Gain vs Trim vs Fader on Audio Recorders for Video & What is Mixing?

[@Weetunet]

For me, one thing that really clarifies the gain/trim vs fader distiction is: using gain/trim is a technical step that you need to do, while using faders is a creative decision. With gain/trim, you bring your signals to a certain measured level, while with faders you use your creative judgement to decide which signals should be louder or quieter than others.

[@curtisjudd]

Good way to think about it. 👍

[@patrickchase5614]

Yeah, this is exactly right. Note that trim can also be a creative decision, for example if you're using a tube preamp (or emulation thereof) in which case the trim determines how hard you drive the tube and what sort of (presumably wanted?) distortion you get.

[@curtisjudd]

@@patrickchase5614👍

[@Weetunet]

@@patrickchase5614 Good point! I did not think of that.

[@sezzivideo]

I’ve used the MixPre 6ii for a couple of years for recording live shows and fuddled my way through to acceptable results, with a lot of help from watching Curtis's Videos. Something that I’ve never quite grasped was the Gain settings in 32bit float so eagerly await the follow up :)

[@curtisjudd]

👍

[@saidcisneros2933]

Thank you for this video Curtis! This clears up the confusion I had with the trim and faders

[@curtisjudd]

👍

[@mattwruff]

Well Done! It is a hard thing to teach/explain. As you know, I've been doing it for 5 decades. Great explanation!

[@curtisjudd]

Thanks Matt!

[@michaelpoczynek]

Thanks, Curtis. Well done as usual. Have a nice day!

[@curtisjudd]

Thanks, you too!

[@THEMARCKNIGHT]

Thank you, finally someone who tells people what actual db range they should hit with gain. My school only tought me „it should be loud enough but not clip“ and wouldn‘t give me an actual number to work with. This clears some things up

[@curtisjudd]

👍 It depends, to be honest, but on quality recorders/mixers, usually -18 is good for dialogue recordings.

[@linda_lawson]

Thank you for this reference video that’s short and to the point. It’s so helpful to us who attempt to teach or reinforce these concepts.

[@curtisjudd]

Thanks Linda 🙏

[@RavikantRai21490]

What a timely upload, Curtis. I've been meaning to login to Learn Light & Sound page and finish the last very few remaining videos from your course but I wanted to do a refresh of every previous video. I will still do that, but gotta watch this first.

[@curtisjudd]

👍

[@ChadWork1]

Great info Curtis! Always a pleasure.

[@curtisjudd]

🙏 thanks Chad!

[@75ajw]

Great video. The question "Why should I mix on set when I can just mix the ISOs in post...?" is always worth discussing. Another point worth making about mixing on set regards sync audio: you may have your Ding-Bell 3000XL hooked up to the cinema camera's audio input, and if the director wants to review a take from the camera, they'd probably like it to have some audio (even a rough dialogue mix!) in order to make decisions about the scene.

[@curtisjudd]

Great point! How are you liking your Ding Bell 3000 XL?

[@ww1www]

Thank you for the video, I enjoyed it.Looking forward to hearing your advice on how to properly use trim, fader, limiter and normalisation etc in a 32bit float workflow. Some recorders do not even allow setting the trim these days, while others do. The F3 has something like trim, but that is just a magnfiication level setting. On recorders without trim control, the resulting audio in the video edting software or DAW will be very low, so you need to normalise, however, there will be low and loud parts... what to normalise to? Or use Loudness normalisation? I love 32bit float, but I am sometimes a bit confused as all my recorders (and I have quite a few) do things somewhat differently. So I am curious how a pro would deal with these things.

[@curtisjudd]

Thanks 🙏 Good questions!

[@stevenkralovec]

8:28 that was hilarious 😂

[@curtisjudd]

🤪

[@sebastiangutierrezumana]

Great video as always! Thanks Curtis! It has been a little bit confusing for me, but Gain and Trim are in fact not the same. They do have some differences. "Gain and Trim, both are gain stages at the beginning of the signal path... Preamp gain is a gain stage that is only positive/additive, and is controlling a physical, analogue preamp which is connected to an analog input... This lives directly after the input socket and before the signal is converted to digital... Trim on the other hand is a digital gain stage which does exist as part of the input channel processing... It allows you to increase (positive/additive) or attenuate (negative/subtractive) the input signal... You can use it to adjust the signal on a particular input channel without altering the analogue preamp stage."

[@curtisjudd]

On field recorders they are the same. On some vintage and vintage style equipment they are as described on Wikipedia (which is what I assume you quoted).

[@sebastiangutierrezumana]

Actually I quote that from an Allen & Heath website (but for some reason youtube doesn't let me paste the link) and read similiar info on Sweetwater and Mackie websites too. That's the reason I got a little bit confuse, because is recent information 🤔

[@curtisjudd]

@@sebastiangutierrezumana good news to remove the confusion, on modern FIELD RECORDERS, gain and trim can be used interchangeably.

