Distressor and Fatso - is there a sw like this?

[urosh]

Again people why so much emotions over technical questions ?

Jaeson : circuit modeling ( under name of circuit
simulators ) exists for more than 35 years , as helping
tools for design and analysys in electronic industry,.
But no electronic engineer in his right mind would
bet his life on results that something like Pspice
spit out. Thing is ,there are something like 30
parameters for transistor in datasheet, and thats only
static description of some things inside. Transformers
are even worse,designing those is still part knowledge
part black magic.
Simply, lot of things in electronics are still
empirical. We dont have enough knowledge to
do exact modeling for audio purposes. We could be
70%-80% there , depending on circuit , IF dsp deginer
also has years of experience and great knowhow in
elecronics. And here comes second and bigger problem :
we still dont know why something sounds good, and thats
it. If u take simple device like Farchild 660
( which is actually highly complex when u start to make
phisicall model of all components ), u dont know what
part contribute to THAT sound, and to what extent. For
instance, Purple Audio had to find exact output transformers
of 1176 for their clone cus some customers were not
satisfied with sound .

So when come coders start to model , question is what
are they going to model, and will that be parts that
contribute to the sound of particular unit ? So dsp
coders will have to do some A/B listening with real units
cus models we deal with are insuficient. But , if these
coders are not seasoned audio engineers will they be able
to spot diferences ? Me dont think so. And even if u
have after all this ostacles good model of some
magical-warm-smearing-put-whatever-bshit-term-thats-hip
peace of hardware chances are u couldnt drive more than
one instance in real time.

And one more thing , there is no unified math theory
for nonlinear systems, like there is for linear
time invariant systems. Even for linear systems , often
we are not able to make even mildly acurate description
becouse of system complexity ( like for instance room
reverberation ). Luckily, we can measure impulse responses
of linear systems and with convolution we can have decent
resulats. But there is no equvalent of impulse response
for nonlin systems ( and that synthefex story in their
aes papers is cute but mathematically without any foundation.
To quote them :"In a non-linear case we make an assumption
that the non-linear process can be modelled by a linear
summation of responses to impulses that are appropriate
to the magnitude of each individual input sample".
Well, I can tell u thats one helluva assumption. I mean,
FX8000 model of 1176 might sound nice but there is no
certanty it will sound LIKE real 1176.)
Actually, we are f**ked even with linear convolution
in some very important cases but thats different story.

Ok omo , now your posts made me write this reply. IMHO
your attitude is discouraging for lot of people, cus
u spread idea that $$$$=good records. I can only state
IMHO, but good engineer(s) are most important factor
in making good record. And another question would be
are we looking at stuff that sells a lot or the stuff
that are of great production value. I mean, that first
big smash CD for Ricky Martin was mixed on protools
(acording to legend , cus I wasnt attending that session).
Even nicer is this :

http://recforums.prosoundweb.com/index.php/m/84811/0

on second page of that discusion, u have Bob Olhsson
himself saying : " I just got a killer sounding album in to
master that turns out to have been mixed in an HD system with
nothing but an R-Channel used on every channel."
For those who dont know who is Bob :

http://www.prosoundweb.com/recording/ta ... o/olmo.php

And even without credentials ( cus most of audio guys on
forums, even big money shots, are full of voodoo shit),
I personaly found mr Olhsson to be single most nonbullshit
guy hangin 'round audio forums. I mean, if u prefer voodoo
talk that both softW and hardW AE camps are spreadin round,
its ok, but im electronic engineer, horns grow on my forhead
when somebody goes into voodooland in technicall discusion.
And audio recording/reproduction is technical problem , remember?

And finally ( if some idle person is still readin this rant).
IM-not-so-HO, good monitoring and good knowledge ( earned by
lot of hard work ) are two key elements in making good
records. If you know what you are doin' and you hear what you
are doin' , cheaper solutions will just mean lot more time to
make everything work.

urosh

[olafmol]

its just DIFFERENT.. not better.

Well, it is and different and better. It MUCH better speaking of sound. There's NO digital plugin EQ today that sounds as good as good analog (and there are plenty of hardware colours to choose from).

hmm i've had plenty of crappy analogue outboard that could never touch the quality of f.e. the UAD plugins . it's all a matter of budget imho. You can buy goodsounding hardware, but just as easy some crappy sounding hardware. And for software it's just the same. It's all acquired taste anyway, most of our generation have grown up with the artifacts of tube, tape, vinyl and FM tranmissions, so we like that sound. But when you compare your vinyl recordings to the original mastertapes they won't sound the same. Acquired taste, i tell you.

[bmanic]

Good post urosh. That last line, it's so right on the money.

One of the differences with a compressor plugin vs a good hardware unit (one specific for the task, like ssl 9000 on drum sub, 1176 doing nice tight pop vocals or LA-2A doing a subtle sweet vocal) is that the hardware seems to instantly work. Nearly no tweaking is required, you just insert it over the desired source and BAm! there you have it (now that I think of it, could be that one reason is the lack of a lot of controls! ).

Very much the same applies to EQ. The plugin eq's of today have taken some tremendous leaps forward (voxengo harmoni EQ, UA Precision EQ, Tritonedigital Hydratone etc.) and if you remeber what we had about 3 years ago it was nearly impossible to get an audio source to sound good with radical eq whereas in the analogue domain you just touched a couple of knobs, a dB here, a dB there and voila! there you had it.

Today that "just a touch of mids" magic IS a fact with for instance Hydratone or HarmoniEQ. Also, surgical, mastering type EQ where one wants to completely remove certain frequencies are BETTER in the digital domain. The Weiss digital eq is getting increasingly popular with mastering studios, so are the algorithmix direct X plugins too.

