How To Quickly Balance Audio Levels In Final Cut Pro - Audio Limiter Effect Tutorial

[@TesLatino]

You know... this is why I don't think I will ever stop going back to basics. After a long time I found myself just feeling good about the audio levels of my content again and this video (which I am sure I saw a couple of years ago also) brought me back to the basics. We adopt bad practices without noticing sometimes. Some people think only big channels can help, but this clearly shows we are all in this together. Thank you Sam. I don't know why you don't have more content. This was and still is great.

[@kurisutofusan]

I watched many videos about this and you had the best explanation of a limiter so far! Most videos focus on the compressor and then they just mention "just add a limiter on top of that" without much explanation.

[@ensingleton]

3 years later, this video is STILL providing value! Thanks Sam!

[@jtherock]

just watched today myself...1st time. Thanks Sam!

[@bwilesuk]

First time someone has ever explained what those ratios are in compressors! Thank you!

[@jenluv]

Two years later, this was so helpful! I'm having mic issues that are super annoying. Thank you!

[@YakNZakFishing]

Brotha this was an absolute joy to watch! Your delivery, cadence, and pace was perfect. I learned something and you’ve gained a new subscriber! Win Win!!! You certainly deserve more subs!!!

[@samueljwalter]

Thanks so much! Hoping to serve up some more content soon!

[@DeliRevv]

You, sir, are a life saver! Last night, I was conducting a video deposition over Zoom and unfortunately the doctor’s audio was lower than the attorneys. Since this is going to trial in 5 days, I was having a small panic attack until I tried your method which has worked a charm. Thank you so much!

[@MsTessG]

You have no idea how much I appreciated this video. It helped me quickly add some great audio to a video presentation. Thank you!

[@Soratui]

New Final Cut Pro user like me try to find many tutorial to make my audio louder but none of them help. This one save me😭 Thank you so much !

[@AllenTyson]

Probably the coolest video intro on KZbin I have ever seen.

[@mitchellkilpatrick1647]

Great video! This is a great quick and dirty way of getting a good level. I would say the best approach would be to have a compressor set at 3:1 or 4:1 with a very fast attack and fast release right before the limiter. This is called "sharing the load" which typically gives a more natural result when it comes to gain reduction, as a limiter can easily distort when pushed too hard. That said, you will inevitably use more processing power. For this instance I think you are taking the most efficient approach. Thanks for the tutorial bro!

[@samueljwalter]

Yeah great advice! I actually use a compressor for all my dialogue, but you are right that this is more of a quick method to get passable results. I debated even making this since I feel like taking shortcuts is not really a great way to go about things. Better to do it the right way. But this comment was very encouraging that this method might still have some purpose. Thanks!

[@aidanjanes2293]

watched this in 2021 lost the video and finally found it again still one of the moat helpful videos ive ever found!

[@thefilmalliance]

Love the production value of this video. Amazing work- even with all that background noise, you demonstrated the limiter perfectly. Subscribed

[@samueljwalter]

Much appreciated!

[@ngonzale3]

Great tutorial. Channel EQ paired with this limiter is a big improvement in my audio. I still need to learn more about compression to see what I'm missing vs your techniques. Thank you very much for this video!

[@pinacolada2386]

this is the best video on the topic! the technique can not only be applied to video processing, but also music production

[@shouldigetit]

This was really solid. Surprised you aren't at 10k + subs

[@samueljwalter]

Thanks! Maybe one day!

[@patriciapaints]

This was so much help, I had a whole online course that I had recorded throughout different days and some parts of the voice overs where much louder than others. This fixed my problem completely Thank you very much! ☺️ subscribed.

[@samueljwalter]

Thanks for the kind words! Glad I could help!

[@IAmDavidWhipple]

Wow this is great. I've avoided the limiter because I didn't understand how to use it. Now I do and like the results.

[@ibefoolin18]

I’m On my way To give you a hug.. where are you right now! This just saved me hours of time…. Thank you!!

