CD final volume

[Carl Fuehrer]

Everytime I bounce songs and make a CD for a client it comes out so low in volume. It sounds fine when it's mixed and pumping out the speakers and I use L2 or L3 to get a consistant level on bounce. What am I doing wrong?

[Greg M]

You need to use thicker CD's - ones that can hold more volume bits

Greg

[Obsidian Dragon]

But what if I'm using the slim cases. In the old day we used the thicker jewel cases but now we use the slim cases. A thicker CD may not fit. I know standard CD can hold music recorded with 16 bits. Will the thicker CD hold 24 bit music? Just kidding. I'm just having a little fun

Actually, try turning down your monitors while mixing. What you perceive as loud enough may simply be your amps. Always try to mix close to (0db) on the peaks. If you're sending your mix to a mastering engineering, they often tell you to leave about 3db for them to have some room to work.

[wikked]

Obsidian has a good point........When I mix what I like to do is start with my master fader at full throttle.

After I get everything balanced the way I like it(the meter might be clipping at this point) then I gradually pull down the master fader until clipping stops.....After analyzing song from start to finish then I might place a Maxim Plug in over the entire mix and set the threshhold to pump up the sound and set the ceiling to hit at zero and never beyond.

This is the bounce for the clients...........

For the mastering engineer (just like Obsidian said) I leave at least 3db to 5db them to work with...

[Third Eye Studios]

I’m definitely not a mastering engineer, but I do end up having to master a lot of my clients work. It’s the only way it will get mastered if I don’t, so I have to give it my best try. So mine won’t be expert advice, but I don’t have people complaining about quiet mixes anymore.

I think what helps me to get my final volume up there, is to start thinking about overall volume before the mastering stage, during the mixing stage (even during tracking with compression). I use EA’s inspector to check out the rms during mixing, and I shoot for a final “raw” unmastered mix to be around -14db to -12db, knowing that during mastering I’ll try to hit close to -11db and sometimes a little louder (don’t yell at me please).

I Start experimenting early on in the mix w/ the mastering plug-ins I’ll be using later, put L2 or VW on the master for a few minutes to make sure the mix is working with it. I think it’s important if you want a loud mix, to start before mastering because the plug-ins available can’t do a lot of volume increase without sacrificing audio quality. Also, try not to squeeze all the volume maximizing out of one plug-in. Try a db or two w/ vintage warmer, a db w/Rcomp, and a db w/ L2. I do BTDs for individual sections of the band, and during mastering if I need more of something, I’ll just import that into the session and move on.