PERCEIVED Volume Balance

Dave_B wrote on 2/12/2009, 5:10 PM
After checking past forum messages, it sounds like I can't do what I want to do, but I'd appreciate it if someone could put me out of my misery and confirm that.

I am an amateur trying to use Vegas Pro 8.0c and Sound Forge Audio Studio 9.0b to create music CDs, slideshows with music, dvd music videos with menus and translation captions, etc, using my personal collection of several hundred audio and audio/video files.

The problem is I can’t get the “loudness” balanced; one selection will hurt your ears while the next will be barely audible. I’ve learned about and tried cut and boost on events and tracks, normalizaion and dynamic compression. They affect dB levels very precisely but don’t seem to address our PERCEPTION of loudness, which I guess depends on the combination of frequencies or the duration of louder passages, rather than just peak dBs, etc.

The only way I can see to do this is by manually listening and adjusting the volume by ear, which I’m not very good at. Is there an electronic method to do this more precisely, or is being able to do it by ear just a skill that good sound people have? Thanks for any help.

Dave

Comments

musicvid10 wrote on 2/12/2009, 8:58 PM
Normalize to the same levels in Sound Forge using the RMS method. -24dB is very conservative, -18dB is moderately conservative (I use this for mastering from live performances), -12dB is fairly "loud," and -6dB is insane. Which setting you choose depends entirely on your program sources.

Perceived volume is a product of average volume and dynamic range, the latter probably is what you are sensitive to. Using the RMS method for normalization adjusts both, especially when compiling audio from many different sources. Some individual adjustments may still be necessary, but not nearly as much as doing it all by ear.
Dave_B wrote on 2/13/2009, 3:55 PM
musicvid,

Thanks for the quick reply. Your suggestion regarding the RMS method agrees with the fact that if I normalize a "loud" clip and a "quiet" clip and then look at statistics, the Max dB levels are close, but the RMS dB levels are -12 for the loud one and -23 for the quiet one.

But I can't find a way to Normalize using the RMS method. There is a reference in the Sound Forge Audio Studio 9 help file to the "Scan Levels Button in the Normalize dialog", but the button doesn't appear in the dialog for that program or anywhere in Vegas Pro 8. Does that mean I would need the full version of Sound Forge 9 to have this capability? Thanks again for your help.

Dave

Edit: Well, I guess I just answered my own question. The comparison on this website indicates that RMS Normalizaion is one of the features included in Sound Forge 9 but not in Audio Studio. So I guess I just have to decide whether to upgrade or not. Thanks again.
LarryP wrote on 2/14/2009, 12:01 PM
I've found the free PSP Vintage Meter plugin handy for loudness variations. The price if right - free.

http://www.pspaudioware.com/indexen.html

Larry
Dave_B wrote on 2/15/2009, 11:43 PM
Larry,

Thanks for the tip. Very nice plug-in and price.

Dave
Geoff_Wood wrote on 2/16/2009, 1:53 PM
Does Wavehammer install with just Vegas ? This has RMS settings.

It surely must do, thinking about it, because TV has very strict RMS requirements averaged over time (I forget what the standard is called, but it expects something like -24)..

Wavehammer certainly comes include with Sound Forge.

geoff
Dave_B wrote on 2/18/2009, 3:35 PM
Geoff,

YES! In fact I found it in both the Studio and Full versions of both Sound Forge and Vegas. I saw Wave Hammer mentioned as a possibility somewhere else but when I searched on "Wave Hammer" and even just "Hammer", in the Help files and User Manuals, nothing came up.

But it is definitely there in the FX favorites. If I can figure it out, you will have solved my problem. Many thanks.

Dave
Geoff_Wood wrote on 2/18/2009, 6:55 PM
It's got a reasonable Help/Manual... Read that then have a good play.

geoff
jbolley wrote on 2/19/2009, 7:21 AM
Wavehammer is surely a powerful plugin but I don't think it does RMS normalization. Its a compressor and a limiter.

Jesse
Geoff_Wood wrote on 2/19/2009, 4:27 PM
That's tue, but given that Wavehammer can compress on the basis of an RMS value, and also has a Volume Maximizer with settable max output, it is possibly more controllable than a normaliser that has a simple "RMS" setting. Though it would need to be done more by experimentation.


geoff