Here I go again with 3rd part plugin to compare with Melda: Zynaptiq Intensity

[pumafred]

Any thoughts, reactions, opinions about this plugin?

https://www.zynaptiq.com/intensity/

viewtopic.php?f=6&t=506693

Tentatively, I am not comfortable with such a “black box” approach. Although it may not matter for “sound creation”, for more standard audio processing I would prefer having a better idea of what is happening under the hood.

I bring up comparisons such as this because the ensuing discussion usually teaches me something about Melda plugins’ capabilities and possibilities.

I am all ears!

[vectorwarrior]

I totally agree about black box tools. As a professional, I want to know what any tool is doing to my audio as I need to be very careful with what I'm outputting.

I've watched some videos of intensity and it sounded interesting, but I've heard mixed responses. It did however, with the help of one of Chandler's videos, encourage me to try to use spectral dynamics as a sort of low level detail booster.

The idea being that you want to upwardly compress quieter signals to boost low level details, this will bring up quiet harmonics and enrich the sound.

The problem of course is that it can boost noise, which is super bad. But by using the custom shape controls on the level transfer curve, you can ensure that the quietest signals stay the same (by ensuring the very first breakpoint is at -Infinity in both x and y axis).

The end result has been pretty cool, I've really brought some recordings to life with this technique and it feels like it serves a similar purpose to intensity. Although, again, I've not used it, I'm just taking broadly.

The benefit of using spectral dynamics for this is that you have lots of controls over how it's handling the signal, eg naturality, smoothness.

I'm not at a computer right now, I can post stuff later if people are interested.

[jmg8]

Interested

[steve2KVR]

+1 interested

[pumafred]

The end result has been pretty cool, I've really brought some recordings to life with this technique and it feels like it serves a similar purpose to intensity. Although, again, I've not used it, I'm just taking broadly.

The benefit of using spectral dynamics for this is that you have lots of controls over how it's handling the signal, eg naturality, smoothness.

I'm not at a computer right now, I can post stuff later if people are interested.

I am HUGELY interested in anything you can tell us about your experience with MSD.
I think MSD is vastly underrated, misunderstood and underused. And, for this reason, it may be left out of the "competition" against prettier, simpler, more marketed, plugins that seem much less powerful.
I am thinking of Izotope Neutrino, the humble Sknote SoundBrigade, Oeksound Soother, the Sonible products. (I am leaving out of this list Soundtheory Gullfoss, until there is a Windows version I can test, because I suspect this is a more sophisticated plugin. But could be wrong.)

[pumafred]

I've watched some videos of intensity and it sounded interesting, but I've heard mixed responses.

The problem with most of the videos about Intensity is that most grossly failed to correct for gain, rendering the comparisons meaningless.

I found Zynaptiq unusually sloppy in this relase, first arguing in forum that it was impossible to better correct for at least some auto gain, then releasing two quick updates that include specifically this feature.

Perhaps they were in a hurry to release into what is fast becoming a competitive field. (As people become tired of analogue emulations, this will continue to grow, both for lazy engineers and for those of -us?- who find it fascinating to have computer-powered "assistants" to further refine their work.)

[vectorwarrior]

Code: Select all

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Okay, paste this into MSpectralDynamics. It's an active preset I made for a sort of low-level detail boost. It is very content dependent, I just tried it on different material (classical, EDM, rock) and not only does it requires tuning for each, it also reacts differently throughout the song, e.g. setting it to sound nice on a quiet piece can feel like waay too much when it gets to the loud section. You could resolve this by setting up a multiparamter to drive some controls based on a level follower... but then you're getting into very 'content dependent' territory that I didn't want to confuse people with just yet.


Controls:

Detail Boost - the amount of clarity/detail increase, the most important control. 0% causes no change to the input signal, 100% is likely too much.

Upper threshold - what is considered 'low level detail', from the upper/louder perspective. Loud signals are not effected by the process, so what is the loudest signal that WILL start to be effected. You'll be tempted to boost this high, but dont, if you raise it so that all signals are affected by it then it ends up being a broadband booster, you want mostly quieter signals to be boosted, like harmonics and subtleties.

Lower threshold - if we boosted ALL quiet signals then the noise floor gets boosted too, which is bad. This control allows you to specify at what volume the process should start returning to normal signals. Essentially this lets you tune the balance between noise-floor-boost vs boosting all those lower level signals. On some signals you can set it to zero and you'll get the most out of the process, but with noisier signals you'll start boosting the noise, so pull it back with this. Usually though it doesn't change the sound too much.

