It might take a bit of back-and-forth to find the right balance between the levels on your loudspeakers, input volume, and main output volume, but this is all a part of mixing professional audio. If your fader levels are too high, then you don’t have any ability to increase the levels as needed, and if they have to be set too low, this means that your loudspeakers are set too high and the signal for the live stream won’t be within a desirable range. If your levels are set properly, you should be operating in a range where the levels for the inputs and output are just below the parity level of 0 on the level faders. I start with my PA speakers set to one-quarter volume and then I increase the volume levels for each input and the main output. A Behringer DI Step 4: Setting PA speaker and soundboard volume levels Using a DI should be done automatically when you are connecting audio from a remote laptop both to lift the ground and to convert the unbalanced signal to a balanced XLR connection.įigure 1. The solution is to add a direct box (aka a DI, Figure 1, below) into the workflow to lift the ground and force the devices to ground, as intended, to their respective plugs. This electrical interference hum needs to be eliminated. Normally, equipment grounds to the A/C plug it’s directly connected to, but sometimes, due to differences in grounding potential, the device chooses the path of least resistance through your audio cables, not to the ground on the plug. Ground loop hum can occur when you’re connecting A/C-powered audio devices together. This is when you listen for obvious problems like a ground loop hum or a noisy or distorted audio signal. You can confirm clean audio with headphones or speakers. This is similar to protecting your highlight when shooting video. With all audio signals, you never want to clip your audio anywhere in your signal flow. Some boards have a levels indicator that is green when you’re in the correct range and red if your signal is too hot. The pre-amp levels can also be labeled as gain or trim. When you connect a cable to your soundboard, regardless of whether it’s a digital board or an analog one, you need to set the preamplifier levels for each input. The use of balanced connections helps reduce external noise from electromagnetic interference, which is especially an issue with longer cable runs. Step 1: Connecting audio sourcesĬonnecting microphones and prerecorded audio sources to a soundboard is best done with balanced connections like XLR or ¼" TRS cables. So, with that lengthy preamble out of the way, let’s start with the basics of mixing audio for a live venue. The biggest reason is that the needs of the audience in the room are different from the needs of an online viewing audience, and if an audio technician is mixing audio only for the room and is not involved in or monitoring the audio for the live stream, the audio levels may not be within a desirable range. Over time, we’ve found that we prefer to handle the audio for both audiences, rather than trust part or all of this to an external A/V company. In my business, I refer to events that have both an in-person audience and a live online audience as a hybrid event, and the majority of the work that we produce is for hybrid events with dual audiences. In this article, I explain my approach to mixing audio for both of these environments at the same time. The main reason is that I’m considering both the in-person audience and the live-stream audience equally and simultaneously. Neither of these two is very complicated to explain and implement, although, in practice, mixing live audio can be very challenging because of room dynamics, electrical grounding issues, and, most importantly, microphone technique.Īs a live-stream specialist, my perspective is going to be different compared to how a live audio technician would approach venue audio. The two most common challenges with audio for a live stream are attaining a clean signal and mixing audio within a smaller range than you might if you’re only mixing for the venue. Mixing audio for a video recording or live stream involves many of the same techniques and equipment, but each has different production standards and you don’t have to worry with live sound reinforcement using loudspeakers. The two most common challenges with live-venue audio are avoiding and eliminating feedback and ground-loop hum.
At its most basic level, it requires microphones, prerecorded audio sources, a soundboard, loudspeakers, and, most importantly, a skilled operator. Mixing audio for a venue is a well-documented practice.