[@romeo5970]

And he's back 🔥 🤜

[@samueljwalter]

Romeo Goodvibes glad to be back. Already working on another one!

[@romeo5970]

@@samueljwalter great!! am looking forward for it

[@software-sage]

Excellent video, very clear instructions with high quality content. This has saved me hours from adjusting each clips gain knob manually.

[@nickconnors8515]

Thank you for the amazing tutorial! Definitely helped a lot with the audio processing I needed! This is the first video of yours I've seen and all I have to say is keep up the great work!

[@samueljwalter]

Thanks so much! Really glad it helped. Im still trying to figure out this whole consistency thing, but I've got another one in the works right now!

[@EstudioInnovacionKansasCity]

wow, you've changed my audio life for the better. So quickly fixed my highs and lows that I used to keyframe before, now it's so easy. Thank you a million.

[@JasonParkerMagic]

Same for me... I was key-framing to fix them manually before!

[@JasonParkerMagic]

Yeah... it seems like a Limiter is better because if someone is listening with headphones... I just don't want it to go above -6db right? Just don't want to hurt their ears.... whereas compressor could allow the volume to go too high. 🤔 Makes me curious exactly in what situations a compressor really keeps a better sound. Maybe on KZbin limiter is good enough?

[@RazShifrin]

SUBBED! great video and it's only a matter of short time till this channel blow up.

[@samueljwalter]

Hey thanks! I should probably get to making videos again so that can happen!

[@Sparkinheart]

BRO! You got some real skill creating videos. Much respect from a fellow creator.

[@shaunmasonmusic]

Any idea what to do if the audio still peaks, redlines and pops even after applying the limiter? Makes no sense!

[@samueljwalter]

If the audio was already clipped or distorted during the recording process, the limited cannot fix it. They may also be something causing the volume to increase that is being applied after the limiter. Any audio gain applied after the limiter effect will negate the effect entirely. For example, if you increase the gain by using the gain slider on the clip in the timeline, that will apply gain AFTER the limiter effect. Hopefully that makes sense. Let me know if you figure it out!

[@shaunmasonmusic]

@@samueljwalter Fastest reply ever haha.. thanks man!! Yeah I did some tweaking and did notice the clip gain was up so I turned it back down to 0 or below 0 and then used the limiter. I’d say it worked. Weird though how the audio visualizer on the bottom right still tends to show clipping on mastered music, which obviously was already brick-walled prior to throwing it into FCPX. The things that make you go hmmm 🤔

[@jamsxssion]

Found this video when trying to research stuff for my own videos! Extremely helpful! TYSM

[@JohnDennery]

I am shocked at your sub count. Super good video, love the content and quality. Thank you for sharing!

[@colzey]

Such a great video, thank you!! Easy to understand, concise and informative!

[@ifedde]

Bro you should have like a gazillion subs, your videos are incredible! Thank you for this!!

[@samueljwalter]

hey thanks so much, more on the way hopefully!

[@johndoeble]

yo i keep coming back to this video cause it's to the point, informational, and i need not spend money on some expensive plug in. Thumbs up from me! 👍😌

[@XIIIBeatoSensei]

Great video, super helpful, great explanation, and this is the first time I see an outdoors FC tutorial XD. I liked that a lot!

[@TravelAddictsLife]

Thank you Sam, great tutorial

[@hairdustry]

after & years my podcast listeners will love you

[@worldwidewallace]

This is a great tutorial. Still seeing FCPX videos where the audio in the actual video is not that great... this is 3 years old but still much better than all the other recommendations and plugins

[@richlo5963]

i hope you do this for a living because youre awesome!

[@CityPlannerPlays]

This was an excellent video! You should keep at this - you're really good!!

[@samueljwalter]

Thank you! Will do another soon I promise!

[@clemensalud]

This sounds so great, was testing everything but this is wonderful, you are awesome! Thanks so much!

