Hi - I'm going to be in the market for a dynamic EQ, mainly to tame vocal resonances that occur on some high volume notes only. In another forum a poster said that there were aliases demonstrated on frequency analyzers, and this could be a problem.
Can someone speak to that please? Even if present, I know aliasing doesn't mean it's an audible problem. Can some users share their experiences?
Thanks!
"Aliasing" a problem in MAutoDynamicEQ and MDynamicEQ?
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Sampleconstruct Sampleconstruct https://www.kvraudio.com/forum/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=191286 - KVRAF
- 16153 posts since 12 Oct, 2008 from Here and there
I use MAutoDynEQ a lot and never heard anything from it I didn't want to hear. It's a great tool, also for creative purposes due to all the modulators.
Last edited by Sampleconstruct on Tue Jan 27, 2015 7:27 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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- KVRian
- 1070 posts since 23 Sep, 2006
I've never experienced anything personally. It does have up to four times oversampling, which should massively help if it were a problem.
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- KVRist
- Topic Starter
- 353 posts since 27 Jan, 2015
OK, well that is nice to hear, thank you!
I'm just a home hobbyist, and don't have great listening skills yet. I could see building up a whole song and missing something that is only subtly there on one track, the mixing equivalent of the frog in the water that is made hotter and hotter, but slowly enough that he doesn't notice.
So real world experience and recommendations is great - thanks! Will probably pull the trigger on the MAutoDynamicEQ when it goes on sale. Tried to learn more about Soniformer and TB Fix, but there is so little info on youtube that I don't feel comfortable, and it's not like the MAutoDynamicEQ looks like it's lacking anything (except linear phase?).
I'm just a home hobbyist, and don't have great listening skills yet. I could see building up a whole song and missing something that is only subtly there on one track, the mixing equivalent of the frog in the water that is made hotter and hotter, but slowly enough that he doesn't notice.
So real world experience and recommendations is great - thanks! Will probably pull the trigger on the MAutoDynamicEQ when it goes on sale. Tried to learn more about Soniformer and TB Fix, but there is so little info on youtube that I don't feel comfortable, and it's not like the MAutoDynamicEQ looks like it's lacking anything (except linear phase?).
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MeldaProduction MeldaProduction https://www.kvraudio.com/forum/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=176122 - KVRAF
- 14019 posts since 15 Mar, 2008 from Czech republic
Very well 
. MAutoDynamicEq is definitely far the most capable on the market. If you run to something like an aliasing, please give us way more information, ideally some analyses or even projects you used. I don't believe you were able to make it cause aliasing (except with some saturation).
. MAutoDynamicEq is definitely far the most capable on the market. If you run to something like an aliasing, please give us way more information, ideally some analyses or even projects you used. I don't believe you were able to make it cause aliasing (except with some saturation).-
- KVRist
- 266 posts since 18 Oct, 2005
Hello All - Maybe I can add a bit to this discussion.
First of all I'm a happy user of the Melda total bundle, and I really like the functionality and overall sound from Meldas EQs, not least the dynamic features, which can help fight resonances and harsh elements, amongst many other things.
But in my hunt for low-aliasing plugins, I've also done some tests using a sine tone at 993 hz (as I've learned in a Gearslutz thread about aliasing).
Maybe these screenshots can get us further into the discussion about aliasing, or other atifacts in Meldas dynamic eq's. The two screen-shots below are before and after processing the 993 sine tone (generated by Moscillator). The first is without processing, the second is processed with MAutoDynamicEQ by -10 db at 2,5kHz.
What I see is a very jagged line of some sort of distortion, that (for my untrained eye) looks like aliasing. If not it's another sort of distortion of the original signal. What I expect, from an ideal dynamic EQ would be that the signal was undistorted, and my own simple measurements (using the same technique) shows several other brands that can accomplish this.
I hope this can add to the discussion here, as I love the overall sound from Meldas EQs, but believe they could be quite a bit cleaner, when it comes to dynamic processing - and hope it's possible
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Mads
First of all I'm a happy user of the Melda total bundle, and I really like the functionality and overall sound from Meldas EQs, not least the dynamic features, which can help fight resonances and harsh elements, amongst many other things.
But in my hunt for low-aliasing plugins, I've also done some tests using a sine tone at 993 hz (as I've learned in a Gearslutz thread about aliasing).
Maybe these screenshots can get us further into the discussion about aliasing, or other atifacts in Meldas dynamic eq's. The two screen-shots below are before and after processing the 993 sine tone (generated by Moscillator). The first is without processing, the second is processed with MAutoDynamicEQ by -10 db at 2,5kHz.
