Analog comeback?

Re: Analog comeback?

Scott Bolt said:
Interesting topic.

I believe that the reason that IEM's are more susceptible to someone actually hearing the comb filtering is that the act of plugging up the ear canal amplifies the direct sound from their skull....
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Bingo. I've varied the delay in my vocal channel by very small amounts just to hear the difference that time changes even less than millisecond can make. very bizarre. Even switching the polarity causes a very noticeable change in the sound of my vocal in my IEMs.

In my case i've found that i'm usually better off with slightly MORE latency as that tends to put the weirdness into a frequency range that is less bothersome. That and i usually run my IEM hot enough that the level overcomes most of the occlusion effect.
 
Re: Analog comeback?

Scott Bolt said:
I believe that the reason that IEM's are more susceptible to someone actually hearing the comb filtering is that the act of plugging up the ear canal amplifies the direct sound from their skull.
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If you plug in a pair of headphones and a vocal mic, you can hear a difference in the low frequencies just by flipping the polarity back and forth while talking into the mic. With earbuds the effect is even more obvious. But somebody else listening several feet away will likely not hear a difference.

A prospective niche product for the analog world would be a little box that mixes the direct mic signal together with the stereo mix from the digital monitor console. Perhaps with some EQ and compression... maybe we're talking about a little mixer/interface box that could go into a 500 rack so you can put some boutique EQ/compression modules into the other slots for a complete mix&match vocal monitor chain.
 
Re: Analog comeback?

brian maddox said:
Bingo. I've varied the delay in my vocal channel by very small amounts just to hear the difference that time changes even less than millisecond can make. very bizarre. Even switching the polarity causes a very noticeable change in the sound of my vocal in my IEMs.
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Polarity will make a huge difference even with out any delay.
In my case i've found that i'm usually better off with slightly MORE latency as that tends to put the weirdness into a frequency range that is less bothersome. That and i usually run my IEM hot enough that the level overcomes most of the occlusion effect.
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A loger delay causes more closely spaced combs so more diffuse than short delay, but not clear it is better. If delay is short enough combing only affects HF.

JR
 
Re: Analog comeback?

This was the scene Saturday at FOH for a well-known 90's country artist. His FOH engineer had a smile on his face at the end, while they initially wanted a digital console he said man "this blows those things away!"
 

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Re: Analog comeback?

Looking at your photo Brandon, some thoughts.....
I haven't mixed a show using a graphic EQ in probably the last 5 years now. Everything is parametric, and I have never missed the graph one bit.

I do miss the analog console surface though. When I mix on analog I find I will do a lot more DURING the show with EQ, whereas with digital I am mostly just adjusting balance once EQ and processing is set. I'll crank the HF on an acoustic gtr during a chorus to help it cut through a dense mix, I'll adjust upper mids and top end of vocals depending on the song, I'll sometimes toggle the LF or the attack of a kick between verse and chorus, etc, etc. It's just not that practical to do that sort of thing on digital consoles since I can't manage multiple changes at the same time.

Analog is definitely more fun for me... but I say this as a digital owner.
 
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