When do you use tube saturation?

mild to low levels of tube saturation can be used to "warm up" an otherwise cold sounding track. It's sometimes just called warming or gentle tube as in Ozone in a preset. In the multiband harmonic exciter there is a tube setting.... it introduces a slight tube saturation to the sound.  Gives it some color.

Of course you can vary the amount of drive or how much distortion these things can add but also consider backing it off a fair way and let it not crunch the signal very much at all but simply listen to what it is doing in this mode instead. It might be good on busses eg an electric guitar buss especially if most of those guitars are crunchy or anything like that. (driven harder) But it might just be the ticket on a drum buss too if backed off a lot.

I have got a Boss distortion pedal (XTortion) XT2. Now this is interesting because I have run some nice synth pads through it but backed it off entirely so it was not distorting at all but it gave the synth parts a nice punchy attitude which really stood out in a busy mix. So I was using this pedal in completely non distortion mode, almost clean mode if you could use that term.

It could be like a compressor either crunching hard with 10 db of gain reduction or simply doing very light duties with only 2 db of gain reduction. In the very light mode you will hardly hear it all but but when switched out it is very noticable.

What Herb is saying is useful too as even in backed off mode might just add a slight warmth to the sound that was not there previously. Do some Bypass tests carefully and really listen for what it is actually doing to your track or buss etc..

jamescollins


Who was it around here that said something like, "I've never recorded anything I've hated enough to put the tube saturator on". Classic.

I wish it was me James because that's always been my exact thoughts. I'll never use one of these things on any of my material. If I do, it will come by way of UAD Studer 800...the one that has this type of sound down. All the others that claim to do this...sound like digital distortion to me...you know...when you run a master bus a bit too hot or you're clipping a channel? That's just how they sound. It's like....these plugs give me digital clipping type artifacts....real saturation doesn't sound remotely close to that at all. On both of my tape machines here (16 track 1 inch and 24 track 2 inch) I have NEVER heard a saturated sound from them that sounded like these supposed saturator plugs. What I get from driving tape or even a tube mic pre...is a completely different sound. Almost like the difference between a distortion pedal verses an over-drive pedal. The tube saturator plugs sound like bad distortion pedals...a real saturated sound is like a lightly clipped, pleasant to listen to, over-drive.
 
I have to admit though...I was down the shore at my other studio tonight and was messing with the Soft Tube saturator in Expanded. Though I'm still not crazy about those types of plugs (they just sound crackly and sonic to me) having the low, mid and high adjustment was kinda cool. It literally made the drive sound less abrasive in certain situations. I could *maybe* find a subtle use for that in a pinch...but I just can't bring myself to use any of these things.
 
So you have my answer there as well, Max...the answer is...never. :)
 
-Danny

I always use other things when I want the colour blue with some brown mixed in other than the obvious digital boutique circuit saturation emulations.

I almost exclusively use Camel Audio's free Camel Crusher as a send effect and I use Bootsy's Ferric TDS on a bus.

There is only one reason that I bother at all, that reason is called Sample Libraries.  These of course are sounds recorded (often clinically) from many disparate sources and in order to make them sound like they are bespoke for a particular project this kind of colouration provides some overall textural unity.

Mike's description of blue with brown mixed in is a good one as a pictorial artist (or even an interior decorator) will often 'dirty' colours with a key colour to bring a sense of unity to a painting.

So Camel Crusher (preset 'Ultra Phat' is in the right ball park) does that for me and is particularly effective on fake strings and horns and dialled lightly in as a send effect.  Ferric TDS I then use if needed as a bus compressor for gluing a sub-mix together. Don't forget with tape emulation as with real tape you are aiming for the spot where your signal would be maximizing the saturation of the tape (spanning the red line) not trying to pin the meter to max where the nasty distortion occurs.

Both of those plugs are free and if I found anything to serve that particular purpose better I might even buy something to replace them.

Don't forget it isn't drive, crunch or distortion you are after here if you want that use an Amp modeller instead.

Jonbouy


I always use other things when I want the colour blue with some brown mixed in other than the obvious digital boutique circuit saturation emulations.

I almost exclusively use Camel Audio's free Camel Crusher as a send effect and I use Bootsy's Ferric TDS on a bus.

There is only one reason that I bother at all, that reason is called Sample Libraries.  These of course are sounds recorded (often clinically) from many disparate sources and in order to make them sound like they are bespoke for a particular project this kind of colouration provides some overall textural unity.

Mike's description of blue with brown mixed in is a good one as a pictorial artist (or even an interior decorator) will often 'dirty' colours with a key colour to bring a sense of unity to a painting.

So Camel Crusher (preset 'Ultra Phat' is in the right ball park) does that for me and is particularly effective on fake strings and horns and dialled lightly in as a send effect.  Ferric TDS I then use if needed as a bus compressor for gluing a sub-mix together. Don't forget with tape emulation as with real tape you are aiming for the spot where your signal would be maximizing the saturation of the tape (spanning the red line) not trying to pin the meter to max where the nasty distortion occurs.

