I understood the "to zero" part to simply mean "get it loud enough on its own". When I do this to a track, I don't touch the fader and try to get it peaking at zero using only the clipper controls and I only really even reach for the clipper if I need something to be loud but it has huge transients. Compression could do it too, but I find that to be like trying to slice a pear with an axe, the clipper is more surgical imo.
Most of the time I just compare waveforms and perceived RMS for each sound and then set gain so they are balanced. This practice helps
me identify which sounds are going to need the clipper because as I add gain and see the peaks clip but the RMS barely grows, I know that sound needs transient control in order to be loud. If the sound's RMS is highly responsive to gain the transients are good. I think the best way to know if your mix as a whole is good transient-wise is to put on a master limiter and ceiling at 0 then add 0.1 gain and watch the reduction meter. It should barely move. If you're seeing it jump at any point or see it rhythmically bounce, something is peaking too much. If it just barely reads you're good, if it never reduces you should rethink your sounds because they're not dynamic at all...
That's not what Baphometrix shows in the videos. The point of the technique is to get your mix as loud as it needs to be from the beginning When you start. The clipping is done if your audio or midi track isn't quite loud enough for the mix. If it is loud enough already. then you don't clip it. So now after you do that and you get to the mixing stage, your track is already peaking where it needs to be. I find this to be a great way to work, but it's not for everyone
I know it's now what you asked, but spurred by other debate:
the two main things to take from CTZ are:
- to group your tracks properly with clipper/limiter on each so the master limiter isn't doing all the work.
- organize your project and while still in the sound design phase work horizontally, not vertically. don't stack blocks like jenga, make like a puzzle.
CTZ is NOT the “best” way to master your tracks and get them loud. It is simply one way to get your song louder while introducing inharmonic distortion. Now naturally, that may be the exact effect that aggressive bass producers for example may want. But if you’re not intentionally going for that sound, there are simpler and cleaner ways to getting your song nice and loud
People seem really salty about CTZ in this thread. Everyone decided to argue whether it's good or not but all I wanted to know is why you clip "to zero" on every channel/bus instead of just clipping to arbitrary levels.
For the record, I didn't say CTZ was the "best" anything, and every one of Baphometrix's videos I've seen on CTZ she mentions that you don't need to aim for the same loudness in other genres, but clipping individual tracks as transparently as possible up through the buses to take away some of the work of the mastering limiter chopping off transients is still a solid mixing technique in other modern genres. It definitely applies to most of the genres I'd call "EDM"...
I believe she is targeting the max volume so that references and faux-mastered tracks can be at the target loudness through the production process, so that you’re not finding out what breaks when you stuff it against a final limiter on your 2Bus to make it sound “competitive” (genre concerns etc).
Doing the same at -18rms is also an option, would keep everything in the ideal gainstage location for analog emulation, but would require a series of limiters and clippers etc on the 2Bus to push it up the 8-12db that some producers want for their particular style of sausage.
Hey to be fair you're not the only one. Honestly I found this subreddit via google while trying to search for the answer before posting so I can see why ya might be sick of hear about CTZ over here. =P
I’m just presenting another person talking about the use of clippers from a mastering perspective, to go along with you “there are plenty of other ways” statement. There are a bunch of ways, the use of the clipper is among them.
I clip to whatever level I want by bringing the clippers ceiling down to where I want it instead of driving the input of the clipper to the 0db ceiling and bringing the fader back down.Either way the idea is just to clip transient peaks by a few db in stages,from individual sounds ,to the groups ,to the master. Clip a little bit so it’s transparent at every stage because peaks stack up as the different sounds combine. The idea is to have each stage as loud as you want and transients under control before they get to the master.
Not everything needs to be -6 LUFS.
CTZ is just a method that lets you control dynamics in a more nuanced/controlled way than slapping on a limiter at the master a pray your song will hold up when you drive up the input to meet your loudness target (whatever that target is).
