How to compress and EQ dialogue using Pro Tools

In this extended tutorial video, I go through my process of compressing and EQ'ing post production dialogue using Pro Tools. The methods shown in this video are my own approach to this so take what you find useful from it and adapt it to fit into your own workflow.

[@paolocapponi2099]

I love all your videos Paul. Please do not ever stop sharing your wise knowledge! You are brilliant!

[@paolocapponi2099]

If I may ask for a video suggestion , I would love to have a in-depth tutorial regarding metering (eg . types of meters, considerations regarding how loud certain elements , such as fx - soundtracks - vocals , should be mixed ) and an explanation how to mix them , keeping always an eye into the Waves post production meter. That would be lovely, I always wonder how pro mixers deal with loudness of the audio tracks.

[@paulmaunder3007]

Thanks very much, Paolo!

[@thomascsaba6684]

Paul, I want to thank you very much for the time and efforts you put into your videos. As somebody who recently (try) to start a career in this field of post production, your comments about techniques and workflow ar highly appreciated!

[@paulmaunder3007]

Thanks Thomas. Keep trying and you'll succeed.

[@nero008]

Each and every one of your videos brings me great joy when I watch them !

[@paulmaunder3007]

Thank you very much! More to follow soon!

[@Oscarggarcia1]

A full hour? Perfect time to grab a coffee and enjoy. Make more!

[@paulmaunder3007]

Thanks Oscar. I will!

[@georgexydous2891]

The way you show eqing and compression, really must be shown and teached in audio schools. Paul many thanks for your efforts!

[@gastibarroule]

Thank you Paul! I've been blindly using compression for dialogue. With your explanation and workflow, now I got a better idea of how to approach it. In the mixes I've assisted, the mixers usually have an open compressor on the DX bus, like the multiband you have here, reducing around maximum 6 db (usually less).

[@paulmaunder3007]

Thanks Gaston. I hope that you find the techniques useful!

[@BrookmanGuitar]

Mr Maunder, your tutorials are some of the very best! I've learnt a lot. Thanks for sharing your knowledge!

[@bryandensley6220]

Great video. That's very similar to how I do it as well for corporate style videos. Start with an EQ, then I always de-ess at least a little bit, then Rcomp with a 3:1 ratio and setting my threshold so that generally I'm only getting around 3dB of compression. I usually always ride the fader after to smooth it all out. I'd be curious to see a video based more on narrative/feature style where there are a ton of dialog tracks, different takes, different scenes, etc.

[@DaveWelschBassist]

Paul, your videos are absolutely brilliant. Thank you, so much!

[@paulmaunder3007]

Thanks Dave! I'll make more very soon.

[@spencerzacharymusic]

Thank you very much Paul, a very very useful resource you've provided us here. Cheers! Thank you

[@paulmaunder3007]

No problem Spencer!

[@hdphotovideo]

Hi Paul, One of the best Pro Tools tutorials for dialog & film, Thanks for sharing your knowledge! 🙏

[@johnmellor932]

I follow similar methods. I recently did a corporate promo, what I'd say is because the turn around was really quick, I had a day to deliver, the approaches in this video I would have run out of time. No time at all for shiney eq settings. I did a one size fits all signal processing stage on the busses and finished with tricky mixing. With that said most of the DX was good quality to begin with. But I had an hour for each version, 6 versions in all. Including session set ups.

[@paulmaunder3007]

Yes, that's very often the reality of it. A lot of the mixes I do are super quick turnaround and there isn't really time to go into too much detail with tailored settings for every piece of dialogue. In this video I've shown a workflow which works if there's sufficient time. As you mentioned though, sometimes the mix just has to be done within a certain limited timeframe. That's a big part of the reason why a lot of people use templates with plug-ins already in place and run most stuff through it with little or no changes. Not ideal but deadlines and budgets often dictate that that's the only option.

[@learnerforever6933]

Massive thanks 🙏🏼 really unique and quality content on Pro Tools and post production I’ve never seen similar videos on KZbin going deep and detailed as you do 👌🏼you deserve more subscribers! Keep up the great effort 👏🏼 BTW I learned from you how to integrate Pro Tools with outboard hardware and using gear as plugins. That improved my workflow and allowed me to enter a whole different world in production. I’m very grateful to you 🙏🏼 thanks!

