Maat Incorporated has released DRMeter v1.0, a universal metering plug-in for stereo bus masters.
DRMeter reckons to be a faithful recreation of the TT DR Meter for modern production environments, ‘addressing an unfulfilled need for all engineers concerned with dynamic range issues’.
DR is a de facto standard created in 2009 to gauge the amount dynamic range compression being applied to popular music. The broad adoption of the DR measurement system paved the way for the movement toward, and eventual adoption of, loudness control standards now in place worldwide. DRMeter’s measurement method conforms to the trusted standard first employed by the TT DR Meter. Its display algorithms follow Maat’s guiding philosophy of attention to appearance and ballistics, achieving the best match between the aural impression
Available for all major plug-in formats, including VST2/VST3 and AAX for macOS and Windows plus AU (Audio Units) for macOS, DRMeter offers two options for metering plus specialised measurement for DR dynamic range. DR is visually displayed as a real-time bar meter plus corresponding numeric fields. Sample Peak Program and RMS amplitude are also shown as nested meters and numeric readouts.
heard by an engineer, and the optical rendering by the meters.
When used with the coming companion DROffline utility, the DRMeter plug-in acts as a real-time gauge of dynamic density, providing preflight checks during mixing and mastering. Offline, a song or entire album can be measured to generate an official DR value.
‘Back in 2007, we were at the peak of the loudness wars, and I remember that I was annoyed about receiving too many overly compressed and limited mixes,’ says Friedemann Tischmeyer, inventor of the DR measurement system and President of Maat. ‘I thought, why don’t we have a simple integer number to describe relevant dynamic range? After two years and a lot of discussions and experimentation, the DR Meter was born. Creating an impact to inspire musicians, producers, and record companies for more dynamic music releases was a driving force, but I never expected such an overwhelming response and appreciation from the engineering community.’
DRMeter is available exclusively at the Maat website.
More: www.maat.digital
