Leveling Tool

This tool was first created during The Last of Us Part II by Emily Scrivner, one of Naughty Dog’s Dialogue Designers. It’s purpose was to do a quick temp level pass of all the assets in a session, leveling them according to the information in a file that included all of our loudness targets. It did this by adjusting the item’s volume - making one volume adjustment that applied to the entire item.

Our current version of the tool aims to improve the accuracy of the original, however, by changing it to level an item using both the item’s volume and the take’s volume envelope automation. This allows the tool to do a blanket pass on an item whenever the entire item is too quiet or loud, while also giving the tool the ability to do a fine-tuned pass and level any individual transients that are affecting the item’s loudness.