Why are my projects so quiet, even after mastering?

Well, firstly if you’re new to mixing then I’d strongly suggest you read about gain staging and when you’re confident your tracks are good, then think about overall dynamics. Bottom line is that higher the perceived loudness of a track, the smaller the dynamic range overall. This balance (I’m short handing here) between loud or being dynamic is the crux of mastering and mixing. It’s tricky to get a perception of both.

Try reference tracks as an aide and read about limiting. Limiting is a common approach but there’s lots of badly limited music IMO so be careful. It’s a skill to get this right. Ps. Don’t normalise your bounced mix!

First, commercial pop songs are produced by professionals with years of experience in mixing and production using equipment costing thousands of dollars if not hundreds of thousands of dollars. No "mastering" plugin can do that kind of magic. Its all about experience and knowing how to create a mix that can be amplified in such a way that it doesn't lose integrity.

Hints... if you're using monitors that don't accurately reflect all frequencies you probably have too much bass, it then becomes impossible to bring the volume up with the overpowering bass or sub-bass. Second, if your file has a lot of peak levels the rms level is probably low. RMS level is where the volume is. See laamusic's advice on using a limiter and gain staging.

Search google. Peak vs RMS

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=11j8aOyfGJQ

ChrisGrahamUK wrote:

Hi there - quite new to this, so I was wondering if I could ask a quick question about volume and mastering.

I've written a short track, which peaks at around -3.5 dB, leaving me some room for mastering etc. I used a programme called T-Racks to master, but my track still sounds infinitely quieter than other commercial songs on my iTunes, but if I increase the volume on my Logic track any further, it clips.

Is there any way around this? Any help would be much appreciated.

Here we go again ... mastering

First of all, if you in general "new to this" then you shouldn't master your track, regardless what "mastering" means. And here are few more advices:

• • Buying a Mastering Plugin doesn't make you a mastering engineer
  • Watching videos about mastering also doesn't make you a mastering engineer because most of the YouTube videos do more damage than actually help in understanding (let alone learning) about mastering.
  • Mastering starts with learning and understanding the basics of audio engineering combined with a lot of practice and expertise

Your question includes another favorite "old wives tale" regarding mastering: "Leave some room for mastering". 

If you watch 10 videos about how much headroom you need for the mastering, then most likely you will get 10 different answers. None of this videos will tell you the little secret. A mastering engineer knows how to use a Gain Plugin to lower the level in case he or she needs more room. How hot you mix (before mastering) has to do with understanding what you are doing and knowing what the actual number on the meter means.

The only "way around" this is to learn the craft. If the "obstacle" that you try to get "around" is "Learning", then most of the time you follow questionable cookie cutter advice with the consequences.

A side note about Peak vs. RMS just to show you how complex such a topic can get.

Peak

If you talk about "Peak", you have to be specific if you talk about "Sample Peak" or "True Peak". THe difference could be up to 2dB depending on the material

RMS

RMS is another one of those misunderstood topics. Yes it gets nasty pretty quick if you try to understand what it is, what it does and look at the math formula. It is often mentioned as to be used to measure "Loudness". But the important part is the "Perceived Loudness" that you want to know and RMS give you an inaccurate reading for that. RMS uses an integration time of 300ms, but our ears are based on 400ms integration time. Even worse, RMS Meter doesn't factor in the Equal Loudness Contours (Fletcher/Munson), that describe how we perceive loudness across the frequency range. Therefore, RMS meters read levels way too hot on low frequency.

Another curf ball is the RMS standard. AES-17 describes how RMS are calibrated (using sine wave), but not all RMS Meter (including Logic) use that standard and, instead, are based on a square wave calibration. That means if you use the Logic RMS meter, your RMS level is actually 3dB lower (just compare it, i.e., with any Meter Plugin that follows AES17, like Ozone). If you aim for a healthy Crest Factor, then your mix in Logic would have 3dB less dynamic than you think.

Here is a screenshot in Logic where you can easily verify that.

One note about the YouTube video from Christopher Carvalho that Pancenter linked in his comment. Christopher said that RMS measures the level over a given period of time, pointing at the selected waveform segment. What he describes is actually the functionality of an LUFS-I Meter. An RMS Meter, on the other hand, has a fixed integration time of 300ms, so the "given period of time" is 300ms, like a "scrolling window". A Peak Meter (PPM Type-I), in comparison has a response time of 5ms.

As you can see, there is a lot of information (knowledge) that needs to be factored in when trying to use those tools and we haven't even started to talk about the Loudness Meters that you really should use instead of the RMS (or even worse VU). They are the only ones that really measure Perceived Loudness and needed when preparing your tracks for any kind of delivery of your song because they are now standards.

Hope that helps,

Edgar Rothermich

Graphically Enhanced Manuals (GEM)

www.LogicProGEM.com

https://www.youtube.com/c/MusicTechExplained/

Please excuse the hijack, this video is excellent, thank you.

However, on using the Adaptive Limiter, is this measuring the Peaks or RMS?

Seriously k. Take it to a new topic, stop hijacking threads just because you have a question.

Try your Mastered wave file In this great site to see what streaming services would do to it. It’s a good starting point to get a sense of where you are. https://www.loudnesspenalty.com/

Don”t just aim to be “loud”, learn about gain staging.