I did live sound for 15 years and worked with a guy also named Dave who I consider a genius, just like you. Can’t thank you enough for these tutorials Dave.
How have I not seen this channel before?! I'm just a clueless hobbyist with a collection of studio gear in my basement that I play at being an engineer on and unlikely to ever do live sound but there's still a wealth of information for my needs in everything I've seen so far. Thank you feller!
When I first started out (nearly 45 years ago), compressors were not something typically found in an effects rack. Therefore, we (my monitor engineer and I) would depend on the musicians to control their dynamics by what they were getting back in the foldback speakers. Any singer worth their salt knows how to work the mic to get the dynamics they were wanting to express. Same went for the horn players. One reason I put MD441 mics on the saxes was so that they could see the mic and work it accordingly. Back then, drummers understood the difference between pp and ff. Guitarists typically had a compressor stomp box and controlled themselves based on what everyone else was doing at the time. We rode the faders to get dynamic emotion. If I did have compressors in the rack, I would insert them across the sub-groups and use sparingly. I get the feeling that many of the younger live mixers these days would benefit greatly by having to learn how to mix without compressors. I have heard too many horror stories of shows ruined by mixes that pander to the bottom 3 octaves at the expense of the rest of the frequency range. Too many seem to mix from the bottom up (kick, snare, bass), where as I always mixed from the top down (get the vocal mics righteous first and bring the rest of the band into a supporting role).
Yes! Years I mixed big band and all was well controlled by musicians. But now with bigger better sound systems providing high quality sound to large areas, even musician control is not enough
Best 5$ I’ve ever spent. Definitely worth all the knowledge/concepts etc. being dropped here. Telegram discussions. Zoom chats. Appreciate it Dave! 🤘🏼.
Thanks for your awesome time Dave its worth to me to be part of all the precious hours and years of experience you share with us. Its definitely wort it. I Thank you!!!
love your cautious air towards bass di and bass players in general. I feel like a huge part of bass playing is being consistent AND dynamic. Accents create groove, and dynamics make a song cohesive
To anyone on the fence about becoming a member, I will say I have found it to be 100% worth it. The insights Dave provides are truly one of a kind and having access to the member content is absolutely worth so much more than the price of admission. Dave, thanks for another fantastic video!
I reference "all this" fairly frequently. I've been super-impressed ever since the blog years at the information and perspective you share. There's a lot to be said for sharing and reinforcing good information with our peers and the public. I've been a fan since hearing Agent Orange in my favorite club on what I believe was a Rat system (whatever that was back in 1982/3!). It was the first time I'd ever heard the tone of drums and it set me on a life course that is still paying off today!
@@DaveRat Seattle's Metropolis, just a stones throw from the Kingdome. A few years later I was the frat boy who offered Black Flag a basement to play in after the fire department shut down the show in Eugene -- they lined three walls of our basement with (what I might assume were your) cabinets and set up on the fourth. I stood between the band and the crowd linking arms with every big dude we could find and remember the sweat condensing on the ceiling and falling like rain during the set. I think we packed 400 kids into a 30' basement. Now I mostly do civic good with charity galas and awards ceremonies but occasionally get to have some fun with music.
Very cool and definitely was there. I remember that gig and the speakers down to the basement. Any pics? That would be amazing and great stuff! I remember the Met and well
At the 8 minute mark: A really good room, recorded by fabulous mics with "reach" like the Flea 50, produces a wonderful sound. Mics 20 to 30 feet away from a full orchestra.
As long as there is not a reinforcement sound syst n in the same room as is what happens with live shows, far mics work or can work. But if the sound of theic is reamplified in the same room, then much of the sound a far mic pics up is a regeneration. That is the big issue
Adding my comments to the pile about Professor Dave. There's this interesting experience listening to Dave when he calmly lays out facts and ideas that are intentionally simple and obvious. Thats how he sets the trap! And then presents relationships and meaning that are obvious only after they are explained. So much pedagogical fun!
Dave, I love it. Your videos are educational, confirming, entertaining, comfortable and just fun to watch. I like what you did with the sound of a spark at the end, even the rat exploding was just hilarious
Awesome as always Dave! The effect of the room and the distance shows the importance of the positioning of the microphone in the Studio. Your visual methods of explaining the
Really interesting stuff - explains why I always find it easier to get a good recorded drum sound with a Glyn Johns style approach, rather than lots of close mics.
I remember my first audio engineering course, our instructor drew a drum set on the board and said "Let's mic it!" and drew one mic over the drums. Then he said "Oh wait we paid for all those mics so we gotta use them too ..." 😆
Yes for recording in a dead room fewer mics at a distance works well and can give a desired sound. For making a drum set live in rooms that are even remotely reverberant and in situations where there is a reamplification of the drum set in the same room, making it a distance is one of the worst things you can possibly do
@@DaveRat would you say there is a valid use case for methods like Glyn Jones in a live setting? Or would you prefer to always close mic no matter what? Thinking of smaller venues, bars and clubs…
Close mic'ing reduces reamplification of room sound, reduced out of time bleed for m other instruments and monitors from being picked up and Increases gain before feedback. For scenarios where the room is well damped, stage volume is low and there is minimal bleed from the room or other instruments into other mics, increasing the mic distances will have minimal negative impacts.
