Audio engineering and mastering is as important to the vlogging and podcasting community, as it is to the recording industry. And the types of equipment and software used affects the overall end product in a big way.
Reaper plugins in particular are described and reviewed on the Reaper blog by many of their clients. Overall, the opinions seems to be that the Reaper plugins and engineering software is vastly superior and produced a higher quality, more precise sound than it’s third party competitors.
But I do have an issue with one of the items advertised in the headline above, the one that says “normalizing is bad.” OK, if it’s bad, why is there a big fat button (OK, it isn’t really that big or fat :-)) in the Item Properties menu called “Normalize?”
This is one of those situations where a tool used in the wrong way or for the wrong thing can be construed as “bad.” But to say a tool is bad is just silly. That’s like saying “hammering is bad.” Yeah, if you try comb your hair with a hammer, I can see how that would be bad :-P. How about changing a lightbulb by “hammering” it. Yeah…bad. But if you need to push a nail into a piece of wood, good luck NOT hammering. Sheesh.
Normalizing is a tool. It can be overused and it can be used incorrectly – just like a hammer. But when used to hammer in the metaphorical nail, it’s the right tool for the job.
OK, I may have taken my metaphors a bit too far. Just keep this in mind when you read the article below.
Read more: The REAPER Blog Q&A # 22 – Normalizing is bad; favorite plugins; mics for podcasting and more