What I see is a very jagged line of some sort of distortion, that (for my untrained eye) looks like aliasing. If not it's another sort of distortion of the original signal. What I expect, from an ideal dynamic EQ would be that the signal was undistorted, and my own simple measurements (using the same technique) shows several other brands that can accomplish this.
I hope this can add to the discussion here, as I love the overall sound from Meldas EQs, but believe they could be quite a bit cleaner, when it comes to dynamic processing - and hope it's possible
::
Mads
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- KVRist
- Topic Starter
- 353 posts since 27 Jan, 2015
Hi Mads - thanks for taking the time to post that!
I've read the plug-in can do upsampling, iirc, could you possibly take the time to repeat your test with upsampling? I've read that can reduce distortion.
Also you say you like the sound ... Can you clarify please, is the distortion shown audible to you?
Thx much -
I've read the plug-in can do upsampling, iirc, could you possibly take the time to repeat your test with upsampling? I've read that can reduce distortion.
Also you say you like the sound ... Can you clarify please, is the distortion shown audible to you?
Thx much -
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- KVRist
- 266 posts since 18 Oct, 2005
This time with 4x oversampling - a little cleaner but still.
I can't hear the distortion as such, on musical material - but I do believe that distortion should be avoided in order to get the best possible sound overall - unless you use it on purpose, for certain reasons. Sometimes audio-files are processed more than once, and it adds up. I believe that "digital haze", that I also call the distortion produced by digital processing, should be as low as possible (again unless it's dedicated distortion, typically harmonic, used on purpose to enhance the audio in certain ways).
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Mads
I can't hear the distortion as such, on musical material - but I do believe that distortion should be avoided in order to get the best possible sound overall - unless you use it on purpose, for certain reasons. Sometimes audio-files are processed more than once, and it adds up. I believe that "digital haze", that I also call the distortion produced by digital processing, should be as low as possible (again unless it's dedicated distortion, typically harmonic, used on purpose to enhance the audio in certain ways).
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Mads
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Last edited by mljung on Fri Jan 30, 2015 2:32 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Sampleconstruct Sampleconstruct https://www.kvraudio.com/forum/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=191286
- KVRAF
- 16153 posts since 12 Oct, 2008 from Here and there
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MeldaProduction MeldaProduction https://www.kvraudio.com/forum/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=176122
- KVRAF
- 14019 posts since 15 Mar, 2008 from Czech republic
Ok folks, it's time for some technical info 
.
First of all, the "993Hz" is just trying to be a an exact frequency bin of the FFT analyzer, since your skirt as way too big apparently it's not exactly ideal
. It should be a vertical line, not a skirt, like this:
Next, if you then process with MAutoDynamicEq, max dynamic gain of -24dB, you can go as low as 2ms release time to get this:
Finally, you can get distorting with ANY dynamic processor, whether it is a dynamic eq, a compressor or a gate (only MSpectralDynamics doesn't cause any distortion, but that's a whole different kind of processor).
Why? Because of the nonlinear processing - simply but, it changes the processing for each sample. If the rates are slow enough, there's still distortion, but it cannot even be measured, like in the image above. But if you set release time 0ms, it becomes a waveshaper! In the case of dynamic eq it's not exactly a waveshaper, but it still reacts to every sample. So this is what you get:
Of course, most plugins don't let you go to such extreme speeds, but that doesn't change anything...
Finally, upsampling does NOT help distortion! It fights aliasing, that's something VERY different. And it doesn't seem to be present in the images. Here's something you NEED to watch and learn before you continue analysing signals :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ic4bVbX ... e=youtu.be
And the audio lesson is over.
.First of all, the "993Hz" is just trying to be a an exact frequency bin of the FFT analyzer, since your skirt as way too big apparently it's not exactly ideal
. It should be a vertical line, not a skirt, like this:Next, if you then process with MAutoDynamicEq, max dynamic gain of -24dB, you can go as low as 2ms release time to get this:
Finally, you can get distorting with ANY dynamic processor, whether it is a dynamic eq, a compressor or a gate (only MSpectralDynamics doesn't cause any distortion, but that's a whole different kind of processor).
Why? Because of the nonlinear processing - simply but, it changes the processing for each sample. If the rates are slow enough, there's still distortion, but it cannot even be measured, like in the image above. But if you set release time 0ms, it becomes a waveshaper! In the case of dynamic eq it's not exactly a waveshaper, but it still reacts to every sample. So this is what you get:
Of course, most plugins don't let you go to such extreme speeds, but that doesn't change anything...