I've found tools like parallel compression and multiband compression to be helpful. As digital consoles continue to progress, these tools are increasingly available for hardly any additional cost (you don't have to rack up additional equiment), but they can also be created if you have enough extra channels available. I use parallel compression for public speakers who are particularly dynamic so their quiet moments aren't too quiet and his loud moments aren't too loud. I can compress them down to a perhaps a 10 dB range and add an uncompressed signal back in so that the natural sound quality is restored. I can also start with an uncompressed signal and add in a heavily compressed signal underneath it so the combined signal is effectively compressed from the bottom up. This works as long as the processing latency is the same on each split signal so the modified amplitudes of the signal are additively recombined without any cancellation. I can do this with multiband compression where I might mic a cajon that is producing a bass drum sound and a snare sound. I can isolate the frequency ranges for each of those and compress them differently although they are coming from the same microphone. I picked up using these kinds of tools from the post-production processing side of the recording industry. Many of these tools they use have applications in a FOH setting.
Parallel gating is something I found especially useful. Gated drums on 1 vca and non gated on another, now you have vsa control to slide between gates and open and anywhere in-between. Soft songs no gated, fast songs all gates and the rest somewhere between.
A fabulous explanation, Dave. This really helped in my understanding of how compression helps recreating something a little bit more natural. Thank you!
I wish that there was a recorded music format that effectively delivers the music as stems (yes, I understand the I.P. problems that presents) and then the playback system could interpret and mix and master the music in realtime based on the mechanical characteristics or context of the playback. Got some big nasty home speakers in a quiet home? Headphones with good isolation? Mega dynamics! Listening in your car with a lot of road noise? Compress it so the quiet parts don't get lost! Little rinkydink speaker? Independently EQ and compress the stems to maximize apparent dynamics with limited power/displacement! Background music in a cafe? Independent compression per stem so it doesn't "pump" while maintaining comfortable background music levels.... etc
Thanks Dave! Your a scholar and a genius! Your videos are so informative! Always enjoying every video as I try to stay up to date! Thank you sir for your wealth of knowledge to share with others, even small PA guys like me!
Great topic Dave! I never regret the $5 membership and neither does anyone else that comes to shows that I mix since it only gets better the more knowledge I can apply ;-)
I had a bit of a chuckle watching this. You were talking about the different types of enclosures being quite reactive and others "naturally reducing dynamics'. I've got an 802 in pieces replacing the shading circuit components at the moment
Good stuff! I have not heard one of those in over 30 years. Sold my 901s to a friend with a crown d150 amp a few years back. That was a nice old school sounding setup
it's amazing to me how you can record a mic's direct output, and comparing it to what you heard through the PA it'll sound really shoddy and inconsistent a lot of the time. You hear a singer through the mic very well regardless when amplified, where listening at bedroom levels it sounds super weak.
@@DaveRat one thing that's clear from live sound, that I've discovered to be very true even in just video game sound design, is the massive difference that sheer VOLUME makes. You think a lightswitch sound, or a footstep, is too bass heavy and thumpy. Then in the game, at the appropriate level, it sounds just right. When designing the sounds you're hearing them dry and at s loud volume. Turning it down and adding the reverb, things change so much.
Awesome Dave, this is something I have been stewing on for the last few months . Great way of explaining it and it made total sense to me. One less thing to keep me up at night haha. Cheers from nz
I always find your videos interesting, educational, and thought provoking. They are very much appreciated. Flip side is I don't always have time to watch them. :(
Yes, in analog I would calibrate all the compressors with a 1k tone, such that all thresholds were the same at 0db (18 in digital), all output levels and all comps were matched. Then I would add make up gain to the compressors on things I want on top of the mix. And use that gain to set the desired mix goal balance.
Hi mr.dave i wanna ask..say i'm sending a compressed signal to the amp...is the amp read it as a regular signal or compressed signal??? Cause sometime we add gain after compressing..our console say its not clipping but the amp say its clipping...any advice/best way to avoid this?? Thanks mr dave
Compression is just a really fast volume control that turns down the loudest parts. Compression won't prevent your amp from clipping Compressing a signal can reduce the amount of clipping but if you turn the signal up louder it will clip again
I love compression. but also don't abuse it.. and I have been evolving in how I use compression for 30 years.. if I feel like I a following my own equation, I take a break for a while then come back fresh after I forget my settings then I sit there and "re find" my new refined settings for each instrument. but anyways, the reason why I love compression is ( and this holds for live and studio for kind of different reasons ).. but live, proximity matters a lot because live, we want each channel to be as isolated as possible and so naturally, we place the mic as close to the source as possible which removes the natural "damping" factor that volumes of air create for sound and certain frequencies which tend to be much louder at close proximity will be picked up much louder than frequencies which tend to survive the distance.. ??? that's sort of what my brain tells me anyways, that's probably not true.. but some stuff just is way too loud in the signal and some stuff is there but not loud enough so I feel like I try to use compressors to "add in" the volumes of air which were removed without adding the time-delay due to the speed of sound. and then I finish the sound off with EQ. But see : this is a super fake way of capturing sound but for me???? that's okay. Now there are purists out there who don't want all that treatment and oddly enough many of those are in the "Punk" scene. anyhow when I do my own music, I am intentionally going for sounds which no instrument makes. I'm trying to create the illusion massive instruments at low volumes. Most of my recordings are only a few tracks. Drums being the bulk of them. I have one plan to use just 1 mic on drums, 1 on bass, 1 on guitar, and 1 on vocals : a 4 track recording that sounds HUGE and use effects to make it stereo. (probably mono drums). I think it would be cool if albums had one song that was a 4 track recording. (think of how your knowledge could make this sound HUGE by using a stereo pair to capture the band in a live-ish setting) and you would have two tracks left to stack vocals or To do a stereo vocal capture of the band and maybe the whole band could stand there like a choir in close proximity.. so much could be done to create a variety of outcomes with just 4 tracks but with modern microphones and preamps and tools... I think it is just a cool exercise. the rest of the album could have 400 tracks if you want. anyways.. as always I watched this whole video and really enjoyed it.
