I can’t give you a precise amount, as it will very much depend on the amount of width that you had in that range to begin with. Using a tool like the Imager in Ozone 9, try narrowing frequencies above about 8 kHz. That qualifier aside, here are a few things you can do to minimize the differences between the source and the encode: Narrow the high-end So while the encode and the source may sound more alike, the cumulative difference between the encode, the source, and what you were originally trying to achieve may still be fairly noticeable. However, the steps we’re taking to get there involve making some sacrifices to the source. I should qualify what I mean by “better.” Really, what we’re talking about is an encode which is perceptually closer to the source. To understand why this is, how you can potentially take advantage of it, and why you might not want to worry about it at all, read on! Manipulating width for a “better” encode At the end of the day the parameter which made the biggest impact was: width! Not only that, but all the other variables had little to no impact (caveats ahead). This yielded a whopping 80 versions of the song!Ģ0 uploaded at 48 kHz and recorded at 44.1 kHzĢ0 uploaded at 44.1 kHz and recorded at 48 kHzĪfter level matching them all for a fair comparison, I got to work listening and measuring to determine which factors played the biggest role in preserving-or degrading-sound quality during format conversion and streaming playback. I then played them all back off SoundCloud, recording the output bitstream pre-conversion-again at 44.1 kHz and 48 kHz-for analysis and comparison against the originals. For each sample rate, I methodically varied the parameters of peak level, crest factor, frequency-specific width, and total width. To get to the bottom of this, I prepared 40 masters of a single song-20 at 44.1 kHz and 20 at 48 kHz-and uploaded them all to SoundCloud. What you can and can’t control in the process How to optimize your songs for streaming on SoundCloud and other compressed audio formats So let’s take a look at why those sonic changes occur, and what we can do to minimize them. Perhaps it’s due to that very ease that questions like, “Why does my music sound different on SoundCloud?” or “What can I do to make my music sound better on SoundCloud?” seem to come up more often than they do for other streaming services.ĭespite SoundCloud introducing a new “mastering” feature to optimize streaming playback, knowing what actually happens to your audio during streaming and mastering is key to understanding how to produce a track with the highest possible sound quality for streaming. Of those, SoundCloud has always been unique in how easy it makes instant uploads for creators. While some streaming services like Amazon Music HD, Apple Music, and Tidal are now offering lossless audio, many others like Spotify and SoundCloud still use lossy audio compression techniques to deliver music.
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