Compressors .... Getting the hang of them.

    I seem to be able to set these up fairly effectively for drums, and vocals and struggle a bit more with guitars and bass.   Probably because it's all subjective and further aggrivated by my relative lack of experiance.    For instance,  I understand that for a snare drum you often set the attack to let a bit of the snap come through .... but for a new rock distorted guitar it seems anything I try less than a Zero for attack time sounds funky & kinda pumps on & off. So should I just use a limiter?
Of what was included in 8.5.3 producer I like the sonitus comp but it doesn't have a make up gain like some other compressors, I hate the "cakewalk FX compressor/gate" plug and have never gotten it to sound useable on anything yet.  Peaple (in forums, & on tutorial videos) talk about the tones & character of this comp or that comp.....    I am not hearing any of that?   Just a little louder, that's all I am getting.  Is it that the sonitus Comp is more transparent than most?   Am I stil so green that I am not hearing/recognizing what is happening to the signal?
 
Thanks Fellas!

I really enjoy the Sonitus because it does sound transparent. I don't know if it's the best of it's style but I do know that it's cleaner and more flexible and useful than any real life rack mount compressor I have ever used.

By the way I own 2 La-610s, 2  - Purple MC77s (1176 clones), and Tube Tech CL-1b and some other cheaper live dude stuff. I grew up with the company owned DBX gear that I operated.



The make up gain on the La-610 is very clean... the input is where you find the dirt.
 
The make up gain on the MC77 is aggressive and solid state grainy. It's got Field Effect Transitors... which react a lot like tubes in some circuits. But the sound of the 1176 is straight forward old school solid state. Ya.

The make up gain in the CL-1B is smooth, full, and fat.


Having said that, I personally think that dsp near real time compressors are the best thing since sliced bread.

There are many Compressors just like the Sonitus. What I like about the Sonitus is that it has lots of controls and lots of metering information. I imagine that many of the straight forward dsp full featured compressors all sound similar because you are basically running the same math. Compression just isn't that complicated an equation.

The emulation compressors purposefully add character to the sound while a contemporary dsp compressor just compresses or limits. The latest, most modern stuff actually looks ahead into the buffered stream... so it can do things that no one ever did with analog.

If you want to hear the colors of distortion (aka non linearity) or noise (aka random sound) you'll need to use some of the special emulations stuff... it's for sale every where.

Or you can use a transparent compressor like Sonitus and learn to send sound to it so you end up with any character you wish.



You seem to have an effective understanding of how to work with a snare.

My guess is that you are having trouble with the guitar because your guitar tone is already heavily compressed... so your hunch that you might just add a limiter, if you even need one, is probably a good hunch.

My guess is that your guitar tone is ready to be mixed... but a limiter can be a nice way to make sure that any efx you have on the track don't create unexpected peaks.

I have a setting in Sonitus I call "polish" It's just a 0.1msec attack with a super fast release. I set the threshold so it barely triggers.

The snare is a great place to learn about compressors. You'll see that a slow attack on a snare still has to be very fast. You'll also see that the release time has to be fast enough to get out of the way of the next hit... or you start getting different squashed sound.... which you may like, who knows?

One really cool thing you can do in SONAR is see the effect of your settings as a wave form drawing in real time by routing the track to a bus and setting the draw while playback function to active. You can zoom in on a snare and learn a huge amount about what you are hearing with your ears with just a few minutes study.

Go for it!!!


all the best,
mike

+1 on the Sonitus compressor...forgot to mention in my post that I do use it quite a bit. I actually like the entire Sonitus suite of plugs. They simply work and have an easy to use interface as well. Also, their presets are in quite a few instances are really great starting points for certain things....especially the compressor. Like for example, if you used it on bass guitar....you may just need to raise or drop the threshold or decrease attack times. But their ratio's and release times work pretty well for most things. It's a matter of taste and how your particular instrument is behaving while using that compressor.

For other things....you use different compressors. Not because they color or do no color...but how a particular compressor reacts with your material. I can use just about any compressor on any instrument. But others seem to handle things "differently" to which in my case, that "differently" would be "better" for me. Like my weapon of choice on my vocals is a NEVE 33609. Is it better than the Sonitus? Not really better, but different with different options as well as how it handles my voice as opposed to the Sonitus. Some guys will use an 1176 on a vocal to give it a bit more punch...for my voice that doesn't sound good to me. Some guys like an LA2A on a snare, I prefer a Fatso Sr to further mold my snare drum due to the coloration it adds. There is no right or wrong way to go about it, Chuck. You just have to keep on experimenting while using a few different compressors to find out where their strengths and weaknesses are for YOUR material.