I HOPE YOUR HAND/WRIST GETS BETTER QUICK. the stove lighter demo was super cool.. you're pointing out things I've heard but never thought to describe to anyone before.. I think there must be some "compression" algorithm for the tascam recorder because you'd think the reverb in the "room" should be relatively the exact same regardless of the proximity to the stove (when you're only moving a few inches) but the "snap" should be much louder relative to the reverb at close proximity?? I need to listen some more--> BUT if there is a built in auto level or compression (because even if you have controls, I have noticed some devices also have some degree of automated management controlling their inputs).. but this recorder would be closer to a digital console would it not?? like a cheaper one?? anyhow there is another reverb happening here which is the Steel frame of the oven itself !!! that arc creates a vibration which comes from the stove itself ( a plate verb ) which should be louder at close proximity to the stove.. but as you pull the device away it would be picking more of the room-verb up. obviously , it is always picking both up but this is why I am asking about the built-in automated portion of the controls--> Certainly a cellphone has that. the quality difference from a recorder app to a video camera in a cell phone is huge usually, probably because of decades of refinement of the automated level controls working in the video app have really dialed up the level management.. but the recorder apps seem to be more crude because they don't let you set your own gain and they have it sorta hyped up such that it doesn't take much to clip the inputs and it doesn't sound warm or nice.. so the phone has a ton of dsp power on tap to process these levels. that tascam recorder probably has much less available and I'm asking a question or sharing what I am thinking more than claiming this is happening. but since I have sat there and listened to this sound before, I am aware that the metal itself will vibrate to the snap (and you can FEEL IT if you touch the stove while its happening, you can feel the taps of the arc) at least on mine you can... I have a Sony recorder. it was cheap and "okay". I love tascam stuff though. I have a tascam cd burner. I believe the arc is caused by a sudden "switching off" of power and since you can never have an "instantaneous" change in current, the sudden switch off by a transistor causes an open circuit and the voltage "needs to " arc the closest gap to correct the situation where as just a moment before, everything was fine.. so strange how that works. I think its even a low voltage getting turned off that causes that super high voltage build up at the point of the arc.. I know you can picture this or correct me on it.. but a relatively low voltage built up over a few seconds is still quite a few electrons.. and when it is suddenly opened instantaneously, then those electrons hop the closest gap to equalize nature....mini lightning. the correction for this is a bunch of de-bouncer circuits around switches. but you know it happens even with big amps.. when you throw the switch off, often there is a nice big blue arc that comes out of both sides of the plastic power switch cover that your finger just pushed!!!
I had all the compression and limiting turned off. It's probably more of a metering thing where there's the same amount of energy occurring in a certain period of time whether you're close or far and when you're close the energy all occurs early and as you get far the energy occurs over a longer period of time. We see this with meters in averaging and RTA and measurement gear
Cowboy junkies whites off earth now and Trinity session.calrec ambiosonic mic into 2track stereo live.ive been chasing that sound for a long time and every now and then I get close.
Tailoring your compression for the monitors that the singers here to each artist is important. I think dividing this up into two parts. Part one is the compression on the sound that the singer hears of themselves. And for that they might want none or some and they are hearing a combination of the in ears or stage monitors and their internal voice Then you have the sound that's being propagated to the audience two larger speakers that may need more compression and may require a different compression strategy to be optimized
Hey!! Quick question, I work for a audio and lighting company and there’s always an argument when comes to testing speakers going out and coming in from a gig , can anyone suggest me the best way to go about testing speakers
One good way is to use an amplifier that has the capability of measuring the speaker impedance like the l-coustics, PowerSoft and lab gruppen amplifiers. Combine that with Smaart for some analyzation software and a mic. Put pink noise or sleep into the speaker the amp will tell you whether or not it's acting similar to other speakers or its previous state and the analyzation software will tell you if it's putting out the proper sound. If you have a setup you roll the speakers in call up the parameters test and see if they're falling within spec
Yeah I think we do have some hoodies in that size. Give a call to 805-383-0777 the rat office and push the button for sales and they can look and see. Cool cool
Would you have any tips for using compression with a system where the compression tends to exacerbate feedback issues? Do i just be more aggressive with my GEQ and Parametric? My experience so far with digital consoles sounding clinical is sometimes the compression seems to boost frequencies that can make a sound more almost brittle eliminating some of the dynamics of the actual sound.
Using compression will increase the average volume and often has the side effect of increasing feedback. Raising the threshold so that only the peaks are compressed and using a higher ratio and not impacting the average volumes will reduce the transients without increasing feedback
I've been hearing people talking about "transients" for years...somehow I managed to not know what they meant. Transient sounds like "transition", so I had the wrong idea. I thought it was some subtle thing. Wouldn't it be more descriptive to say "attack"? I mean, synths and effects all use "attack"... Curious where the term "transient" came from? It feels like the wrong word to use.
