364 Jamming with a Virtual Band
Let’s play the song and check the output levels. If the levels are too high,
you’ll need to lower the output. If the levels are too low, you’ll need to raise
the output.
If you didn’t complete all of the previous exercises, open the project
Magic
Rock Song.band in the Lesson_12 folder to catch up.
1 Press Return and then the spacebar to begin playback. As the song plays,
watch the Master Output Volume meters for signs of clipping.
NOTE
If you don’t see the master level meters along the bottom of the
GarageBand window, increase the size of the GarageBand window. You
may need to change the resolution of your monitor to make more room.
You can also hide the track info if it’s visible.
If you see any clipping (red) in the meters, stop playback. If you aren’t
sure whether you saw red, the handy clipping indicators (red dots) at the
end of the meter light up to let you know that clipping did indeed happen.
You should discover red level meters and some clipping throughout
the song.
2 Drag the Master Output Volume slider to -3.1 dB to lower the output
volume and avoid clipping.
3 Play the song again from the beginning and check the new output level in
the meters.
Be careful not to set your levels too low. Ideally, your levels should peak
between the highest green and yellow portions of the meter. Fortunately,
you selected Auto Normalize in the GarageBand preferences, so the levels
should still output with plenty of volume for iTunes.