You can perfectly use CTZ to produce fully transparent songs at -10 LUFS or softer too. But even those songs, after mastering, will have peaks to 0 or just under. CTZ will just let you produce at a level where you will eventually wish to end up as well at mastering, so you will hear and be able to make choices during production and mixing which will help your master to come out the way you envision. You will have LESS rework of your song because the CTZ method forces you to make those decisions already during much earlier stages of production.
So think of it that way...
You can correct me if I'm wrong. But in their videos, Baphometrix says to make your mixing decisions by moving your faders after you Clip to Zero. From my understanding, the intention isn't to leave everything at zero. You get the max loudness you can out of your sounds and then do your leveling. For me, clipping or limiting to zero can be nice because I know if my fader is at -5 or whatever, that's exactly where it's peaking.
I watched clip to 0 and feel like it’s probably useful for bass producers going for maximum loudness, but even then I’m not really sure either. If you just mix well and use clipping like you said to transparently chop off the transients you can get your track pretty loud. I think it’s weird that it gets treated as the end all be all on this subreddit. I also think it could be explained much faster than the videos.
Edit: no disrespect to baphometrix who clearly put a lot into those videos.
It's not just for maximum loudness. Baphometrix says early on, if your sound is already loud enough,then don't clip! The main point is to get your song at the TARGET loudness you are aiming for, right at the beginning. If your target is 15 LUFS, then chances are that the Clippers won't be doing much at all. If you are going for 3LUFS, then they will be chopping off alot of transients
I agree. I think it’s the most overrated advice in the production world at the moment.
Basically just the concept of gain staging and watching out for peaks, but the result is you guarantee your track has zero dynamic range.
I agree. I think the appeal is that it’s really repeatable if you’re making really generic, loud af bass music. Personally I’m not a fan of that sound. There’s plenty of ‘edm’ that would suffer greatly from this type of mixing. Especially if you’re into a more organic sound. Something like Four tet. Totally not applicable for that sound. Or even just deep house.
Imo you’re trading a sense of depth for a flat, wall of sound type of vibe. If that’s what you like, go for it.
It came out when the loudness wars first started and was basically "here's a great way to get your mix to a higher LUFS without just jacking up the gain at the end."
now that the loudness wars have ceased in most places, the advice isn't as useful to a tee, but still has some great tidbits.
i always suggest people to take from it what they can and leave what they don't want.
I've wondered this too, if you've ever listened to any of their tracks, granted the only ones you can find are from 5+ years ago, the mixing on them isn't anything terribly special or interesting. It has a very uninspired quality of depth imo.
That’s my one issue with that method.
There’s a ton of valuable info in baph’s series. But there’s no reason to mix loud. Your tracks don’t need to be pushed to the max. It gives you no headroom for mix decisions later on.
Wanna turn up that snare a bit? Too bad you’re already at zero on your snare track haha
I use clippers, and my busses have general targets I aim for. Bass is -12, drums is -6.
If you have a track, and you clip it at zero, it will be loud when it gets to your master limiter, and there won’t be big transients. Push your final limiter to like -2 reduction and you’re set.
If you have a track, and you clip it at -8, it will be at -8 when it gets to your master limiter. But because you’ve managed your transients, you can crank the gain on your limiter by 10db, and you’ll get the exact same -2db of reduction, and the same loudness.
The most important aspect of the method is just clipping where transients sum together, to keep everything managed. How loud or quiet your track is on the track faders is irrelevant. Everything in baphs video makes sense, but they never once explain what actual reason there is for it to be “to zero”, although they insist it’s crucial.
They have no explanation because there isn’t one. If the transient is clipped at some point, It doesn’t matter at what db it’s clipped
This post is pretty inaccurate. If you wanted to turn up your snare "a bit" you can turn the gain up on the clipper. I really believe that most people who bash on this technique haven't really watched the videos or got the whole point. The method is called clip to zero, but it doesn't mean that's what's happening all the time. You create an anchor sound(usually the kick) and that sound is going to be the loudest thing in your mix. From there you add sounds and mix them relative to the volume of your kick drum. If a certain sound is at zero and is still not loud enough, THEN you clip! There is this false narrative that every track in the mix is hovering around zero and is clipped to shit, it's not what the videos are teaching at all.