.. I kind of forgot what I wanted to say.. maybe my point was that digital IS coming of age right about now, we are seeing some truly wonderful plugins everywhere, filters, eq's, compressors, distortion etc. and this is just the beginning. I can't even imagine how things will sound after 60 years when coders have had the same amount of experience as engineers who've built quality audio hardware. Never the less, a good sounding tool, be it hardware or software, is just that, a good sounding tool. I'm pretty sure that the pultec will be as desireable after 30 years time as it is right now, not just for it's antique value but for it's sound.

Cheers!
bManic

[kl3in]

Ok, here goes...

http://amj.bombsquad.org/temp/mm_original.mp3

http://amj.bombsquad.org/temp/mm_fatso.mp3

Ignore the cheese songwise (those robot vox were a temp thing, though the cheesiness has grown on me since...)

Regards,

JMH

I haven't read the entire thread, but I was surprised to see some people being disappointed with the difference between these two examples. To me - without analyzing the different areas of the frequency spectrum - there's a big, big overall difference. The Fatso'ed version has lost it's digital shine, or polish if you will, in a most favourable way. While the Inflator is great, it won't do anything like this.

In terms of mastering, the Fatso is not really made to replace a compressor or limiter, so the difference in amplitude should not be of concern.

[omo]

urosh, I can't believe you're trying to make a point with a quote fo this magnitude - " I just got a killer sounding album in to master that turns out to have been mixed in an HD system with nothing but an R-Channel used on every channel." - HILARIOUS! ON EVERY CHANNEL! AND ONLY R-CHANNEL! Wow, that must hell of a channel, then.

"AE is what really counts" thingy is irrelevant here. Sounds like some kind of excuse. There's difference in equipment and thtat is what we're discussing.

Anyway, if someone wants to hear then he already did. If not then I'm of no help however loud. I'd like to prove myself but just can't invite all of you guys for a blind listening session. I'd love to, tho

[omo]

Today that "just a touch of mids" magic IS a fact with for instance Hydratone or HarmoniEQ. Also, surgical, mastering type EQ where one wants to completely remove certain frequencies are BETTER in the digital domain. The Weiss digital eq is getting increasingly popular with mastering studios, so are the algorithmix direct X plugins too.

.. I kind of forgot what I wanted to say.. maybe my point was that digital IS coming of age right about now, we are seeing some truly wonderful plugins everywhere, filters, eq's, compressors, distortion etc. and this is just the beginning. I can't even imagine how things will sound after 60 years when coders have had the same amount of experience as engineers who've built quality audio hardware. Never the less, a good sounding tool, be it hardware or software, is just that, a good sounding tool. I'm pretty sure that the pultec will be as desireable after 30 years time as it is right now, not just for it's antique value but for it's sound.

Yes, in fact there are areas where digital outperforms analog by miles! No doubt about it. Different? Yes, but for different purposes. One thing is to have a limiter on a radio station where it is a necessity and it is very different oh... Am I repeating... Digital IS coming of age right now, I agree, but it is just not clear how steap the curve will be It looks like plugs make good steps every day, but still there's a loong way to go.

Digital is the king for transparency, but make no mistake - good digital doesn't come cheap too (speaking of ADC/DAC, EQ's, comps too btw - Weiss mentioned here, for instance). Some plugs are very transparent, including comps. Analog on the other hand is never transparent but that's the point and that's where most digital developers fail to grasp the idea. I sometimes have this feeling like 50% of AEs are mastering AEs... that many "mastering" products on plug-in market.

[urosh]

Sorry for that long post people, it seems I got
carried away.
Back on topic :when you are trying to do "analog magic"
on daw, remember one thing. There are just few hardware
boxes that go gracefully into clipping. And even fewer
are solid state boxes in wich u can clip internal amp
stages without getting agressive/ugly. So good AE , who
is carefull with gain staging will make signal go from
channel input to main out of large desk without any
block inbetween go into clip/saturation. However, most
of equipment with "euphonic" character will distort a bit
long before clipping , this THD goin from about -80 to
-60 dB in normal operating conditions , to up to -20 dB
just before clipping. And this will be mostly 2nd and 3rd
harmonic dist. So , if u slam some "saturator" plug on
channel, be sure not to drive it into clipping . That is
get to know that plug , at what input level it clips, and
how controls affect operation. And then use it subtly.
Remember, in old desks, u have bunch of intertnal
blocks that signal passes trough, each adding just a bit
of coluration. But finall effect is that track sits
better in the mix, with out being affected in any too
obvious way. So , add saturator plug ( voxengo has one
realy nice one for this ) when working on final mix,
and go adjusting amount of colouration while listening
whole mix. With a bit of luck , and quite a bit more of
experience, u can make track sit in the mix at 0.5 dB
lower level, or u can make it really cut trough the mix.
And buch of small things like that will make difference
between ok mix and stellar mix. And when u have stellar
mix, u go back on that channel with some nonlin plug
thingie, turn it of , and in some cases u could be
suprised how subtle that processing was.
Ofcourse, on $$$ API and Neve desks , u have all that
magic happening on its own, cus sound has to go trough
bunch of transformers and not-so-perfect amp stages, all
of which are rather subtle on its own and in isolation.

Remember, if goin analog emulation path , four subtle
plugs could be much more than one drastic plug. Ofcourse
nothin comes for free, cus u will have to have helluva
knowledge and experience to know what four subtle things
to use. Or u could go into wild guessing and
experimenting, but that is long iterative process, and
speed is one of cruciall factors in audio engeneering.

urosh