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Losing quality from resampling?

Posted: Thu Jul 21, 2011 3:46 am
by ChadDub
When you resample, do you lose some quality/frequencies from bouncing so many times? Just asking.

Re: Losing quality from resampling?

Posted: Thu Jul 21, 2011 4:21 am
by Heartless
Not unless you are lowering the bitrate or using a crappy renderer.

Re: Losing quality from resampling?

Posted: Thu Jul 21, 2011 4:28 am
by wormcode
Digital data can be copied forever without quality loss. Depending on what you do to the actual bounced files, yes of course there could be quality loss. Especially if you're applying pitching, distortion or filter/phasing effects, you will lose lower frequencies like that. Just keep the originals whenever possible, and save the project with the VST/MIDI data before you delete it in case you want to change it later. It's usually referred to as destructive or non-destructive editing.

Re: Losing quality from resampling?

Posted: Thu Jul 21, 2011 4:45 am
by ChadDub
How do I know how I should render? I have it set to 44.1k WAV at 32 bit. I assume that's the best?

Re: Losing quality from resampling?

Posted: Thu Jul 21, 2011 4:48 am
by Shum
That will be fine.

Re: Losing quality from resampling?

Posted: Thu Jul 21, 2011 4:56 am
by ChadDub
ok good, thanks.

I made a thread that didnt get hate.

Re: Losing quality from resampling?

Posted: Thu Jul 21, 2011 4:58 am
by jrisreal
I dont ever hear any quality loss, but I render at WAV, 32-bit float, 320 kbps, and 64-bit depth

Re: Losing quality from resampling?

Posted: Thu Jul 21, 2011 5:09 am
by wormcode
32 bit is fine but 24 bit for most stuff will be basically the same thing in most cases but doesn't need as much disk space. 32 bit has the benefit of "infinite headroom". These days space isn't really an issue though anyway so keep it all at 32 if you want. Most DAWs will run internally at 32 bit fp regardless. Anyway this is something that people will argue over for hours, but I find for 95% of stuff 24 bit is enough.

Re: Losing quality from resampling?

Posted: Thu Jul 21, 2011 5:12 am
by jrisreal
wormcode wrote:32 bit is fine but 24 bit for most stuff will be basically the same thing in most cases but doesn't need as much disk space. 32 bit has the benefit of "infinite headroom". These days space isn't really an issue though anyway so keep it all at 32 if you want. Most DAWs will run internally at 32 bit fp regardless. Anyway this is something that people will argue over for hours, but I find for 95% of stuff 24 bit is enough.
lol infinite? I knew there was more headroom, but infinite is even better!

Re: Losing quality from resampling?

Posted: Thu Jul 21, 2011 5:16 am
by wormcode
Well it's theoretical I guess. If someone actually needs that much, then something is wrong I think haha.

Re: Losing quality from resampling?

Posted: Thu Jul 21, 2011 5:22 am
by jrisreal
wormcode wrote:Well it's theoretical I guess. If someone actually needs that much, then something is wrong I think haha.
Good point.

Re: Losing quality from resampling?

Posted: Thu Jul 21, 2011 11:28 am
by FuzionDubstep
Usually re-sampling sounds is done to make the sound more gritty and heavy so losing quality is inevitable during this process and is kind of what you are trying to achieve in order to make it sound more hard hitting and distorted..

If you want a clean sound then I don't recommend re-sampling and if you do then do it lightly and carefully without to many effects

Re: Losing quality from resampling?

Posted: Thu Jul 21, 2011 11:46 am
by samkablaam
jrisreal wrote:I dont ever hear any quality loss, but I render at WAV, 32-bit float, 320 kbps, and 64-bit depth
eh?
wormcode wrote:32 bit is fine but 24 bit for most stuff will be basically the same thing in most cases but doesn't need as much disk space. 32 bit has the benefit of "infinite headroom".
and, eh?

