I usually use WLM from Waves …
where do you do the Loudness
of the tracks? and what is the average in LUFS that you
lets for soundtrack sales
Ha! That’s the thing I was wondering also!
Of course average (for example) EDM track will always be much more compressed than average cartoon track = EDM will have more LUFS/RMS.
But I found that for example average EDM traks on AJ have tendency to have much more LUFS than for example Halloween Cartoon music. Even when some of those short cartoon tracks have potential to sound good with much more bigger compression.
It makes sense when we think about buyers who are listening to one category and do not want to change the speakers volume manually. Especially when they are listening to tracks on shitty speakers or headphones. Especially if they have some kind of limiter with autogain in operating system like laptop Windows or Smartphones. In this situation tracks too loud can sound very bad.
I’m not sure what is the best way… But right now sometimes I’m checking by ear examples from category of my track and sometimes I am lowering volume even if my track sounds dope with bigger compression…
the listeners when evaluating the sales library, perceive the difference of Volumes …
This greatly influences the acceptance for them to buy the tracks …
there should be some LUFS directed pattern for a fair dispute.
if we are not going to end up going to the scene of electronic music, where there is the great war of loudness …
Not sure if this helps much, but I’ve heard people going as loud as -7 LUFS for a majority of their tracks.
Depends on the genre you work
For it’s about -7 -10 dB
In the rock genre I aim for -10 to -11 RMS. Which i find to be too loud for my own personal tastes and forces me to smash stuff really hard. Would be nice if AJ would implement some sort of standard.
Hello all,
I am pretty interested in this disccussion.
I just have written a hardrock/metal song, that would be suited for extreme sports/racing.
My usual LUFS was around -12dB before being on AudioJungle, now I set them to -10db.
For this metal piece, I decided to be a bit louder, so set to -9…
But when comparing to other similar tracks on AJ… wow… mine is really quiet !!
So should I follow the average Loudness for this genre?
Another question would be… maybe I could provide a “less squashed, quieter” version for the customer, and just keep the preview loud, to compete ?
I wish AJ player had the same thing as itunes, youtube and others, that is, lowering the level of tracks that have average LUFS above a certain threshold…
So… should I leave my -9dB?
@frozenjazz, I agree this topic would be great if we could get some clear guidance on. My experience is that a lot of the best selling tracks are loud at AudioJungle. I have to tweak quite a lot to get close without distortion…
Cheers,
Carl
I have finally uploaded a hip hop track today after I deleted it from the queue at least 5 or 6 times since it just was not loud enough for this genre. I have never gone lower than -11 - 12 db RMS but I finally stopped tweaking at about 8.5 db. The past 24 hours tweaking and remixing to get this track loud whilst still avoiding clipping was painful and annoying since mixing a track never takes longer than 20 - 30 minutes. The loudness war rages on and I am now participating…
I spent much much time on my metal track since I wrote my last comment… I was saying that I would target -9LUFS (I don’t know the RMS value, I only use LUFS now - but they are not too far apart), but I realized that the similar tracks on audiojungle were in fact around -6.5!!!
So I worked hard, trying to be louder but still sound ok… and I could not believe that I got soo loud in the end, I reached -5.5… I decided that it was really too much and now I uploaded at -6.5LUFS, which is really probably too loud… but this track is full of heavy metal guitars, doing continuous power chords.
In hiphop genre, I used to produce at around -10 but on my own beat selling website, I know am around -12, and I am really happy with this, as my tracks have more dynamics, more punch, which is great for hiphop. I could get -8.5db but would not be sounding nice in my opinion…
That being said, if I decide to post hiphop sound on AJ, maybe I’ll have to do the same, and boost my overall volume…
I go with -7 -5 RMS for almost everything (hip-hop, funk, electronic). I think that most of the tracks here are around these levels, at least based on my research. It’s pretty easy - just download desired preview track and compare to yours inside your DAW.
Wow… -7 to -5 is insanely loud
If you put this music on youtube, the volume will be immediately lowered, and as a result the loudness will be way less than if is had been mastered at more reasonable levels…
I don’t know what the customer really want - I have read many comments complaining that the music was too loud (they rarely complain that it is too quiet).
The problem is that when browsing, yes, louder seems to be better… oh well
I also go with -7 -5 RMS. It looks so wrong to push it that high, and yet my tracks still don’t sound as loud as other tracks on here,… so I don’t know… Maybe there’s something I’m missing in my mastering process.
Of course it would be better to have a quieter master with more dynamics,… but it would be skipped over as weak while browsing.
@PhreaSpirit as I was surpised by the insanely loud levels that you are announcing (-7 to -5 RMS!!) I checked two of your tracks (Hiphop Street and DubFlow), and they are closer to -11 RMS… This makes more sense, I could not believe these crazy levels you were announcing
By the way, I love the Hiphopish tracks you produce, very nice, well done !
@PurpleFogSound hm… that is strange… I also checked one of your tracks, “it’s a trap”, and it did not sound that loud, and does not “look” loud either (look at the waveform here on AJ…) and I measured it it is around -10 maximum… not -7 or -5 …
What kind of tools do you use to measure your levels?
To really get a sense of loudness I now prefer to use LUFS measures than pure RMS.
The free dpMeterII VST is really nice for that!
I’m using the meter from Ozone 5. Either it’s off, or (more likely) I don’t know how to properly read it. I’ve been feeling really guilty to reach these values, now that I know they’re wrong, I feel relieved. Thanks for alleviating my soul @frozenjazz
Will definitely check out your VST… and probably will have to rethink my whole mastering process.
Well, i use Ozone myself, but never really checked the RMS there, as I am now using LUFS rather than RMS anyway, and my Ozone (7) does not show LUFS as far as I know.
dpMeterII is here: http://www.tb-software.com/TBProAudio/ go to the downloads, it is free of charge. I am not the only one to recommend this tool - this developper makes excellent plugins, some are freeware (like ISOL8, dpMeter, mvMeter), other not.
i like it because it is simple. I also use EBULoudness by ToneBoosters because I have bought the BusEssentials, incredible value. Both allow RMS and LUFS measurements, and give the same exact readings
Another free option would be Youlean Loudness Meter - for some reason I prefer the simplicity of dpMeterII, but it is also an excellent free meter for LUFS (not sure it does RMS, but today LUFS is the only real loudness unit
anyway )
Thanks for your comment!)
I am using Ozone 7. I also use FabFilter Pro L, and it shows about - 11 dB rms (as you say). Ozone 7 probably has different integrated time settings. Or it uses diferrent rms detection algorithm… I am using 300ms VU mode (standart). Maybe i should switch to Fabfilter completely, it gives more realistic picture…)
By the way, in Ozone 7 there are settings for LUFS in “I/O” section in settings.
Wow… the option was well hidden under “integrated” and “momentary”… slight_smile:Thanks for the tip… but I’ll still use dpMeter which readings are waaay easier to get, to refresh, and you have all them at the same time if you wish…
Mmm so in forums, when people pretend they can easily reach -5dB, which is, believe me, really difficult ! , maybe they are simply confused about the readings of their meters
I’ve found the top selling tracks here to be reeeealy loud. To the untrained ear louder=better, so you have customers flipping through a bunch of songs they are going to tend to like and then buy the loudest.
It would be nice for AJ to introduce some kind of normalization similar to what music streaming services use.