Hmmm, transient as in occuring over a short period of time. Comes and goes away. Transient humans are constantly on the move. Transfer and transistor are relating to change. Short term fast changes in signal. Seems good to me for a a description
Attack I think is a word used more by people who work with synths while transients is more of an audio/recording thing. I'd say you can use either word and someone knowledgeable would know what you were talking about. If you break out the old school big boy audio books you will see the word transient or transients thrown around more than the word attack. It took me a lot of years of reading and doing audio to really understand the stuff that Dave breaks down and describes so clearly in this video. Thanks Dave, this is the first video of your's I have seen and It is really really well done. I look forward to watching the rest of the stuff on your channel.
Attack has to do with the beginning of the signal, release or decay has to do with the end of the signal. A transient is a signal or part of a signal with an extremely fast attack and extremely fast decay or release. -ish This is muddled by the fact that a square wave or other waveforms with sharp edges contain loads of hig frequency content needed to make the sharp edge. This HF content appears as burst of HF creating a transient. Adding a low pass filter reduces the transient. So another way toook at transients is as a burst of signal that has substantial high frequency content and lasts for a short period of time. When I say " high req content" that would be high FREQS in relation to the bandwidth at hand. So for subs, a transient will be much lower frequencies than for tweeters.
Ha! Yeah,in the event of worst case scenario I could end up with needing to dump a cup of water on some things ny embers glowing on my stove! But, that said, this is R19 certified cotton house insulation so the odds of me ne ding to get that cup of water is minimal
Interesting. I met Sebastian once. I was doing sound for chili peppers in Santa Barbara and Chad, peppers drummer and I went over to sebastions apartment/crash pad and hung out and listened to stuff. He gave me some recordings of John Bohnam drum tracks that we nothing but drums for maybe 6 Zeppelin songs. If you have not heard them, they are pretty cool and findable if ya Google them.
To answer that question one must first define the application and goal. Recorded music very rarely is recorded without compression on some or all instruments. Home hifi speakers tend to be incapable of dealing with uncompressed conted. This is easily demonstrated by trying to use home hifi speakers for live music applications. Compression can be divided into two main categories, individual instrument or input compression and master or mic compression. Without input compression, most music becomes borderline unlistenable and can not be broad ast over radio or played back on consumer speakers at anything but very low levels. That said, most non live audio people confuse mastering compression with channel compression The over use of mastering compression to increase that average volume level of music can sound quite undesirable. With live music, compression is used way less and using lots of compression increases feedback issues. So if we were to generalize, compression is pretty much necessary and beneficial for recordings and live reinforcement, One exception is classical music and other acoustic recordings where no compression may be used to maintain accuracy. That said, those non compressed mixes tend to be far mic'ed not close mic'ed. By far mic'ing the room itself and reverberations of the the room sort of acts like a compressor by reducing the volume differential between the loudest and softest sounds. What we don't want is the over use of compression to where it degrades the sound.
@@DaveRat I don't understand , they saved my life and in the same time made me hate people more BUT i love you for those video, great job for numbs as me.
I did live sound for 15 years and worked with a guy also named Dave who I consider a genius, just like you. Can’t thank you enough for these tutorials Dave.
🤙👍🤙
How have I not seen this channel before?!
I'm just a clueless hobbyist with a collection of studio gear in my basement that I play at being an engineer on and unlikely to ever do live sound but there's still a wealth of information for my needs in everything I've seen so far.
Thank you feller!
Great to meet you thank you and welcome!
When I first started out (nearly 45 years ago), compressors were not something typically found in an effects rack. Therefore, we (my monitor engineer and I) would depend on the musicians to control their dynamics by what they were getting back in the foldback speakers. Any singer worth their salt knows how to work the mic to get the dynamics they were wanting to express. Same went for the horn players. One reason I put MD441 mics on the saxes was so that they could see the mic and work it accordingly. Back then, drummers understood the difference between pp and ff. Guitarists typically had a compressor stomp box and controlled themselves based on what everyone else was doing at the time. We rode the faders to get dynamic emotion. If I did have compressors in the rack, I would insert them across the sub-groups and use sparingly. I get the feeling that many of the younger live mixers these days would benefit greatly by having to learn how to mix without compressors. I have heard too many horror stories of shows ruined by mixes that pander to the bottom 3 octaves at the expense of the rest of the frequency range. Too many seem to mix from the bottom up (kick, snare, bass), where as I always mixed from the top down (get the vocal mics righteous first and bring the rest of the band into a supporting role).
Yes! Years I mixed big band and all was well controlled by musicians.
But now with bigger better sound systems providing high quality sound to large areas, even musician control is not enough
Best 5$ I’ve ever spent. Definitely worth all the knowledge/concepts etc. being dropped here. Telegram discussions. Zoom chats. Appreciate it Dave! 🤘🏼.
Mike you rule and thank you!!
Thanks for your awesome time Dave its worth to me to be part of all the precious hours and years of experience you share with us. Its definitely wort it. I Thank you!!!
You are awesome Hennie!
love your cautious air towards bass di and bass players in general. I feel like a huge part of bass playing is being consistent AND dynamic. Accents create groove, and dynamics make a song cohesive
Agreed
Dave you are a legend and a fantastic teacher.
Humbled
I use compression as a effect. Never knew I’d love it so much
🤙👍🤙
To anyone on the fence about becoming a member, I will say I have found it to be 100% worth it. The insights Dave provides are truly one of a kind and having access to the member content is absolutely worth so much more than the price of admission. Dave, thanks for another fantastic video!
