A Question About Gain

Good Evening Y’all. So i have a sound that is very very quiet after some Initial Sound Design processing (Using Image-Line’s Sakura Plug-In, its like a dual string instrument sort of), i have it turned up in volume in the Plug-In to the point where it is as loud as possible without clipping but still very quiet. Next i have it assigned to a Mixer Channel and its coming in at about -20 to about -28 db, pretty darn quiet and that’s with the Fader on the track all the way up. My solution to this is assigning a Digital Equalizer at the beginning of my channel strip and driving the Input and Output Knobs (sometimes its like +10 db) as far up as i can to the point where i have about -3 to -6 db of head room or as close as i can to it. For some reason i feel like this isn’t a good solution. Does anyone have any other suggestions as to how to solve this issue? If you find your sound is really really low (at the very beginning of your channel strip) is there a way to turn it up while still preserving the integrity of the sound? What are any rules that apply as to how much Input and Output Gain you can drive when wanting to achieve a little more (or in this case a lot more) Gain on a really quiet sound when navigating your channel strip, as you channel strip and begin to stack Plug-Ins? (Also I am referring to the Input and Output dials of each Plug-In and not the Drive). Appreciate any feedback!

Hmm, an instrument shouldn’t be that quiet. I would check the instrument to make sure the gain staging is correct. Since it is coming direct from a virtual instrument you will not need to worry about the noise floor, so just use a simple gain utility plug-in.

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Thank You Paul! What are some good gain utility plug-ins that you recommend?

What DAW do you use? Stock utility plug-ins are good enough. DMG Audio do a free utility plug-in that is great.

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If you are using Ableton there is a stock plugin called Utility

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Evening Paul! To answer your question I use FL Studios. Also I’ll have to check out the DMG Audio Plug-in you suggested too, Thanks!

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