Setting Sound Levels

[John Rofrano]

> 1. Are there any good instructions or tutorials on how to set appropriate audio levels in sony vegas? What is the workflow and general rules of thumb?

If you are rendering for broadcast, ask the broadcaster what levels they expect. If this is for personal use, -3dB is a good target. I usually adjust the levels manually to get close, then I add Wave Hammer to my master audio output with the Master for 16-bit preset and set the output to -3dB and let Wave Hammer worry about keeping things under that level.

> 2. If I’m going to playing a DVD on a plain old TV with internal speakers, should I use stereo vs 5.1 settings?

I would definitely render as stereo unless you have a 5.1 surround system.

> 3. What is the disadvantage of rendering to a mpg-2 file and then using that in DVD architech vs rendering the video and audio seperately?

Your audio will get rendered twice, once to MPEG2 and then again to AC3 to place on the DVD. You will maintain higher quality if you render AC3 directly out of Vegas but if you try both ways and can’t hear the difference then use whichever one is easier to you.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Larry Cole]

Thanks for the great comments. I tried the wavehammer last night and immediately liked it. I do have a couple of follow up questions please….

Is the wavehammer designed to compliment or replace the compressor and limiter plug-ins that are assigned by default when an audio track is added?

I have a section of music that I really wanted to punch though the noise but with the wavehammer applied I could not get the volumn level up. I had it applied on my audio music bus. If I apply it to the track can you turn it on and off?

I just started playing with buses and automation recently. How does automation on an audio bus affect the tracks assigned to that bus? I played with the sliders but did not see any affect.

Again, thanks for your help and suggestions.

[John Rofrano]

> Is the wavehammer designed to compliment or replace the compressor and limiter plug-ins that are assigned by default when an audio track is added?

You could certainly use it in place of those. I like to use it as a mastering tool but it can be used as a track compressor and it can be used without turning on the volume maximizer.

> I have a section of music that I really wanted to punch though the noise but with the wavehammer applied I could not get the volumn level up. I had it applied on my audio music bus. If I apply it to the track can you turn it on and off?

You can automate it on a bus or a track. The track will give you more control over just that track of course without affecting the whole bus.

> I just started playing with buses and automation recently. How does automation on an audio bus affect the tracks assigned to that bus? I played with the sliders but did not see any affect.

Automation is no different than setting the sliders manually. The slider that has the most effect is the threshold because it determines when the compression kicks in. The lower you set it, the more it affects softer sounds.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Larry Cole]

How do you see the timeline for a change in the audio bus levels?

I was thinking that the bus levels affected the entire project and stayed constant. I could not understand how automation would interface with that concept and based on your comments I can see that my assumption was wrong. I think this is the missing piece that is keeping me from understanding this feature.

[John Rofrano]

> How do you see the timeline for a change in the audio bus levels? …I think this is the missing piece that is keeping me from understanding this feature.

Ahh… I can see now how this is the missing piece for you. You must press the B key to reveal the bus tracks. They will appear at the very bottom of the timeline and you can resize how many show up before they scroll off the screen. Then add an FX to the bus, right-click it and choose FX Automation Envelopes. Without knowing this, I can understand your confusion. 😉

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Larry Cole]

Excellent. Thanks so much for your help.

[Johnsy D’souza]

Hi John and the others,

I have been reading and referring to your posts for a long time now. Helped me a lot. I’ve just jumped on to this thread, though very late.

I’d like to say here that I usually render to AVI and PCM (uncompressed) before writing to DVD Architect, where the choice is either AC3 5.1 or stereo.

Any disadvantage or anything wrong with that?

Also, how do I go about (rendering) when I want a true 5.1 DVD?

Johnsy