Thank you Lucy and great to see you and hang at the zoom chat!
I reference "all this" fairly frequently. I've been super-impressed ever since the blog years at the information and perspective you share. There's a lot to be said for sharing and reinforcing good information with our peers and the public. I've been a fan since hearing Agent Orange in my favorite club on what I believe was a Rat system (whatever that was back in 1982/3!). It was the first time I'd ever heard the tone of drums and it set me on a life course that is still paying off today!
So cool Clint! Where was the club and love Agent Orange!
@@DaveRat Seattle's Metropolis, just a stones throw from the Kingdome. A few years later I was the frat boy who offered Black Flag a basement to play in after the fire department shut down the show in Eugene -- they lined three walls of our basement with (what I might assume were your) cabinets and set up on the fourth. I stood between the band and the crowd linking arms with every big dude we could find and remember the sweat condensing on the ceiling and falling like rain during the set. I think we packed 400 kids into a 30' basement. Now I mostly do civic good with charity galas and awards ceremonies but occasionally get to have some fun with music.
Very cool and definitely was there. I remember that gig and the speakers down to the basement.
Any pics? That would be amazing and great stuff!
I remember the Met and well
@@DaveRat it sounds weird now but I don't think anyone took a single picture. I was black and blue from neck to toes the next day. Unforgettable.
Yeah, not a lot of pics from back then. Good times and great to meet ya again!
At the 8 minute mark: A really good room, recorded by fabulous mics with "reach" like the Flea 50, produces a wonderful sound. Mics 20 to 30 feet away from a full orchestra.
As long as there is not a reinforcement sound syst n in the same room as is what happens with live shows, far mics work or can work.
But if the sound of theic is reamplified in the same room, then much of the sound a far mic pics up is a regeneration. That is the big issue
Always thinking outside of the box. You my friend are a world wide treasure. Love from Australia.
Thank you Dan and love Australia!
That's Y he is that 🐐. I would love to seeing him work In a live stream
🤙👍🤙
Thanks for all you do!!!
Awesome and thank you Steve!
the recording of this video sounds great on a pair of ADAM A7s here! lovely and balanced sound!
👍🤙👍
Adding my comments to the pile about Professor Dave. There's this interesting experience listening to Dave when he calmly lays out facts and ideas that are intentionally simple and obvious. Thats how he sets the trap! And then presents relationships and meaning that are obvious only after they are explained. So much pedagogical fun!
Truly honored and thank you James!
Dave, I love it. Your videos are educational, confirming, entertaining, comfortable and just fun to watch. I like what you did with the sound of a spark at the end, even the rat exploding was just hilarious
Fun and yeah the sound for the extro was fun to do
Awesome as always Dave! The effect of the room and the distance shows the importance of the positioning of the microphone in the Studio. Your visual methods of explaining the
phenomenon of the microphone distortion. Many thanks!
Super cool Randy!
Really interesting stuff - explains why I always find it easier to get a good recorded drum sound with a Glyn Johns style approach, rather than lots of close mics.
I remember my first audio engineering course, our instructor drew a drum set on the board and said "Let's mic it!" and drew one mic over the drums. Then he said "Oh wait we paid for all those mics so we gotta use them too ..." 😆
Yes for recording in a dead room fewer mics at a distance works well and can give a desired sound.
For making a drum set live in rooms that are even remotely reverberant and in situations where there is a reamplification of the drum set in the same room, making it a distance is one of the worst things you can possibly do
@@DaveRat would you say there is a valid use case for methods like Glyn Jones in a live setting? Or would you prefer to always close mic no matter what?
Thinking of smaller venues, bars and clubs…
Close mic'ing reduces reamplification of room sound, reduced out of time bleed for m other instruments and monitors from being picked up and Increases gain before feedback. For scenarios where the room is well damped, stage volume is low and there is minimal bleed from the room or other instruments into other mics, increasing the mic distances will have minimal negative impacts.
@@DaveRat awesome info!
Another great video about the reality of recording and reproducing audio. I wish more “audiophiles” talked about these realities
Awesome and thank you
I've found tools like parallel compression and multiband compression to be helpful. As digital consoles continue to progress, these tools are increasingly available for hardly any additional cost (you don't have to rack up additional equiment), but they can also be created if you have enough extra channels available. I use parallel compression for public speakers who are particularly dynamic so their quiet moments aren't too quiet and his loud moments aren't too loud. I can compress them down to a perhaps a 10 dB range and add an uncompressed signal back in so that the natural sound quality is restored. I can also start with an uncompressed signal and add in a heavily compressed signal underneath it so the combined signal is effectively compressed from the bottom up. This works as long as the processing latency is the same on each split signal so the modified amplitudes of the signal are additively recombined without any cancellation. I can do this with multiband compression where I might mic a cajon that is producing a bass drum sound and a snare sound. I can isolate the frequency ranges for each of those and compress them differently although they are coming from the same microphone. I picked up using these kinds of tools from the post-production processing side of the recording industry. Many of these tools they use have applications in a FOH setting.
Parallel gating is something I found especially useful. Gated drums on 1 vca and non gated on another, now you have vsa control to slide between gates and open and anywhere in-between.
Soft songs no gated, fast songs all gates and the rest somewhere between.
@@DaveRat Oh, interesting! I can use that.
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Great content. I download podcasts and compress them in Audacity for listening in the car. I don't miss anything and I don't get deafened.