I can sit here and type up a novel for you telling you what compressor I use for each instrument as well as the different ratios etc...none of that matters when you bring YOUR material into the scheme of things. You have to find out what the best tool for the job is for your stuff. But having a few different compressors at your disposal is a good thing. Here's another example...

When I process my guitar tracks, 9 times out of 10 I'll throw a Sonitus on each guitar track. Now, if I'm really layering and adding "the wall" so to speak, I'll still add a Sonitus comp to each track, but I won't hit them as hard. The reason being? I'll be sending all those guitar tracks to a bus where I'll have a UAD Precision Bus compressor waiting to handle the entire lot as an entity. This to me does an excellent job for layering purposes and still keeps things in check. The Sonitus compressors on each guitar track are used for "conditioning". Maybe a 1:5 ratio...-10 threshold...just to keep them a bit tighter as individual instruments. When they hit the UAD on the bus, now they are being processed as "the wall" and it just further tightens things up. :)

-Danny

Same here Danny!

all the best,
mike

LOL Chuck! Don't be too hard on yourself. It happens...and trust me, as much as I'm so anal and focused with this stuff, I make a few mistakes from time to time that just make me laugh. You're only human. :)

One other thing I forgot to mention that you may want to keep in mind and that is...toggling the comp on and off. Try your best not to increase the output so that with the compressor on, it's louder than it is with it off. All you really want to do most times (especially if you're using your Mesa or anything with loads of gain due to the compression of just having a gain sound) is condition the sound and keep it from running all through the mix. Another thing to keep in mind too...and you'll love this little bit of info here...

When you are tweaking your guitar tones as well as your input levels, always play the song you are going to record. The reason being...you're going to get different signal levels on different chords like I mentioned before. Like, if an A chord isn't in the song, you'd not want to adjust your input level lower than you need to....which you would have to do because of that A. Granted, as long as you're at about -6dB peak going in, you'll be fine for just about everything but it helps when you play the song you are going to record. It helps you set the right levels as well as the right eq curve.

If I play something using a low Bb like that little tune I posted up a few weeks ago, I'm not going to use the same eq that I would use for something else tuned to standard, know what I mean? Certain tuning brings in different sets of circumstances as well as eq possibilities. You may need a little more high end sparkle on a low tuned guitar because of two things...

1. There will rest assured...be a bit more low end going on.

2. There will be less tension on the strings which unfortunately, also takes a little bite out of the tone.

All these things also come into play when you make your compression choices because of how the tuning, chords used, amount of gain in the tone etc, reacts when the compressor is used. So keep some of this in mind. I had a feeling removing that low end blanket would make a huge difference in your tone. There are a few plugs out there that allow you to listen to what is being removed when you high pass. Like, you can click a button and it allows you to hear just the low end it is removing. This is what taught me a bit about what to listen for. Once you can identify with hearing frequencies mess with your tracks, they literally stick out to you like a sore thumb without even having to use one of those plugs with the button that shows you what it's removing.

That said, most of those types of plugs over-accentuate what they are truly removing. My friend Philip from this forum and I were working on a song where we used one of my high gain guitars. He was using a plug by Waves that had one of those "difference" buttons and it was for some odd reason, showing lots of 8k and above frequencies in my tone that do not exist. Putting my tone on a scope, and you see it drop down to nothing after 4k. However, the noise this thing would put out when you solo'd up what it was actually removing....was brittle to where you couldn't even hear these frequencies in my tone at all.

For me, I can hear things that are offending at all times. There was nothing offensive in this tone that should have brought about the high end this plug was claiming to be there. So my point is...if you use any of these types of plugs, do not hold too much stock in "the difference" button when it exists. It definitely over-accentuates what it is really working with. The good thing about some of those types of plugs though, when you DO have a problem it can teach you what the problem area sounds like.

