I have been saying for a sometimes I would post up a fingerstyle song so here it is. It is the first one I learned, a cover of John Denvers ‘Leaving on a Jet Plane’ using a simple inside outside pattern as Justins lesson.
It is a while since I played it, so did a quick refresher earlier this week, the chords I remembered but some of the lyrics were a bit vague. Anyway, got all the gear out, last night and got going. I adjusted the balance, by recording small parts, see more later and then just launched into it and recorded it in one take and then packed up the gear. With my limited experience of playing solo and with the guitar club in front of an audience, I like to do one take warts and all. There were some errors on chords and few bits of the lyric that were not quite right but playing ‘live’ you just have to keep going and hope the audience don’t notice or mind.
In terms of gear used a condenser mic for guitar and dynamic for vocals, going into 2i2 and recorded in OBS on my laptop. It was recorded as a combined single input from the two channels, so I adjusted the balance with the gain knobs on the 2i2. When I listened to the MP4 file on my PC it sounded fine but in the process of getting it onto YouTube the volume of the guitar seems to have reduced and not sure why.
All comments good or bad welcome.
Michael
Hi Michael, I thought it to be a nice performance overall, even if I agree the volume of guitar is a bit low. I didn’t mind/noticed the errors. Maybe I would add a bit of dynamics in volume when you get to the chorus or I would experiment with some strumming for the chorus to make it stand out and bigger than the verses.
Keep going is really a valuable skill to develop, I myself still need to work a lot on that, just let the music move on. Well done for this, I can see how much playing live at the guitar club is helping you in your development.
Thanks for sharing and bringing my attention to this beautiful song.
Nice job Michael and I tend to agree with Silvia @Silvia80 on experimenting with some dynamics which would bring the song out and make it pop when it needs to. Thanks for sharing!
Silvia @Silvia80
Thanks for the comments. Always lessons to learn from a recording and perhaps I should do more. Yes lots of ways to improve things and that is perhaps I need to give that more attention such as dynamics etc. Keeping going is a key part of playing Infront of an audience which I like to do things in one take, but it might also be worthwhile for my own benefit in multiple recordings and trying different things.
Really not sure why the guitar was so quiet when the original MP4 file was fine, need to look at different ways of getting onto YouTube.
Eddie @Eddie_09
Thanks, yes need to look more at dynamics.
A bit pitchy on the vox. One thing you might try is pushing the words forward in your mouth as you form and sing them. I think if I heard it right you trend a little low and the above tends to bring up the pitch a little. Worth experimenting with…
Well done for sharing Michael. The commitment you made and the setup you used to record deserved a better result in terms of guitar sound level, shame about that. Nonetheless what I could hear was fine. Keep on keeping on!
Thanks John @Willsie
Not sure what happened with the low guitar sound. It was ok in direct monitoring through the AI and also on the recording on the pc, but not when uploaded. I am in the process of working on playing with different balance in the recording and different routes to get it onto YouTube, to make sure I can avoid this in future.
Michael
Well done, Michael. Looking at the Stats for nerds it seems that you’re -14dB which suggests that the audio when uploaded was way below youtube’s standard and they don’t increase the volume. @DavidP is better at explaining it.
Thanks James @Socio
You do learn something everyday, absolutely knew nothing about this facility. The info does explain a lot, I think it means what I am sending to YouTube was not loud enough.
Michael
Well done Michael! Very enjoyable performance as it is already. You’ve already got some good tipps here on where to take it next, so upwards and onwards!
Bravo, Michael, a first finger-style performance playing and singing. I think majority will agree that picking and singing is another step up from strumming and singing (which is also challenging) I guess it is all challenging until you become proficient
So well done on the performance, lots to like.
Also sounds like you are well getting to grips with recording, using your gear and tech to produce a clean recording which can serve as a foundation to improve that aspect.
Ah the mysteries of a change in how it sounds from the listen on the PC to the playback on YT. I have experienced that and don’t know YT and streaming well enough to offer any explanation.
Firstly, as @Socio pointed out the overall level of the recording was low. Plenty head-room to raise that. Now does that play a part in how the balance may have changed? I honestly don’t know.
The good news is that it is easy to sort that out.
If you are familiar with using a DAW, like Reaper, what is unfortunate is that OBS does not have the equivalent of a Master track which you can work adjust. So to raise the overall level you need to raise the level of each individual source track.
My suggestion is as follows:
When you setup to record play and sing the song and watch firstly your 2i2. Depending on which generation, you’ll see either coloured halos around the gain knobs or maybe LEDs. You should set the gain knobs so that most of the time the halos are green, a flash of orange now and then OK. If you see any red then dial down the gain. In this song you probably want to do that singing a verse and then chorus. Don’t worry about balance.
if you can, depending on your computer position, you should also watch the levels on the meters in OBS. You should select Audio Mixer under Docks menu. Unlike on the 2i2 where the red indicates likely clipping, this is not the case on the meters in the Audio Mixer in OBS. Look at the scale and you’ll see the meter will be red once the level is above -10dB, which is totally fine.
You will see a blue slider for each source. The slider can be adjusted but note that at its top most position it is set for 0dB adjustment and can only be lowered to reduce level. After you have observed in a test play, you may need to adjust the gain on each source track in OBS. This is for two reasons. Firsly to get the balance right. Secondly to get the overall level to a good level. Ideally when you check Stats for Nerds in YouTube, an ideal number is between -6db to -3db. You can even tinker to try for even close to 0dB. What you want is no indication that YouTube lowered the level of your recording, which will mess with your recorded dynamics.
In the case where your levels in the source tracks are in the orange band or even more problematically in the green, you need to boost the gain. the simplest way to do this is to open up the Advanced Audio Settings. There you will see a volume setting, which you can then raise with a positive dB adjustment. This is an iterative process to set the levels in OBS to achieve good balance and a suitable signal level.
I start with just playing, not recording until the levels look OK from a loudness perspective, averaging around -10dB. When both are at that level, then I start with test recordings to adjust the balance.
Once that is all sorted, you can make the recording and upload to YouTube. Use Stats for Nerds to check the level. I expect that if you have achieved around -10dB to -5dB for each track and a pleasing balance then you will be OK in YouTube. If not you can either boost the levels in OBS and re-record or if you have a video editor you can generally raise the overall audio volume in the editor and re-render the video. In my case, as a Reaper user, I can drop the video into Reaper and raise the level there and then re-render.
You can also short circuit the final step of adjusting the overall level with a Loudness meter on the PC. I have installed the Orban Loudness Meter on my Windows PC. I can view levels while playing on that meter as well as after making the test recordings. Fairly simple to use and saves potential hassle of the rinse and repeat uploading to YouTube for that final check.
Well, that is a lot of detail Hope it makes sense and helps improve the recording process for you. Feel free to ask anything.
Once again, well done on a first finger-picked recorded performance!!
Thanks David @DavidP
I think singing and playing whether strumming or finger picking is not easy. With fingerpicking using a pattern it has to be automatic, this song as I said uses a very simple pattern. I have learnt other more complicated patterns for other songs, with some of these are so ingrained that if I try to think what I am doing it will inevitably go wrong, which I think is a good sign.
Recording sound levels - thanks for the very helpful info, it is clear from your suggestions I am not getting some things right. It is a while since I recorded and thought I had a set up that was ok but when I set about this recording I updated OBS and my previous settings didn’t seem to work. I am going back to basics, you may hear from me again on this.
Michael
