K-System for Dummies

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[@allensmith8884]

This is what the Studio One manual says now in 2022 : “The K-20 meter is for use with wide-dynamic-range material, e.g., large theater mixes, ‘daring home theater’ mixes, audiophile music, classical (symphonic) music, hopefully future ‘audiophile’ pop music mixed in 5.1, and so on. The K-14 meter is for the vast majority of high-fidelity productions for the home, e.g., home theater and pop music (which includes the wide variety of moderately compressed music, from folk music to hard rock). And the K-12 meter is for productions to be dedicated for broadcast.”

[@michaelkelly4055]

K 12. Broadcast Level(TV/Film)

[@VAEOMMusic]

What a dummy i was. Never knew i could resize level meter vertically. 🙄 Always used to peek into miniature level meters on fader You saved me Joe

[@JashandeepReehalMusic]

I love that he doesn't have an actual idea of what the different meters do. Make me more connected to these tutorials.

[@djnekkon]

I'm a sound engineer and there are plenty of software now made for podcaster with different approach and terminology....which I dont have a clue...standard is being killed by proprietary...it sucks big.

[@daniellesaux6152]

I have to agree with you. I lost interest when he hovered over the R128 button and said "I.. don't know.. what that is.."

[@garvolt]

@@daniellesaux6152 Good excuse to go and research it yourself. It's new to us all. He cannot know everything.

[@daniellesaux6152]

@@garvolt Well said Jim and point taken. I'll be more considerate going forward.

[@fredphoesh]

@@daniellesaux6152 actually he said the opposite, that he was endeared by Joe's authenticity. Who gives a toss whether he know what each button does, this video is not for smart-asses after all.

[@petegiant]

An essential part of the K system is calibrating your monitors to a specific db level.

[@keyboardmatrix4328]

Much much better tutorial than last time. This was very informative and learning. Brilliant Joe

[@bodeghost]

Joe, what would we [dummies] do without you! man... you just hit it out of thee ballpark EVERY SINGLE TIME! YES YOU ARE "LIGHTENING-IN-A-BOTTLE," Sir! thank you, thank you, thank you for sharing this beauty of a tutorial!... 😉 🍀 💜 🎶 👻 🐾 🤗 🐶 love & Light To You All out there in KZbin Land & Beyond !

[@mt-jn2vf]

Very helpful, Joe. Thank you.

[@iamgeorgesears]

I will give this a shot. And I really appreciate the honesty here.

[@stu4116]

Brilliant Joe. I've learnt 3 things from this, how to resize and rotate the level meter, and the two K-20 & K-14 uses... Oh!! and a 4th, being a dummy for not knowing these already :) lol

[@radthesnake]

Duuude, this all makes sense now thank you so much

[@ch-vs3fw]

THANKS JOE!!! Super helpful!!

[@guyonamotorcycle1]

The answer is right in front of you... K20= 20db of headroom, K14=14 db and so on... Good vid by the way.

[@exavierme]

As usual, you rock! Thanks

[@KozmykJ]

R128 the modern EBU Broadcast Standard. Y'know LUFS and all that ... It's not easy to keep up with all the Standards ... but it Is possible. 😉

[@thlgnd]

there are no standards in music. film yes, music no.

[@TwstedTV]

