Clipping in the Analog vs. Digital Domain
When talking audio, all types of distortion and noise are not created equal. Some types of noise and distortions sound subjectively “good”, other types not so much.
Having an artistic opinion on the types of noise you do and don’t like in your recordings is critical when making your music. And, understanding the many different types of noise you’ll run into in the recording studio is a great first step towards developing those opinions.
Where to draw the line on good vs. bad noise gets tricky, because it often comes down to a unique combination of personal artistic preference, style, and musical genre, and these will all vary significantly by individual artist. For some quick tips on controlling noise in your home recordings, check out this article. Now, onto the deeper dive on this subject:
Analog distortion
Analog gear: an analog mixing board, an outboard analog mic preamp, an analog compressor, are all audio tools that clip or distort gracefully. If a signal is too hot and overloads the gear, it might not sound too bad, or might even be something cool sounding. Tube amp distortion is an example of intentional clipping that can sound cool. Hitting the transformers hard in a mastering compressor is another common way of adding character and depth to music, and can also sound cool.
Digital clipping
Digital clipping, if you’re mixing or recording audio using a computer, sounds very different, and it doesn’t usually sound cool or add character. It just sounds bad, very harsh and unpleasant.
You can hear what digital clipping sounds like by taking out your phone, making a voice memo, and then yelling into the mic loud enough that it clips. Now, listen back. This isn’t a very pleasant sound, and is probably not an effect that will be enjoyable for most people listening to your music.
It is interesting to note that several modern artists have started to incorporate intentionally ugly digital processing sounds into their music-the opening track to Bon Iver’s album 22, A Million comes to mind. But, the key concept here is that this is an intentional artistic choice. Unintentional, random digital clipping tends to sound, well, like you made a mistake.
Luckily, this is a very easy item to fix.
Solutions to prevent digital clipping
If you’re mixing or recording onto a computer, do not aim at the top of the meter! Instead, aim for the very loudest parts of your mix to hit at around -6 dB. Even a tad lower is not a problem.
Don’t worry, this won’t mean your music will sound too soft. We’re not finished yet, and additional volume will be added as we continue on through the music production process. But, understanding where and how we add that additional volume as we move towards the finished product is important, if we want to end up with the highest quality end result.
Yes!
No!
If it’s too soft to hear, and you want to hear the music louder while you’re working on it, simply turn up the volume on your speakers or headphones-do not adjust the mix itself.
Another helpful general guideline is:
When your final mixes are done, your music should sound exactly how you want it to sound in every respect, with the only exception being final volume level.
Your mastering engineer will help bring your music up to full level after they receive your final mixes, while also making sure your music sounds its very best across all the different playback mediums.
Another helpful tool for getting better and more consistent mixes on your own is to use our Mixing Cheat Sheet-it’s got all the steps to a great mix, clearly laid out in order for you.
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If you’re not using a mastering engineer, you should give it a try. We’re one of the biggest bangs for your buck in the recording game. If you don’t want to hire this out and are interested in learning, here’s where to start. You will need to:
Look up all the published specifications for each different playback medium you’re considering (streaming, CD, vinyl, etc).
Understand these specifications. They change sometimes, particularly when it comes to streaming services.
Invest in a high quality limiter that shows you the necessary information to master to these specifications.
Learn how to use this limiter, in combination with other mastering tools like EQ and stereo compression.
This all gets quite technical, but is good information for all musicians to learn about and try for themselves.
How to check for digital audio clipping
Here’s a handy tool available in MacOS that can tell you if you’re clipping any digital samples quickly. You can use this tool to check your mixes for any clipping, before sending them off to mastering:
Open Terminal. You’ll see the command line, don’t worry it’s gonna be ok.
Type “afclip”, with a space afterwards.
Drag the WAV file of your mix (or a group of them) into the Terminal window. You’ll see a long file name populate in the window.
Hit Enter.
After a short wait, you’ll see the command line return one of three things: an error message, “no clipped samples”, or a report that pops up that showing detailed information on any samples that have clipped.
If you see “no clipped samples”, you’re good to go!
FYI, this is the same Apple developed command line tool that is used to meet the Mastered for iTunes specification.
If you’re liking what we’re doing here, we’ve got a whole series of articles on making the most of the audio gear you already you have- it’s called High Quality Budget Gear.