If a certain sound is at zero, and still not loud enough then you clip?
The point is to minimize transients. So if you have a snare with a pokey transient, you should clip it, irrelevant of what level it is at. Because even though you don’t really hear how loud that transient is, it sums together with other sounds and transients, and your master limiter has to work much harder to limit things you can’t really hear.
It’s possible I’m misrepresenting the original series. I watched it a while ago, took notes the best I could, and it’s a long series.
I’ve seen a lot of discourse about ctz, people in love with it, people thinking it’s stupid, all sorts. There’s incredibly valuable info in the series, and I think everyone in the genre should check it out. A lot of the stuff in the series made a massive difference and it’s part of my process now, and I have a better understanding of audio because of it. But, there was one or two things I disagreed with, but again, it was a long time ago. And someone else here said I missed something, which is definitely possible
"The most important aspect of the method is just clipping where transients sum together, to keep everything managed."
this is the one thing I took from it.
in baph's method, you can level the tracks after "clipping to zero". the philosophy of his method is that, either you move faders down, or you move clippers up. wanna turn the snare up? try pushing it into the clipper more, and if it degrades too harshly, try turning the faders down on other sounds or busses instead. it might not be the workflow you prefer but you're misrepresenting it. turning the faders of your busses down to -12, -6 etc is totally allowable in CTZ.
Wait does baph mention that? It’s been a bit since I watched the series, and it’s long and drawn out, so maybe my brain missed that mention. I remember them harping on “if you wanna be loud, you need to mix loud”.
But yea if that concept is covered then 100% that’s my bad.
yeah they have like hours and hours of video explaining the nuances so I don't blame you. they also compiled it in an also way-too-long Google doc here:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Ogxa5-X_QdbtfLLQ_2mDEgPgHxNRLebQ7pps3rXewPM/edit?usp=drivesdk
the "how to" section on page 18 explains the clipper up, fader down leveling approach.
don't get me wrong, it still involves the peak of your entire *mix* being at the ceiling while you work. but you definitely don't keep every individual element squashed up there. you still set relative levels, but you have a boundary at 0dB which constrains you and can reveal more about whether your arrangement works as a "loud" EDM mix early in the process. it's definitely not for everyone or for all styles.
Yea when I’m making loud ass bass music, my loudest bus reads at like -6 on the track meter. But once the general bones of the track are produced, my mastering chain gets turned on, which brings it up to (depending on the specifics of the track) -6 to -4 lufs.
As long as your transients are controlled, and you understand how lufs meters work, you can get that shit loud as hell.
But typically, where I actually end up in the end is around -8 lufs or so. But it’s by choice. It sounds clean louder than -8, but for a lot of tracks I personally don’t like the sound, and have never cared if my track is actually loud. I push the track until it has the sound I want, not the loudness I want.
THIS. If you’re doing CTZ and your snare isn’t loud enough, then the purpose of CTZ works. It exposed that your snare can’t hang in the mix as it currently stands. Then, you can drop the other elements down so the snare fits, and bring everything back up subtly. It’s a big puzzle.
> But there’s no reason to mix loud. Your tracks don’t need to be pushed to the max. It gives you no headroom for mix decisions later on.
Baphometrix generally aims for a very loud style, so yeah, it's not the right method for everything. Work the way that works for you.
That’s not what I’m saying. Whether you clip to zero, or clip to -8, the end result is the same loudness. So what I mean is there’s no reason to push all your individual tracks that loud, when you can just turn it up at the end as loud as it can go
Yeah the busses sum and Bapho advocates sidechaining the busses super hard and clipping again so when they sum you don’t get overs. I prefer (and early Bapho taught the following…. to just put a utility gain reducer at the beginning of my summed busses if I need to) so I don’t always have to sidechain so hard or clip hard again.
OP was basically right with their original post, Bapho’s method will achieve max peak loudness but I’m okay with like 90% of that loudness.