Both of those plugs are free and if I found anything to serve that particular purpose better I might even buy something to replace them.

Don't forget it isn't drive, crunch or distortion you are after here if you want that use an Amp modeller instead.

This guy gets it.













So do the rest of you... I'm just having a joke with my pal Jon.

:-)

Johbouy, interesting routing.  Have to give that or something similiar a try.

And like EQ or 'verb or many things, with distortion/saturtion you want to "hear" it.  But by the point it can be too much.  Back off so you only "feel" it. 

@

bitflipper

...followed by real analog silence.

Had to smile on that one... It would then most likely be followed by a very real-sounding human gasp, or even possibly a loud human cry. (No audiophiles needed.)

Or explictive deleted.

Yes, I remember the QuadraFuzz.

One thing that puzzles me is when some one explains that they mainly use synths for their music and so they appreciate having a saturation process to fatten up the tone.

Honestly, it leaves me thinking... "what was wrong with the synth?"

We can easily learn that the two Saturators in PC simply add some harmonics and some noise.

I can not, for the life of me, figure out how you can play a synth patch and wait until after the fact determine that you need to add more harmonics.

Additive synthesis is a basic form of synthesis; It is used in old Pipe Organs and every other organ on the planet.

Additive synthesis is all about adding harmonics to a base tone. Traditional additive synthesis is the original Saturation tool.  Why does anyone need an extra automated saturator to pile harmonics on top of that?

How does someone practice the craft of patching up a tone while postponing the harmonic tweaks until mix time?

With a organ... it's just another flick of a switch or a pull on a draw bar... while you are playing. It seems pretty darn easy.

So I can't think of many good uses for a thing called a Saturation plug in. I just don't get it.

Organs and string sections have always provided beds for music... and I think that adding a "bed" of saturated tone can be a great arranging trick. All the other instruments bias up, if you will, on top of that tone. The interaction creates similar effects to what people seem to look for with a Saturation plug in. Using a bed appeals to me... it's *musical*, what ever that means.


I know this statement may come alarmingly close to frustrating my favorite colleagues... but it's something that truly leaves me wondering what's up.

It's obviously another way to work, and I know people really appreciate the effect.

My buddies in town have their *heat* and they think it's super cool... I told them "Please, don't even bring it up around me." and we all had a big laugh.


I guess I just don't get it.

:-)

all the best,
mike

I use tube saturation just before the rinse cycle.

I would suggest that almost every filter I can think of has a non linear output.

The fundamental idea of additive synthesis is that mashing two tones together creates exciting harmonics.


The other day I was playing around with Dimension Pro... you can mash 4 tones together with that sampler... and away you go.

I was surprised to learn that many people were unaware how easy it is to mash up your own tones with Dimension Pro, where as that is all I would ever think to use it for.

I'm just a hack of a guitar player, but it is an ironic fact that Craig Anderton's two books for guitarists (one with the Quadrafuzz in it) were the windows for my realization that my chain of foot pedals is actually a modular synthesizer. I figure I have been enthused about synthesizers for quite some time. I love it.

The QuadraFuzz is another example of additive synthesis at work.

I help a friend tune church Pipe Organs... well, honestly I just drive him to places and try to make sure he doesn't fall onto the pipes as he's up hanging in the ghost. I really enjoy the idea that they are acoustic synthesizers. I mean, think about that, acoustic synthesis.. how cool is that?

Anyways, I'm just babbling.

all the best,
mike

ChuckC


Are we talking about for instance.... the Saturation sliders on the left & right sides of the vx64 vocal strip?  

I was specifically talking about the one in Pro Channel and Pro Channel Expanded.

Interesting, Mike, about mashing tones in DimPro.  I often find myself stripping out and down presets and working on one element to get the tone, and then adding moreto it.  But I seldom have more than two elements going, unless there is a lot of timing or frequency differences going on.  I mean, an element is a complete synth engine on its own.

I guess I try to layer different synths to mash the tones, rather than get one synth to do it.  Like your pipe organ (or piano played over the entire keyboard), it is very easy to fill up the entire spectrum w/ one instrument or line. 

@

I agree, I enjoyed reading that link. It provides lots of stuff to think about.

Good stuff.

Thanks for posting.

all the best,
mike

I thought I'd add one, as I don't think it's been mentioned:

A common application for "tube" distortion is as an alternative to EQ for bringing up som midrange in bass instruments and making their tone more audible in the mix!

Since the harmonics generated by the plugin (or analog fuzz box or whathaveyou) are tracking the fundamental, the additional output stays the same no matter which note the bass is playing (unlike when using EQ where some notes are accentuated more than others).

I find that Expanded's SoftTube module in "keep low" mode works great for this purpose!

Sven