🎛️👍🎛️
A fabulous explanation, Dave. This really helped in my understanding of how compression helps recreating something a little bit more natural. Thank you!
You are awesome Dave!
@@DaveRat right back at you, Dave!
I wish that there was a recorded music format that effectively delivers the music as stems (yes, I understand the I.P. problems that presents) and then the playback system could interpret and mix and master the music in realtime based on the mechanical characteristics or context of the playback. Got some big nasty home speakers in a quiet home? Headphones with good isolation? Mega dynamics! Listening in your car with a lot of road noise? Compress it so the quiet parts don't get lost! Little rinkydink speaker? Independently EQ and compress the stems to maximize apparent dynamics with limited power/displacement! Background music in a cafe? Independent compression per stem so it doesn't "pump" while maintaining comfortable background music levels.... etc
Agreed
that was very enlightening, as always : ) Thank you Dave to share so much with us.
🤙🎛️🤙
Great analysis and survey of things to think about. Thanks so much for helping to improve my live sound environment.
Cool cool Tom thank you
This is the weirdest and most informative dog-petting ASMR video I've ever seen 🖤
I love that
Thanks Dave! Your a scholar and a genius! Your videos are so informative! Always enjoying every video as I try to stay up to date! Thank you sir for your wealth of knowledge to share with others, even small PA guys like me!
🤙👍🤙
Great topic Dave! I never regret the $5 membership and neither does anyone else that comes to shows that I mix since it only gets better the more knowledge I can apply ;-)
Thank you Cory!
I had a bit of a chuckle watching this. You were talking about the different types of enclosures being quite reactive and others "naturally reducing dynamics'. I've got an 802 in pieces replacing the shading circuit components at the moment
Good stuff! I have not heard one of those in over 30 years. Sold my 901s to a friend with a crown d150 amp a few years back. That was a nice old school sounding setup
Thanks Dave, much love mate!
Awesome and thank you!
Funny how the sound of the stove spark at 2% speed sounded exactly like the sound of fireworks outside of my house with windows closed. Totally got me
Interesting and inspiring as always ✌🏼
Awesome and thank you!
it's amazing to me how you can record a mic's direct output, and comparing it to what you heard through the PA it'll sound really shoddy and inconsistent a lot of the time. You hear a singer through the mic very well regardless when amplified, where listening at bedroom levels it sounds super weak.
So many variables and too many assumptions will lead us astray
@@DaveRat one thing that's clear from live sound, that I've discovered to be very true even in just video game sound design, is the massive difference that sheer VOLUME makes. You think a lightswitch sound, or a footstep, is too bass heavy and thumpy. Then in the game, at the appropriate level, it sounds just right. When designing the sounds you're hearing them dry and at s loud volume. Turning it down and adding the reverb, things change so much.
Awesome Dave, this is something I have been stewing on for the last few months . Great way of explaining it and it made total sense to me. One less thing to keep me up at night haha. Cheers from nz
Cool cool Bryce!
Hey, DB! Thanks for enduring the stove clicking for knowledge and science 😂 20:50
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I always find your videos interesting, educational, and thought provoking. They are very much appreciated. Flip side is I don't always have time to watch them. :(
Got to watch at double speed!
Hi Dave,
Would you normally put the threshold at the nominal level before compression? Say -18 db?
Do you always add some makeup gain?
Yes, in analog I would calibrate all the compressors with a 1k tone, such that all thresholds were the same at 0db (18 in digital), all output levels and all comps were matched.
Then I would add make up gain to the compressors on things I want on top of the mix. And use that gain to set the desired mix goal balance.
Very interesting! Thanks, Dave! 🙂
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amazing info
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You are my Hero Dave! :)
Big smile and thank you TheMidBoss!
Hi mr.dave i wanna ask..say i'm sending a compressed signal to the amp...is the amp read it as a regular signal or compressed signal??? Cause sometime we add gain after compressing..our console say its not clipping but the amp say its clipping...any advice/best way to avoid this?? Thanks mr dave
Compression is just a really fast volume control that turns down the loudest parts.
Compression won't prevent your amp from clipping
Compressing a signal can reduce the amount of clipping but if you turn the signal up louder it will clip again
Yeah!
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Thanks Dave great talk ! I sampled the stove you recorded you don't mind if I make music with it ?
Do it! Awesome!
Thank you for sharing this! (and dogs! 😆)
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I love compression. but also don't abuse it.. and I have been evolving in how I use compression for 30 years.. if I feel like I a following my own equation, I take a break for a while then come back fresh after I forget my settings then I sit there and "re find" my new refined settings for each instrument. but anyways, the reason why I love compression is ( and this holds for live and studio for kind of different reasons ).. but live, proximity matters a lot because live, we want each channel to be as isolated as possible and so naturally, we place the mic as close to the source as possible which removes the natural "damping" factor that volumes of air create for sound and certain frequencies which tend to be much louder at close proximity will be picked up much louder than frequencies which tend to survive the distance.. ??? that's sort of what my brain tells me anyways, that's probably not true.. but some stuff just is way too loud in the signal and some stuff is there but not loud enough so I feel like I try to use compressors to "add in" the volumes of air which were removed without adding the time-delay due to the speed of sound. and then I finish the sound off with EQ. But see : this is a super fake way of capturing sound but for me???? that's okay. Now there are purists out there who don't want all that treatment and oddly enough many of those are in the "Punk" scene. anyhow when I do my own music, I am intentionally going for sounds which no instrument makes. I'm trying to create the illusion massive instruments at low volumes. Most of my recordings are only a few tracks. Drums being the bulk of them. I have one plan to use just 1 mic on drums, 1 on bass, 1 on guitar, and 1 on vocals : a 4 track recording that sounds HUGE and use effects to make it stereo. (probably mono drums). I think it would be cool if albums had one song that was a 4 track recording. (think of how your knowledge could make this sound HUGE by using a stereo pair to capture the band in a live-ish setting) and you would have two tracks left to stack vocals or To do a stereo vocal capture of the band and maybe the whole band could stand there like a choir in close proximity.. so much could be done to create a variety of outcomes with just 4 tracks but with modern microphones and preamps and tools... I think it is just a cool exercise. the rest of the album could have 400 tracks if you want. anyways.. as always I watched this whole video and really enjoyed it.
