Recording vocals in 16 Bit

[mrskytown11]

I may have to record vocals in 16 bit with a USB yeti due to my circumstances and I’m not able to get my regular condenser microphone from storage in another location.
What’s the best recording level to use for 16 bit, doesn’t it have to be as high as possible due to the noise floor?


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[DanielTT]

16 bit has a theoretical dynamic range of 96dB, so if you peak at -9dBFS you still have a dynamic range of 87dB left.
Should be enough, but it also depends on the arrangement. If it is full with guitars and drums then the noise will be masked by the instruments, while if it is solo voice then it is easier noticable.

Another question is if you planning to compress heavily afterwards, because that will bring up the noise...

Good luck,

Daniel


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[mrskytown11]

I’m just doing rap vocals, I’m not sure how this will turn out, but it should be good enough, maybe if I record vocals as loud as possible without clipping then i should be far away from noise, of course I’ll cut out any low end I don’t need and make sure I use vocal padding to create a more suitable recording arrangement for tracking vocals


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[V.G.]

I may have to record vocals in 16 bit with a USB yeti due to my circumstances and I’m not able to get my regular condenser microphone from storage in another location.
What’s the best recording level to use for 16 bit, doesn’t it have to be as high as possible due to the noise floor?


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Whatever you record, record in 24 bits! And the point is not the difference in the dynamic range, but the fact that you will continue to process the track with plugins and edit.
Believe me, you can only hear the difference at the end, when it’s too late to change something.

[DanielTT]

Wouldnt worry too much, in the tape days most tape machine had a dynamic range of 75-82dB, the early days of digital all converters were 16 bit and were much worse in quality than nowadays, and countless hit records were made, were nobody complained about the noise.
In the 16 bit converter days peak at -9 was kind of the norm.

Daniel


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Re: VG yes, 24 bit is preferable, but since Mixbus is 32 bit float all processing is done in that domain... your starting point is just a bit noisier than it could have been.
No harm there.

With digital people tend to focus on the numbers too much. An average pop song has a dynamic range of around 14 dB, and the noise is well below....


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[Aparich]

I may have to record vocals in 16 bit with a USB yeti due to my circumstances and I’m not able to get my regular condenser microphone from storage in another location.
What’s the best recording level to use for 16 bit, doesn’t it have to be as high as possible due to the noise floor?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Whatever you record, record in 24 bits! And the point is not the difference in the dynamic range, but the fact that you will continue to process the track with plugins and edit.
Believe me, you can only hear the difference at the end, when it’s too late to change something.

I second that recording in 24 bits would be a better way to go.