TIL: Gain Staging is Misinformation

Here’s the thing about gain staging in modern recording: -don’t clip a converter and don’t bounce/export anything over 0dB. That’s it for hard rules- especially with 24+bit audio where the digital noise floor is very low. ProTools, Logic and most other mainstream DAWs have 750+dB of headroom internally. That won’t be the problem. We tested and proved it. Virtually every plugin that isn’t linear has a trim knob on the input if it’s getting too colored. You can have every track in pro tools several dB past zero and just turn down the master fader… and the end result is 100% mathematically identical to having the tracks within the range of the meter (which covers a small fraction of the actual usable range).

From a workflow perspective, as a mixer, I’d rather tracks come in already balanced a little bit. Most of my favorite producers send materials in this way: lead vocals, kick, and snare might be way hot, and synth pads, FX, rhythm parts, might be as quiet as -30dB peak. Why put everything to a magical special number for the level just to use the faders to have to balance it again?

/r/audioengineering Thread