[Flac-dev] floating point

[Brian Willoughby]

On Aug 14, 2009, at 17:14, Paul Davis wrote:
> You're assuming that you never store intermediate mixes that may
> actually have overflowed a 24 or 32 bit representation. I would agree
> that this might not be best practice, but its actually not as
> un-useful as it might at first appear.

I covered intermediate mixes in the second half of my response.

But few consumers of audio are actually interested in production, so  
they don't need intermediate formats.


> i'm not an advocate for Ardour using FLAC as a native format. i just
> don't like telling users "it can't be done".

Ardour can certainly support FLAC for Bounces or any other final  
output.  It wouldn't even be hard to support FLAC as well as Ableton  
Live does, and perhaps even go beyond what Ableton supports.

Saying "it can't be done" is a gross oversimplification.  A more  
accurate statement would be "FLAC is not the ideal format for all  
possible files that Ardour might work with, but FLAC is certainly a  
perfect choice for most input and output files."

The typical DAW allows a Bounce in 24-bit or even 16-bit, and it is  
assumed that the user understands the consequences of choosing a  
narrow bit depth like 16-bit.  Ardour would not even need to guide  
the user to avoid FLAC for intermediate storage, at least not any  
place where 24-bit and 16-bit are other format options.  It would be  
sufficient to have a chapter in the manual discuss the benefits of  
using higher bit depths for intermediate mixes.

I haven't used Ardour, but if certain functions like Track Freeze are  
available, then Ardour could limit the options to 32-bit-clean  
formats.   If the GUI makes bouncing of stems obviously distinct from  
a final bounce, then Ardour could again guide the user towards 32-bit  
for intermediate mixes while allowing the choice of FLAC for final  
delivery formats.

Brian Willoughby
Sound Consulting