Fabfilter Pro-Q 4!

[LoveEnigma18]

FabFilter did a Holiday Sale last year during the end of December. I wonder if they would run a sale this time, but at the same time I doubt it as Pro-Q 4 was just released.

ProR2 upgrade was on sale last year

hmmm hopefull there will be one then.

Thanks, Ploki.

But the main difference is Pro-R 2 was released on 2nd November 2023, which was a couple of weeks before their 2023 Black Friday sale.

Pro-Q 4 was released after the 2024 Black Friday sale, and looking at the history now, it seems FabFilter only does bundle discounts for the year end. So thinking again, I guess individual plugins sale is highly unlikely for the next few months. However, I think in account purchases may still qualify for discounts in that case.

Interested in buying Pro-MB as well, but I may just buy the Pro-Q 4 upgrade now and be done with it.

[Jac459]

The more you divert concentrated focus from ears to visual stimuli the less discriminatory your hearing is towards the instantaneous facets of a sound which produce the whole. And that is one sound alone never mind in a complex mix down.

I agree extremely strongly with this. I've used Brainworx SSL strip and Schepps Omni Channel the last 6 months, with very little of these visual EQs. I feel like it really was the right move. Trains you to mix with your ears not your eyes. The compressors in those strips are really more utility, they just give a bit of control to reign in the dynamics right away. The EQs just let you hone the sound with broad strokes right away. You don't need ProQ per channel, until maybe...

My disagreement with you is that I think after you've used channel strips substantially, moving to visual EQs is (potentially) a smart move. Much more granularity, much more control, much more immediate, with so much more detail you can then add with your equalization. It's like an evolution from the basic skill. But without that basic skill built up, you won't be able to really see that.

But going directly to "visual eqs" or whatever the term is is not the way anyone should do it (IMO - and it's actually not that important). Channel strip plugins are the bee's knees though, don't get enough love.

I have this super cool trick, it's a "hack" that makes ANY EQ instantly just as cool as the old not visually oriented EQs of our youth! I close my eyes before making any commitments and listen.

Works great and I get to join the modern era and let kids on my lawn even!

I see it bit differently than you.

I think your point is more generally: "be careful to not bias your brain and ears, they are easy to trick." --> I agree.
And then your point is that visual feedback may be part of the bias --> I kind of agree.
And then your conclusion is "don't use". --> I disagree. For me the advice that work best is "whatever the f**k you do, with or without visual feedback, after doing it, take a step back, get a coffee. And A/B test what you did with full focus on sound.
A/B, A/B, A/B, that's the best."

But good visual feedback is much much appreciated during the change process.

You might want to read through my post again. I'm basically saying if you work with the modern tools there's no reason not to take time to adjust to them, i.e. don't look at the screen when listening back to your edits if you feel the visual feedback will taint your perception of the actual sound.

There is nothing wrong with modern tools, it's up to you to come up with good practices especially if you notice some sort of bias from starring at a screen. Pretty much any time I'm mixing or mastering audio at some point I listen without looking at a screen etc. It's simple really, the problem is not better tools.

So we all agree then....

[Andreya_Autumn]

Daily audio work has been my bread and butter for a very gracious 25 some years now. Not everyone is lucky enough to have that opportunity even if they love sound. Also, in that time, in various jobs I've def found myself between "swamped with work" and "time to test and experiment". Not all audio jobs are the same ya' know? When I'm grinding work hard I'm usually knee deep in EQ3 7 Band for tracking and Pro-Q3 for mixing (now 4 I'd imagine unless some nasty bug appears). WHen I need fast and consistent, that's where I'm at. Still, I've def had my moments just pissing around with alternate workflows and plugins to see if there was a better/faster way.

that's absolutely fair and i do that as well

but i wasn't talking about growing/experimenting. Merely to the "but i can do that with X plugin with just 10 more steps and 10x CPU", "visual aids are for losers" and similar sentiment crowd.