[@SamEdits02]

Great vid ! How do you apply the limiter on more than one clip ?

[@BangkokExplorer]

This advice saved me big time this afternoon! Many, many thanks!

[@JoshuaMayo]

Yooo I live in Winston too! Awesome video brother

[@samueljwalter]

Oh sick! Always enjoy knowing about creatives in the 336! I’ll have to sub 👀

[@gabegabrielson4239]

If you have several audio clips under the dialogue, how can you apply the limiter to all clips automatically? Do you have to somehow join or combine the multiple audio (acoustic) segments together?

[@jkoizoratravels]

did you figure this out?

[@queencat01]

I have the same question as you!

[@paulleyva5076]

This was very useful, thank you!

[@efetack]

Thank you. That was quick and a real good help. I like the quality of your video content. First time here. Subbed. I am at the beginning of my channel now after a long pause. Preparing my first clips now in Final Cut. Starting up a channel we don't want to get Audio Professionals I guess so, well, me not, haha. Thus this was an excellent QUICK help. Keep it up. Thx again.

[@samueljwalter]

Thanks so much! Glad you found it useful!

[@brandcrumbs]

where have you been all my life - this is amazing

[@Photobyashutosh]

well explained, i was searching for more

[@elhippiegypsie]

loved it man! thanks for sharing your experience!

[@LikkleBurbo]

Thanks my g

[@BrandonMenancio]

Great vid! Thanks!

[@CORITOENTERTAINMENT]

Your parents should be proud. Nice job!

[@samueljwalter]

My dad always said he wanted a son who knew how to use Final Cut's limiter filter.

[@faheyjamestravel.]

Awesome! I learned soemthing very useful today! Thanks!

[@southforkdancemoves]

I'm in WS too! Great video.

[@PSVisualss]

Really helpful! don't stop making videos.

[@samueljwalter]

Thanks, more to come!

[@MarisolsAdventures]

would you apply the same limiter settings if you are combining sounds on one clip an music on other?

[@samueljwalter]

You certainly could, although it would give you a slightly different result. You could try getting your audio levels close to where you want them, compound clip all the layers together, then apply a limiter overtop the compounded clip. If you try this, I'd be interested to see how it turns out! I personally just use the limiter for my dialogue and then set the volume of the music/SFX's accordingly.

[@MarisolsAdventures]

@@samueljwalter thank u for ur feedback. Appreciated it

[@CarolineElizabethMartin]

appreciate this video☺️

[@ImaginetMedia]

Excellent info. Very clear, concise and exactly what I was looking for Subscribed.

[@MichaelForceYT]

U have insane potential on KZbin

[@samueljwalter]

Thanks so much, I appreciate that!

[@IrishTenorBanjo]

Brilliant this is a fantastic video

[@samueljwalter]

Thanks, appreciate it! More on the way!

[@georgianageorgie8719]

Love your videos!!

[@henriklarsson8809]

Awesome! Thank you. Very well explained and helpful. Makes a huge difference in my audio. 🙏

[@micheltheodorou1110]

Thanks bro I use your technique since you uploaded, 2 years now

[@bencorwin]

Awesome stuff! Thanks!

[@nichols9156]

Great video!

[@samueljwalter]

Thanks, I appreciate it!

[@speakenglishwithjohn8244]

Thanks a million

[@queencat01]

Hey Sam, I'm learning FCP and I keep a tab open on your channel like Google. Thanks for all the helpful content so far :). I do have one question for you: what's the best way for me to apply the audio limiter to my entire project? Should I compound my entire track and apply the audio limiter to it? Or do I apply it to each individual clip? What about the sound effects and music? Many thanks!!