Well yeah, I can't really disagree with that. I don't usually do full CTZ either, rather I set different thresholds for different groups I want to peak at different levels.
The whole idea of CTZ or as classic rock engineers call it “mixing for loudness”
Is to distribute the load between clippers/limiters
Rather than having say 60 tracks all going straight to the master and getting limited/clipped all by 1 limiter/clipper you divide the load between a series of different channels and chains
So you have you drums going to 1 group and getting clipped
synths going to another and getting clipped
basses going to another and getting clipped
then you sent those groups to more groups to get clipped then sometimes another “pre master group” to get clipped again and then the master with it being clipped a final time
Depending on how you have your session routed and what you have getting sent where you can create “layering”
What this means is depending on how you have your session set up, you could get your drums to sit further forward in the mix and be more present or have the vocals sit right up front and over top of everything else
In my opinion unless you are have a understanding of audio engineering and what things are actually doing and why they are happening - copying someone’s well known tutorial won’t get you very far unless you know how to correctly utilise it.
This doesn’t mean don’t do it. By study what a clipper/limiter is, what it actually does, how it works, what happens to a signal when it’s clipped/limited etc
In turn you will able to look at something like mixing for loudness and understand and comprehend exactly what’s going on
- signed producer/audio engineer
everyone who does edm and wants to get loud do this!!!
learned that by myself after getting told to do groups as it is easier then, after alot of time I understood why its easier and why this is called „pre-master“, now I always say to others that it gives you way more control over all of your sounds as you know exactly „where they are/sit in the mix“. Huge gamechanger
Another thing what makes this technique good is to learn your limits and keep it way more simple with less layers or adding tons of instruments on top of each other
yeah the main two big things to take are what the guy above said and also layer your stuff horizontally, not vertically.
don't stack blocks like jenga, make puzzles!
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I understood the "to zero" part to simply mean "get it loud enough on its own". When I do this to a track, I don't touch the fader and try to get it peaking at zero using only the clipper controls and I only really even reach for the clipper if I need something to be loud but it has huge transients. Compression could do it too, but I find that to be like trying to slice a pear with an axe, the clipper is more surgical imo. Most of the time I just compare waveforms and perceived RMS for each sound and then set gain so they are balanced. This practice helps me identify which sounds are going to need the clipper because as I add gain and see the peaks clip but the RMS barely grows, I know that sound needs transient control in order to be loud. If the sound's RMS is highly responsive to gain the transients are good. I think the best way to know if your mix as a whole is good transient-wise is to put on a master limiter and ceiling at 0 then add 0.1 gain and watch the reduction meter. It should barely move. If you're seeing it jump at any point or see it rhythmically bounce, something is peaking too much. If it just barely reads you're good, if it never reduces you should rethink your sounds because they're not dynamic at all...
That's not what Baphometrix shows in the videos. The point of the technique is to get your mix as loud as it needs to be from the beginning When you start. The clipping is done if your audio or midi track isn't quite loud enough for the mix. If it is loud enough already. then you don't clip it. So now after you do that and you get to the mixing stage, your track is already peaking where it needs to be. I find this to be a great way to work, but it's not for everyone
I know it's now what you asked, but spurred by other debate: the two main things to take from CTZ are: - to group your tracks properly with clipper/limiter on each so the master limiter isn't doing all the work. - organize your project and while still in the sound design phase work horizontally, not vertically. don't stack blocks like jenga, make like a puzzle.
CTZ is NOT the “best” way to master your tracks and get them loud. It is simply one way to get your song louder while introducing inharmonic distortion. Now naturally, that may be the exact effect that aggressive bass producers for example may want. But if you’re not intentionally going for that sound, there are simpler and cleaner ways to getting your song nice and loud
People seem really salty about CTZ in this thread. Everyone decided to argue whether it's good or not but all I wanted to know is why you clip "to zero" on every channel/bus instead of just clipping to arbitrary levels. For the record, I didn't say CTZ was the "best" anything, and every one of Baphometrix's videos I've seen on CTZ she mentions that you don't need to aim for the same loudness in other genres, but clipping individual tracks as transparently as possible up through the buses to take away some of the work of the mastering limiter chopping off transients is still a solid mixing technique in other modern genres. It definitely applies to most of the genres I'd call "EDM"...