You won't mix better if you chop off your limbs, you'll mix better if the environment you mix in can be trusted. You won't stop "notching" with parametric because mixed with a ch strip for half a year, you'll stop notching because you'll begin to understand how monitoring (room+speakers) imposes itself on the sound, what soloing frequencies with highQ actually does and whatnot and because your monitoring system isn't lying to you

Yeah this for sure.

And to be even more specific, it's not that you'll stop doing that notching entirely, it's that you'll start to only do it to fix problems you've already identified by ear before looking at the EQ.

I haven't done this pro for 25 years. But learning since a good 15-20 or so, and pro for the last 4. And my experience agrees with the above. When the work needs to get done you use the tools you know well. No time for second guesses. When work is sparse, experimenting with other workflows can be a fun and useful learning experience. I've never particularly gelled with channel strip-style plugins (even though I learned on analog desks and have recorded to tape etc etc), but I guess I shouldn't write the category off entirely. If I did more tracking work, maybe I'd feel different!

And to be completely fair, I do think the anti-visualizer folks have a point. We *can* get tricked by the visualizer sometimes.

Example: Say you've EQd lots of acoustic guitars (often challenging, right?). You've probably seen many cases where the pickup/mic/room exaggerates a couple of resonances that are present and sound fine acoustically, but on the recording end up uncomfortably weirdly loud. Narrowly reduce those and the sound feels more natural again. Say you've had that same situation lots of times with different sources, and now today you're tracking tambourine. Looking at the spectrum, you see a buncha quieter noisy stuff, plus two peaks standing really tall above the rest. You instinctively cut those because you've come to associate that shape with bad sound. But almost every tambourine has that kind of profile! You may have made it sound worse!

I've definitely done that in the past, only to later realize my mistake and undo it. I also remember hearing Dan Worral talk about this with respect to the EQ curve shape itself: with a fabfilter-style visual you may shy away from a more dramatic- or weird-looking EQ curve, even though it maybe sounds better. That's definitely happened to me! You know how Pro-Q will dynamically zoom to the +/- 30 dB view when you boost or cut by more than 12? Sometimes I still catch myself thinking "oh, maybe that's too much" when that happens even though I know full well that sometimes a part *needs* 20dB of boost.

So while I definitely disagree with the hardline "don't use fabfilter stylee for your first years) sentiment, I do see where they're coming from. Advanced graphic EQs are worth using in spite of this issue, but this is an issue to be aware of, especially while learning.

[perpetual3]

Was going to say the same thing. Works for any kind of effect or instrument too.

The more you divert concentrated focus from ears to visual stimuli the less discriminatory your hearing is towards the instantaneous facets of a sound which produce the whole. And that is one sound alone never mind in a complex mix down.

I agree extremely strongly with this. I've used Brainworx SSL strip and Schepps Omni Channel the last 6 months, with very little of these visual EQs. I feel like it really was the right move. Trains you to mix with your ears not your eyes. The compressors in those strips are really more utility, they just give a bit of control to reign in the dynamics right away. The EQs just let you hone the sound with broad strokes right away. You don't need ProQ per channel, until maybe...

My disagreement with you is that I think after you've used channel strips substantially, moving to visual EQs is (potentially) a smart move. Much more granularity, much more control, much more immediate, with so much more detail you can then add with your equalization. It's like an evolution from the basic skill. But without that basic skill built up, you won't be able to really see that.

But going directly to "visual eqs" or whatever the term is is not the way anyone should do it (IMO - and it's actually not that important). Channel strip plugins are the bee's knees though, don't get enough love.

I have this super cool trick, it's a "hack" that makes ANY EQ instantly just as cool as the old not visually oriented EQs of our youth! I close my eyes before making any commitments and listen.

Works great and I get to join the modern era and let kids on my lawn even!

[counterparty]

You can also turn off the spectrum analyser in Pro-Q very easily.

