Understand the Audio Chain

Any recording setup will have a particular path the audio follows. This is called the audio chain. Understanding this will help you fix problems as well as improve your production.

Here’s an overview of a typical chain:

Audio source ➜ Technique ➜ Environment ➜ Microphone ➜ Preamp ➜ Processor ➜ Mixer ➜ Recorder ➜ Editor ➜ Final export

Depending on each tool in this chain, there may be several subchains. For example, a mixer and recorder may have their own preamps and processors.

Each link in this chain does something with the results of the previous link: either passing it through or modifying it in some way.

Here are more details about each potential step.

1. Audio source: This is your voice, your cohost’s voice, or sounds you play. An audio source may have its own subchain, such your guest’s equipment and software before their audio enters your own chain.
2. Technique: How you use the microphone and even your own voice greatly affect your results. I’ll talk more about mic technique in a later lesson.
3. Environment: Noise and reverb are the most common artifacts of where you record. These artifacts may simply be captured (such as reverb), or they could affect your technique (such as unnecessarily shouting into a mic because you’re in a loud environment).
4. Microphone: There are different microphones for different applications. What works well for an audio podcast may not work well for video, and vice versa. Microphones capture a range of sound frequencies and nearly always increase or decrease the strength of those frequencies. A condenser microphone, for example, is more likely to pick up the frequencies your computer or HVAC generate. And an omnidirectional microphone picks up sound from all directions whereas a cardioid microphone picks up sound primarily from directly in front of the capsule.
5. Preampflier (preamp): Microphone audio needs to be amplified. Most condenser microphones have this built in (and thus why they require plug-in or phantom power) while most dynamic microphones require an external preamp. Most mixers and some other hardware contain their own preamps. A high-quality preamp will cleanly increase the gain (or volume). But a low-quality preamp will introduce a constant hiss relative to the gain increase.
6. Processor: Most audio processing does one or both of two things: changes volume or adds effects. For example, a compressor is changing the volume of certain volume ranges (or frequencies), EQ changes the volume of certain frequencies, noise-reduction changes the volume of certain patterns and frequencies, and special effects add other kinds of processing.
7. Mixer: The most obviously named thing, a mixer mixes audio. That mixing could route and combine audio to certain destinations, processing, and more. Most mixers have built-in preamps and may offer a basic processor (such as EQ and compression).
8. Recorder: At the end of the real-time chain is something to capture the audio. This could be a mobile device, a PC with software, a dedicated recorder, or something built into one of the earlier steps. Like a mixer, a recorder may also have its own preamps and processing.
9. Editor: Your editing software and tools (often called a DAW—digital audio workstation) gives you all the tools to further adjust what has been captured. This allows for non-linear editing (in other words, jump to wherever you want).
10. Final export: Lastly, the format and settings you choose when encoding your file can also affect its quality. For example, WAV and AIFF are uncompressed and don’t alter the quality, but MP3 and most of the video formats compress by removing or “abbreviating” detail. Thus, a highly compressed file won’t sound as detailed. But remember that if you didn’t capture much detail to begin with, saving in a higher format won’t add new detail.

It’s usually best to make adjustments early in the chain rather than rely on something further through the chain. For example, it’s better to reduce noise in your personal technique and environment than to use processing or editing later.

Also keep in mind how far through the chain you are monitoring your audio.

When you face a problem or want to improve your sound, follow this audio chain from start to finish.