Gain - Obviously for gain compensation, only reduces the volume. This is compatible with the AGC 'set' control.

Tone - Detail boosting tends to boost high frequencies more than low, so you can 'tune' it with this if need be. Note that when adjusting this setting you'll likely have to adjust some other settings to compensate (e.g. gain).


This is how I've been using it, but may not suit you:

- With all controls set to default, set detail boost up to 100% to have an extreme (and probably nasty) effect
- Try increasing the upper threshold and watch how the effect is reduced, you want to set it high enough that the effect is audible but not gross
- Try changing the lower threshold to as low as possible, see if any weirdness or noise is introduced as it starts boosting the super low signals
- Now back off the detail boost to 50% (or whatever) so it's subtle and nice
- Press the AGC set (or manually adjust the gain to match the input)
- Use the smart bypass in the Melda plugin to compare to the original (rather than using your DAW's bypass, which will cause latency adjustment and makes it harder to compare because of the glitch)
- If you dont like the brightness, increase the tone control (counter intuitive I know) and it'll start boosting more lower freqs than high. You'll need to readjust the gain control if you touch the tone control.

Again, this probably isn't going to compete with Zynaptiq's Intensity, but it's a different approach which you might not have tried before. I've also made a MXXX patch with an EQ split module so you can really tailor the character of the effect (e.g. split out just the highs/lows and have the effect work on just that, ignoring the mid frequencies).

Interested if anyone finds this useful. I was working on some monster sounds recently and it really brought them to life in a way that EQ and saturation wasn't able to.

Thanks

[Annabanna]

I just find it contradictory about Intensity that it touts itself as at least resembling infinite bands, yet the custom bias option provides 9 fixed bands. Those two concepts just don't match up.

I'm personally not a fan of the black box approach in the least, but I also wouldn't expect to find many fans here.

I do, however, predict that tools in the MSD, DSM, Intensity overall genre will improve dramatically over the next few years. From that perspective, having some of them being Waves One Knob simple will likely spark wider interest.

[pumafred]

Again, this probably isn't going to compete with Zynaptiq's Intensity, but it's a different approach which you might not have tried before.

Will try, thanks!

[MeldaProduction]

I actually used just MDynamicsMB to simulate something fairly similar like that one, but I cannot share it, because I need it for something (I'm so mysterious ). I actually like the sound of my version more than the traditionally overpriced Zynaptique thing, but of course it's everyone's taste.
Anyways it was quite simple, as many bands as possible and I think the ratio was about 2 .

[pumafred]

I actually used just MDynamicsMB to simulate something fairly similar like that one, but I cannot share it, because I need it for something (I'm so mysterious ). I actually like the sound of my version more than the traditionally overpriced Zynaptique thing, but of course it's everyone's taste.
Anyways it was quite simple, as many bands as possible and I think the ratio was about 2 .

The mysterious Mixing Revolution...
I am surprised you would use MDynamicsMB and not MSD. But I know if you told me more, you would have to kill me, so shhhhh!

[pumafred]

viewtopic.php?f=6&t=506693&p=7128698#p7128698

[Chandlerhimself]

I don’t like the black box approach either. Sometimes fewer controls are nice, but in this case it seems like they need a lot more or at least say what it should be used for.

I’m pretty sure that it is doing something like MSD and just filtering out certain bands, but the mysterious nature of what its doing and the fact that a lot of people are saying it just sounds like an exciter doesn’t make me excited about it.

I think its a great idea on paper, but in execution its not as impressive, but I’m sure there are some people who will love it.

[MeldaProduction]

I actually used just MDynamicsMB to simulate something fairly similar like that one, but I cannot share it, because I need it for something (I'm so mysterious ). I actually like the sound of my version more than the traditionally overpriced Zynaptique thing, but of course it's everyone's taste.
Anyways it was quite simple, as many bands as possible and I think the ratio was about 2 .

The mysterious Mixing Revolution...
I am surprised you would use MDynamicsMB and not MSD. But I know if you told me more, you would have to kill me, so shhhhh!

hehe, well, I was actually thinking about it, but MDynamicsMB is just more lightweight and doesn't have latency, so I thought I'd try with this one first .
And actually not for mixing revolution, though it will probably make it in there