Audio Metering: What is dBu vs dBFS?

[@NealWillaert]

Going hard with the videos. I like it ! Thanks for sharing Matt !

[@akiratheastronaut]

Where on your meters do you aim to keep "normal" dialogue? What about, say a wild track of footsteps? Shouting? And finally, when recording room tone, do you keep your gain more or less to where it was set during the takes, or do you find it useful to record the tone with gain set a bit higher? Thanks!

[@cscrignaro]

Record room tone at the same gain settings you used during takes otherwise it defeats the purpose of it.

[@akiratheastronaut]

Thanks for the reply Carlo, that makes sense. On a bit of a different note, I was once on a job as an assistant, dialogue scene between 4 actors sat at a restaurant table. There was a hum, we knew where it came from, but it was not possible to stop it. The mixer planted a mic pointing straight at the hum source (which was several meters away from the scene, so the booms covering the dialogue would have picked up that same hum very differently). I was wondering what the thinking behind this was, but it was a hectic day and then forgot to ask him. I later thought it could help post for de-noising to have loud and clear takes of said hum. But in the same way as what you described for room tone, would it not make more sense to have "clean" takes of that hum, but from the perspective of the boom, and from where the dialogue was taking place? Sorry for the long-winded one :)

[@cscrignaro]

Its an old school way of helping post de-noise. Basically post would take that hum and reverse polarity so it reduces its precense. But with the tools we have today it is unecessary to do so.

[@emrahterzi6524]

What's is your record level on sound devices 664, minimum between maksimum?

[@DamnHeadHumpers]

I am just learning about this stuff, but I am not sure why your picture shows -16 dBfs in relation to the +4 dBu standard, as the +4 standard relates in dBfs towards the American SMPTE standard. The picture also doesn't state what standard is being used to compare dBfs to +4dBu.

[@Theonlyoneto]

U got any recommendations on what I should learn bout with dbfs and what not

[@cscrignaro]

-20dBFS = 0VU = +4dBu by AES/SMPTE standards. For EU they likely use -18dBFS = 0VU = +4dBu for no apparent reason other than to 'be different'.

[@rachidajewher8649]

according to EBU R68 for Europe -18dBFS = 0VU = 0dBu

[@NATmusic27]

Did you learn this at university?