Metering for Recording & Mixing

Here are some resource for anyone who wants to record well and maintain a good healthy signal between the headroom and noise floor. It is an essential aspect of recording and mixing audio. It involves the use of visual representations and measurement tools to assess the levels and dynamics of audio signals. Metering helps ensure accurate and consistent sound reproduction across different systems and platforms. You can significantly reduce the chances of unpleasant distortion due to audio level overload and/or applying wrong gain structure approach resulting in high noise floor.

Below is a diagram to illustrate the relationship between analog and digital audio.

In my opinion, the best practice will be keeping your PEAK level of the individual track to +/-6dBfs within -20dBfs in your DAW. This is especially important during recording and mixing, especially if your approach is hybrid between analog and digital signal processing.

Below is a screenshot showing how 1kHz Sine Tone at -20dBfs looks like on the VU meters. This is to express +4dBu = 0VU = -20dBfs as shown on the diagram above.