[Dr.Gunjah]

You guys are not wrong that your eyes can fool you, so you shouldn't rely on visual EQs or analyzers only.
Then again, your ears can fool you just as much and you seem to forget that.
'Trust your ears' is not useful advice when even 0.5db increased loudness can already make you believe it sounds better.

Imo the lesson to learn here is not that visual EQs are bad, but that you should check if your EQ moves (or any change really) actually sound better in a loudness compensated A/B comparison. That was not easy to do in the earlier days, but now we have the technology. Performing actions in a revisable manner helps way more than just removing the visual component, which may or may not deceive you. This way you are able to identify a bad move and can revert (and also learn from) it immediately.

[billinder33]

I built a deesser chain with TDR Arbiter, the new Pro-Q spectral filter, and Pro-MB all hitting the ess frequency in small amounts. Worked really well and didn't obliterate the track like a single deesser might.

[Aloysius]

It's a game changer.

[Ploki]

But the main difference is Pro-R 2 was released on 2nd November 2023, which was a couple of weeks before their 2023 Black Friday sale.

Pro-Q 4 was released after the 2024 Black Friday sale, and looking at the history now, it seems FabFilter only does bundle discounts for the year end. So thinking again, I guess individual plugins sale is highly unlikely for the next few months. However, I think in account purchases may still qualify for discounts in that case.

Interested in buying Pro-MB as well, but I may just buy the Pro-Q 4 upgrade now and be done with it.

Hm hm good point. Not sure then.
I can recommend ProMB tho, but unless you need fixed crossovers it’s slightly redundant now with ProQ4 added functionality.

I built a deesser chain with TDR Arbiter, the new Pro-Q spectral filter, and Pro-MB all hitting the ess frequency in small amounts. Worked really well and didn't obliterate the track like a single deesser might.

And here i am just using ProDS in broadband like a sucker.

But really, you’re overdoing it. You’re not supposed to notched the f**k out of sibilances, you’re supposed to make them quieter if they’re too loud. Multiband de-essing only makes sense on full mixes

[fisherKing]

am loving Q4; the instance view alone is worth the price of admission. scrolling thru eqs and making adjustments is SO useful; the spectral dynamics works well, the other new features and improvements are really nice.... am happy with this (the ff eqs have been my go-to for a long time...)

[t.o.t.s.]

lol i gotcha!

[rod_zero]

You guys are not wrong that your eyes can fool you, so you shouldn't rely on visual EQs or analyzers only.
Then again, your ears can fool you just as much and you seem to forget that.
'Trust your ears' is not useful advice when even 0.5db increased loudness can already make you believe it sounds better.

Imo the lesson to learn here is not that visual EQs are bad, but that you should check if your EQ moves (or any change really) actually sound better in a loudness compensated A/B comparison. That was not easy to do in the earlier days, but now we have the technology. Performing actions in a revisable manner helps way more than just removing the visual component, which may or may not deceive you. This way you are able to identify a bad move and can revert (and also learn from) it immediately.

Totally, people underestimate psychoacoustics and overestimate our hearing capabilities.

[elxsound]

You guys are not wrong that your eyes can fool you, so you shouldn't rely on visual EQs or analyzers only.
Then again, your ears can fool you just as much and you seem to forget that.
'Trust your ears' is not useful advice when even 0.5db increased loudness can already make you believe it sounds better.

Imo the lesson to learn here is not that visual EQs are bad, but that you should check if your EQ moves (or any change really) actually sound better in a loudness compensated A/B comparison. That was not easy to do in the earlier days, but now we have the technology. Performing actions in a revisable manner helps way more than just removing the visual component, which may or may not deceive you. This way you are able to identify a bad move and can revert (and also learn from) it immediately.

I use both eyes and ears, because I still can!

[machinesworking]

I use both eyes and ears, because I still can!

Thanks for summing up what I was trying to say.

[Jac459]

...

Totally, people underestimate psychoacoustics and overestimate our hearing capabilities.

100%.