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If you see it again it's because something has changed so please set your preferences accordingly. Today, normalization is often regarded negatively in the audio world, losing ground against other, less invasive techniques. That being said, when used wisely, it can be a great ally in audio editing, mixing, and making audio more consistent.
It has applications in music, television, broadcasting, podcasting and more. Further, doing loudness normalization to dialogues and podcasts can enhance their perceived quality considerably. The first method, commonly known as peak normalization, is not a complex process but rather a linear one.
It is achieved by taking the highest peak in the waveform and bringing it to the norm along with the rest of the clip proportionally. Hence, by applying the same amount of gain across the board, dynamics are respected, and you get a waveform that is close to the original, only louder or quieter. The peak normalization process effectively finds the highest PCM sample value of an audio file and applies gain to, typically, bring the peak up to 0 dBFS decibels Full-Scale , which is the upper limit of a digital audio system.
To learn more about the often confusing subject of decibels in audio, check out my article What Are Decibels? Note that peak normalization is only concerned with detecting the peak of the audio signal and in no way accounts for the perceived loudness of the audio.
This brings us to the next type of normalization. The reason many people choose this second method is because of the human perception of loudness. At equal dBFS values and ultimately sound pressure levels , sustained sounds are perceived to be louder than transient sounds. Loudness normalizing, on the other hand, will adjust the levels of the recording to perceived loudness. This is a more complex, advanced procedure, and the results are perceived as louder by the human ear.
They are both standard loudness measurement units used for audio normalization in broadcast, television, music, and other recordings. The audible range for human hearing is 20 Hz to 20, Hz, though we are more sensitive to certain frequencies particularly in the Hz to 6, Hz range. This normalization process could be used to bring the overall level up or down, depending on the circumstance.
As mentioned previously, dynamic range compression and normalization are similar but different. It may be individual snare hits or even full mixes. Normalization can be done automatically without changing the sound as compression does. This means you have far less control. There are different ways of measuring the volume of audio.
We must first decide how we are going to measure the volume in the first place before we can calculate how to alter it, the results will be very different depending on what method we use.
This only considers how loud the peaks of the waveform are for deciding the overall volume of the file. This is the best method if you want to make the audio as loud as possible. There may be large peaks, but also softer sections. It takes an average and calls that the volume. This method is closer to how the human ear works and will create more natural results across varying audio files. This means that to make a group of audio files the same volume we may need to turn them all down so that none of their peaks clip goes over 0 dBFS.
This may not be desirable, an example would be in mastering. Another problem is that RMS volume detection is not really like human hearing. In fact, normalizing an entire track to 0 dB is a recipe for disaster. The normalize function finds the highest peak in the entire waveform and raises it to the target. With this peak touching the 0 dB maximum, things get unpredictable. When digital audio gets converted to analog to play through your speakers, the filters that reconstruct the signal smooth out the curve between individual samples in the file.
Sometimes the arc between two points close to the ceiling can exceed the maximum! The result is clipping from inter-sample peaks. It comes out as distracting harshness and distortion in your music. Properly controlling the levels inside your DAW is called gain staging. It means checking the volume of each element you record and making sure not to exceed a healthy level throughout your mix. If you follow these guidelines for gain staging you might be surprised to hear how quiet your finished bounce seems in comparison to tracks on your streaming platform of choice.
Mastering brings up the overall loudness of a finished mix to exactly the right volume—no intersample peaks, no wasted headroom.
Unlike normalization, mastering turns up the volume dynamically so that even quiet passages can be heard clearly.
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