Can you tell the difference between amp sims and a mic'd amp recording?

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Not reliably, especially not in a full mix. When I do notice it, it's mainly flatness from IRs and the inharmonic sludge from aliasing. It was much easier in earlier ampsims, which were often just simple static waveshapers -- but even that could be quite effective nonetheless, as in mda's Combo.
Wait... loot _then_ burn? D'oh!

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I think I agree with everyone who says that sims have got better, and even amp modeling on real amps has improved quite a bit.

In the past I have owned some pretty decent amps, but all the ones I have now are solid state and so I usually get a better sound from sims than I do from any of them, even if they have modeling.

What I think I gain from the sims is the ability to easily move mics, reamp, etc. and just keep tweaking until I get the sound I want. The only thing I can't go back and change is the guitar I used and the pickup selection I chose.

Wouldn't mind a few decent tube amps though, but have not really had the money to spend on them for a while.
Sweet child in time...

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Funkybot's Evil Twin wrote:
transmetropolitan wrote:The usefulness depends on the question you're trying to answer. If you're looking to find out " how well does the modeled amp sound through the modeled cab and modeled microphone when compared to the real things," then it's a valid exercise.

If you're looking to have a conversation about inspiration, that's something else entirely. No amp sim provides as visceral a feeling a feeling to me as a real amp, but in honesty, I can't wake up the neighbors when I want to record a guitar amp at night, so there's trade offs. My short term goal is to start mic'ing an amp again, but I need something a lot less loud than my Twin Amp, which I can almost never play.
If the goal is making music, and by extension making music as well as you can then creating an environment that inspires great performance is priority number one.

Yes, we all have to live within a compromised world - budgets, time, gear, noise, space etc etc etc - and making those compromises is what ultimately separates a musician from an audiophile.

If you're a musician, then the the question of whether it's theoretically possible to trick people that a plugin is in fact an amp is a rather irrelevant and pointless endeavour. Who cares anyway?

Do it the best you can with the stuff you have and try the stuff you don't have when you get the chance. What works in practice is what matters, the theory be damned.

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memyselfandus wrote:Can you tell the difference between amp sims and a mic'd amp recording?

If so.. what do you hear?

If not.. what are you listening for? that would tell the difference?
Double-blind tests of Fender Mustang Vs the actual tube amps modeled,
where neither the player nor listeners knew which was which, proved it can be
a toss-up in some situations.

And I agree wholeheartedly with the previous post.
Cheers
Last edited by glokraw on Wed Jan 28, 2015 1:13 am, edited 1 time in total.

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They all sound like lifeless fizzy crap to me. Throw some reverb or a stereo delay on and their fine.

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Perhaps modern emulations have become as detailed as the real thing of output transformers, speakers, mics and room acoustics. I have fairly good faith that the emulation of circuitry ahead of the power tubes and output transformers might conceivably be modeled rather faithfully. Real power tube sections, transformers, speakers, rooms and mics are beastly complex. Maybe some emulators are similarly detailed nowadays, but it is more difficult to believe.

But maybe simpler sounds better in some cases. Maybe simpler sounds better in most cases, dunno.

It is similar with a real rhodes vs software, real hammond and leslie vs software, real grand piano, room and mic vs software. The real is lots more complex than the emulation. But whether the complexity makes it sound better, dunno.

Doing it the old fashioned way takes lots more work to get a good recorded track, because the extra complexity offers more opportunities to do it wrong.

I can't hardly play, especially guitar. Sometimes in the past I'd record many tracks attempting to do a guitar part right, then do sequencer micro-surgery picking out little parts of all the tracks where I got something right for a note or two, and the final composite track will have all the notes I wanted in there, in-tune and in-time. Just can't play geetar good enough to do it any other way.

If I do that as hobby exercise in the future, will probably clean-DI my playing, then re-record the final composite track thru amp and microphone. Maybe the result would take more effort than using an amp sim. Perhaps the reamped result would suck more than software application of amp sim, but out of religious conviction that "realer is better", would probably want to go to the trouble of adding the reality complexity of a real amp, acoustics, and mic.

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No difference in a complete recording.