Re: Losing quality from resampling?

Posted: Thu Jul 21, 2011 8:24 pm
by wormcode
samkablaam wrote:
and, eh?
Like I said people will argue over it for hours, it's a touchy subject. What I meant was 24 bit already provides for for 144dB, 32 allows for even more headroom and smooths off clipping.

People arguing for hours
http://www.gearslutz.com/board/music-co ... tools.html
http://www.gearslutz.com/board/masterin ... -file.html

There's about 100 threads on that alone there haha.

Re: Losing quality from resampling?

Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 2:16 am
by samkablaam
cool. headrooms not infinite though, you can still clip 32 bit files.

Re: Losing quality from resampling?

Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 3:35 am
by Ldizzy
FuzionDubstep wrote:Usually re-sampling sounds is done to make the sound more gritty and heavy so losing quality is inevitable during this process and is kind of what you are trying to achieve in order to make it sound more hard hitting and distorted..

If you want a clean sound then I don't recommend re-sampling and if you do then do it lightly and carefully without to many effects
wrong.

re-sampling is simply the action of taking an audio bit and re-using it for further usage.

its like if people on the Davidguetta.com forum were saying compression is to get the bass to pump under the kick. its just a stylistic tendency to use a tool a certain way.

resampling can be done with cleaniness in mind and as its been stated above, it won't get ur sounds """""gritty"""""" if done following certain guidelines (bit depth etc).

Re: Losing quality from resampling?

Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 10:17 am
by FuzionDubstep
Ldizzy wrote:
FuzionDubstep wrote:Usually re-sampling sounds is done to make the sound more gritty and heavy so losing quality is inevitable during this process and is kind of what you are trying to achieve in order to make it sound more hard hitting and distorted..

If you want a clean sound then I don't recommend re-sampling and if you do then do it lightly and carefully without to many effects
wrong.

re-sampling is simply the action of taking an audio bit and re-using it for further usage.

its like if people on the Davidguetta.com forum were saying compression is to get the bass to pump under the kick. its just a stylistic tendency to use a tool a certain way.

resampling can be done with cleaniness in mind and as its been stated above, it won't get ur sounds """""gritty"""""" if done following certain guidelines (bit depth etc).
it depends what you're going for but with dubstep the large majority of people re-sample to get a heavier sound and if not then there shouldn't be any problems with sound quality or any noticable difference at least..

Re: Losing quality from resampling?

Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 11:44 am
by slothrop
Yeah, you could repeatedly bounce a track to audio just for shits and giggles, but in dubstep or dnb people are normally talking about taking drums or a bassline, adding a load of FX, resampling, slicing a bit, adding a load more FX, resampling, slicing a bit, repeat until it's bare phat innit.

In which case you aren't going to lose quality from bouncing it but you might lose quality (for some definition of quality) due to running it through loads and loads of plugins each of which mashes the sound slightly as well as doing what you actually want it to do, rather than using fewer plugins but spending more time getting each one to sound right. Although I guess that's more of a drums / live instruments thing than a bass thing, since messing up things like the tightness and character of the individual hits matters less when you're just trying to make a bassline go whaaaeeeoooiiiii-uh wuuuu wuuu weeee-uh anyway.

Re: Losing quality from resampling?

Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 2:40 pm
by FuzionDubstep
I get this now I didn't really read the post properly just the title. I thought he was on about bass sounds because they can lose quality very easily through re-sampling whereas re-sampling in general other things doesn't lose quality as long as you do it carefully and bounce at the same bit rate each time..

but yeah it shouldn't lose quality if you re-sample with care in mind and don't go crazy

Re: Losing quality from resampling?

Posted: Fri Jul 22, 2011 4:47 pm
by Mannyyyyy
you shouldnt lose quality when resampling and IMO you should always bounce your sound after every 3 effects you put. Then you would get more sounds in your sample library and you can always go back if you think you messed up on the effects chain.