Finally, upsampling does NOT help distortion! It fights aliasing, that's something VERY different. And it doesn't seem to be present in the images. Here's something you NEED to watch and learn before you continue analysing signals
:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ic4bVbX ... e=youtu.be
And the audio lesson is over
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- KVRist
- 266 posts since 18 Oct, 2005
I should add that I used the auto function for attack and release times - which I guess most people would.
So I didn't try to produce bad measurements.
I'm about to leave my computer today, but just for a comparison of distortion produced by TB Fix, at more or less the same gain reduction in the 2,5 kHz area (so should be comparable), I have uploaded a final screen-shot using the exact same (if not perfect) measurement method . It's obvious that both distortion levels and aliasing is close to non existent here, and even if I turn the attack times down to 1 ms it still more or less this clean.
I'm not saying my measurements are perfect, but later on we can take them to Gearslutz and see what the experts (and other users) there have to say about them - just to open the discussion further.
I have nothing against learning that the dynamic EQs from Melda are as good as it gets regarding both distortion and aliasing (which I reckon can be called distortion of the signal too). I have an idea that they can be cleaner, and I would love to see this happen - If I'm convinced that I'm all wrong - I promise I'll admit it.
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Mads
So I didn't try to produce bad measurements.
I'm about to leave my computer today, but just for a comparison of distortion produced by TB Fix, at more or less the same gain reduction in the 2,5 kHz area (so should be comparable), I have uploaded a final screen-shot using the exact same (if not perfect) measurement method . It's obvious that both distortion levels and aliasing is close to non existent here, and even if I turn the attack times down to 1 ms it still more or less this clean.
I'm not saying my measurements are perfect, but later on we can take them to Gearslutz and see what the experts (and other users) there have to say about them - just to open the discussion further.
I have nothing against learning that the dynamic EQs from Melda are as good as it gets regarding both distortion and aliasing (which I reckon can be called distortion of the signal too). I have an idea that they can be cleaner, and I would love to see this happen - If I'm convinced that I'm all wrong - I promise I'll admit it.
::
Mads
You do not have the required permissions to view the files attached to this post.
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- KVRist
- Topic Starter
- 353 posts since 27 Jan, 2015
Attack time ... release time ... auto settings ...
Confusing to me, when applied to an "always on" signal, .like the sine wave.
But either way ... the visual difference between the TB tracing and the Melda tracing is striking. Is this truly an apples vs. apples comparison?
40dB down is probably barely audible if at all for a single note, but I think "Mads" is probably right, it could sum over multiple signals to significantly affect the tone of the signal.
Following, and thank you all.
Confusing to me, when applied to an "always on" signal, .like the sine wave.
But either way ... the visual difference between the TB tracing and the Melda tracing is striking. Is this truly an apples vs. apples comparison?
40dB down is probably barely audible if at all for a single note, but I think "Mads" is probably right, it could sum over multiple signals to significantly affect the tone of the signal.
Following, and thank you all.
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MeldaProduction MeldaProduction https://www.kvraudio.com/forum/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=176122
- KVRAF
- 14019 posts since 15 Mar, 2008 from Czech republic
Hehe ok, actually you unintentionally found the worst scenario. Anyway I looked a little closer to your screenshots, so here's your explanation :
You generated test-tone is at about 1kHz, but you placed the peak filter at 3kHz, thus in the area where the only existing signal is some kind of noise. MAutoDynamicEq tried to adapt to the signal in that band, but since it is basically empty, it was "jumping a lot" and the minimum release time in the plugin is 0ms, while TBFix has 10ms, so it is considerably slower. The distortion seems to take place at about 1ms, so well, there you have it.
If you place the band around 1k, no distortion takes place, because there actually IS a signal. Of course we could add some "slow" switch or something, but the test scenario you created almost never exists, since it doesn't make sense - you don't want to eq something that's not there. But we'll see...
You generated test-tone is at about 1kHz, but you placed the peak filter at 3kHz, thus in the area where the only existing signal is some kind of noise. MAutoDynamicEq tried to adapt to the signal in that band, but since it is basically empty, it was "jumping a lot" and the minimum release time in the plugin is 0ms, while TBFix has 10ms, so it is considerably slower. The distortion seems to take place at about 1ms, so well, there you have it.
If you place the band around 1k, no distortion takes place, because there actually IS a signal. Of course we could add some "slow" switch or something, but the test scenario you created almost never exists, since it doesn't make sense - you don't want to eq something that's not there. But we'll see...
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MeldaProduction MeldaProduction https://www.kvraudio.com/forum/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=176122
- KVRAF
- 14019 posts since 15 Mar, 2008 from Czech republic
Anyway, after some thinking, let's add RMS length & Hold that should do the trick... RMS will default to some very low value to minimize the fluctuations just in case one needs to work with these signals.