​@@thlgnd Actually there was a standard. Way before everyone had studios in their own homes / apartments / basements. Back in the day when people had to actually go to professional recording studios and pay $100 to $250 an Hr to produce music, the record label would send your DAT "Digital Audio Tape" to a mastering plant to get mastered, and it was the Mastering Engineer who set the standard for the level before your song got printed onto records, cd's and cassettes. google a real mastering engineer by the name of Don Grossinger. One of the legends from back in the day. He set the standards of music back in the day...... These days, that all went to shit, with every joe, dick and harry claiming to be mastering engineers. (too funny). Now a days, every child in the world has a "so called" recording studio, or studio... to produce music and they release their own music on places like DistroKID. And there is no way for anyone to tame their levels, hence why the HUGE loudness wars happened. Because kids still believe that louder is better. NO ONE and I MEAN NO ONE is respecting the LUFS Standards set in todays world of 2021. The rules are there, the DAW companies even placed LUFS meters in their DAWs, and people STILL DON'T respect the rules put in place... Because no one gives a crap anymore. People these days only care about how loud their mix are compared to other people. Hence again "The Loudness Wars" 🤷‍♂️🤦‍♂️ And as far as you saying that "there are no standards in music. film yes, music no." is complete false...!! Why do you think Apple set rules for submitting songs to Apple music at -14 LUFS ?? and Why Spotify set their submission rules to -16 LUFS and youtube music is ruled at -14 LUFS. There are rules & standards, its that no one is respecting the rules put into place, because no one gives a crap, everyone wants to do they own rules. God, I miss the 80's......... 🤦‍♂️ So since there are no longer gate keepers for mastering levels, because these days any 5-year old child can claim to be mastering engineers (which is hilarious), has no one to tame their music levels. In the 80's there were never ANY problems recording music levels, or LUFS or loudness wars. however you want to put it. Because people back then knew what the hell they were doing. and there was mastering engineers that were treated by record labels as gate keepers of music volume. Before ANYONE could release ANY music into the public, it has to go through the record label & mastering engineers first. That is no longer the case because now every joe, dick and harry can claim to be mastering engineers and release music at a extreme high volume, with no care in the world because they can, because there is no longer REAL MASTERING ENGINEERS..... those days are now long gone. I have 45 years in the music industry and have seen go from great to complete shit.... And yes I worked as an audio engineer in very famous studios back in the day. Way before people started to get their so called "Home Studios"...... I lived throughout those eras and seen the industry change. Now these days, everyone is trying to find ways to go above and beyond unison, so they can be louder than everyone else as we continue on the loudness wars. Again, We NEVER EVER had these problems in the 80's, and its one of the main reasons why people these days love 80's music. It contains proper level and dynamics.... they days its all about noise & volume.

[@denn_al]

Super helpful. Thanks Joe👍

[@MrSkyTown]

I’m just starting to use this. It really does help.

[@musiccreation1198]

Thanks Joe!

[@balarila99]

Very clear and concise, and will try this. Now, would you recommend using the K20 on the master tack or would this also work on sections? E.g. monitor the K20 levels each for the strings, brass, woodwinds, and percussion sections in an orchestral arrangement.

[@truework8676]

Love the simplicity and the nonchalant humor 😂 had me 💀

[@cheribarkman1784]

Thanks Joe.

[@JohnDeCarteretElvis]

Hi Joe, Nice expalnation. If you want a full understanding of the K-System, Bob covers it in his book , The Mastering Engineer. It's on it's 3rd or 4th Edition, I still have the 1st and it was very in depth throughout. I learnt much from it. Never met him but have communicated with him at various times.Oneof the greats in Mastering alongside that of Glenn Meadows, both great guys! *I've just been experimenting with the 'Level Meter,' and if you select the dropdown menu there are presets, which when selected explains their usage. K-12 is for 'Radio Broadcasting!''

[@Yahoomediaclub]

Good video Joe...I’m using Klanghelm VU and keep mixes -20-24. Then build from that, when I was using -12 I had never any space for kick Bass +Vox...I do like the new meter tho..thanks

[@Zickcermacity]

5:54 - This advice also applies to home listening: Get your volume from your speakers, not by slamming the song in mixing and in post

[@MattVelic]

Definitely super helpful rules of thumb.

[@SoundslikeTunesTV]

AWESOME!!!! THANK YOU!!!!

[@suhaasbandari1513]

Thanks!!!!

[@nedim_guitar]

This is great, very helpful!

