Seeking Recording Advice

[DesolationAngel]

In the Soundcloud share part of Logic Pro make sure you select uncompressed and 'available for download' and then you'll get... well, uncompressed downloads.

[Trevor B.]

Originally Posted by Doug Young

or post to soundcloud with downloads enabled - it's a checkbox on the permissions page. With that, people can download the original file, unmunged by soundcloud

Hey Trevor, that sounds *much* better than what I recall of files you shared with me some time back. But I'd suggest not panning inwards. Just leave the tracks as they are - hard left and right. If it sounds too wide, adjust the mic placement.

Thanks, Doug, for the encouragement and advice. Re: the panning, the settings in Maestro were not co-ordinated with the pan settings on the Logic Track Headers. I had to upload new Maestro firmware to make it compatible with Logic 10.1 so I just uploaded the software as well and clearly overlooked those settings.
I have the Download Enable checked in the Permission pane of the Soundcloud file for this clip.

[rick-slo]

Originally Posted by Trevor B.

Thanks, Doug, for the encouragement and advice. Re: the panning, the settings in Maestro were not co-ordinated with the pan settings on the Logic Track Headers. I had to upload new Maestro firmware to make it compatible with Logic 10.1 so I just uploaded the software as well and clearly overlooked those settings.
I have the Download Enable checked in the Permission pane of the Soundcloud file for this clip.

A new clip with no panning? I don't see it.

[Trevor B.]

Originally Posted by Doug Young

or post to soundcloud with downloads enabled - it's a checkbox on the permissions page. With that, people can download the original file, unmunged by soundcloud

Hey Trevor, that sounds *much* better than what I recall of files you shared with me some time back. But I'd suggest not panning inwards. Just leave the tracks as they are - hard left and right. If it sounds too wide, adjust the mic placement.

Thanks, Doug, for the encouragement and advice. Re: the panning, the settings in Maestro were not co-ordinated with the Logic Track Header settings. In my own humble defence I had to download new Maestro firmware to match the link up with Logic (the Maestro input settings - phase, phantom power and gain now accessible in Logic inspector).
I have Download Enable checked in Soundcloud Permissions

[Trevor B.]

Originally Posted by rick-slo

Yes. Converted it to a wav file.
Here is the link:
http://dcoombsguitar.com/Guitar%20Mu...MacbookPro.wav

Thanks, Derek. Sounds really good to me!!!

[Doug Young]

Trevor, you're recording in Logic? You can just export (bounce) as aif or wav, which is more standard. I think the track sounds not bad, but there's a slight boxiness and peakiness on the bass notes that's quite possibly from the panning. You're getting phase cancelation, since spaced pairs are inherently not very phase aligned (part of what sounds good with them), so you're losing the spaciousness.

[Trevor B.]

Originally Posted by DesolationAngel

In the Soundcloud share part of Logic Pro make sure you select uncompressed and 'available for download' and then you'll get... well, uncompressed downloads.

Okay. Just one more thing that got past me. I checked the Allow Downloading and Streaming but didn't see the uncompressed option in Logic Share.
Thanks for pointing it out.

[Trevor B.]

Originally Posted by sdelsolray

Yes, Trevor...please post links to two files, one for each mic and each at 44.1k/24 bit or better, .wav format.

Some folks, me included, may wish to tweak your recording in their DAW.

Hey Steve,
It's 12.30 and I'm done in for tonight. Will post the tracks separately tomorrow or Sunday.

[Doug Young]

Originally Posted by Trevor B.

Okay. Just one more thing that got past me. I checked the Allow Downloading and Streaming but didn't see the uncompressed option in Logic Share.
Thanks for pointing it out.

Ah, didn't realize you used the Share option to post it to soundcloud. I just bounce to disk where I have full control over the options, and then post the file. I guess that Share feature is convenient, I just never trust magical operations like that.

[DesolationAngel]

It's not so much 'magical' as just convenient... the thing with Soundcloud; you have no control regardless. Whatever you send will go through Soundcloud's compression, which takes it to 128kbps regardless of anything you do. However, if you use the Uncompressed option it actually makes a decent fist of the compression (if you set the share to 128 before it goes then it just recompresses it with predictably bad results; the horrors of a solo acoustic guitar with a touch of reverb going through two different algorithmic passes of compression at 128 doesn't bear thinking about). So, I send as uncompressed and hope for the best.