For example....if you used a Waves Eq that had that "difference button" and got the eq to sound the way you wanted it removing the low end in your guitars we were working with...and then hit the difference button...you'd hear this blanket of low end kinda like an "uhhhhh' or a "wuuuhhh" sound. But the plug with "the difference" button engaged would make it so dominant, you'd be like "ok, I know I got too much low end in my tone...but there ain't no way I got that much!" But hearing it in that state...shows you what to listen for so when you DO listen to your tone...this sort of sound, though not as accentuated, will be what you want to take away in moderation. You'll get this stuff man...just stick with us and keep asking questions. :)

-Danny

Here is a thread I posted a while back you may find useful

http://forum.cakewalk.com...;m=2116921&mpage=1

Hi Jeff, I really like your article, but as evidenced by Chuck's experience last night... I think the advice to wait until the end to consider the threshold isn't the best way to learn about compressors.

If the threshold isn't set to a useful place you'll never hear the things you are speaking of listening for in the attack and release explanations... so you have to work on threshold AS you consider all the other stuff.

That is the thing about using a compressor... like so many artistic endeavors, you have to consider more than a few things simultaneously and gracefully bring many ideas together into a state of conciousness where you no longer think in terms of sequential steps.

Having said that... I think you post is filled with very useful information.

Well done!


all the best,
mike

DeeringAmps


Thanks Danny and Jeff, a wealth of information here.

Danny, drifting off topic here, but you mentioned the UAD stuff.
I know at least 2 of us have mkII's on the way with the free DUO card.
What are the "essential" UAD plugs in your opinion?

Thanks,
Tom

Hi Tom, you're welcome and sure, I'll give you my take for what it's worth. Keep in mind, these are of course just my opinions on these plugs...but I feel they are valid ones because I work with so many different styles of music on a daily basis. Don't let the long hair rocker thing fool ya. LOL! I do rap one day, R&B the next...jazz the next, pop the next, techno the next, metal the next, then country and then some instrumental guitar music the next....so I use this stuff on a wide array of music all the time. From ixing, mastering, helping me produce...I've really given this stuff a work-out. But here are my picks in order of importance going right down the line.
 
*=Necessities for me only
No * means info...might be useful.
 
*Channel strips: I like both the NEVE 88 RS and the SSL E. The cool thing about these is, you can mix and match having a NEVE and an SSL in your mix. :) And...if you have the Waves version, you'll notice the UAD uses no system resources...so this is a plus. All the UAD 1 type plugs barely tap the resources on the card.
 
Compressors and limiters:
 
DBX 160: I like the dbx 160 on bass guitars. To me, dbx has just always had a cool way of handling bass transients and their comps always have a bit of a color to them. Kinda dirty at times, but just adding enough dirt so that it's grit, not bad over-drive. Some guys hate their compressors. To me, it depends on how clean your instrument is. The grit this can add is a good thing with a super clean signal. The grit it can add if your signal isn't clean...can make you want to hang yourself. So it's definitely a "special comp" in my opinion.
 
*Fairchild 670: What's not to like about this? You can use it on anything really. I personally love it on drums as it seems to add a bit of color to them as well as keeping them consistent due to the additional controls this comp gives you that others don't have. You'll find one of these on every drum bus for every project I use. This is also awesome for parallel compression on drums.
 
I'm not a fan of LA3A or 1176 type compressors although the LA2A is my weapon of choice for squashing rooms, over-heads, and simulated/user created room atmospheres. The 3A just doesn't do anything for me, but I have it just in case. It's good to have an 1176 on hand just to have one...but it's not something I run to for lots of things.
 
I'm this type of engineer Tom....for years, my battle has been to get rid of noise, drive and other "snerts" within my mixes. I sincerely don't like when things drive unless they are supposed to "drive" at the source. Anything that literally adds drive to an already printed sound just never sat too well with me. I like things as clean as they can be as well as being as pure as they can be. These types of compressors dirt up more than they compress in my opinion and I have just always hated that drive type sound unless the instrument is literally printed with drive. Things I hate with drive...bass guitars, vocals, synthetic hammond simulations using comps like these or "drive" plugs etc.
 
I've never been a fan of any of the SSL type comps. I don't know what it is...but none of them ever give me the results I'm looking for. I'd say use the one in Sonar X1 and save your money and skip the UAD version.
 
*NEVE 33609: One of the best comps ever made in my opinion hands down. You can use this on anything and everything. I especially love it on lead vocals as it seems to breathe incredibly well no matter what vocal you throw at it.
 