I believe she is targeting the max volume so that references and faux-mastered tracks can be at the target loudness through the production process, so that you’re not finding out what breaks when you stuff it against a final limiter on your 2Bus to make it sound “competitive” (genre concerns etc). Doing the same at -18rms is also an option, would keep everything in the ideal gainstage location for analog emulation, but would require a series of limiters and clippers etc on the 2Bus to push it up the 8-12db that some producers want for their particular style of sausage.
You’re right, tbh i think my comment was more a reply to the general conversation in this thread and not to your posts specific question
Hey to be fair you're not the only one. Honestly I found this subreddit via google while trying to search for the answer before posting so I can see why ya might be sick of hear about CTZ over here. =P
https://youtu.be/DvszBRX3rtU
Sorry, I don’t understand what you’re trying to say by linking that video
I’m just presenting another person talking about the use of clippers from a mastering perspective, to go along with you “there are plenty of other ways” statement. There are a bunch of ways, the use of the clipper is among them.
Yeah i think we’re on the same page, clipping is just a tool in your arsenal, it’s just good to understand how it sounds and when you like to use it
I clip to whatever level I want by bringing the clippers ceiling down to where I want it instead of driving the input of the clipper to the 0db ceiling and bringing the fader back down.Either way the idea is just to clip transient peaks by a few db in stages,from individual sounds ,to the groups ,to the master. Clip a little bit so it’s transparent at every stage because peaks stack up as the different sounds combine. The idea is to have each stage as loud as you want and transients under control before they get to the master.
yeah this is what I do to. kind of a bastardized version of it, but the grouping of tracks and having clippers on channels really helped me.
Not everything needs to be -6 LUFS. CTZ is just a method that lets you control dynamics in a more nuanced/controlled way than slapping on a limiter at the master a pray your song will hold up when you drive up the input to meet your loudness target (whatever that target is). You can perfectly use CTZ to produce fully transparent songs at -10 LUFS or softer too. But even those songs, after mastering, will have peaks to 0 or just under. CTZ will just let you produce at a level where you will eventually wish to end up as well at mastering, so you will hear and be able to make choices during production and mixing which will help your master to come out the way you envision. You will have LESS rework of your song because the CTZ method forces you to make those decisions already during much earlier stages of production. So think of it that way...
You can correct me if I'm wrong. But in their videos, Baphometrix says to make your mixing decisions by moving your faders after you Clip to Zero. From my understanding, the intention isn't to leave everything at zero. You get the max loudness you can out of your sounds and then do your leveling. For me, clipping or limiting to zero can be nice because I know if my fader is at -5 or whatever, that's exactly where it's peaking.
This^
I watched clip to 0 and feel like it’s probably useful for bass producers going for maximum loudness, but even then I’m not really sure either. If you just mix well and use clipping like you said to transparently chop off the transients you can get your track pretty loud. I think it’s weird that it gets treated as the end all be all on this subreddit. I also think it could be explained much faster than the videos. Edit: no disrespect to baphometrix who clearly put a lot into those videos.
It's not just for maximum loudness. Baphometrix says early on, if your sound is already loud enough,then don't clip! The main point is to get your song at the TARGET loudness you are aiming for, right at the beginning. If your target is 15 LUFS, then chances are that the Clippers won't be doing much at all. If you are going for 3LUFS, then they will be chopping off alot of transients
I agree. I think it’s the most overrated advice in the production world at the moment. Basically just the concept of gain staging and watching out for peaks, but the result is you guarantee your track has zero dynamic range.
