KVR Mix Workshop - Week 2: Snare

[spinedoc]

Kim,

You seem to big on saturators. Could you give us a rundown on the top 3 or 4 you use?

spinedoc

[Kim Lajoie]

Kim,

You seem to big on saturators. Could you give us a rundown on the top 3 or 4 you use?

spinedoc

Sure.

am-phibia is my all-time favourite. This thing is just all kinds of awesome. Not just for saturation, but for general sound shaping (except for vocals, which I'll get to later). It's got about half a dozen different EQ algorithms (that actually sound different), it's got high and low frequency exciters, cabinet simulators and two drive stages (the output level control is actually a 2nd drive stage!). The main drive stage itself is quite versatile (it's got a very wide range of gain - from about -12dB to +60dB I think). It can double as a lead channel of a guitar amp, so it definitely goes there. It's got two "advanced" controls, which adjust the knee (from soft to hard) and the "character" (which I think adjusts the bias or something. It moves from smooth to crunchy). The only thing I'm not terribly excited about is the compressor - it's just too smooth and slow for my taste. The limiter mode might be better, but I don't use it often. When I need actual compression, I reach for am-track. My only complaint is that it uses so much CPU (it's actually quite complex, and most of it is oversampled 4x), so I only use it on key foreground instruments.

Voxformer is a great channel strip. Not just for vocals (actually for vocals I only use it for its gate, which works brilliantly). Like am-phibia, the saturation stage has a very wide range, but it's got more of a dry flavour to it. It's also got a bias control which changes the character between smooth and predictable to harsh and nasal. Voxformer also has quite a low CPU usage (barely even noticeable), so I use it on almost every background sound that needs it. Like am-phibia, I don't really like the compressors in this either - they're simply too tame. The EQ is pretty ordinary too, but comes in handy sometimes (it's more flexible than my regular EQ).

am-track is my regular compressor. I love this compressor so much! The modern "VCA" mode is precise and predictable (without sounding boring) and the vintage mode does wonderful things to drums... Sorry, was this about saturators? I find myself using the tape section of am-track quite a lot. Not because "it sounds like tape", but simply because it sounds good. It has a way of softening transients (and at extremes, flattening dynamics), and can be pushed extremely hard before it gets hairy. Even then, the "EQ lo/hi" control can be turned down for even more softness (amazingly, pushing the high frequencies into it doesn't bring back the harshness!). The best part about am-track is that it uses so little CPU, so I can use it on almost every track.

Oligarc is cool too. The overdrive component is strange - it doesn't have a wide range (it doesn't go into full squarewave territory) but it can sound quite harsh nonetheless. What makes this special though, is that the drive level can be controlled with an envelope follower. On a couple of songs on my current album I've bussed the drumkit through it and used the envelope follower to apply saturation that gives weight and body to the main hit but doesn't bring up the tail. Combined with an envelope-followed output level stage (which also includes a limiter), this is really something special. And of course, (in the same plugin instance) I've also used the envelope follower to control the wet/dry balance of the phaser, so that the main hits are dry and solid, but the tails have a little bit of stereo phaser on them. Weird. And awesome. And that filter...

T-RackS is mentioned here because I'm under contractual obligations. Haha, not really. I bought T-RackS before my professional relationship with eSoundz. The multiband limiter is the only section of T-RackS that I use regularly, because it sounds awesome and there's nothing like it. I rarely use it in mixing though - but it's been on every master that's come out of my studio since about 2004. The default settings are quite coloured (and that can sound cool), but get quite messy when pushed to extremes. Setting the overload (that's such a cool word by the way!) to maximum (+5dB) and release time to minimum, it's amazingly transparent (for my mixes, anyway!) in that it can be pushed to commercial levels (and beyond!) without actually upsetting the dynamics or the balance of the mix. It has all the advantages of a final clipping stage, but the multiband arrangement (and built in limiters) allows it to be pushed way beyond single-band processors before choking.

The interesting thing that that I didn't buy any of these plugins for their saturation! I bought am-suite for the compression algorithms, Voxformer for the EQ and gate, Oligarc for the filter and T-RackS for the whole suite (and because it was free with Amplitube1, back in the day!). Chances are you already have some plugins that have interesting overload characteristics. Experiment with what you have. Saturation is a very funny thing - not only is it very personal, but different types of saturation respond differently to different types of sounds.

I think the value in me writing this is not so you all can now go out and buy the plugins I use (if you did, you still wouldn't sound like me!), but to provide a view about what I find useful in a saturator and how I use them. No doubt you could get good results with different tools. There's a lot of great freeware floating around these days, and there are a lot good tools that are more expensive too.

Hope that helps.

-Kim.

[spinedoc]

Great informative post. Thanks Kim.