Black Box HG-2MS, 3D depth, punch and sheen all in one plugin
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- Опубліковано 8 вер 2024
- Critically acclaimed jazz and prog rock mixing and mastering engineer Mark Wingfield demonstrates audio examples of Plugin Alliance Brainworx Black Box Analog Design HG-2MS in a mastering situation on a stereo mix.
Mark has mixed or mastered three Downbeat Magazine Masterpiece Albums of the Year, two JazzWise Best Releases of the Year and three All About Jazz Best Albums of the Year. Jazz albums he has mixed or mastered have received more than 300 rave reviews worldwide. Mark mixes and masters at his UK based Heron Island Studio.
If you are interested in working with Mark on your next album you can contact him here:
heronislandstudio.co.uk
Being able to Saturate below or above a certain frequency is one of the most Productive features of this plugin. using this plugin right, will allow your mix to sound 3D and "like a record"
Best saturation plugin ever!! I bought it without even testing it!!
After using different saturators- but not in a master bus-I finally picked it up today on PA sale. I used your tweets as starting points and fine tuned them to remedy for youtube exaggeration and to adopt to my material of course. Works (subtly) very well to bring up the third dimension from a mix. I made a few first presets and named them after you in respect! Thank you for the insight on this plugin.
Cheers, glad it was helpful!
I think it is the best and most useful purchase I made this beginning of the year ..with a super offer from the Plugin Alliance ... This Video is excellent and I now understand many subtleties and exact functions ... Thank you very much for clarity of explanations!
Thanks, glad it was useful. Yes I'm finding this plugin makes it's way into many of my mixes.
Thank you so much for the review.
Cheers!
Thank you Mark for the great lesson and the fantastic music !
Cheers!
I've been tinkering with the basic Black Box plugin a while and just picked up the MS version on sale. This was the first video I watched for orientation and to review the extra features.
I just wanted to say how much you helped me achieve the clarity and depth I was after. Excellent run down and amazing focus on the points that really matter. Liked and subscribed.
All the best!
Pretty impressive plugin. I think I need this in my life especially now with the M/S option. I've been using The Oven for mastering purposes before the Limiter but I might have to get this and compare...
I love the sound of the Oven. It's frustrating it doesn't do mid/side like the black box. But the Oven does sound great,
Thank you for this video, I bought this plug-in some days ago and it's really amazing! About the output compensation level, it's enough to hold "shift" while you move the Pentode's knob and of course the same thing for the Triode ;-)
Thanks for the tip!
Crazy how good this is
Great video and lesson Mark. Thanks so much for all the examples and words of wisdom. Truly appreciate it! Great stuff!!
Cheers!
excellent demonstration! it definitely gives very nice depth... thanks!
Cheers!
@@heronislandstudio8054 ...by the way, what is the name of the band/song you were mastering? very nice song!
@@themastroiannis Yes, i would love to know that too. It is very inspiring !
Thanks for your video, you absolutely convinced me about upgrading to the new version, really brings the functionality to a whole new level.
You know there is autogain if you shift+click whilst turning the Pentode and Triode knobs. The output knob gets turned down automatically
Great tip but its ALT+click not shift+click 😀
I mostly just use the density parameter anyway and leave the other settings as I prefer
Simply wow, thank you
Great video! Thanks! ;-)
Cheers!
Been playin with it since release, it is a weapon, thanks for this
Cheers
Gr8 vid ...gr8 plug in
Cheers
LIVES IN MY MIX BUS 😊
11:40 Start video here
Yes auto level compensation very important...apparently from an earlier comment ...its there.... cool
Thanks for another excellent video Mark ! I've watched this a few times, it's really impressive how you open up the mix and get a more '3D' sound using the HG2 ms. Beautiful music by the way. Would love to hear your thoughts on the Softube Drawmer 1973 multiband compressor and how you would use it !
Hi Mark. What a great video. Can I ask who the artist is? It sounds a lot like Gavin Harrison's band "Dizrhythmia". All the best.
Can't you just send mono of a signal to one track and side signals to another track and there just use the old hg2 plugin separately ?
Yes you could, but you would not be able to fine tune the saturation section the way you can in the new version. In the original, you have a preset tilt filter for the saturation hi or low setting. With the new version, you can tune the filter position individually to each track. I find this makes a huge difference.
Where would you put this in your mastering chain if there's additive eq? Would you create the desired frequency response first and judiciously saturate the highs and lows or would you try this on first and see if any shelving eq is still needed to achieve the clarity you seek?
I don't have a definite rule, it depends on the source material. But I would normally put this near the end, though not necessarily as the last process.
@@heronislandstudio8054 thank you!
Great sound, quite versatile too. How would you compare it to the Vertigo VSM-3?
I like the Vertigo but I think the Black Box MS is more versatile and you have more detailed control. But the saturation on both is different. The Vertigo can sound really great.
@@heronislandstudio8054 thank you.
They really should've added gain compensation to the new version...
They didn't add oversampling 😞
If you check Blackbox in Plugin Doctor you can see that there is no noticeable aliasing even when the saturation is turned way up. So either there is oversampling already or they have coded in a way that doesn't need it. I don't know anything about coding, but I have heard some eminent DSP coders explain that oversampling is not the only way to avoid aliasing.
use sparingly, too many mixes are slammed with saturation and its killing dynamics, on a super clean master a little saturation can add some needed energy and punch, but then again what the hell do i know 😅
i'm still unable to understand what's the issue with tricking your ears? if the trick seems to work? i mean all audio-manipulation is trickery, right?...to some extent? i mean we're making music, much of it quite goofy, to be frank, not some bullet-proof paradigm to end world hunger to the very end of time....that said i like this device a lot....the m/s addition is quite appreciated.
don't for get to tell people that there is a popping sound when ever you hit play back or bounce down not to mention this is a back that is over a year old and you have not fixed it don't for get that
Yes that's true in Logic when you bounce this plugin makes a click and I forgot to mention that (I haven't checked it in Pro Tools or Cubase). So thanks for pointing that out. I did contact support and they said they are aware of the issue and it will be fixed in the next update, so let's hope they do.
@@heronislandstudio8054 how long ago did u send ur ticket in because for some its been over a year
@@GILLISH Three of four months ago problably.
why wouldn't you hear the 3d on headphones?
Because on headphones you are right in the middle of the soundstage. Listening on speakers is more like listening to a gig or being in a room watching musicians play in front of you. With headphones it's more like you are one of the musicians, that's the perspective you have to the soundstage.
@@heronislandstudio8054 OK, appreciate it!
@@heronislandstudio8054 So basically it has audience perspective but not performer perspective? Although, on your end, comparing it to another brainworx product, would you say it holds up? Say vs Iron spl etc
does so little , almost not worth mentioning. Ozone has a Multiband saturator (exciter) that has more flexibility. MS also.
What do you mean, "does so little"? It does its own thing in its own way, and has its own flavour
@@KariKauree yes, i guess that is true