VST Instrument Master Volume

Hey William!

How to gain stage in FL Studio is definitely still a very relevant concept to understand in music production in today’s modern age of music making on a computer!

We typically know gain staging when it comes to recording so that we hit the sweet spot to avoid unwanted noise and hiss from hardware components, but not be too loud without distorting!

The concept of gain staging is that the volume at each stage is at a sweet spot so that each audio effect/process can manipulate the audio at its best.

This starts with the INPUT of your audio signal.. so for example, on most Virtual Instruments/Synths, this would be the Oscillator (Generator).  This would be the first place to adjust your volume before it starts hitting other audio effects the Virtual Instrument may have, like a compressor, chorus, reverb, etc.

Then from there, you can adjust your volume’s before and after usually as it goes into each effect..

Finally at the very end of the audio chain is the MASTER volume.. this is the very last step, and is usually meant as a “trim” to adjust the Virtual Instrument’s volume for the actual song/mix.

Depending on your Virtual Instrument, if your volume is way too loud, this is where you’ll hear distortion, but not all Virtual Instruments are like this.. and sometimes it’s just one effect that is causing distortion within that Virtual Instrument.

If the volume of your virtual instrument can’t get loud enough, you can try that Volume Multiplier you mentioned under Levels adjustments under the wrench in the FL Studio Wrapper..

It’s usually nice to have the volume a little hotter (too loud), as it’s easier to turn things down then not be able to turn things up..

The biggest thing is to make sure distortion is not happening when you don’t want it.

Does that bring some clarity to how to gain stage in FL Studio and Virtual Instruments?

Best practice is to keep the master volume out of the yellow/red, but it’s important to understand that when we talk about “32-bit Floating point” you can actually push you volume louder, then turn it down after.

Some synths will distort if it shows red, so this is bad.

If you turn it up loud, and there’s no distortion, you can turn down your volume on a mixer fader that your virtual instrument is routed to.

When it comes to hardware recording, we have a fixed volume, so red is bad, and yellow is to be very cautious that you may distort.

When you’re ITB (in the box), we don’t always have to play by those rules – and it’s typically a “by ear thing”.. if it’s distorting, then pull back on the master volume of your virtual synth there!