DAW stands for Digital Audio Workstation, and is an electronic device or software application used for recording, editing, and producing audio files.
Some ‘notable examples’ of DAW software applications. Excellent further reading about DAWs in general can be found at **https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_audio_workstation**
Every DAW performs the same functions at their core, so you are essentially “paying for features” as you go up the apparent ‘hierarchy’ of DAWs from the free to paid ones…
Programs like Audacity and OcenAudio are technically not DAWs, but rather are ‘audio editing software’ applications.
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These programs are designed for more specific, destructive audio editing – such as sound design – rather than nuanced edits or in-depth mixing.
That being said, they serve their purpose for voiceover talent who want a simple program to record, do basic clean up, and then sent the files to their clients.
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Obviously Adobe Audition or Pro Tools will be a much more “complete” or “full” application and can do ‘more’ out of the box than Audacity, and they also have different aspects to them when it comes to editing audio. DAWs like Pro Tools also have application-specific plugins that work only with them, such as iZotope’s Dialogue Match plugin.
REAPER, Audition, and Pro Tools, (etc.) ****use non-destructive editing, meaning that any changes you do can be easily undone on the fly right in the track and interface without forcing you to have to undo your changes, or risk affecting your master file.
Another benefit of these non-destructive DAWs is that they have “real time FX” (plugins / inserts) editing, which you can toggle on-and-off without affecting the audio file itself - so you can add/remove FX as much as you like and adjust their settings without altering the original.
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Because Tony has been working in the industry for a while, he has developed his own personal workflow and will often use a particular DAW for a specific reason.
eg: He’ll use REAPER when he needs to do sound design, Studio One if he’s mixing a client’s demo, and if he’s doing ADR (dubbing) he’ll use Pro Tools - partially because of the various plugins he has, but also because of the experience he has with each application and how easily and quickly he can do certain things through muscle memory, more streamlined processes, etc.
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Both gain and levels refer to the loudness of the audio.
However, gain is the input level of the audio, and volume is the output.
When recording audio, gain is the first control that the microphone signal goes through, while the levels are adjusted after that.