Can't Get Sound To Be At A Good Level For All

Hi guys.

I produce videos on youtube, and am trying to figure out why my listeners variably tell me that either the sound is perfect, or it's too low.

For instance, I just posted this video:

Two people said the volume was too low. Another said it was fine. On my Mac Book Pro, it's a perfect volume.

So if my own laptop speakers are not a good way to judge, how do I know how loud I should make my videos?

For the video I linked to, I recorded my audio with a microphone and added it in to FCPX separately.

When I played it back, the volume sounded unpleasantly loud, and I had to cut my speaker volume by 50% to make it sound ok.

So I lowered the volume by dragging the decibel slider (green bar under the video) into the negatives. After I did this, it sounded great on my mac at full volume.

But I'm gathering that this is not a good technique.

How can I figure out how to make my audio a good level for everyone?

Thanks!

You have to watch the audio meters, period. Vocals should average around -6 for what you're doing. Then you know if anyone has an issue, it's on their end.

What Ben is saying is true to an extent, but it gets a bit more complicated than that.

I'll save you from the boring details and just try and stick to what you can use...

In short, when considering audio you need to consider Peak Levels, which is the highest level your signal goes and Loudness energy which is the overall volume of the audio. The old school guys used to call it RMS, but it's not quite the same.

Believe it or not, those loudest peaks that you see in the meters don't nessesarily mean that's how loud your audio is, just how loud the attack transients is. They are quick and drop away very quickly and so they don't contribute too much to how loud the sound is.

To measure loudness you need special meters, like these for example
www.waves.com/plugins/wlm-loudness-meter...us-quick-start-guide

In the case of this meter you mostly need to concern yourself with the, the Momentary and the Peak readings, that should give you most of the info you need to get good levels.

For content like YouTube you would want your overall loudness to be around -16dbFS, that's where your overall energy should sit. But you also need to be careful that the peaks don't clip, exceeding 0dBF. So somewhere between 0 and 16 is where you want most of your signal to sit.

A tad complex for internet video. For broadcast maybe, but simply internet, what I said works. I've been doing it for over a decade.

Could be a tad complex. But Internet audio has been progressively stepping up its game so it's becoming more in line with broadcast.

But seriously, average energy around 16, peaks not over 1, isn't that complicated.