Obviously all bets are off when you're doing your own hosting...

(Oh, and if you upload as compressed AND allow for downloads the downloads should come down as the uncompressed original not the 128 compressed file).

[Doug Young]

By "magic", I just meant "not under my control". I haven't tried the Logic share feature, but I have tried various "share directly to You Tube" features of other programs, and my issue is that they'll just select a "best for You Tube" set of parameters that I don't know what they are. Might be good, might not. And maybe they were the best when the program was written, but web sites are moving targets. So I'd prefer to specify the format of my files. I can't control how You Tube or SoundCloud, etc, munges the files for streaming, but at least I can control the original format, and also maintain a copy for myself. So with Soundcloud, for example, I can tell people that they can download the original, unaltered file (which still takes a degree of trust in soundcloud, but it seems to be true so far)

[DesolationAngel]

Originally Posted by Doug Young

By "magic", I just meant "not under my control". I haven't tried the Logic share feature, but I have tried various "share directly to You Tube" features of other programs, and my issue is that they'll just select a "best for You Tube" set of parameters that I don't know what they are. Might be good, might not. And maybe they were the best when the program was written, but web sites are moving targets. So I'd prefer to specify the format of my files. I can't control how You Tube or SoundCloud, etc, munges the files for streaming, but at least I can control the original format, and also maintain a copy for myself. So with Soundcloud, for example, I can tell people that they can download the original, unaltered file (which still takes a degree of trust in soundcloud, but it seems to be true so far)

Right... as I outlined in my post, above. Logic's share feature gives you three compression options plus uncompressed. Soundcloud does not give you any control over how it presents the compressed file for streaming. It does allow for uncompressed downloads. I always send uncompressed because two passes through that kinda compression will kill most anything. (I'm not trying to be antagonistic, it's just that I've spent a lot of time trying to figure out Soundcloud and getting the right settings).

[Doug Young]

I must be missing something, I'll have to take a look. Is there some setting that's better than just producing the best 24 bit/44.1 (or 88.2, or 96K whatever) mix you can produce and then uploading that? I just view soundcloud as a quick and dirty way to share sound clips, but assume anyone who cares about quality will download the original, so I just produce what I would create for a high quality target. What else should I be doing?

[DesolationAngel]

Originally Posted by Doug Young

I must be missing something, I'll have to take a look. Is there some setting that's better than just producing the best 24 bit/44.1 (or 88.2, or 96K whatever) mix you can produce and then uploading that? I just view soundcloud as a quick and dirty way to share sound clips, but assume anyone who cares about quality will download the original, so I just produce what I would create for a high quality target. What else should I be doing?

No... you're not missing anything... but we might be talking past each other a bit

I was just saying that;

• the 'Share to Soundcloud' function of Logic Pro gives you the ability to squirt uncompressed OR compressed
• Soundcloud will compress to stream regardless of what you send
• 128kbps is their streaming bitrate
• Sending a 128kbps will STILL end up going through their munging pipeline
• Sending uncompressed (from the Share feature) will send an uncompressed that can be downloaded at whatever you set your project to be

So, I just sent created two projects, both at 24bit but one at 44.1 and the other at 96k... using the Share to Soundcloud in Logic and sending uncompressed, they both were compressed to stream but the downloads brought back both the 44.1 and the 96.

Ergo; using the Share feature in Logic is just a little more 'convenient', when you use uncompressed, than bouncing out to a WAV/AIFF and then going through the uploader process in a browser. (Plus the share feature allows you to set various permissions like Private/Public, download or stream etc).

[Trevor B.]

Originally Posted by Doug Young

Trevor, you're recording in Logic? You can just export (bounce) as aif or wav, which is more standard. I think the track sounds not bad, but there's a slight boxiness and peakiness on the bass notes that's quite possibly from the panning. You're getting phase cancelation, since spaced pairs are inherently not very phase aligned (part of what sounds good with them), so you're losing the spaciousness.

Here's the link to the aif of the same tracks; https://soundcloud.com/stream