*Precision Bus Comp: The best bus comp I have ever used. This thing is killer for anything that you have layered that you send to a bus. Put this baby on a bus, process the layers as an entity and it does the rest for you. The filter control is an awesome touch for adding a little coloration if need be.
 
*Fatso Jr. and Sr: Dear Lord, thank you for these incredible compressors that you have given me! I can't brag enough about these...because quite simply, these are the closest "coloration" compressors out today that come close to having a hardware comp. The coloration controls make an incredible difference. I use the Jr. on my 2-bus, the Sr. on anything....really nice on bass, back up vocals, string ensembles...it's just an awesome comp package.
 
*Studer A-800 Tape Deck: Dear Lord....sound familiar? LOL! This really does a nice job at giving you that tape saturation so many plugs claim they can do. This one really does it right to me, Tom. I have a Tascam 16 track 1 inch machine here and a Tascam 24 track 2 inch machine here. I've used and loved tape for years, so I know quite a bit about the analog realm. This Studer hits that tape driven sound nearly to the "T" and you can actually mess with the bias, tape brand, calibration and speed. It's great on every channel of a mix, as a two bus enhancement along with a 2-bus comp....it's just off the hook in my opinion. I'm in a Van Halen tribute band on the side. One of the toughest things in my opinion, is nailing the timbre of Eddie's sound. Not the sound itself, but that saturation he's getting due to being so loud and having his output tubes literally cook. I really don't like to play or record that loud, so I'm at an instant disadvantage by not cranking up my amp. However, enter the Studer 800, tweak it a bit, and there's that Eddie saturation with control over the timbre of the saturation.
 
*SPL Transient Designer: This is an amazing little piece. Many have tried to emulate it, no one (in my opinion) has it down like SPL. This thing is incredible at transient control. Make a snare drum resonate more, crack harder, take the ring out of toms or make dead toms come to life, add a bit of pizazz to an acoustic guitar, make a bass guitar less percussive and almost fretless...or curb the pick attack of a bassist that is using one of those heavy picks making the bass sound terrible...this will help you with all that stuff.
 
Delay/Modulation: I like the Dimension D and the Boss Chorus because in my opinion, they give you sounds that no other plug give you that do the same or something similar. They just do their jobs differently. I wouldn't call these plugs "necessities" so to speak, but they are truly "different" and cheap enough to add to your tool box "just because"....especially the chorus as it has its own distinct sound.
 
Eq's: Manley Massive Passive is a really different eq. I personally feel it gets a bit too much hype if I can be honest? It's really cool, but to me, not something you want to use all the time...but that's just me. I do, however, use the Manley Massive Passive Mastering plug for subtle enhancements due to how it seems to color mastered material. It just adds a little sparkle in a good way. But to me, a surgical eq it is not.
 
*NEVE 1073/1081: I love these. Great for fine tuning just about anything...but the 1081 sounds great on vocals for me as well as anything that you may want to really hone in on. The same with the 73...they just have different qualities. I don't think any of the other NEVE eq's are needed.
 
*Cambridge: Great for surgical stuff as well as anything really. Necessity? Yeah...only because of its surgical values when you may be in a pinch. But if you don't encounter that often, you can hold off on this.
 
*Pultec Pro: I love this...especially on guitars. I had it for years on the UAD 1 and only used it once in a while. I guess because I just didn't quite understand it. I made friends with Beau Hill who produced bands like Alice Cooper, Dweezil, Ratt, Winger, Europe, Warrant etc. He and I became really good friends and would talk on the phone for hours. Me picking his brain on techniques, him picking mine because he had just switched over to pro-tools and all this new software gear. He was used to the big NEVE and SS consoles etc...so this new way of doing things was not quite to his liking at first. But we became really good friends (still good friends to this day actually) and he shared some tips and tricks about the Pultec as well as some of the settings he had used through the years. I don't know if you've ever heard Beau's work, but he was responsible for most of the killer guitar sounds from all the bands in the 80's signed to Atlantic. One thing he always did well, was guitar tones. Warren DeMartinni, Reb Beach, Kee Marcello, Dweezil Zappa...all killer tones produced by Beau. So he turned me onto this thing because he had always had the hardware version with him on all his production jobs. It's amazing how this piece enhances ANY guitar tone just by turning it on.
 
