Is the Hard Limiter bad practice as a shortcut?

[DJ Void]

Lots of times because of the headphones I have I end up mixing my songs too loud at first and have to mix them down. But when you get to like 20+ samples/presets it takes a while. Is it bad practice or is there any reason why I shouldn't just use a hard limiter on the master volume to keep it all from clipping as a shortcut?

I feel like this would be something that's bad practice but I wouldn't know why tho and was just wondering if anyone had any thoughts on the matter. Thank you.

[slipstick]

Try it. It's quite normal to include a brickwall limiter as the last thing in the Master FX chain but the idea is usually that it just catches the odd excessive transient. If you really are way too hot on input and are using the limiter to knock the level down a lot you should hear that it's killing your dynamics, basically upsetting your careful mix balance. If anything the song will sound louder overall because all the stuff you originally had quiet is now relatively louder. People used to think this was a good thing but I think the "loudness wars" are more or less over.

Depending on how good a limiter you're using and exactly how you have it set up you'll probably also hear it "pumping" as it cuts. Of course in some styles of music this isn't necessarily a bad thing

BTW what's wrong with just turning the master volume down manually ?

Steve

[TheOneNotHere]

Generally it's all about preference, but in my opinion it's the wrong way to go. As you use a limiter it cuts the higher higher peaks in the track, but it also limits the dynamic range of a track which can be hurtful in the end, considering your going to master the track which is the time when you use a limiter. So what's that mean, well, say you are finished with a track and you have that perfect mix down, once you add a limiter, your taking some of that punch and drive away, compressing it, which squashes the track and can start distorting it, now once you export that and master it, you are putting that already limited track through the ringer by adding a compressor and another limiter to it, which will be take even more of the dynamic range of the track glue the sound even more, and it end up being squashed and losing that drive of energy in the track.

I would advise to turn up the volume on the computer to the highest setting, keep every track below 70% or more in volume, and use the spectrum analyzer to see where your frequencies are hitting (below 0db is perfect!) and your track should be fine.