[@sebastiangutierrezumana]

@@curtisjudd Oh now I get it! That's interesting! On field recorders they are like the same, but for stage mixing boards the do have little differences. I also read that in that case (stage mixing boards) sometimes the console have both, gain and trim, and that it gives you a "cleaner" mix (less noise) giving a little bit of gain and then boosting the signal with the trim! Great topic! Thanks again Curtis 🤝🏽

[@iFilmFlops]

Amazing! I really needed this a few days ago :) I think in field recorders, which is what I've been using for a long time, the concepts of gain and faders can seem like the same thing. But three days I go I started working with a proper mixer and it took me a while to figure out that the faders were having no effect on my microphone's gain. Finally I figured out that faders only apply to that channel's level in the mix. It's not until you separate the two that you have to understand the difference. Now, if I may make a request, I need to properly understand routing: analog to Dante, inputs vs outputs, inserts, and how plugins come into the mix. Thanks!

[@curtisjudd]

👍 we cover some of those in my courses and some in my other videos here on KZbin. And, of course, there are more videos to come.

[@IanCresswell]

Great video Curtis.

[@curtisjudd]

Thanks Ian.

[@slyhow]

Curtis, you're such a great teacher. Appreciate the video!

[@curtisjudd]

🙏

[@johnheiser2604]

Thanks Curtis

[@curtisjudd]

👍

[@abyshines]

"Sponsored by me", hilarious, honest yet brutal. 😊 keep the good work ❤

[@curtisjudd]

😉

[@notchilli]

It might have already been said but a reason I create mixes (especially with Narrative work) is I like to know that I have what post needs cause what ever I can create on set will only be able to be bested in post. This gives me the confidence that when a director or AD ask "do we have it?" I can say yes or no.

[@curtisjudd]

Great point! 👍

[@orcaacht1223]

Amazing video :)

[@curtisjudd]

🙏

[@angizian]

Curtis this is awesome, such a key topic for sound recording and yet it's not very common to talk about! One more thing to add of why you should mix is if you have a director or client and you feed them with the raw sound they on one hand will think you're doing the work wong and on the other hand they won't be able to concentrate on the shot, if for example, one of the talents is talking backstage or whatever non desired sound gets to the director/client. Do you use automix? is it worth it? and I wanted to ask you how's the post production process when you mixing and you want to adjust one mic, you have to go back to the ISOs and remix from scratch? Thanks again for all Curtis!

[@curtisjudd]

I use auto mix for podcast or panel style discussions, not for narrative video. To fix the mix in post, it depends on the situation. You CAN go back and start from scratch with the iso files, but you could also just cut in an iso file in a problematic spot and use room tone or other things to make it sit right.

[@Flo-Perso]

Great videos every time Curtis ! Do you think there will be new video recorders soon ? I'm thinking buying a F8nPro or a MixPre-6 II because i will have projects that need it, but i don't know if it's a great time to do it or if i can wait a little bit

[@curtisjudd]

I’m not aware of any new options coming in that space, just lower end like ZOOM H1 XLR.

[@slauprod]

@@curtisjuddThanks 😉

[@GaryStockton]

Excellent explanation Curtis. I am curious about one thing. Why are black bars on each side of the video in the player? Was this composed at a different frame size?

[@curtisjudd]

That...was a mistake with a long story. Good eye!

[@GaryStockton]

@@curtisjudd I figured. Very good video.

[@patrickchase5614]

I was gonna ask why you have that Allen&Heath instead of buying a CL-16 to go with your 888, but I looked at the specs and now I understand.

[@curtisjudd]

😀👍

[@ronnyshama]

So wait do faders only affect the mix or does it affect the Iso tracks too?

[@curtisjudd]

In most cases, faders ONLY affect the mix. There are a few more advanced mixers out there that allow you to record the iso channels "post fader" meaning they DO take into account the faders for the iso recording. And then there's ZOOM 32-bit float recorders where the knob (say, on the F6), in its default configuration, is a fader and the audio is recorded post-fader. So, it depends on your recorder/mixer.

[@Andreas-ov2fv]

I love how Curtis is pre-emptively exhausted by people bringing up 32-bit float in the comments. Kind of like an IT professional who has to hear another brag/pitch/sermon about Mac.

[@curtisjudd]

LOL

[@HariomKumbhkar1]

Sir please one video created by asmr 🥺🥺🙏🙏 How to use asmr mic and record and room noise remove

[@curtisjudd]

I need someone to teach me to ASMR 😀

[@HariomKumbhkar1]

@@curtisjudd Sir, what I meant to say was please tell me a good and low cost microphone which I can use to record my ASMR sound and how can I remove the background sound of traffic in my room.

[@curtisjudd]

@@HariomKumbhkar1 Perhaps the RODE NT5?

[@curtisjudd]

@@HariomKumbhkar1 And to remove background noise, maybe Waves Clarity Vx.

[@SmartEnergyLab]

Thanks once again Curtis for helping me understand how to make better recordings.

[@curtisjudd]

👍

[@edclevel402]

First. 😎

[@curtisjudd]

Thanks for coming by!

[@JamesMatthewGallagher]

First. 😎

[@curtisjudd]

Congratulations! Thanks for coming by!

[@JamesMatthewGallagher]

@@curtisjudd Thanks! Technically I was second. 🙂

[@curtisjudd]

@@JamesMatthewGallagher LOL 😂