*Precision plugs: If you get one precision plug, the Multiband is by far the greatest of all time. Nothing I have ever used compares to this thing. As a matter of fact, it's so transparent and non-offending, I've replaced my API 2500 in my mastering chain with this for some jobs. It's so easy to use, it's amazing how it makes things glue together in a good way. This is also great for guitars that may be whoomfing a bit or a low tuned bass that may lash out at you on certain notes. Dial in the frequency, jump on the threshold a little and bang...it keeps the sound totally in check without artifacts of any kind.
 
The Precision Eq is a pretty cool eq. Not a necessity, but again, another tool for surgery moments.
 
Precision Hz and kHz plugs: These really work well for a wide array of situations. The Hz plug can really help you with low end instruments like kick drums, bass, left hand keys/strings. The kHz is great for enhancing the upper end of the spectrum. For example...you can't find the crack you want in a snare or the attack/crack you need on a tom....this will always help you achieve that. Totally transparent and smooth without sounding synthetic. Necessities? It depends on the engineer and what you're faced with, but I have them and use them fairly often. None of the other Precision plugs get any use for me. Their maximizer is horrible...maybe worse than Boost 11.
 
*Reverbs: All their reverbs are good...seriously. My main two from UAD are the EMT plate 140 and the voice of God Himself....the EMT 250. That 250 is just crazy. Not useful for everything...but man, when you use it on things that it enhances...look out. Incredible on lead vocals, back ups, strings, piano's...it just has a sound that is all itself. The Lexicon...well, the name says it all. Killer verb unit here good for everything. However, I don't find it a necessity nor do I find these last two necessities because I have impulses and other units that do what they do to be honest. The Dream Verb and Pro Verb are both really good verbs...different sounding...but not as lush as I like my verbs to be. Still good and the different sound they give off is good to have in your tool box for those times when "lush and transparent" isn't the way to go.
 
Hope some of this helps, Tom. If you have any questions or anything, let me know.
 
Chuck: I didn't think you'd mind me sharing this stuff in your thread because you're a good guy. In the event my novel here is bothersome, let me know and I'll remove it and forward it to Tom privately. Thanks brother. :)
 
-Danny

Danny,
Thanks so much for taking the time.
Looks like I have a little research and budgeting to do.

Tom

The most disheartening thing about The Daniac's posts?



I can NEVER find fault with them*




*Unless it's a typo.





Rock on Danny.

UAD is a PCI-e card that "hosts" the software(plugins) loaded on your hardrive.

Think of it a s dongle (but inside your computer*)

*If you have a desktop. If you are a laptop and have an express card slot you can get the UAD-2 Laptop Solo.

Ya

Aye

Thanks Danny.

I totally agree that there are many many ways to arrive at the sound each, or any, of us may be listening for.

all the best,
mike

Danny Danzi

  
 ...
*Pultec Pro: I love this...especially on guitars. I had it for years on the UAD 1 and only used it once in a while. I guess because I just didn't quite understand it. I made friends with Beau Hill who produced bands like Alice Cooper, Dweezil, Ratt, Winger, Europe, Warrant etc. He and I became really good friends and would talk on the phone for hours. Me picking his brain on techniques, him picking mine because he had just switched over to pro-tools and all this new software gear. He was used to the big NEVE and SS consoles etc...so this new way of doing things was not quite to his liking at first. But we became really good friends (still good friends to this day actually) and he shared some tips and tricks about the Pultec as well as some of the settings he had used through the years. I don't know if you've ever heard Beau's work, but he was responsible for most of the killer guitar sounds from all the bands in the 80's signed to Atlantic. One thing he always did well, was guitar tones. Warren DeMartinni, Reb Beach, Kee Marcello, Dweezil Zappa...all killer tones produced by Beau. So he turned me onto this thing because he had always had the hardware version with him on all his production jobs. It's amazing how this piece enhances ANY guitar tone just by turning it on. 
  
 ... 
-Danny

Thank you for your detailed and fun reading post there.
I thought I'd mention something nice that seems to me to be unique in the Pultec and that is narrow top boost on the drum bus. It's a bit contrary to the norm for eq method raising narrow' but it's a nice way to place and slip in some brightness w/o altering much of the tone balance in the sub mix. (You can go in just above and not mess with the snare's high center you have placed for example.)
For what ever reason it seems to go well on that plug where the same just doesn't sit well on some other eqs.