well across the board. My levels need to stay between -12 and -6 and this is an easy solution. I don’t know a whole lot about audio mixing and i haven’t really had to mess with the compressor settings at all in FCP.
I have started experimenting with my workflow in Avid. In the testing i have done so far – i’ve taken the compressor settings in FCP and (best i can guess) put them into the RTAs compressor/limiter effect. But i still get peaks above zero.
I am looking for settings that i can apply universally to fully mixed quick times (with varying levels and compression) that will even out everything. Perhaps there is a better way to do this other than the compressor/limiter? Or does anyone know of a good tutorial on audio compression for video editing?
thanks in advance!
Mark -
7 Replies
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I am by no means an audio export, but have you looked at Normalization, and perhaps more specifically Peak Normalization:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audio_normalization
Michael
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The built in comp/limiter is not too great. If you need to take care of peaks, you need to get yourself a brickwall limiter. I use and like both the Massey L2007 as well as the Nugen ISL. The latter is way more complete, does True Peak limiting, and does mono, stereo, 5.1, 7.1, and sounds great. The Massey L2007 is very decent, simple to use, but only does mono and stereo.
Bear in mind that RTAS is on its way out, MC 8.1 and up will only support AAX plugins. I think both the Massey and the Nugen plugins have AAX versions as well.
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Job,
I have the L2007 from Massey and it’s not working properly in 8.1, even though I have the AAX version of the plugin. The plugin applies, but the interface doesn’t appear. I contacted Massey about it and they are investigating.
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May be unrelated but I have had this issue with built in RTAS plug-ins in v6 and v7
Workaround is to switch workspace to a different setting (eg audio editing) then back again
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[Trevor Asquerthian] “May be unrelated but I have had this issue with built in RTAS plug-ins in v6 and v7
Workaround is to switch workspace to a different setting (eg audio editing) then back again
“
Thanks. Didn’t work, but appreciate the suggestion.
The Avid supplied plugins work fine. I don’t have any other third party AAX plugs to test.
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I appreciate all the feedback!
After a full day messing around with AudioSuite and RTAS I think what i need to do is use the Compressor/Limiter through the AudioSuite. Just seems to work better and being clip based instead of affecting the entire track you have more control over it. RTAS as someone else mentioned seems to be sketchy.
It still seems like the FCP compressor sounds better but i’m still getting to know AudioSuite so perhaps i will figure out all of the nuances.
thanks again!
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Thanks for the heads-up!
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