Recalling gains to channels after softpatching inputs

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  • #100130
    Profile photo of M Van HoutenM Van Houten
    Participant

    Hi folks I’m after a way to retain or recall preamp values to channels after soft-patching a file to suit a different input patch.

    I can see that the preamp value is associated to the socket but I am looking for a way to segregate the association to recall preamp values from original channels and not be left with the residual values from the new input patch.
    I’ve tried both global safe and recall filtering between scenes but i can’t seem to disassociate the value from the socket.

    #100131
    Profile photo of BrianBrian
    Participant

    There isn’t any way of doing this. The gain setting is part of the physical preamp circuitry. When you patch to another input, you are changing to another preamp. The system is always going to pull the current gain setting from the current preamp.

    Trim control on the other hand is set at the channel level.

    #100137
    Profile photo of RSRS
    Participant

    If you are in the channels overview and hit “Library”, you can store the channel with preamp settings when “with preamp” is ticked in that window.

    #100147
    Profile photo of M Van HoutenM Van Houten
    Participant

    Surely there’s a way to push the values to the sockets again though?
    I had a look at channel library we found the with preamp settings option but saving and recalling an individual library for each channel seems a bit long winded. I guess what I’m looking for is a multi-channel library with a recall filter of only preamp settings I guess?

    #100155
    Profile photo of BrianBrian
    Participant

    It’s like driving one car with the cruise control set at 55mph and then changing cars and wondering why the cruise control is set at 65mph and not 55mph like the other car. The preamps are completely different for each input. If you change inputs, you change preamps. Gain is set in the preamp and does not follow the channel.

    #100156
    Profile photo of BrianBrian
    Participant

    Think of an analog board. If you plugged in a mic into channel 1 and set the gain properly and then decided to move the mic to channel 7, you wouldn’t expect the gain setting to be the same on channel 7 as it was on channel 1.

    This is exactly what happens when you change the input on a channel (from local socket 1 to local socket 7 for example). Yes the channel number is the same, but the physical preamp is going to be different. The new gain setting for the input is going to be whatever the gain setting has been for local socket 7 all along.

    You can always go back to the original input (local socket 1) and the gain will go back to what it was before you changed to local socket 7.

    #100186
    Profile photo of BrianBrian
    Participant

    This is also why it doesn’t really work to save a gain setting in a scene and apply it to a new input.

    If you always switched from input socket 1 to input socket 7, then you could save two scene with the gain set correctly on each scene (scene 1 has the gain set correctly for input socket 1 and scene 2 has the gain set correctly for input socket 7). The trouble is when you want to change the input to something else – perhaps local socket 5. Local socket 5 has it’s own preamp with a level that already exists. A scene isn’t smart enough to read your mind to know what input preamp you are going to want to use in the future and what gain you are going to want to use. If you load scene 2, it is going to change the gain setting for local socket 7, not local socket 5.

    There is a simple way of doing this yourself however. Look at the gain setting of your current input before you patch the channel to use another input. Then change the gain setting of the new input to match the old input gain setting. Sure you have to think about this before you patch the new input (or go back and repatch the original input to look at it’s gain setting), but this is the simplest solution.

    The closest “automatic” solution that would be available is a “save gain” button that would store the currently selected channel’s input gain setting in memory. You could then patch a new input and hit “recall gain” and it would set the gain for the currently selected input to the value that is currently stored in it’s memory. Other than the fact that the console would “remember” this number vs you having the memorize it, this is no different than doing it yourself using the method listed above.

    Hopefully all this makes sense!

    (This might be a repost. The original post disappeared when I edited it).

    #100225
    Profile photo of M Van HoutenM Van Houten
    Participant

    To be writing down dozens of preamp values in this day and age seems unnecessary and long winded.. you’re talking stone-age equipment like Yamaha PM5D capabilities.

    It’s a digital environment. The “you can’t do it on an analog board” excuse is old and disproven by Midas when they used that response for the issue of being able to create custom fader banks in the pro series… guess what you can now do on their new console.

    You can’t recall channel settings on an analog console either, but there’s a feature in digital consoles that allows storage and recall of channel settings via libraries.

