In years of failing to understand compression, this video makes it so darned easy and clear! The mark of a great teacher! Excellent!

tHANK you! *[Applies compressor]* thank you. *[normalize]* Thank you.

I've been watching videos and reading articles about how to use the compression tool and you are the *first* person to actually tell me what everything does (aside from the buttons we don't touch). Which is so much easier to understand and makes so much more sense than just... fiddling around with the numbers. Thanks! :'D

Excellent explanation. The best I have found here on KZfaq. Thank you very much.

Thanks Phil, been banging my head against a wall trying to figure out the best audio edits in Audacity. This really helps!

Squooshing it down - love to see a real professional that knows his audio terminology. This was super helpful, thanks so much for this!

I played with Compression on Peaks and it really works well. I used to compress to 0dB then amplify to minus 6dB on voice-overs and it was a pain. I'd have to dork every sentence this way, and it got tedious. Now I do this: 1) Compress (settings: TH: minus12dB, RATIO: 2:1, YES-Compress on peaks, NO-Make up gain), 2) Amplify to minus 6dB. Now the voice-overs are more even. For background Music, do the same, but use 5:1 on really "aggressive" pieces with lots of dynamic range. Amplify to minus 12dB to minus18dB to avoid the music competing with the voice. Compressed music is fine for background - it's used to mask noise and create ambiance, not override the voice. With additional sound effects, use 5:1 and amplify to minus12dB. Add it up: with minus 6dB plus minus 12dB plus minus 12 dB = 0dB and you will be assured that the mix will not peg the 0dB level. I make videos with PowerPoint and set the volume level in PPT to: Voice: HIGH, Music: LOW, Sound Effects: LOW or MED, depending on effect, and on whether it occurs with voice or not. The resultant exported MP4 video from PPT will do the mix and the results are very consistent.

Phil, your videos are humorous as well as educational. Appreciate it brother. I can actually pay attention when you talk lol.

THANK YOU; first tutorial I was able to find that clearly explains what the compressor does and how changing the settings will actually affect your audio!!

Nice explanation, thanks. I would add the "Compress based on Peaks" option is useful to maintain some dynamic, which you should use if what you are compressing is music in order to keep the accents (forte, debole, etc).

Thanks allot Phil, you got a sub. I am recording lets plays and I have some experience as a recording artist but none as a sound engineer. I want my audio to really shine in what I do and this simple explanation has made a world of difference to my recording. Again thank you so much for this.

Thank you so much! I love how you explain things - I am a newbie, and this was so easy to understand. You're brilliant!

Just a small correcten (only 6 years late) - there's actually no universial "recommended theshold" unless for maybe standard treatment in post after a recording session in a studio. But DRC is mostly a tool for reducing the difference between the highest and lowest parts of an audio file. Say, like if you have two people talking and one voice is a lot stronger than the other, or there's been an issue with the mic making one voice really weak. So what you do is an analysis, preferrably a contrast analysis, to find our roughly what level your peaks are at and where the lows are. Since you need to bring the two voices closer to each other (without amplifying background noise, so make sure to make a noise analysis too), your threshold should be lower than the average dB of the strong part, making it then easier to bring them together with another pass or simply normalising it and repeat the process. Still, I'm glad people make these videos. And it's still here 6 years later! :) I wish more people cared about sound engineering.

Hey Phil, great video, it's timeless and classic. I'm here in April if 2019 and you're still current. Thank you for sharing.

Thanks for making this video, I've been going mad trying to get this right. Your video has been very helpful.

Exact information that I needed, well presented. Thanks Phil.

Thanks for this. Helps me improve the recordings of my guitar lessons. Makes playing them back during my practice much more pleasant.

This was clear and helpful. Thanks Phil.

Great job explaining. I usually get those spikes recording from disc or records. (Scratches, etc).

Awesome. This is a really clear, concise explanation .

Great video, I've watched tutorials twice as long and still never figured the compressor out. I've been using Audacity for years, and if those spikes were at an area that I needed them lowered, I would expand the sound wave way out and either get it far enough to make the dots a curve 1/2 the original size, or just rush it and highlight it, and hit a negative amplify, which would result in sound loss. You actually said "WHAT" the compressor does, and not just "slide this or that here or there". For that a thumbs up and a new subscriber. Now I will look through to see if you have a tutorial on removing and leveling squeally distortion, which is how I wound up here in the first place -lol.