[@samueljwalter]

Hey there, thanks so much for the kind words. I actually have moved on to Davinci Resolve, but I think I can remember enough about FCP to hopefully answer this! There are a few ways you can go about this. You could duplicate your project (to keep the original safe), compound clip your dialogue, music, and SFX into individual groups and apply the effects you want to each. You can also copy and paste effects across multiple clips if you want to avoid compound clips. In Davinci, you can place specific audio on individual tracks and apply effects to the the tracks, not sure if Final Cut has anything like that or not, but hopefully that helps!

[@kubelkowaty]

Thanks for this tutorial! Can You tell me how You record sound from Mac? Are You using application for routing audio?

[@samueljwalter]

Hey thank you for watching! It’s been a while since I made this, but I believe I just exported the sound from each stage of the tutorial and synced it up whenever I played it. Could be wrong, but I believe OBS is now capable of capturing Mac desktop audio. Not sure though tbh

[@TAMAGNATV]

You saved my life ! THANK YOU SO MUCH... So easy and clear

[@samueljwalter]

Glad it helped!

[@RemboUSMC]

Excellent explanation and excellent post production. I believe the 1.04k subscribers will have a lot more zeros in the future if all of your content is as high quality as this.

[@MikeyJunior]

Thank you! This helped a ton!

[@samueljwalter]

Mikey Junior's KZbin Adventures glad I could help!

[@lotuslightheart]

This is helpful! Thank you!!

[@PhotowalksTV]

Subscribed! Love the video.

[@samueljwalter]

Hey thanks so much!

[@ksyutang]

Well explained. You earned yourself a subscriber. Thanks for this

[@samueljwalter]

Hey thanks! I’m actually on the middle of transitioning to a new full time job that will give me more personal time to make videos. More on the way!

[@ksyutang]

Looking forward to it. I can see you being one of my go to channels for FCP tutorials and your production is so good. Good luck with your new job

[@keokiyuen5458]

Gold! Thank you my dude.

[@BananaEigoTV]

great video. keep coming back.

[@Brunonw1]

Thank you for this lecture, Sam. One question please: You don't want the audio louder than - 3 dB, but you set the Output Level to - 6dB (at minute 2:48). Is this an error or is this OK?

[@TheJoeCozzoShow]

would like to know the answer too!

[@Passodopo]

If you read the caption at 2'48" you understand what happened: He just changed his mind and decided He liked it more at -6db

[@shanethepotter]

So I use FCP to combine Worship videos I have purchased to make worship sets for our church services. Some of them are mixed much louder than others. As a result when our soft songs are loud enough the loud songs are VERY loud and the the LORd sound are good the soft songs are TO SOFT. Can this limiter work for that, is there a better tool? I am wanting to make it so the distance between the loud end and the soft end is less drastic. thoughts?

[@pixienix]

was super concerned for your laptop balancing on your lap near water the whole time 😂 ty for the explanation!

[@samueljwalter]

well, you are smarter than me because I actually fried it after this shoot! haha

[@bobrosberg55]

Great help, great tutorial, thanks much!

[@fletcherbrown728]

I was doing great until the time at 2:50 when you said you would set the limit to -3 db but the picture shows that you set it to -6 db. Later you said you adjust the gain until it’s just hitting the threshold that you set before. I’m not sure if the threshold you meant was -3 or -6. Can you clarify. Anyway, a great presentation other than that confusing part for me.

[@samueljwalter]

I did the screen recordings after the actual filming. You can see a note I left on the screen that I decided -6db worked better for the audio I recorded. You should not be using this particular setting exactly like I set it, you should be setting it based on your particular audio. -6 was keeping my levels more appropriately where I wanted them.

[@tpadn]

THANK YOU SO MUCH!

[@dj-7154]

hi what lavalier microphone did you use for this video? many thanks

[@samueljwalter]

I used the rode smartlav+ with a TRRS to TRS adapter to make it work with the rode wireless go

[@IagoAlmeidaI]

awesome tutorial

[@mgunner69]

Good stuff mate. Appreciate it.