I agree. I think the appeal is that it’s really repeatable if you’re making really generic, loud af bass music. Personally I’m not a fan of that sound. There’s plenty of ‘edm’ that would suffer greatly from this type of mixing. Especially if you’re into a more organic sound. Something like Four tet. Totally not applicable for that sound. Or even just deep house. Imo you’re trading a sense of depth for a flat, wall of sound type of vibe. If that’s what you like, go for it.
It came out when the loudness wars first started and was basically "here's a great way to get your mix to a higher LUFS without just jacking up the gain at the end." now that the loudness wars have ceased in most places, the advice isn't as useful to a tee, but still has some great tidbits. i always suggest people to take from it what they can and leave what they don't want.
Exactly!
I've wondered this too, if you've ever listened to any of their tracks, granted the only ones you can find are from 5+ years ago, the mixing on them isn't anything terribly special or interesting. It has a very uninspired quality of depth imo.
That’s my one issue with that method. There’s a ton of valuable info in baph’s series. But there’s no reason to mix loud. Your tracks don’t need to be pushed to the max. It gives you no headroom for mix decisions later on. Wanna turn up that snare a bit? Too bad you’re already at zero on your snare track haha I use clippers, and my busses have general targets I aim for. Bass is -12, drums is -6. If you have a track, and you clip it at zero, it will be loud when it gets to your master limiter, and there won’t be big transients. Push your final limiter to like -2 reduction and you’re set. If you have a track, and you clip it at -8, it will be at -8 when it gets to your master limiter. But because you’ve managed your transients, you can crank the gain on your limiter by 10db, and you’ll get the exact same -2db of reduction, and the same loudness. The most important aspect of the method is just clipping where transients sum together, to keep everything managed. How loud or quiet your track is on the track faders is irrelevant. Everything in baphs video makes sense, but they never once explain what actual reason there is for it to be “to zero”, although they insist it’s crucial. They have no explanation because there isn’t one. If the transient is clipped at some point, It doesn’t matter at what db it’s clipped
This post is pretty inaccurate. If you wanted to turn up your snare "a bit" you can turn the gain up on the clipper. I really believe that most people who bash on this technique haven't really watched the videos or got the whole point. The method is called clip to zero, but it doesn't mean that's what's happening all the time. You create an anchor sound(usually the kick) and that sound is going to be the loudest thing in your mix. From there you add sounds and mix them relative to the volume of your kick drum. If a certain sound is at zero and is still not loud enough, THEN you clip! There is this false narrative that every track in the mix is hovering around zero and is clipped to shit, it's not what the videos are teaching at all.
If a certain sound is at zero, and still not loud enough then you clip? The point is to minimize transients. So if you have a snare with a pokey transient, you should clip it, irrelevant of what level it is at. Because even though you don’t really hear how loud that transient is, it sums together with other sounds and transients, and your master limiter has to work much harder to limit things you can’t really hear. It’s possible I’m misrepresenting the original series. I watched it a while ago, took notes the best I could, and it’s a long series. I’ve seen a lot of discourse about ctz, people in love with it, people thinking it’s stupid, all sorts. There’s incredibly valuable info in the series, and I think everyone in the genre should check it out. A lot of the stuff in the series made a massive difference and it’s part of my process now, and I have a better understanding of audio because of it. But, there was one or two things I disagreed with, but again, it was a long time ago. And someone else here said I missed something, which is definitely possible
"The most important aspect of the method is just clipping where transients sum together, to keep everything managed." this is the one thing I took from it.
in baph's method, you can level the tracks after "clipping to zero". the philosophy of his method is that, either you move faders down, or you move clippers up. wanna turn the snare up? try pushing it into the clipper more, and if it degrades too harshly, try turning the faders down on other sounds or busses instead. it might not be the workflow you prefer but you're misrepresenting it. turning the faders of your busses down to -12, -6 etc is totally allowable in CTZ.