[@paulmaunder3007]

I'm pleased that you find the videos useful. Just let me know if there are any particular Post production topics you'd like me to cover.

[@FredLILLO]

Ce n'est jamais évident de parler d'EQ et de compression ! Mais ton explication est claire et détaillée ! Bravo A bientôt Fred L.

[@paulmaunder3007]

Merci Fred!

[@StudioBuster]

man, you are LEGEND for me!

[@paulmaunder3007]

Thanks. More videos to come soon!

[@lalujose3261]

Very good. This is what I was waiting for.

[@Matchat11]

Man I've been to all your content and noticed : 0 dislike! plenty of likes from my part though thanks for all, happy new year, mat.

[@louiesito9106]

Thank you for the video ! I am a novice. This is great material for someone like me. Subscriber for sure !

[@momins-topic4470]

something difrrent your tutorial ... its like unique. thnxxx ❤❤💐💐

[@colindayo]

That was a superb tutorial and very well delivered - thank you so much❤

[@Paulkruz1]

I made this request months ago, thanks foe this practical lesson

[@paulmaunder3007]

Sorry it's taken so long!!

[@Paulkruz1]

@@paulmaunder3007 Its come at the right time, very educational like the rest but by far this is my favorite of them all. Very detailed > Thank you very much

[@damianpress]

Mackie HR824 mk1's made in USA. I miss those guys - such great speakers!

[@moqtev]

Hi Paul - thank so much for sharing your knowledge and clever solutions!

[@matthewmutton]

This video is superb. Thank you very much for putting this together

[@keyibreand3840]

Paul you are the best!

[@toncitafra3151]

You are a professor that I never had.

[@globofonia]

Thank You so much for sharing knowledge. I admire you, you inspire!

[@paulmaunder3007]

Thanks Leonardo

[@MRicciardi]

Absolute legend. Thanks for that mate!

[@thomasbecka5316]

Thank you for this tutorial, I just want to precise an information concerning the SA2, the range of frequency is only from 3k to 10k aprox, so its a multiband compressor but not in the full spectrum.

[@ChrisPFuchs]

Thanks for the tutorial, I love these types of videos! It's really cool seeing other people's workflows and methods. I'm also a big fan of the SA-2 and RComp on dialogue. @56:45 I think that might be a good example of why RComp can be so transparent as you say. RComp's ARC, automatic release control, helps prevent situations where a large spike in volume causes the subsequent audio to be egregiously attenuated, which is what I think was happening there with the ProComp? Also, while I know this was demonstrating how to compress dialogue in different situations and mixers don't always have the time to do so; I think using some clip gain automation as it goes into the compressor could help make the compressor do less work in some of the situations shown here. I really like clip gain > clip gain automation > gentle slow compressor > gentle peak compressor/limiter > volume automation as a way to get really transparent leveling, where each stage is making the next do less (if any) work. Another thing I noticed was during the Roof Culture track, a few of the clips (like 3) had a resonant frequency that stood out to me, but at different frequencies depending on the clip. I didn't even know it was a thing until now, but that seems like a perfect situation to use that clip channel strip thing ( as opposed to having to automate an EQ ). If only I had ProTools Ultimate :( The only thing I was really wasn't a fan of, and I love and use RX all the time, was the Voice Denoise. I could definitely hear artifacting. I personally like EQ + WNS on the dialogue track and Voice Denoise when necessary on the dialogue bus, but I really don't like relying on the adaptive mode. Especially at the beginning of a clip, as it takes a second or so to adapt properly and clamp down and can cause other funny stuff. It's super useful in situations as you mentioned in the video, but ultimately I prefer to automate it ( again, that also unfortunately takes extra time so adaptive mode can sometimes be a time saver). One thing I learned from one of John Purcell's noise reduction demonstrations (dialogue editor; at least what I took away from an offhand comment of his :P) is that a little bit of an expansion type noise reduction like WNS, DNS, or C4 in expansion, can help the dialogue feel a little bit punchier, before it starts making the gating noticeable, whereas Voice Denoise or Spectral Denoisers don't really do that as much to my ears. So I really like RX/Absentia (Audiosuite) > (DX Track) EQ (filtering) > WNS > (DX Bus) RX Voice Denoise for my noise reduction workflow.

