VO-BB - 20 YEARS OLD!

[Kristin Lennox]

I have no idea what my noise floor is.

There. I said it.


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[dwpthe3rd]

[dwpthe3rd]

[Ed Fisher]

[Bob Stevens]

I will quote Wiki....

Downward compression reduces loud sounds over a certain threshold while quiet sounds remain unaffected.

Upward compression increases the loudness of sounds below a threshold while leaving louder passages unchanged.

Both downward and upward compression reduce the dynamic range of an audio signal.

An expander performs the opposite function, increasing the dynamic range of the audio signal. Expanders are generally used to make quiet sounds even quieter by reducing the level of an audio signal that falls below a set threshold level.

Compression and limiting are not different in process but in degree and perceived effect. A limiter is a compressor with a high ratio and, generally, a fast attack time. Most engineers consider compression with ratio of 10:1 or more as limiting.
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[Kim Fuller]

Kristin - so glad you said it. Because I was sure thinking it

[Ed Fisher]

I agree that "downward compression" and "limiting" are basically the same thing. I've just never thought of compression as being in only one direction. Every compressor I've ever owned did both at the same time. (which is why we called them "compressors" and not "limiters.")

[Benjamin Stovall]

@Clutter Ash

I think it's a fair point to say that a limiter by default does not raise volume. To clarify, I should say that a limiter allows us to increase the loudness of the audio while maintaining a target peak level. The topic was about increasing volume, so I referenced it with that purpose in mind.

As far as compression goes, specifically downward compression as Bob was thoughtful enough to point out, the quiet levels are not affected. Of course, one could argue that "make-up gain" could be used, etc. There are a lot of misunderstandings about this. Just take a look at this thread over at Gearslutz and pop some corn: compressors do not make quiet sounds louder: true or false?

As an aside, The School of Audio Engineering has a great reference regarding limiters/compressors/expanders, etc. that can be found here:

http://www.sae.edu/reference_material/audio/pages/Compression.htm

Thanks,

Ben

EDIT: It's probably just a matter of time before someone checks me on the proper usage of volume vs. loudness.
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[vkuehn]

At times this conversation is frustrating, at times this conversation is amazingly amusing. Part of our challenge is that we cover a wide age span, and we became attached to the technical side of audio technology at different times in history.

I began working in radio BEFORE the transistor was in the marketplace. We had limiters and they were tube based devices. We had the schematics and you could read the instructions, take a V-O-M meter and see before your very eyes what was going on in the circuits and how the process worked. Just after I got started the first compressors (tube based) began showing up. In that era there was no terminology that I ever came across where people tried to talk about DOWNWARD compression as opposed to some other kind of compression.

Today's software based computerized versions of limiters and compressors and whatever else we call them are labeled as though they work just like the old discreet circuit hardware. Little graphic knobs are labeled dB (plus and minus), milliseconds, etc. They pretend to do what the old tube equipment did, but I must tell you that it took me 5 or 6 years to finally get where I could trick those electronic pretend knobs to do for me what the old mechanical knobs did.

For the life of me I cannot comprehend what the term UPWARD COMPRESSION means. In my feeble brain, compression is compression. It has no downward, no upward, no sideways. It's just compressed/mashed sound.

Some of you younger folks who have grown up with today's computerized audio processors get what you want out of them because you are not haunted by this "ghost of recording sessions past" and the language of the past.

Here is an amusing related situation. I'm also a bit of a photography nut. I used to have a home darkroom with trays and developer chemicals and an enlarger. We dealt in exposure, contrast, hard and soft paper, etc. When I go into photo editing discussion boards, you sometimes find this same conversation. Adobe Photoshop gives you controls to control all kinds of attributes of a photographic image and they are labeled with names to indicate that changing a control in Photoshop will do the same thing you used to do in the dark room. But some "deep thinkers" who say they have a lot of technical skills make a lot of arguments that when when adjust the CONTRAST in Photoshop, you are really getting some other change that creates a pseudo-contrast change! (Do I, Should I... care if it is pseudo or real? Only if I don't get the result I wanted and I have to learn to lie to my software to get what I really want.)

Welcome to technology of the 21st century. All of this rambling to say that we all need to have some patience with this thread. We are all using words that sound like we all speak the same language, but in some technical areas, we aren't. Be patient as we work out our language kinks.

Now, if you will excuse me, I need to go "fluff up" my hard drive.

[georgethetech]

I only use peak values when measuring noise floor/dynamic range.
Compressors/limiters only raise perceived volume when the RMS increases after makeup gain is applied. However, in the case of many digital limiters, the makeup gain is built-in, such as in "Maximizers", with the ability to set the maximum level, as in normalization.
Compressors ALWAYS raise noise floor if you use make-up gain.

That said, I've heard two files that sound drastically different in terms of noise, but read nearly the same on the meters. Obviously, not all noise is created equal.

If it sounds good, then it is good.
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[Philip Banks]

From the top 7ft 2in.

[Rob Ellis]

okay but what is that in dbs?

[Rob Ellis]

[Philip Banks]

Would 7ft 2in from the top equate to 11?

[ballenberg]

George said: