Night mode · Tips

Films are mixed for cinemas. At home the dialogue is too quiet and the explosions too loud. Squeeze them together on your output.

Simple
Better: four bands
Save it

A bookshelf speaker and a remote in the evening.

01Simple

AUDynamicsProcessor  Compression Threshold  −30 dB
                     Headroom      8 dB
                     Attack Time   0.01 s
                     Release Time  0.3 s
                     Master Gain   +8 dB
AUPeakLimiter        defaults

The compressor turns the loud parts down. Master Gain brings everything back up, so the quiet dialogue rises with it. The limiter keeps the extra gain from clipping.

A synthesizer knob on an aluminium panel.

02Better: four bands

Explosions are mostly bass; dialogue is mostly mids. AUMultibandCompressor splits audio at 200 Hz, 900 Hz and 4 kHz and compresses each band on its own, so a bass hit doesn't duck the voice over it.

AUMultibandCompressor  Threshold 1  −45 dB    rumble
                       EQ 3         +3 dB     speech
                       Post-Gain    +6 dB
AUPeakLimiter          defaults

03Save it

Click Save as Preset… and call it Night. Pick it from the menu bar when the house is asleep, and your usual preset in the morning.

On surround systems, check the status line. If a plug-in only takes stereo, the chain folds to stereo and says so.