I did not know Bandcamp provided WAV files. I do not use them much, but for the times I have, it has always been FLAC for the lossless option.
My statement was on that interpretation, I would call it FLAC because it is FLAC. But is a specific Bandcamp provides a WAV, I agree it should be called a WAV. There are a few different types that could be offered, there is about half dozen formats that can be used, I would tend to agree that the type used should be defined as a sub of Lossless. WAV is sort of outdated for distribution as it is uncompressed, which is wasteful on storage and bandwidth. But if sources do exist from sellers (including âsellersâ of free material), then it should be described as such.
https://www.beatport.com/ sells wav and mp3 files.
It is a little annoying to need to convert this to flac but occasionally they are the only store where I can buy a lossless recording.
I am a bit shocked that Beatport would sell WAV files, but I do not use them for anything so I cannot say much. It is shocking though⌠the image I have of the company is modern and advanced in technology. Yet here they are selling WAV vs FLAC or really any other compressed lossless, and MP3s which are technologically obsolete. Good to know though, thanks for sharing.
I was really surprised to find out that an audio engineer I know prefers wav.
I donât know why, but I do know that he knows what heâs doing. But it might be hubris to assume that people (or entire store fonts) who use wav simply know what theyâre doing.
If you have the HDD space I suppose there is no difference, perhaps a step less of encoding with wavâŚ
I do not want to speak for those on that side, but that makes sense to me. When you are doing audio editing, you will be editing in an uncompressed format, typically WAV. For me, if I am going to sample audio in another track, I will be doing this work with WAV files. So if my audio is stored in FLAC format, I am decompressing this audio to WAV to work with it, Same is true for audio analysis tools, Some of these tools only accept WAV and some of the tools will decode the compressed format for you so it can use the WAV. The thing to remember is that a compressed audio file needs a decoder to work. Sort of like those clothing vacuum storage bags⌠you can store all your clothing in much less space, but to use your clothing, you need to release the vacuum from the bag in order to get the clothes.
The big difference is who the user is, like pre-production or post-production. People like your friend will not want to ever use a lossy compressed format like MP3 or M4A since sound quality will begin to deteriorate quickly from generation loss. Maybe others have a different view point from other areas of the industry, but this is mine from where I use audio.