Digital recreations of FX as well as instruments are well to the point that it is very difficult to detect the sim from the real thing.
Interestingly, we have reached a point in music where live performance often strives to re-create the recorded in-the-box studio production. Live drummers try to perform like an 808 and so on. So the line has become quite blurred.

More to the point of the amp sims and similar FX, taking this one step further, I have said many times here before my belief that the actual "tone" of an actual guitar is irrelevant as there is an infinite number of FX combinations that get piled on, making the finished performance unrecognizable from the original. We take out transients, throw them back in, compress, limit, expand, phase, filter and delay at will.

Sure, if the guitar itself is crafted to tease better playing from the guitarist, that certainly has value. But the actual tone of the notes being played is of less and less importance IMHO.

I know this drives guitarists crazy when I say it, but I'm prepared to take the heat.

Cheers
-B
Berfab
So many plugins, so little time...

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JCJR wrote: I can't hardly play, especially guitar. Sometimes in the past I'd record many tracks attempting to do a guitar part right, then do sequencer micro-surgery picking out little parts of all the tracks where I got something right for a note or two, and the final composite track will have all the notes I wanted in there, in-tune and in-time. Just can't play geetar good enough to do it any other way.
:) You know I can play, my problems always start when I know that record button is on. If I could find someone to trick me and secretly record my "practice" takes... :lol: :x I should use that "pre record" feature in the DAW...

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Codestation wrote:
JCJR wrote: I can't hardly play, especially guitar. Sometimes in the past I'd record many tracks attempting to do a guitar part right, then do sequencer micro-surgery picking out little parts of all the tracks where I got something right for a note or two, and the final composite track will have all the notes I wanted in there, in-tune and in-time. Just can't play geetar good enough to do it any other way.
:) You know I can play, my problems always start when I know that record button is on. If I could find someone to trick me and secretly record my "practice" takes... :lol: :x I should use that "pre record" feature in the DAW...
Dude, get a foot pedal to some midi keyboard and midimap record to it, pretty much like stompbox then :tu:

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Cazio wrote:
Codestation wrote: :) You know I can play, my problems always start when I know that record button is on. If I could find someone to trick me and secretly record my "practice" takes... :lol: :x I should use that "pre record" feature in the DAW...
Dude, get a foot pedal to some midi keyboard and midimap record to it, pretty much like stompbox then :tu:
Hopefully he's figured out a good solution in the almost 3 years since that was posted.

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way more rumbly bass coming from amp than that coming from standard studio monitors

and very little compression except when using Metal type of amp
If your plugin is a Synth-edit/synth-maker creation, Say So.
If not Make a Mac version of your Plugins Please.

https://soundcloud.com/realmarco

...everyone is out to get me!!!!!!!

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Yes. Amp sims tend to sound boxy compared to the real deal. You also don't hear as much of the nuances of the guitar player versus real amps. Also, the older ones were very fizzy in the 3.5 to 5k region but that seems to be less common these days.

As far as cab sims, well the modeled ones generally sound plastic and impulse responses sound lifeless and flat. Anyhow, if you know how to get around the limitations, you can still get great sounds out of amp sims with tweaking. Amplitube's offerings these days are fantastic imho and can sound realistic in a mix, especially if you are good with equalization.

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Yes. Amp sims tend to sound boxy compared to the real deal. You also don't hear as much of the nuances of the guitar player versus real amps. Also, the older ones were very fizzy in the 3.5 to 5k region but that seems to be less common these days.

As far as cab sims, well the modeled ones generally sound plastic and impulse responses sound lifeless and flat. Anyhow, if you know how to get around the limitations, you can still get great sounds out of amp sims with tweaking. Amplitube's offerings these days are fantastic imho and can sound realistic in a mix, especially if you are good with equalization.

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m03 wrote:
Cazio wrote:
Codestation wrote: :) You know I can play, my problems always start when I know that record button is on. If I could find someone to trick me and secretly record my "practice" takes... :lol: :x I should use that "pre record" feature in the DAW...
Dude, get a foot pedal to some midi keyboard and midimap record to it, pretty much like stompbox then :tu:
Hopefully he's figured out a good solution in the almost 3 years since that was posted.
:lol: Ha you are right..

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I don't know, never tried to, don't care. I use amp sims and bring the character of many things you wouldn't expect in doing. I would say that this tech has been mature for a while now.

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