FabFilter Pro-L best for me?

[maxxxter]

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[manducator]

Ah, ok. But what's Poco brickwall?

[maxxxter]

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[audiosabre]

I find that the best way to get loudness isn't to limit the whole song. I find it much better to limit and clip individual tracks and use the master limiter to simply catch any peaks.

I was never impressed with any (driven) limiter plug on the master. It will distort, audibly or not. Gave me a bad taste, then I discovered the above and can get much more out of my limiters/clippers.

Then there's the old compress before limiter trick; damage limitation and dynamic shaping (or sharpening in my case). Win win

[vicshere]

AudioSabre, what you describe is what I have been doing, and for my money you are spot-on.
I use PSP stuff to compress, and once I have the warmth, etc, I place Pro-L on each individual track, listen to them all solo then together, finally placing one at the end, on the master channel, just to keep everything under control.
And, having tried this method while trialling various limiters, Pro-L has been miles ahead and will be the one I buy.
I have put silly amounts of gain, via the Transparent setting, on pretty dodgy, poor samples, and can't really get it to sound bad!
I love all my PSP stuff, and they are just about the only eq, compression, delay and other effects I use these days, and I will buy Xenon as well when I have the cash. But Pro-L has to be my first one at the moment.

[vicshere]

By the way, for pretty dry vocals (just a bit of reverb), Pro-L has astonished me with its clarity and how it sits in soft acoustic mixes, distorted electric guitar mixes, and everything in between. Never had to do so little to the vocals.

[audiosabre]

Looks like we are in agreement. Forgot to mention I use Pro-L too

[Resonator63]

AudioSabre, what you describe is what I have been doing, and for my money you are spot-on.
I use PSP stuff to compress, and once I have the warmth, etc, I place Pro-L on each individual track, listen to them all solo then together, finally placing one at the end, on the master channel, just to keep everything under control.
And, having tried this method while trialling various limiters, Pro-L has been miles ahead and will be the one I buy.
I have put silly amounts of gain, via the Transparent setting, on pretty dodgy, poor samples, and can't really get it to sound bad!
I love all my PSP stuff, and they are just about the only eq, compression, delay and other effects I use these days, and I will buy Xenon as well when I have the cash. But Pro-L has to be my first one at the moment.

You mention using PSP stuff.If you have VintageWarmer try using that.It can do brick-wall limiting too.
Probably more of an alternative for colour than transparency.But it is always an alternative
For transparency i'd go with Pro-L though.

[vicshere]

Thanks, Resonator, for all your help!

[Resonator63]

Thanks, Resonator, for all your help!

You're welcome
Enjoy Pro-L, it won't let you down

[Brother Charles]

I find that the best way to get loudness isn't to limit the whole song. I find it much better to limit and clip individual tracks and use the master limiter to simply catch any peaks.

I was never impressed with any (driven) limiter plug on the master. It will distort, audibly or not. Gave me a bad taste, then I discovered the above and can get much more out of my limiters/clippers.

Then there's the old compress before limiter trick; damage limitation and dynamic shaping (or sharpening in my case). Win win

+1

Me too. That's how I do it. Folks (in the know) tell me that they didn't hear or suspect any limiting/brickwalling in my recordings.

[Mario-C.]

Try the Arts Acoustic CL before you buy Pro L ... CL is one of the best I've ever heard.

[ObsoleteAcc99]

I hate ProL, worst purchase ever.

How come?

Very simple; during several different private mastering sessions, my other limiters achieved better, more transparent, louder results. That's it.

I was actually quite surprised at how bad and farty ProL sounded, it couldn't get anywhere near the loudness and transparency I managed to achieve with my other limiters.
It just distorted badly and made the track sound small, thin and squashed when I managed to get it to be as loud as, for example, the VladG limiter (which sounded fat and effortless).

Poco Brickwall was the absolute winner, Mellowmuse LM1V was the second best, VladG lim6 was the third (really nice), Sonnox came as fourth and Ozone 5 the last.
ProL was the worst, I was appaled at how bad it was. It distorted badly at same or similar loudness settings, regardless of the algorithm or a preset chosen.

And the tracks were well mixed, shouldn't have been such a hard job to do.

EDIT: Later on, I also demoed PSP Xenon (horrible) and Barricade (quite nice).

I agree xenon is pretty bad, and i agree the TC one is very good. But i am flat out shocked at your pro-l results.

[billcarroll]

I hate ProL, worst purchase ever.

How come?

Very simple; during several different private mastering sessions, my other limiters achieved better, more transparent, louder results. That's it.

I was actually quite surprised at how bad and farty ProL sounded, it couldn't get anywhere near the loudness and transparency I managed to achieve with my other limiters.
It just distorted badly and made the track sound small, thin and squashed when I managed to get it to be as loud as, for example, the VladG limiter (which sounded fat and effortless).

Poco Brickwall was the absolute winner, Mellowmuse LM1V was the second best, VladG lim6 was the third (really nice), Sonnox came as fourth and Ozone 5 the last.
ProL was the worst, I was appaled at how bad it was. It distorted badly at same or similar loudness settings, regardless of the algorithm or a preset chosen.

And the tracks were well mixed, shouldn't have been such a hard job to do.

EDIT: Later on, I also demoed PSP Xenon (horrible) and Barricade (quite nice).

I agree xenon is pretty bad, and i agree the TC one is very good. But i am flat out shocked at your pro-l results.

Something smells good in stinkville ... honey, bring me the cats ass! <takes a giant sniff of the cat's butt> ahhh, that's better.

FabFilter Pro-L and PSP Xenon are both absolutely fantastic limiters, and top in class in almost every aspect. If the two of you think these limiters stink or sound bad somehow maybe you should hang out. You definitely have something in common

Each to their own.

[samsam]

Also reeling here to see Ozone finish 'last'. Just wonder how great my mixes would sound if I wasn't using something as 'bad as Ozone... er 'lol'...