I HOPE YOUR HAND/WRIST GETS BETTER QUICK. the stove lighter demo was super cool.. you're pointing out things I've heard but never thought to describe to anyone before.. I think there must be some "compression" algorithm for the tascam recorder because you'd think the reverb in the "room" should be relatively the exact same regardless of the proximity to the stove (when you're only moving a few inches) but the "snap" should be much louder relative to the reverb at close proximity?? I need to listen some more--> BUT if there is a built in auto level or compression (because even if you have controls, I have noticed some devices also have some degree of automated management controlling their inputs).. but this recorder would be closer to a digital console would it not?? like a cheaper one?? anyhow there is another reverb happening here which is the Steel frame of the oven itself !!! that arc creates a vibration which comes from the stove itself ( a plate verb ) which should be louder at close proximity to the stove.. but as you pull the device away it would be picking more of the room-verb up. obviously , it is always picking both up but this is why I am asking about the built-in automated portion of the controls--> Certainly a cellphone has that. the quality difference from a recorder app to a video camera in a cell phone is huge usually, probably because of decades of refinement of the automated level controls working in the video app have really dialed up the level management.. but the recorder apps seem to be more crude because they don't let you set your own gain and they have it sorta hyped up such that it doesn't take much to clip the inputs and it doesn't sound warm or nice.. so the phone has a ton of dsp power on tap to process these levels. that tascam recorder probably has much less available and I'm asking a question or sharing what I am thinking more than claiming this is happening. but since I have sat there and listened to this sound before, I am aware that the metal itself will vibrate to the snap (and you can FEEL IT if you touch the stove while its happening, you can feel the taps of the arc) at least on mine you can... I have a Sony recorder. it was cheap and "okay". I love tascam stuff though. I have a tascam cd burner. I believe the arc is caused by a sudden "switching off" of power and since you can never have an "instantaneous" change in current, the sudden switch off by a transistor causes an open circuit and the voltage "needs to " arc the closest gap to correct the situation where as just a moment before, everything was fine.. so strange how that works. I think its even a low voltage getting turned off that causes that super high voltage build up at the point of the arc.. I know you can picture this or correct me on it.. but a relatively low voltage built up over a few seconds is still quite a few electrons.. and when it is suddenly opened instantaneously, then those electrons hop the closest gap to equalize nature....mini lightning. the correction for this is a bunch of de-bouncer circuits around switches. but you know it happens even with big amps.. when you throw the switch off, often there is a nice big blue arc that comes out of both sides of the plastic power switch cover that your finger just pushed!!!
I had all the compression and limiting turned off. It's probably more of a metering thing where there's the same amount of energy occurring in a certain period of time whether you're close or far and when you're close the energy all occurs early and as you get far the energy occurs over a longer period of time.
We see this with meters in averaging and RTA and measurement gear
Cowboy junkies whites off earth now and Trinity session.calrec ambiosonic mic into 2track stereo live.ive been chasing that sound for a long time and every now and then I get close.
In a live situation do you find vocalists like compression on their mic? I know some like to control it themselves with proximity .
Tailoring your compression for the monitors that the singers here to each artist is important.
I think dividing this up into two parts.
Part one is the compression on the sound that the singer hears of themselves. And for that they might want none or some and they are hearing a combination of the in ears or stage monitors and their internal voice
Then you have the sound that's being propagated to the audience two larger speakers that may need more compression and may require a different compression strategy to be optimized
as usual great info... 🤘🤘
Thank you!
Hi, Mr Bones! 5:48
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Hey!! Quick question, I work for a audio and lighting company and there’s always an argument when comes to testing speakers going out and coming in from a gig , can anyone suggest me the best way to go about testing speakers
One good way is to use an amplifier that has the capability of measuring the speaker impedance like the l-coustics, PowerSoft and lab gruppen amplifiers.
Combine that with Smaart for some analyzation software and a mic.
Put pink noise or sleep into the speaker the amp will tell you whether or not it's acting similar to other speakers or its previous state and the analyzation software will tell you if it's putting out the proper sound.
If you have a setup you roll the speakers in call up the parameters test and see if they're falling within spec
And then there is the club dj.... So far only 1% that I have met really understood "red light makes you sound bad"
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Hi dave do you sell the RAT jackets (xxx)
Yeah I think we do have some hoodies in that size. Give a call to 805-383-0777 the rat office and push the button for sales and they can look and see. Cool cool
Would you have any tips for using compression with a system where the compression tends to exacerbate feedback issues? Do i just be more aggressive with my GEQ and Parametric? My experience so far with digital consoles sounding clinical is sometimes the compression seems to boost frequencies that can make a sound more almost brittle eliminating some of the dynamics of the actual sound.