[@linfr8066]

Thanks for the tutorial 🎶🎶🎹🎤👍🏼

[@Whanworld]

Ever since I saw you using the k20 metering on the Foo Fighters mix tutorial, I always use it and my mixes make more sense!!! If that makes sense 😂

[@the16thLeVel]

Thanks man!

[@alligator6985]

Awesome!!!; Thank you!!!!

[@sillyfello]

most overseen topic.. thanks man..

[@philmccracken6134]

How many times have I seen people use the Master fader as a monitor knob. xD Thanks for the video!

[@vloggingpractice8077]

Great video!

[@enuf247]

Thanks, Joe, I wish I could like this video 20,000 times. I have struggled with this concept for years and you explained limiting and monitoring for this dummy. Thank you!

[@gameslappers]

I'm definitely one of the people at the back of the class doodling so thanks for the simple explanation XD

[@geebee44]

thanks

[@chris-rb7bm]

Great video. Thanks.

[@chris-rb7bm]

that last sentence, yep that was me lol! :)

[@markminassian1991]

Joe, It appears that when engaging the K-system it affects the metering on the main bus only and does not affect the meters on the individual tracks. Am I correct that it has no effect while setting recording levels on the meters of the individual tracks?

[@daveeverton8089]

Hi joe would you use k metering for recording guitars ans synths

[@binsh3el]

Nice, how can use plug in on part of track ..?! example (Delay in last word) !!

[@eylam9690]

When it comes to audio engineering I need it explained as dummy as it gets. All I know is that, one day, I was playing music, the next day I found myself having to deal with LUFS and K12 and threshold, attack and release time and knee and low shelves and high cabinets and FORF and GILT and Gerfazenhaurenbergen dot. etc..

[@todezwis]

So, do you use K-20 to gain stage each separate track in the song? Or is it only to check the overall level of the entire mix?

[@DEADRECKONINGOFFICIAL]

Killer video! Question.... I know you don't mix metal.... But I've still learned alot from you. For this lesson you mentioned quite parts around yellow etc and louder for red. But in a normal metal song you really don't have that fluxation of quite to loud. It's all loud. So how do you go about dealing with songs like that?

[@anshuljain8515]

You would want to stay in the green zone at all times with such a song

[@DEADRECKONINGOFFICIAL]

@@anshuljain8515 so treat anything that would peak into the yellow instead of the red I'm guessing

[@davidgelder]

If it’s equally loud throughout, it’s okay to be constantly tickling the red just like the section that Joe demo’d: lots of headroom left at that point so you’ve got plenty of room for mastering later.

[@anshuljain8515]

@@DEADRECKONINGOFFICIAL Apologies on my end for not being clear. I am talking about being in the green zone with the K14 meter, not the K20. With the K20 meter, being in the green zone will feel like working on a really quiet mix for a song. But having a K20 meter hovering around red and not knowing the actual loudness won't help a lot either. I know this is a "K metering for dummies" video so I wouldn't wanna go into depth regarding the topic. But just to make you understand better, the K meter is for loudness which is different than peaks. Loudness is about how loud or soft we would perceive a song, overall. When you talk about a typical metal track (I apologise for stereotyping the genre to make a point) you are probably talking of a song pretty much full of Drum hits and guitars riffing with a vocalist singing( or screaming). Such a song has a lot of stuff playing almost all the time. A K meter would indicate the overall loudness of the song being pretty close to the louder parts, as there aren't many soft parts in the song in the first place.

[@DEADRECKONINGOFFICIAL]

OK awesome. I have a better understanding now. Thank you both!!!

[@alexkuple]

Thanks for this video, now I know the K system

[@omarrandall6477]

I noticed that you have the pro eq on all the channels..Is that all I need to mix?

[@allinonethegreat]

Do you start your tracks at 0db or -6db ?

[@T-i-n-o]

K20: wide dynamic music / classical / “audiophile” K14: high fidelity music for home listening, rock, folk, pop etc K12: broadcast productions

[@anthonycunningham4598]

Thanks, from dummy #2! This helps.