[@paulmaunder3007]

Thanks for your comments, Chris. You raise a number of useful and important points. I agree that the Voice DeNoise processing wasn't 100% ideal in this case. Typically I don't use the adaptive mode but I did a separate detailed video on noise reduction and I didn't want to spend too much time on it in this particular video. You're right about the fact that adaptive mode takes a couple of seconds to act, often not catching the noise in the first part of the audio. My personal preference for the best result would be to send it to RX and process it there. The module I'd use would depend upon the characteristics of the noise. There are times when a mix just needs to be done and sometimes, with deadlines looming, I will resort to either Voice DeNoise or Dialogue Isolate within Pro Tools. I've found the latter to give the better results in most cases. I'm pleased that you took the time to watch the whole video and to provide such a well considered comment. Thank you!

[@stock3045]

Great video and information!

[@paulmaunder3007]

Thanks

[@adrien3684]

Great video, very informative and a good workflow to follow

[@Moltown]

YESSSS!!! THANK YOU welcome back!

[@paulmaunder3007]

Thanks Sean!

[@icrodriguez21]

excellent video! thanks a lot for all the info. It would be awesome to have a video for SFX editing :)

[@paulmaunder3007]

Thanks Ivan. I'll add that to the list of potential videos :)

[@bobgelissen]

GREAT VIDEO! Very Helpful. Thanks!!!

[@adityatrisnawan9668]

Very Helpful. Thanks.

[@paulmaunder3007]

You're welcome!

[@ryanlovesound]

Really helpful

[@paulmaunder3007]

Glad it helped

[@477JEANPAUL]

thanks for sharing your knowledge!

[@Nandini_das15]

Love ❤️ Man Thanks for such great insights

[@rtouss]

This is Gold. Thank you!

[@sjase1]

Good stuff - love your work. Are you able to do a video on automating EQ and compression on clips for those of us that don’t have ultimate? Would be beneficial for those of us working on short docos with lots of different dialogue sources.

[@paulmaunder3007]

That's a useful suggestion. I will add it to the list of video ideas. Thanks!

[@kinanballagh2339]

great video

[@thlgnd]

Attack is not how fast it acts but the amount of time it takes to reach full gain reduction. In other words, there is no waiting period.

[@sebastiaankoning3863]

Thank you!!

[@paulmaunder3007]

Thanks for watching, Sebastiaan!

[@eddyramindra7846]

Big Thank

[@paulmaunder3007]

No problem!

[@KeyzConClase]

Great video, I would use an outboard compressor such as manley or neve.

[@paulmaunder3007]

If you've got such good outboard gear then yes, make use of them! :)

[@ruisoares5952]

Hi Paul. Thanks for all the videos. There's one thing I do differently from you. When I'm having trouble with peaks I put the limiter first then the EQ , just to make sure that there's no clipping ahead. Thank you so much. I'm learning a lot. Best regards.

[@PC-oi3dw]

Fantastic video Paul. Great info to recalibrate my knowledge and start the day. If your end goal is to hit the integrated -23LUFS, do you find yourself aiming to hit the isolated dialogue at a lower level for content with loud elements - whether it be SFX or music? And vice versa for with dialogue-heavy content with the dialogue hitting close to -23LUFS and using that as the anchor point for your entire mix?

[@paulmaunder3007]

Thanks Peter. Yes, that would be about right. It depends on how prominent a role the dialogue plays in the mix. The approach you describe is a good one.

[@pat2651]

The frequencies for the SA-2 are 3, 5, 7, 9, 11k

[@Andymier27]

Thank you Paul for such a great video! I learned a lot. Can I ask a question that might sound stupid? When measuring Loudness usually you would instantiate your Loudness Meter on your master and set it to Program, however I get confused and don't quite grasp it yet when you read specs about setting your meter to Dialog-Gated. Does this mean the loudness meter has an algorithm that understands what is dialogue and what is not? or do I have to insert a meter at my Dialogue Stem? (I'm thinking maybe about iZotope's Insight 2 with the Relay Plug-in added to the Dialogue stem?) Last but not least for example example Netflix Specs states that your loudness measurement is Dialog-Gated But with ITU-1770-1 (Which to the best of mi knowledge was the first revision that did NOT included a gate) so it baffles me how am I supposed to measure Dialogue-gated with a setting that doesn't include Gating?!?! (Please excuse me for any spelling mistakes and sorry for the long question) Thank you so much!

