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Squeeze more out of Multi-Band Compression

2013/05/10 in General News, Tips and Tricks

MBD4 IEM Glue

 

In this post we take a look at the Multi-band Compressor introduced to the iLive FX rack in V1.90. If you read my previous post on the DynEQ4 then you will know that soundman Ben Booker has created some presets for the Dynamic FX units and these are now in the library when you install V1.91.

There are two compressor models in the rack:

Multi_BD3

MultiBD3
The 3-band compressor is geared towards mix mastering, where a shallow 6dB slope is more commonly used giving flat band summing and in phase summation. This provides minimal phase distortion, minimal latency and above all natural sounding transient behavior.

MultiBD4

MultiBD4
The 4 band compressor is geared for instrument processing, where the tight slopes are critical for frequency isolation between the 4 spectral bands. Again all slope filters are carefully designed to sum flat. The choice between 6, 18 and 24 dB is a user selectable parameter – the user can decide based on the required band isolation needed for that instrument and compression scenario and also keep phase distortion minimal. So it is possible to have aggressive compression in adjacent bands and still keep phase distortion minimal.

MBD4 slope 6 combi

 

MBD4 slope 18 combi

 

MBD4 slope 24 combi

 

The user can choose the type of ballistics from Peak or RMS, or in auto mode, Opto or Auto Punch.The gain reduction curve shows the actual real world summing of the compressor bands. Some multiband compressors don’t show the real emulated summation.  In some cases audible colouration can be produced if the actual summed frequency response isn’t flat due to the settings of the frequency bands. On our Multiband compressor GUI, the band summation response from the settings is calculated and displayed – you see what you get!

The ‘iLive Rack FX’ pdf download explains the different controls and indicators that are found on the GUI for the MultiBD3&4

You will find some multiband compressor presets created by Ben Booker in the V1.91 library, Ben says “Multiband compressors can fix many problems in the audio world as long as low ratios and little gain reduction are used. They can also sculpt the sound by turning frequency bands up and down individually.”

MDB3 Honky Bass

Dynamic Equaliser gets a boost!

2013/05/03 in General News, Tips and Tricks

DynEQ off micV1.9 introduced for the first time, emulations of dynamics processors which can be loaded into the 8 FX engines. With the ‘time varying’ effects such as reverb, delay, chorus, ADT etc its fairly easy to try different settings to hear how they affect the instrument or signal, it can also be good fun and can be a ‘creative’ experience enhancing the production of the mix to reproduce what the artist did on the recording, or create a musical sonic atmosphere to suit the performance. But for Dynamic Equalisation and Multi-band Compression the setup, control, and outcome of the ‘effect’ requires a deeper understanding of the principles of sound engineering and more of a prescriptive approach to handle certain signal conditions. Check out V1.91 on the A&H site – the boffins have asked soundman Ben Booker to provide some libraries for these units with brief explanations of how they work. Now you can pull them out of your engineer’s toolbox when you need a fix, or some ‘fairy dust’ in your mix!

MBD4 IEM Glue

Ben says: “The Dynamic EQ and Multiband Compressors are very powerful and flexible tools for the audio engineer. The skill required from the engineer is to use small amounts of EQ and compression to achieve the desired results and to learn from experience when and how to get the best from these sophisticated processors.”

Spectral Compression

Spectral Compression
You can cut a frequency range when the audio level in that band is above a level threshold – reduce high level energy in a frequency band.

Spectral Enhancement
You can boost a frequency range when the audio level in that band is below a level threshold – enhance low level energy in a frequency band.

Spec Gating edit

Spectral Gating
You can cut a frequency range when the audio level in that band is below a level threshold – reduce low level energy in a frequency band.

Spec highlight edit

Spectral Highlighting
You can boost a frequency range when the audio level in that band is above a level threshold – enhance high level energy in a frequency band. (careful with this one!)

The ‘iLive Rack FX’ pdf download explains the different controls and indicators that are found on the GUI for the DynEQ4

Ben Says: “Dynamic EQ should be used with great care. Limited amounts of expansion (sound gets louder above or below threshold) and compression (sound is reduced above or below threshold) should be used. It’s worth spending some time with the presets and learning the functions of this impressive tool. The results are worth it and will give your final mix the polish it needs.”

We’ll look inside the Multi-band Compressor in another post