[@mkm0901003]

love you

[@happydrumstick5371]

I know this video doesnt have anything to do with this but I'd just like to know how I can fix this. A friend of mine (beginner) has just got studio one prime, windows. She can arm tracks, and her I/O settings are set up, but her microphone is disabled. We tried manage aufio devices, sound settings, troubleshooting, but we cant seem to enable it. I remember I had that problem too when I was starting on a windows computer, but I've forgotten how to fix it. Apparently the microphone is only disabled in studio one, it is enabled in the settings themselves, and it does pick up sound, it just wont go into studio one. Its disabled in the I/O page. Does anyone know how to fix this?

[@user-mr1zm2kg1x]

Is there a way to just click and pull the master fader longer separate from all other faders so my k14 meter is longer in the master buss . I don’t like the meter plug in taking up my screen .

[@tomslowcat]

I think the "kid at the back" you're talking to at the end of the video has already run off at the very start. You can hear him shouting away in the background. You have to keep your pupils in check mr. Gilder!

[@Camo_Corey]

So would you put k14 level on your master fader or still k20?

[@Zickcermacity]

1:48 EBU-R128 - it's a broadcast loudness standard. -21-23LUFS, with plenty of headroom to leave the peaks intact

[@pascalmerschaudio]

Joe the R128 is the EBU norm for European Brodcasting i believe

[@earledaniels4539]

Why do I always have to explain things twice to that kid in the back, hehe 😋

[@knitetyme1]

I have never known what those meant. I kinda had an idea but not certain. This video is EXACTLY what I thought those meant. If you wrong Joe, we both wrong. 💯

[@chriselden1352]

i dream to have these videos in french...

[@psychobillybert]

“People mix too loud so their mix is always clipping and their solution is to put a limiter...” Feeling a little called out. Thanks for the explanation, Joe! Made it easy to understand. Looking forward to using this info.

[@christopherharv]

Does this relate to LUFS at all? I can't help but think it does, because if you're finishing a master with 14dB headroom, that's right around -13 below 0, which is usually cited as the LUFS target level of -13dB LUFS The K-System meter seems to move like it's somewhere between a dBFS meter and a VU meter. Best of both worlds? That alone has me interested.

[@DeltaWhiskeyBravo13579]

I think it's close to LUFS. The R128 setting in the Studio One meter will have LUFS on it.

[@beatweezl]

Joe, your method may be right but according to the Studio One User's Manual, the K20 system is more specifically designed for higher dynamic mixing like orchestral or movie soundtracks. K14 for modern rock and pop/electronic music, and K12 for broadcast/voiceover audio book type stuff. I think that's why your mix is showing quite a bit of red. I personally would stay with K14 with probably less red and master with K14 as well.

[@presonus]

🤷‍♂️ - Joe Gilder

[@ridinglow6732]

That’s what I thought also.. it says the same thing in the fabfilter documentation

[@bubinga_basher]

In order for my toms NOT to clip, I have to set the volume @-53. Everything else seems fine. Kind of opposite of the K sys. Is that polarity??

[@presonus]

Probably just recorded them too hot. 😊 - Joe Gilder

[@bubinga_basher]

@@presonus It's actually when I'm checking levels. Before I ever record anything. Only my toms too. Strange

[@fredphoesh]

I don't get it. Joe, you say you get more headroom on a k20, but that depends on where you are "aiming at". Where does one aim? The K meter does not show peaks, so you don't know what to aim for because you don't know how much your peaks will be above the average that it shows. So why not just use RMS which DOES show peaks and aim for say -2 or -3 for your peaks. That's all you need worry about, the rest will obviously not clip. With K20 clipping happens at about +8 it seems... so I don't get the point of another 12 db above that if it's useless anyway!

[@GetSongsDone]

LUFS > Ks?

