Compression

Re: Compression

John Chiara said:
Yeah, sorry for the tangent. I just get frustrated. I did an opening gig for a National this week and the house guy didn't patch in any comps because he doesn't use them. I am assuming ignorance but Man I am baffled by so many seemingly uninterested mix engineers. Again, trying to imagine another occupation where just getting by is acceptable. I think this prevalence makes it hard to convince owners, promoters or even bands that there is a difference out there.
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It's not the fact that mix engineers aren't interested enough in the technology, science, and art of what they are doing (though they most definitely aren't), but rather that they are so few good, experienced, and educated engineers at the lower levels that when and if the owners/promoters/bands move up the ladder, they aren't educated/exposed to the technology enough to understand why it's important to get good equipment/engineers- let alone that there are better ones who know their craft better than inexperienced club volunteers who only know their Kraft.

But that's another tangent. :razz:
 
Re: Compression

:-D This thread blossomed nicely.

Shall use my new gig as opportunity to experiment with compression.

For the record I LOVE gates!!!!! (And if I had to choose, I'd choose gates, and if i recommended someone buy some outboard processing, it'd be compressor/gate devices and why in the world on a console with no buses would you Just want compression?!!! Still so so baffled).
 
Re: Compression

Lisa Lane-Collins said:
:-D This thread blossomed nicely.

Shall use my new gig as opportunity to experiment with compression.

For the record I LOVE gates!!!!! (And if I had to choose, I'd choose gates, and if i recommended someone buy some outboard processing, it'd be compressor/gate devices and why in the world on a console with no buses would you Just want compression?!!! Still so so baffled).
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If you want gates that really, really work, I'd say get gates, not gates that are part of a compressor/limiter. There may be some which are functional, but all that I've seen are really "stupid" gates. Really functional gates are those which will respond to a specifically chosen frequency or range of frequencies/
 
Re: Compression

Dick Rees said:
If you want gates that really, really work, I'd say get gates, not gates that are part of a compressor/limiter. There may be some which are functional, but all that I've seen are really "stupid" gates. Really functional gates are those which will respond to a specifically chosen frequency or range of frequencies/
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Yes, yes, and yes again. Without a proper key filter to prevent the gate from opening when triggered by other adjacent signal sources it is pretty much useless for live sound. The easiest example is on a snare drum using the low cut portion to stop the kik from opening the gate and the hi cut filter to remove the hi hat. In the case of a single filter, centering on the snare drum fundimental and then narrowing the Q to remove the kik and hi hat is basically the same thing. At that point you can really shape the sound of the snare with the hold and release controls.
 
Re: Compression

I've designed a few of both and dedicated stand alone gates are generally different animals than the functions added into compressor/limiters, A common problem with added compression is that you boost the noise floor along with the signal. Many compressors build in some downward expansion or gating to deal with this boosted noise floor. Dedicated noise gates are designed to operate up to higher thresholds and open/close more aggressively.

Different horses for different courses.

JR
 
Re: Compression

Lisa Lane-Collins said:
:-D This thread blossomed nicely.
why in the world on a console with no buses would you Just want compression?!!! Still so so baffled).
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Here is a for example: The lead vocal, the one everyone is here to see and hear doesn't project when he/she speaks but really belts it out when when singing. The transition from talking to sining may be nearly instantaneous. Instead of sweating out riding the gain for maybe hours, setting the comp just right can make life for you AND the audience much easier.

The same is true for any vox or instrument that transitions from can't hear to overly loud.

As to whether the compressor is place in the channel insert or a bus, that is a matter of choice based on the needs of the show an personal preference.
When mixing monitors from FOH a comp in the vocal bus only insures that no compression is added to the monitor mix.
 
Re: Compression

Tim Perry said:
Here is a for example: The lead vocal, the one everyone is here to see and hear doesn't project when he/she speaks but really belts it out when when singing. The transition from talking to sining may be nearly instantaneous. Instead of sweating out riding the gain for maybe hours, setting the comp just right can make life for you AND the audience much easier.
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I'm in that situation fairly frequently when mixing for contemporary worship services, and usually try to give myself plenty of room to ride up the input fader for the softly spoken parts.

You don't find you're squashing the dynamics for singing too much when you use compression+makeup gain to bring out the spoken parts? What sort of general parameters for compression do you typically use in that scenario?
 
Re: Compression

Jeff Carter said:
I'm in that situation fairly frequently when mixing for contemporary worship services, and usually try to give myself plenty of room to ride up the input fader for the softly spoken parts.