Using compression will increase the average volume and often has the side effect of increasing feedback.
Raising the threshold so that only the peaks are compressed and using a higher ratio and not impacting the average volumes will reduce the transients without increasing feedback
@@DaveRat I thank you sir for your reply
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I've always liked to wide-mic a whole band playing live, & have them get it right... my stems are filthy. 😂
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"To compress or not to compress...that is the question.."
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I've been hearing people talking about "transients" for years...somehow I managed to not know what they meant. Transient sounds like "transition", so I had the wrong idea. I thought it was some subtle thing. Wouldn't it be more descriptive to say "attack"? I mean, synths and effects all use "attack"... Curious where the term "transient" came from? It feels like the wrong word to use.
Hmmm, transient as in occuring over a short period of time.
Comes and goes away.
Transient humans are constantly on the move.
Transfer and transistor are relating to change.
Short term fast changes in signal.
Seems good to me for a a description
Attack I think is a word used more by people who work with synths while transients is more of an audio/recording thing. I'd say you can use either word and someone knowledgeable would know what you were talking about. If you break out the old school big boy audio books you will see the word transient or transients thrown around more than the word attack. It took me a lot of years of reading and doing audio to really understand the stuff that Dave breaks down and describes so clearly in this video. Thanks Dave, this is the first video of your's I have seen and It is really really well done. I look forward to watching the rest of the stuff on your channel.
Attack has to do with the beginning of the signal, release or decay has to do with the end of the signal.
A transient is a signal or part of a signal with an extremely fast attack and extremely fast decay or release. -ish
This is muddled by the fact that a square wave or other waveforms with sharp edges contain loads of hig frequency content needed to make the sharp edge.
This HF content appears as burst of HF creating a transient.
Adding a low pass filter reduces the transient.
So another way toook at transients is as a burst of signal that has substantial high frequency content and lasts for a short period of time.
When I say " high req content" that would be high FREQS in relation to the bandwidth at hand. So for subs, a transient will be much lower frequencies than for tweeters.
Oh my I hope that is a fire safe material!!😂
Ha! Yeah,in the event of worst case scenario I could end up with needing to dump a cup of water on some things ny embers glowing on my stove!
But, that said, this is R19 certified cotton house insulation so the odds of me ne ding to get that cup of water is minimal
Bud, I hope your arm is ok. What happened? I'm hoping something with bikes or surf living life, I also hope it's not too bad
Broken pretty good, metal plate snowboarding jumps. And thank you!!
Hello to your canine assistants.
Got to love the pups!
"bass player that plays inconsistently" I feel attacked
I should have said extremely rare and uncommon event where the possibility that a bass player plays inconsistently
Dude my weineruahuah doggie looks so near exactly like yours! He’s my best pal 13 years now :) fantastic doggies :)
Love the pops!
You can really hear the room the lower the speed
Yeah that worked better than I thought it would
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I skipped to the part with the cute doggy
Yes scanning the highlights is a valid approach
his speaking voice sounds just like Sebastian Bachs
Interesting. I met Sebastian once. I was doing sound for chili peppers in Santa Barbara and Chad, peppers drummer and I went over to sebastions apartment/crash pad and hung out and listened to stuff. He gave me some recordings of John Bohnam drum tracks that we nothing but drums for maybe 6 Zeppelin songs. If you have not heard them, they are pretty cool and findable if ya Google them.
@@DaveRat I will check them out thanks. So can you sing high like Bach also?
Hell no. I try and make sure I never end up on the wrong side of the microphone when the show starts
Dave what you do to your hand take care of your self geesh
Snowboard jumps went well. Snowboard jump landing went not so well
NO and No, Dynamic range is awesome, Fidelity is lost, not sure if the digital industry can live without it...
To answer that question one must first define the application and goal.
Recorded music very rarely is recorded without compression on some or all instruments. Home hifi speakers tend to be incapable of dealing with uncompressed conted. This is easily demonstrated by trying to use home hifi speakers for live music applications.
Compression can be divided into two main categories, individual instrument or input compression and master or mic compression.
Without input compression, most music becomes borderline unlistenable and can not be broad ast over radio or played back on consumer speakers at anything but very low levels.
That said, most non live audio people confuse mastering compression with channel compression
The over use of mastering compression to increase that average volume level of music can sound quite undesirable.
With live music, compression is used way less and using lots of compression increases feedback issues.
So if we were to generalize, compression is pretty much necessary and beneficial for recordings and live reinforcement,
One exception is classical music and other acoustic recordings where no compression may be used to maintain accuracy. That said, those non compressed mixes tend to be far mic'ed not close mic'ed. By far mic'ing the room itself and reverberations of the the room sort of acts like a compressor by reducing the volume differential between the loudest and softest sounds.
What we don't want is the over use of compression to where it degrades the sound.
Ok I just wanna snuggle with your dog i can't hear you......
Pups!!!
@@DaveRat I don't understand , they saved my life and in the same time made me hate people more BUT i love you for those video, great job for numbs as me.
What happened to your arm, Dave?
Thanks for asking, broke my wrist snowboarding and now I have a titanium plate in it
@@DaveRat glad you are healing up! Thanks for the reply 🤘
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Run out off gas
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@DaveRat thump up
What’s that creature on Stage right? 🫣