A dumb question

[sethwudel]

Ive always just gone with make - do vocals, but now I want to record vocals in protools properly and I am always confused when i have this discussion with someone so I just try to clear up my confusion once in a while.

My friend tells me that when you record vocals you want to do it at levels of like minus six decibels.

I can understand having the levels down on the pre amp, but am not sure what difference it makes having the levels down on the pro tools mixer when i record. I mean are the levels on the mixer not correspondiong to the output, rather than the input, so does it make a difference whether those levels are high or low?

The problem I have is tat I want to be able to hear my vocals in the mix when i sing, but how can i do that if i turn the vocals down on the mixer when I record?

Im kind of getting too stories here. My friend is telling me my levels on the daw mixer need to be down, while the reocrding revolution guy says that you want the gain on your pre amp down, and that you can adjust the levels on your daw mixer to hear yourself in the mix.

So its kind of two stories here.

So with the protools mixer, can i turn that up when i am recording so that I can hear myself in the mix, or will that affewct the recording?

Do the mixer clip meters reflect input or out put?
Please help.

I want to record vocals at low levels, but still want to hear myself in the mix when i record
please help
thanks

[Bill Denton]

Actually, you want to record everything at -15 to -18 on your Pro Tools input meters.

Tell us what preamp and interface you are using and I'll give you some more info...if you can pass a test on the Pro Tools manual...

[albee1952]

A little more to think about...I wonder if maybe you are confusing RECORDING level and LISTENING level. Getting the Pro Tools track meter just into the yellow as a proper RECORDING level. But nothing says you can't push the fader up so you can hear it better in the phones. Some details that have served me well are; have meters in Pre-Fade during tracking. Insert a compressor plugin and use it to boost the LISTENING level a bit(plugins act on the recorded audio so they don't affect the actual recorded audio, just what you hear). When I was giving singers a headphone mix that was simply the main outputs of my interface, I would push the track fader to +6 or +9, and that would make it loud enough in the phones to make them happy. Once they were finished, I'd just pull the fader back to -0 and move on