MSpectralDynamics : fan mail

[Alphacodex]

Ok great, I'll try that! So the higher the slope value the more difference between bass and treble, right?
Or the other way round, when I got the feeling the bass was tamed to much at a slope of 3dB I put it to like 4dB?

[MeldaProduction]

Not really, just watch the analyzer . The slope controls how the energy is distributed over the spectrum, it can move bass up and treble down or conversely.

[robertszalapski]

That's cleaner, yes. I usually draw in my own curve anyway to control > 12k more heavily, 16k spikes often make it through some mixes and they don't sound pretty. This smooths it out a bit.

[bbaggins]

On the master bus, the two parameters I reach for first are Slope and Knee. I often end up with the slope at +4dB and knee at 80%. When I'm happy with the overall effect, I then dial it back a little with the wet/dry slider. Often, that's all the tweaking that's required.

What's surprising is that the result is not the over-polished mush you might expect. Instead, it actually brings out upper-mid and high-frequency subtleties and gives new clarity and sparkle to instruments.

Sometimes it enhances reverb and cymbal tails on drums a little too much. Sometimes, that's a cool effect, but if it's too distracting it can be mitigated by raising the release time.

I have one enhancement suggestion: a clipping indicator. It's not always easy to see minor flat-topping on the spectral display. A little red dot somewhere in the analyzer window would be handy.

[Moonwrist]

Wow, I really underestimated that plugin. It even seems to be able to fix some mixing errors to a certain degree.

And it can show you that there is a problem in some where in your mix.

In a similar way that you put a maste eq and noticed that your mix benefit for some high boost. You can leave it to that and apply the eq to master or you can try to find those channels that benefit most of that high boost and apply it to those channel eqs.

It isn't a meter like an analyzer but you can find a lot by using it.

[MeldaProduction]

bbaggins: What do you mean by clipping? There is no limiter or clipper. This isn't the final master stage, so even output exceeding 0dB isn't such a big deal and you can see it in the metering section (initially hidden).

[bbaggins]

I definitely hear distortion if the input is too hot. It will show visually as flat-topping in the spectral display. Perhaps "clipping" isn't the right word, but that's what it looks like.

clip.jpg

[Alphacodex]

If the input is clipped it might as well be the fault of the previous plugin in your chain, the VSTi, the used sample or even the engine of your daw itself. Which daw are you using?

[MeldaProduction]

Actually Codex, I don't think his input is clipped - to get the spectral levels so high, the input must be way above 0dB. For most signals I could hear lots of distortion way before the spectrum meter reaches 0dB, because the input was like +20dB... So please, bbaggins, you really need to keep your levels controlled, the golden rule is to keep all stages below 0dB, despite floating point precision allows us to get above. Of course, occasional overs do not matter...

[bbaggins]

Oh, I know it's up to me to manage levels, just like it's my duty to maintain the oil level in my car. Still, it's nice to have an "idiot light" in both cases.

[Alphacodex]

[Alphacodex]

One thing I noticed in cubase for example is: I can safely exceed 0dB in the individual channels, however exceeding 0dB on my master bus, will clip badly right away.

Apart from that, I read that there are plugins that cannot cope with levels higher than 0dB (or do not correctly react to the headromm above 0dB), so yeah, it's wise to always keep your levels below 0dB on every channel AND at every plugin output.
In fact I usually leave a lot more headroom (like 5dB-10dB per channel), that way I can almost prevent clipping problems completely. In the very last stage, I then rise the level back to 0dB with a brickwall-limiter.

[MeldaProduction]

Exactly!

And btw bbaggins, it's not MSpectralDynamics, which is distorting, it's the next stage probably. Also if the spectrum display shows a peak, it does not mean the output will too, so having clipping indicators, however that would work, in the spectrum display is pretty useless. But you can show the master input & output peak meters, then you can ensure it won't exceed 0dB, or cope with that using output gain.