[@subdukteddb3139]

I agree with k-20 🎉 In my opinion all music should have as much dynamic range as possible! It’s what makes it real, it’s 2024 an still nightclubs are using a mono system 😂 With the sound system technology available now , mono is an insult 😅

[@srhodes6963]

Why can’t we have a meter that automatically sets an ideal starting point that we can then adjust with the faders for balance? In other words, you have max volume on each track without clipping by default and you work from there. Same thing on the master. That may not be ideal for every professional scenario, but just put a toggle on the function. This way the average home producer making demos can get on with their lives and forget about all of these complications

[@kromanoidx]

K-14 Gang

[@vxllzbeatz]

Is this only for studio 1

[@presonus]

Other DAWs and metering plugins have K-System. - Joe Gilder

[@deaddetailentertainment8942]

K12 = pop and radio K14 = rock and country K20 = classical and hi-fi music

[@llgms]

Dummy explanations for complex things.. YES!!

[@george8920]

what about K12 - ????

[@bartdeclercq8179]

is used as reference for tv broadcasting

[@djnekkon]

5 people dislike this video because they are trap producers and they cant distinguish between mixing and mastering....heck they prob use a Neumann mic straight to a macbook to record vocals....

[@fredphoesh]

I didn't press "dislike" but I did not find it helpful to explain the most basic thing. If choosing a metering system is simply a different way to measure the same sound, why would using a K20 give you more headroom than using any other meter. It does not... so what is the difference between peaking at +8 on a k20 meter and peaking at, say, -2 or -5 if you like on a RMS meter? I don't get the advantage of using the K system.

[@djnekkon]

@@fredphoesh true, but when you here the word IT and software developer...you know its going to be a marketing video. Trust me. I know people in the business that can't mix or master even when the meters are screaming for their attention.

[@royalmusicparis]

why not add VU METER 14K Like a real analogue console?

[@tatertotter25]

for i once was a dummy, and now i am not anymore a little bit less than i was used to be in the past a dummy

[@brendanmarr5169]

guessing you don't do freelance mixing right? these vids and your own music keep you busy enough!!

[@matttorrence2900]

I definitely am a dummy

[@hrorm]

Thanks from us dummy kids in the back !

[@eylab1541]

Dummy and proud.

[@davidnika446]

My only regret is that I have but one thumb to give.

[@groupeSHININGMINIATURE]

Nice vidéo. I am always louder.

[@agthaog1986]

K metering is dead. It's all about the Loudness metering now

[@FrozenPlasmaOfficial_YT]

not while mixing. while mastering. 2 different stages within the production

[@agthaog1986]

@@FrozenPlasmaOfficial_YT if u ask me it still is pointless. Simple gain staging in my opinion is more then enough.

[@agthaog1986]

@E V P El English please

[@agthaog1986]

@E V P too much 2 b asking man

[@beatweezl]

@Esteban Vargas You're the one who should be using Google translate since you're in an English speaking environment! :^D

[@citizenworld8094]

Here in z Berlin EDM platz, z K 12 audio is vot v use for z Killer Audio. Ja. - Gregor who doubles as bouncer and DJ invented z Killer Audio 12 to show American dummies how v make z best beats. Use z K 12 Killer audio plugin vit caution

[@danielraju4458]

The dude talks about all the obsolete K-series and then states he ain't aware of EBU R128, the broadcasting standard that's become ubiquitous with the implementation of LUFS loudness standardization.

[@mohokios]

i just hate S1 mixer for real...

[@reginaldmaclin4445]

Terrible terrible job with Studio One 5. Need to do a better job with beta testing, and fixing bugs. You should prioritize that just like you do adding 60 plus features. Upper management I’m guessing had rushed Presonus Software to put this out. I’m already seeing user sell their Studio One 5 license.

[@chancenobra]

Pretty harsh take man, I think they did a pretty good job and at least they aren’t selling a perpetual license that expires like Avid does

[@DavidNutter1963]

🙄