[@paulmaunder3007]

Hi Andres. These are excellent questions! Dialogue gating refers to a loudness spec which can intelligently recognise what's dialogue and what isn't. When Netflix introduced their current specs, they used a hybrid between different measurement systems. Firstly, as you mentioned, they use BS.1770-1 with no relative gate. Additional to that, they incorporated a version of the old Dolby dialogue intelligence, which differentiates between dialogue and non-dialogue. Any meter which supports this Netflix spec (I use Nugen VisLM) can be added to the master and it will measure only the dialogue component of the mix. Netflix use dialogue as the determining factor for program loudness. For most other purposes on other platforms, use a more recent version of BS.1170 with the relative gate.

[@Andymier27]

@@paulmaunder3007 Again Thank you Sooo much!!! thank you for explaining it in such clear terms!! All the best!

[@galette]

Thx Paul ! Awesome vidéo as usual, i’m a bit surprise that you’re not using more of clip gain to even it up. maybe there is a reason ? Keep the good work !

[@paulmaunder3007]

Thanks Gael. I usually would use more clip gain but I wanted to try and keep the video to certain topics and not to go into too much detail about other processes for the sake of the tutorial. But yes, normally I'd clip gain each clip overall and selectively clip gain particularly quiet or loud parts up or down in order to smooth it out a little more prior to it hitting the compressor. Someone else commented on this too so perhaps I will address it in a separate video. Cheers!

[@Cooking_with_grandmaYT]

Greatly appreciate your patient, practical and therefor very useful explanation. Have you per chance used Izotope's Neutron 3 compressor (in multiband mode) and, if so, do you find it can work well, and perhaps even intuitively (?), for doing - more or less - what you did with another multi-band compressor, the matching of your four dialogue tracks that concludes this video? Thanks.

[@paulmaunder3007]

Thanks Thomas. I haven't used the multi band compressor in Neutron 3 specifically but I use some of the other Izotope stuff and it's excellent so I'm sure it's more than possible to get great results with the Neutron multi band compressor on dialogue. How do you find it?

[@Cooking_with_grandmaYT]

@@paulmaunder3007 Thanks for the reply, Paul. I am a photog and doc maker trying to learn to work better with sound in post, slowly but surely, and only just starting into understanding how to work best with Pro Tools. RX has become a familiar and incredibly useful tool, of course, amd Nectar too, but 'real' mixing and mastering (in Pro Tools and not in FCPX!) is still pretty fresh and I've yet to feel I really have a real handle on Neutron's power (or Pro Tools for that matter!). Your videos have been some of the most useful I've seen for practicaly guidance for working with Pro Tools on the sorts of things I do, so very much appreciated.

[@paulmaunder3007]

@@Cooking_with_grandmaYT I'm really pleased that you've found the content in my videos useful. I'll continue to make them as and when I can. Just let me know if there are any specific topics you'd like me to cover. Good luck with your Pro Tools journey!

[@ryanlovesound]

Hi Sir, Can you do a video about reverb surround. Like when we have ADR, we try to match it with another dialogue through using EQ and Outside Reverb. Some engineers I see they send Stereo reverb Left Right + Stereo reverb Surround. And some engineers I see they send to mono reverb, and use plugin to upmix this reverb to 5.1. What is your favorite one to do reverb surround? Thank you a lot

[@paulmaunder3007]

I do reverb in various different ways, depending on the project. For surround reverb my favourite for the last few years has been Phoenixverb from Exponential Audio (now owned by izotope) but recently I've been using Cinematic Rooms from Liquid Sonics.

[@ryanlovesound]

​@@paulmaunder3007 Now i'm using the old TL Space and some regular Reverb plugins. I'll try Cinematic Rooms. Thank you a lot!

