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Hi ! my name is Sudhir Shenoi, and
Welcome to the video on effective use of Compressors !
I'm going to experiment with
izotope Alloy 2 and five pre-recorded tracks in Logic Pro.
The first 2 tracks are drum tracks where I've used the software synth Ultrabeat
to create a drum loop. Let's listen to the drum loop.
The third track is created using a third-party software instrument plugin
called "Swarplug"
which emulates an instrument called "Mridangam". For those of you who are unfamiliar with
this instrument, this is a percussion instrument
used in Indian classical music and I would encourage you to google this up
and see how it looks like. Let's hear how it sounds.
The fourth track is a Synth Pad
which is recorded using EXS24 software instrument that came along with
my DAW.
I just played a Chord using SynthPad. Let's hear how it sounds.
The 5th track was created using a bass guitar that I played manually.
Let's hear how it sounds.
One thing that strikes you immediately
is that it is weak towards the fifth bar of the clip.
Let's see if izotope Alloy 2 can fix this.
As you might know, a compressor reduces the amplitude of a signal
when the signal crosses the threshold from a lower amplitude to a higher amplitude.
It is extremely useful in correcting mistakes in inconsistent velocity and volume
while playing manually. I'm going to insert the compressor now.
As you see, the transmission curve shows 1:1
throughout the range, which means that there is not going to be any transformation.
But I will change the compression ratio
to about 2:1
Also, the threshold level is set high to start with.
You see, we have around -10.5 dB of peak input signal.
If you want compression you need to set that threshold somewhere below this peak.
I'm going to set it at around -22.5
When you apply compression, the signal level is suppressed more for the input levels above threshold.
You can see this in the waveform above
in the form yellow lines that denote the compression in real time.
Also, when you compress, there is a loss of signal level which can be compensated with
post compression gain. We need to be a bit careful about this
since gain acts equally on the signal levels below and above the threshold
and care should be taken not to introduce unwanted noise
or distortion.
The knee, kind of, creates a smooth curve around the threshold
which makes the sound transformation more natural
when you choose "soft".
The attack and release times determine how fast the compression gets added
and removed in the real-time.
High-speed attack captures the transient for
compression and high-speed release quickly brings back the original input level
into the mix....
without compression, very quickly when the signal falls below the threshold.
I'm going to leave them as is for the time being.
For better efficiency and productivity, I'm going to start using
some of the great presets that came along with izotope
Alloy 2.
For bass guitar, I'm going to use "picked electric bass".
For drums, I'm going to use "parallel compressed rock drums".
For Mridangam, I'm going to use "midrange tonal percussion" because that's what it is.
Before we listen to the final output of the
mix after compression, let me reflect upon today's lesson.
Of all the lessons that I learned till now
in mixing, learning compression was the most rewarding one.
As we all know, this is just a small initiation into this concept
and it will take years of practice with various tools
to build expertise. Hope you enjoyed today's lesson.
Thanks for watching and I look forward to your review comments.
Let's see how it sounds after all the compression that we did.
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