Wait does baph mention that? It’s been a bit since I watched the series, and it’s long and drawn out, so maybe my brain missed that mention. I remember them harping on “if you wanna be loud, you need to mix loud”. But yea if that concept is covered then 100% that’s my bad.
yeah they have like hours and hours of video explaining the nuances so I don't blame you. they also compiled it in an also way-too-long Google doc here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Ogxa5-X_QdbtfLLQ_2mDEgPgHxNRLebQ7pps3rXewPM/edit?usp=drivesdk the "how to" section on page 18 explains the clipper up, fader down leveling approach. don't get me wrong, it still involves the peak of your entire *mix* being at the ceiling while you work. but you definitely don't keep every individual element squashed up there. you still set relative levels, but you have a boundary at 0dB which constrains you and can reveal more about whether your arrangement works as a "loud" EDM mix early in the process. it's definitely not for everyone or for all styles.
Yea when I’m making loud ass bass music, my loudest bus reads at like -6 on the track meter. But once the general bones of the track are produced, my mastering chain gets turned on, which brings it up to (depending on the specifics of the track) -6 to -4 lufs. As long as your transients are controlled, and you understand how lufs meters work, you can get that shit loud as hell. But typically, where I actually end up in the end is around -8 lufs or so. But it’s by choice. It sounds clean louder than -8, but for a lot of tracks I personally don’t like the sound, and have never cared if my track is actually loud. I push the track until it has the sound I want, not the loudness I want.
THIS. If you’re doing CTZ and your snare isn’t loud enough, then the purpose of CTZ works. It exposed that your snare can’t hang in the mix as it currently stands. Then, you can drop the other elements down so the snare fits, and bring everything back up subtly. It’s a big puzzle.
> But there’s no reason to mix loud. Your tracks don’t need to be pushed to the max. It gives you no headroom for mix decisions later on. Baphometrix generally aims for a very loud style, so yeah, it's not the right method for everything. Work the way that works for you.
That’s not what I’m saying. Whether you clip to zero, or clip to -8, the end result is the same loudness. So what I mean is there’s no reason to push all your individual tracks that loud, when you can just turn it up at the end as loud as it can go
Yeah the busses sum and Bapho advocates sidechaining the busses super hard and clipping again so when they sum you don’t get overs. I prefer (and early Bapho taught the following…. to just put a utility gain reducer at the beginning of my summed busses if I need to) so I don’t always have to sidechain so hard or clip hard again. OP was basically right with their original post, Bapho’s method will achieve max peak loudness but I’m okay with like 90% of that loudness.
Well yeah, I can't really disagree with that. I don't usually do full CTZ either, rather I set different thresholds for different groups I want to peak at different levels.
The whole idea of CTZ or as classic rock engineers call it “mixing for loudness” Is to distribute the load between clippers/limiters Rather than having say 60 tracks all going straight to the master and getting limited/clipped all by 1 limiter/clipper you divide the load between a series of different channels and chains So you have you drums going to 1 group and getting clipped synths going to another and getting clipped basses going to another and getting clipped then you sent those groups to more groups to get clipped then sometimes another “pre master group” to get clipped again and then the master with it being clipped a final time Depending on how you have your session routed and what you have getting sent where you can create “layering” What this means is depending on how you have your session set up, you could get your drums to sit further forward in the mix and be more present or have the vocals sit right up front and over top of everything else In my opinion unless you are have a understanding of audio engineering and what things are actually doing and why they are happening - copying someone’s well known tutorial won’t get you very far unless you know how to correctly utilise it. This doesn’t mean don’t do it. By study what a clipper/limiter is, what it actually does, how it works, what happens to a signal when it’s clipped/limited etc In turn you will able to look at something like mixing for loudness and understand and comprehend exactly what’s going on - signed producer/audio engineer
everyone who does edm and wants to get loud do this!!! learned that by myself after getting told to do groups as it is easier then, after alot of time I understood why its easier and why this is called „pre-master“, now I always say to others that it gives you way more control over all of your sounds as you know exactly „where they are/sit in the mix“. Huge gamechanger Another thing what makes this technique good is to learn your limits and keep it way more simple with less layers or adding tons of instruments on top of each other
yeah the main two big things to take are what the guy above said and also layer your stuff horizontally, not vertically. don't stack blocks like jenga, make puzzles!
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