[@arturcorcodel]

Hi Paul, greeting from Moldova from a former student of yours at SSR, 2016 - 2017 ))) I have slowly transited from music production to post-prod, so I have a question regarding the loudness. I know that it is a different topic but any way... What I usually do, is that I do the work on the dynamic and eq and everything, taking in consideration the loudness specs, keeping the final mix at about the right LUFS level. After I print the mix, I run WLM Plus in Audio Suit, rendering the audio file(final mix) with the plugin at the needed value... I found this as a very fast and easy way to do the job when you need to deliver in time and with all the specs in place. So are you using WLM with Audio suite?

[@paulmaunder3007]

Hi Artur. It's good to hear that you're now working in post! Personally, I don't use WLM as an Audiosuite plug-in to correct the loudness after mix down. I get the mixes to spec as I mix but I don't see a problem with using WLM in the way you describe, as long as the mix was close to the target level anyway. Sometimes you need to do what works in the time available.

[@alankillian]

Great video Paul, thank you for taking the time to make it. Do you have a standard mix bus setting? For example, I've seen some use a Waves L3 to put a bit more final limiting across the mix. And if so, what settings would you use on the limiter? Having said that, I guess your approach is to treat the dialog per track.

[@paulmaunder3007]

Sorry for the late reply. I don’t use the same settings all the time but I do have some common ones which I use often. I’ll make a video soon about it. The Waves L3 is a plug-in which I use on the master bus quite regularly.

[@alankillian]

@@paulmaunder3007 Thanks Paul, looking forward to any new videos.

[@santiagoboada9843]

Thank you, amazing video! Quick question. After compressing each track individually, do you add more compression (or a limiter) on a Master Dial Bus to "glue" all the dialog? I'm thinking more of a movie where you have different characters.

[@TheBuksnica]

hey Paul, did you try using Oeksound Soothe plugin to remove harshness frequency from dialogue? I've try it and it's super easy and fast to do it :) plugin is absolutely doing magic, it work well on low end as well ;) All the best and keep posting great videos ! Cheers from Serbia and Synthetic Media crew !

[@paulmaunder3007]

Hi Milos. I haven't tried it myself but I've heard it mentioned a few times. I'll take a look at it when I get a chance. Thanks for the suggestion.

[@johnmackniskas891]

Paul would you consider vocal rider a better choice than compression?

[@robinglass7625]

Awesome video! My only question is, if I am planning to release a film to KZbin, Vimeo, and submit to film festivals. Should I be shooting for -14 LUFS or -23LUFS?

[@jordanus21393]

It's not uncommon to have 2 different mixes. We do it all the time in commercial editing.

[@F84R]

Hello, I have a question. Help me. We made a deal with a film company, and we are going to work with the tracks provided to us, how can I combine all the separate sessions into one track to work with them?

[@EVGENI_SCHMIDT]

Thank you for the video! Can sometimes short term over -18 for a few seconds ?

[@DavidKfilmmaker]

Late to see this. What reverb plugin do you use for post?

[@esporax]

What do you think about the use of expanders to increase the level of dialogs without increasing noise?

[@bryanguzman2093]

aunque spotify indique a -14 LUFS la música se sigue masterizando a -9 o -7 LUFS

[@xujedy1740]

Love your content man, keep it up. Just one thing, the dialogue you are playing are much quieter than your voice though

[@paulmaunder3007]

That's because the dialogue is unprocessed at the start of the video. One of the difficulties of making a video about dialogue compression is that a lot of the dialogue will be quiet to begin with. The only way to make it louder would be to turn it up or compress it, which is the very process I'm covering. This video is one which is best listened to through studio monitors.

[@Tomaslaravo]

After starting learning audio production, i know just heard clicks everywhere.😅

[@GRIGA01]

how in the holy hell is your dialogue sitting at -23. My dialogue feels far louder but still sits below -30, when i boost it, it is fatiguing

[@colindayo]

It’s all in the mid range

[@kikecolombo]

Hi Paul! thank you so much for this tutorial, so you dont ever level manually the clip gain? i'll try to use compressor as you do, thanks again