You don't find you're squashing the dynamics for singing too much when you use compression+makeup gain to bring out the spoken parts? What sort of general parameters for compression do you typically use in that scenario?
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Split the problem mic into two channels. Set up one channel for the spoken voice/comp. Let the other channel handle the dynamic voice with little or no comp.
 
Re: Compression

Dick Rees said:
Split the problem mic into two channels. Set up one channel for the spoken voice/comp. Let the other channel handle the dynamic voice with little or no comp.
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That method works very very well if you have the extra channels and compressors. Put a fast attack and high ratio, say 6:1 or better on the speaking channel and set the threshold to come in hard at anything beyond speaking. Use the gain makeup on the compressor to get the voice in fader range, you will have the headroom at the fader during the loud parts when the compressor clamps down. Cut the gain back on the "singing channel" and set the fader so that the combination of both channels is at the correct volume for the singing part. You shouldn't have to worry with it anymore. You really wont hear the singing channel much at all at voice levels. The compressor will clamp down on the speaking channel and the singing channel will add the dynamics back in. If you have another channel of compression you can process the singing channel at a much lower ratio and just tame the peaks. Usually you can get away with just a compressor on the voice channel (which is the problem channel).

The other thing you can do if you only have one channel is to use a softer ratio (3:1 or even a little less) and bring the threshold way down so that you are actually just starting to see compression during the speaking. Not quite as natural sounding as the multi channel method but it is a hands off the fader method as well. The thing to remember is that lower compression ratios sound more natural if they still do the job. If you have the controls you can back the attack off a little bit to add a little dynamic content but you have to be really careful or it will not clamp down fast enough on the loud parts.

Let us know how it works out for you Jeff.

-Eric
 
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Re: Compression

Dick, Eric--

Thanks for the tips. It's a digital console with plenty of spare input processing channels so definitely doable in my situation. It's a couple of weeks until my next turn in the rotation but I'll report back with the results.
 
Re: Compression

Eric Cagle said:
That method works very very well if you have the extra channels and compressors. Put a fast attack and high ratio, say 6:1 or better on the speaking channel and set the threshold to come in hard at anything beyond speaking. Use the gain makeup on the compressor to get the voice in fader range, you will have the headroom at the fader during the loud parts when the compressor clamps down. Cut the gain back on the "singing channel" and set the fader so that the combination of both channels is at the correct volume for the singing part. You shouldn't have to worry with it anymore. You really wont hear the singing channel much at all at voice levels. The compressor will clamp down on the speaking channel and the singing channel will add the dynamics back in. If you have another channel of compression you can process the singing channel at a much lower ratio and just tame the peaks. Usually you can get away with just a compressor on the voice channel (which is the problem channel).

The other thing you can do if you only have one channel is to use a softer ratio (3:1 or even a little less) and bring the threshold way down so that you are actually just starting to see compression during the speaking. Not quite as natural sounding as the multi channel method but it is a hands off the fader method as well. The thing to remember is that lower compression ratios sound more natural if they still do the job. If you have the controls you can back the attack off a little bit to add a little dynamic content but you have to be really careful or it will not clamp down fast enough on the loud parts.

Let us know how it works out for you Jeff.

-Eric
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I feel stupid for never thinking of this.
 
Re: Compression

Most of the multi channel compression stuff falls in the "compensation for poor muscianship" catagory. The old trick of making a drummer more consistant can be done the same way with kik and snare.
 
Re: Compression

Eric Cagle said:
That method works very very well if you have the extra channels and compressors. Put a fast attack and high ratio, say 6:1 or better on the speaking channel and set the threshold to come in hard at anything beyond speaking. Use the gain makeup on the compressor to get the voice in fader range, you will have the headroom at the fader during the loud parts when the compressor clamps down. Cut the gain back on the "singing channel" and set the fader so that the combination of both channels is at the correct volume for the singing part. You shouldn't have to worry with it anymore. You really wont hear the singing channel much at all at voice levels. The compressor will clamp down on the speaking channel and the singing channel will add the dynamics back in. If you have another channel of compression you can process the singing channel at a much lower ratio and just tame the peaks. Usually you can get away with just a compressor on the voice channel (which is the problem channel).

...

Let us know how it works out for you Jeff.

-Eric
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Ran this today, worked brilliantly. Was able to go between the worship leader speaking (with some light instrumentation in the background) to belting out her singing parts with minimal fader tweaks.

With the "speaking" channel not sent to any of my reverbs I was actually OK leaving the reverbs up during her speaking parts as well, which was a nice bonus.

Thanks again for the tip.
 
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