[@e.zbabytv8574]

Does this tool also boost up quiet parts of the audio to what you set the gain to?

[@gomogulist]

Wow, this helped me a lot. I was able to enhance audio quality.

[@JonSparkman]

how do you only have 1k subs? great vid bro.

[@jawn6955]

hey man thanks for the excellent clear tutorial :) !

[@lsutton6022]

I have an award-winning documentary, but my sound is not good! I really NEED this. I am using FCP10.7.1 and can't find this limiting option anywhere. I located the effects box, but can't get it to activate; it's always shaded, no matter what I try. What must I select to make it active, please???? in fact, the speaer icon at top of inspector is not always there, even where there is clearly sound on the timeline!!! eh? help!

[@OrdinaryFilmmaker]

Good tutorial. Give me the right info I needed to tweet my audio. Thanks Sam. PS Would you every want to appear on my livestream?

[@samueljwalter]

Thanks so much, glad it was helpful for you. And gosh, I'm not sure what I could contribute, but I'm down to help out! Always happy to meet a new friend in this space. Blessings!

[@oye-ermac]

Nice edit and video! Which is the level of dB your audio shouldn't surpass? I'm feeling like everything is quiet when I'm on FCP but when I export it, it gets a little bit louder.

[@samueljwalter]

Interesting. I'm not sure what could be happening with the audio getting louder after export, but I'll look into it. I generally just want my audio bouncing comfortably between -6 and -12. I personally don't want it louder than -3db. There are actual standards for web video known as LUFS that will tell you what the industry standard for loudness is. I don't know too much about that at this time, but I would encourage you to look it up if you are interested. Curtis Judd has some great videos about that if you are interested!

[@oye-ermac]

@@samueljwalter I'll take a look, thank you!

[@lemontreeworldwide]

Great video thank you

[@solo_official-ready]

You have great content quality. I wish you’d continue making videos.

[@samueljwalter]

Thank you! Working on it!

[@guzjungjiraa]

very good and useful. thank u so much!!!

[@samueljwalter]

You are so welcome, glad it helped!

[@FatihVideographer]

Hi! As far as I know the recommended db for music is around -18 but I this limiter won't allow me to lower the volume below -10db. Any suggestions? Thanks a lot

[@theyumee]

thank you so much for making this video😭 you're the best!!!

[@samueljwalter]

You are so welcome!

[@EJIqpEP]

Thanks for the video. What are you doing if even +20db gain is not enough?

[@samueljwalter]

No problem, thank you! If you need a little extra gain, apply the gain effect and raise the slider up a few notches. Make sure the gain effect is applied first, you want to gain and then limit, not limit and then gain. Let me know if that doesn’t make sense and I’ll try to be more clear!

[@EJIqpEP]

@@samueljwalter Thanks a lot for your fast answer. Everything is crystal clear!

[@sage-smr]

Thank you!

[@TheFujiwuji]

I'm totally confused. My FCP project audio runs hotter than suggested here (high green, but not yellow or red), yet when I do an output and make an .mp4 the audio seems too quiet. And what is strange is when I upload the .mp4 to KZbin, my video plays quieter than other videos, so I'm worried that my audience will have to raise the volume to a high level just to hear the audio. This whole output audio process is maddening because I never know what is a good level for my videos, and how to output them correctly so the audio is normal.

[@PontiusTheBarbarian]

Great video however I am having a strange issue with my mic audio and the limiter....it doesn't seem to want to work for my mic audio. My gameplay will stop at 0db as advertised, but my mic audio will go over the threshold. I had to raise my mic gain pretty high but even with gain at 0 it still goes over the limit. Help.

[@samueljwalter]

How did you go about raising the mic level? For example, if you used the audio control bar on the clip, that is the last adjustment applied in the chain, which would explain why it’s going over the limit. You would effectively be limiting it to 0db, then applying gain after that, sending it over. Let me know if this is what is going on, otherwise we can troubleshoot some other things.