SUPERB VIDEO! Extremely easy-to-understand, informative and personable. Well done! Thanks for posting! :)

dudes awesome, explains everything crystal clear :D

Very helpful tutorial!!! And your way of speaking is fun to listen to! haha~~~ Thank you for the video!!!

Thank you! This really helped me a lot in mastering audio

Thanks for explaining that.I will surely use it. :)

Excellent. Thanks a ton!

You explained it perfectly and I understood. I love the robe (don't change man!)

This is a great video and it helped me a lot!!!

your videos are great my friend. Thanks for the help!!

Very helpful tutorial, thanks Phil 👌🏾

Wonderful. Thank you for this.

thanks for making this video, I'm implementing some of the suggestions for my own podcast now.

That was super helpful. Nice clear explanation.

Thanks that was very helpful!

Great video, Phil. Thanks! I was having trouble placing your Southern accent. Where are you from?

thanks so much this was so helpful

how do you do the opposite?

Nice and clear, sir! Thanks

very helpful, thank you!

Thank you! Very good tutorial

Super helpful video, thank you!

Awesome, thanks!!

Superb tutorial! Thank you sir.

Thanks again for the educational video!

nice to hear Florida son. For those squeels perhaps the notch filter might be useful. But first I would run the built in Plot Spectrum thingie to see where the frequencies are. I may have a video on that but am not sure.

thanks very helpful

Fantastic video, SUBBED!

Normalize tool or Envelope tool works well too for some cases. TY for vid!

Thank you!

Thank you do much!

Thanks....You rock!!!!!

Also thanks for this! It helped lots!!!!

I've just contacted ACX for their audio requirements. I don't like how these settings can't be set for all recording.

thanks Phil

Thank u very much!

Hm, I only started noticing effect by setting the threshold to -35dB with a ratio of 2:1.

The accent is everything

Hello, currently I am completely stuck with the compressor tool. So what this video is saying is all it does is "sqoosh down" the loud peaks. But is that only for the rigjht side (the quiter values)? I do video game walkthroughs and I'd find it useful to also increase some of my lows aswell. You didn't go over the spectrum of this tool. Like lets say if I went to -60 (Extremely loud) and then made the ratio 5:1 what would this do as opposed to the threshold being at -1? You see im trying to understand this tool and decide when to tweak things and how to do it precisely. I do understand ratio equals a stronger compression. I am asking what does threshold do and at what values does it do it.

Great!

thanks Phil!

i love you

thank you much

This guy is dope!

Thanks!

Why did you mess up the aspect ratio?

So... if you use the compressor with the make up gain box checked, seems this is the same as compressing while normalizing at the same time.

Do you investigate spirit voice phenomenon???

Nice Tutorial👍🏻 My question: Which one comes first 1.Compression, 2.Amplify, 3.Normalize? Thank You

Ok, i need extra guide and maybe it will be more easier just to tell you what im trying to accomplish. In recordings id like to amplify and make audible any sounds outside the normal sound frequency range the human ears can hear and process.

Boy ,you broke it down !

TA equalization? Sure, if I can find it. I know equalization is an effect but not sure what TA is... I'll check it out and probably make video.

That ending tho

No pretentiousness BS here. He showed the problem, explained the compressor tool and how to fix the peak problems. And you did it all in a bathrobe... perhaps we need all the "Audacity experts and sound engineers" to begin wearing bathrobes. I learned more from you than many of them put together. Perhaps, you should nick name yourself the bathrobe professor of sound. Thank you.

That's that shit that I like, good work sir, maybe make a vid on EQ?

Excellent video even I (the technophobe) understood it :) Mum's and dad's approval? haha!

great!!! can you make a tutorial of audacity beTA equalization? plzz tnx!!

Why is it making mine louder?

New Orleans.

You have a cool last name. :D

i mean audacity beta version,

Uh .... I don't know.

why you wanna remove me? just joking agagagagagag

Guy teaches audacity but can't lower the volume on that white noise...

Thank you!