    I can see why the gain value is connected to the socket, and how it relates to scene recall.
    At one time did actually think the recall filtering scene to scene on a D-live was a little more powerful than what I have found it to be recently hence why I was hopeful there would be a simple way to successfully achieve a softpatch in a walk-in engineer’s show file.

    The fact that we can store a channel library with a gain setting means that we are already able to send a previously stored preamp value to the socket.

    With that in mind we should be able to have a library recall filter that would let us choose what parameters are recalled. If this was possible along with being able to store a multi-channel library it would make the whole process a pretty simple one. (Digico SD consoles have the same socket/preamp relationship with snapshots and I believe their term for a channel library would be a preset and the equivalent of filtering would be recall scope.

    #100233
    Profile photo of SteffenRSteffenR
    Participant

    @enginearing

    How would you do this on other consoles?
    How would a recall filter affect this? It doesn’t.

    The only solution that I can see at the moment is to write down the settings…
    Since you change preamps/sockets a scene recall will not do the trick… it will recall the patch as well

    If you change the socket to a socket without gain and phantom power…what should happen?
    The system can patch 800 sockets…

    #100240
    Profile photo of M Van HoutenM Van Houten
    Participant

    Other consoles:

    Venue consoles the gains are snapshottable so you build a snapshot with just the gains in the snapshot scope.

    As I’ve said above the Digico SD consoles the gains are tied to the sockets but it is achievable by building a multi-channel preset, and recall scoping the gains when it is recalled. This pushes a gain value from stored channel data to the I/O rack.

    The A&H channel library it seems like an equivalent to a channel Preset. If we were able to build a multi-channel library that contains the channel data for a chosen number of channels and some recall filtering when the library is loaded, then that should allow a level of filtering where only gains are loaded.

    #100322
    Profile photo of WolfgangWolfgang
    Participant

    At the moment, channel gains can only be recalled with the library. this is done for each channel individually.
    Or with a scene recall. In this case, however, the sockets must correspond to the real inputs.

    The wish to be able to recall several channels simultaneously via the library (with the gain values) has already been expressed.

    #109019
    Profile photo of M Van HoutenM Van Houten
    Participant

    So I have just managed to work around this issue on the Avantis using the CSV file import/export function.

    While not the multi-channel library with recall filter that would make sense, by plugging in a computer running director I was able to export the CSV file, edit the patching (while retaining the Gain data) and then import the back to the console.

    this works to easily shuffle an input patch coming from a generic festival patch, or in the event of changing where a stage rack source was coming into the console I was able to move the 1:1 patch from S/link to and IO card and not lose headlamp data.

    #109089
    Profile photo of ChrisChris
    Participant

    Just purely out of curiosity, what would this capability allow you to do?

    I am able to use scenes to pretty much recall any setting I could desire and filter those settings just about any way I want to. How is that not similar to what you are trying to accomplish?

    #109092
    Profile photo of ChrisChris
    Participant

    I’ll give an example of what I’m talking about. Maybe this is not related to what you are trying to do, but…

    Virtual Sound Check doesn’t work with tie lines. I want to send a VSC like mix through the tie lines so I have a scene for normal patching and I have a scene that remaps all my inputs so I can basically run my own VSC. Both scenes have different gains for each channel but I have filtered out everything else so I can have the same processing for each channel. Is something like this not what you are looking for? Genuinely curious.

    #109099
    Profile photo of M Van HoutenM Van Houten
    Participant

    -Mix engineer has existing show file for act, touring all own mics/DIs
    -Festival provides generic patch
    – softpatching inputs = losing gains
    – dictate original gain values (at preamp) from channel

    As discussed above using scenes means that the gains are linked to the pre-amp port (as they should be).
    Because of this when the new ports are chosen the existing gain values come into the channel with the new patch.

    Because scenes treat the entire IO port and associated gain data as one element, I believe the desired values has to be stored as a library… when you recall a channel library it’s a channel setting that forces a preamp value back to the preamp.
    If we were able to write a multi-channel library for a chosen number of channels (as we can with Digico channel presets) the library recall filtering would enable a way to recall the original gain values when a new input patch.

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