Are Analogue Modelled Channel Strips Snake Oil?
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- čas přidán 8. 09. 2024
- In which I address a question in a comment, which unfortunately got buried before I grabbed a screenshot: snake oil? Or... whats the opposite of snake oil? Anti-biotic?
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I almost never comment on a video, but I have to this time. Please do not stop with the in depth videos. The algorithm might be telling you to, but the producers likely disagree. I literally cannot think of another channel on youtube that describes how plugin works to such an extent as this channel does, and therefore provides the same quality of learning. One of a kind channel.
Personally I don’t think Dan Worrall will stop making those in-depth kind of videos, as he’s said before that he loves geeking out about plugins. I think his comment about the reception of his last video was more of a relief that he doesn’t have to worry about making lower-effort videos than normal while he still feels like crap from Crohn’s Disease before starting medication for it, not an acknowledgment that he should exclusively make lower-effort videos from here on out. Dan, if you’re reading this, I also hope that someday you will make more detailed videos breaking down plugins and other audio concepts, but if you decide not to, I will respect that decision, and I wish you well as you start your medication to help with living with Crohn’s Disease.
I just thought he was sarcastic about the low-effort part.
I don't know what video he's talking about, but I have to agree with the "algorithms". While I love that Dan has this vast knowledge I get lost and my mind wanders trying to listen to his in depth content. Add his hypnotic voice to it and all bets are off. I just can't focus. This video, however, I stayed with him the whole time. I think he would do well to tone it down a bit, maybe even dumb it down a bit. That's just my opinion though.
Hate, bitterness and negativity is what drives CZcams and most social media. Sad but true.
The voice of reason and with a tongue planted in the cheek. Entertaining, educating and thought provoking.
^^ This !
I think people who think "analog mojo" will fix their bad mix don't realise that a lot of bad music/mix/mastering was made exclusively using analog gear. We just only remember the good music and become nostalgic of that.
Or how much of a pain in the ass it was to work on, say, tape?!
Yeah, in my experience, audiophiles who obsess over analog gear, tend to have extremely reactionary tastes in music, unwilling to entertain the validity of the creative output of younger generations. It's an emotional attitude, driven by anger over no longer being young, taking their frustration on whoever they can get away with feeling powerful over
@@UnfortunatelyTheHunger I own a truckload of analog hardware and plenty of plugins. I want to hear more about my emotional attitude and anger, and how I take that out on plugin users.
@@legacyShredder1 I know reading comprehension is hard, but 'tend to' indicates an average. As in, not all. Complicated stuff, I know.
@@Arcessitor The point. You missed it.
Dan yapping while still teaching is something I'm absolutely up for.
I found out how much "magic" they pack into their plugins when I took a closer look at one of the brainworx consoles (I forgot which one it was because I didn't buy it). It had a "sheen" knob. When activated, the sound experience was much brighter and clearer. When I examined the thing with the doctor, I realized that they had already built in a lowpass filter when loading the plugin. With the premise of analog warmth, this was acceptable to the ears. If you then activate "Sheen", this lowpass filter is deactivated. Ultimately, the "Sheen" button was simply a return to the normal digital sound. What made the difference was my premise of what makes the sound 'analog' and what makes the sound 'digital', nothing else.
Thats not what i've seen reviewers testing it say sheen does on those console plugs, it radically changed the EQ
Iirc sheen changes the shelf frequency or the bell width. You're correct that it's not magic.
Cool you should just buy more analog gear
@@stayinspired2027Also buy me a taco, please.
I think what anolog modeled channel strips do for me is almost a mental thing, where it puts me in the mindset of working on a console. So instead of wondering what to load on each individual thing, you just put the same channel strip on everything and go, avoiding the mire of options. Also, the limitations are good for avoiding amateur mistakes, where instead of contorting the sound with 15 bands of fully parametric EQ, you got 3 or 4 bands to work with, which you quickly learn is completely sufficient 99% of the time. And if you're working with stepped frequencies and a preset Q-factor, well that's just straight-up idiotproof, which is great for me.
Yup! It’s a great place to start. And once I feel like I can’t get a certain sound out of my comp or eq on my Focusrite plugin in, I’ll try putting on something cleaner on (dynamic le from ozone 10 is my go to stand alone comp, similar to the fabfilter proMB and that normally gets my sound where it needs to be. No magic fixes. just tools that I learned in and out!
I fully agree. I've recently become a strong believer in channel strip plugs as a mixing approach. I put them on everything and just that practice alone is a giant step into being a vastly superior producer (of course, you have to actually mix on it, not just slap it on).
These short "low effort" videos are great! Thank you, Dan!
Absolutely. That Pedal Show do short [Effector Du Jour] videos that involve a seven minute investment of my time. They don't delve into every single ounce of detail like their hour--long episodes, but they sure are accessible.
Came for the level-headed audio analysis, stayed for the level-headed political analysis
The vast majority of audio engineers who have used this analog technology at that times are grateful that these analog days with all its pitfalls and problems are over. Nuff said.
If I'll ever make plugin, I'm definitely going to implement "Accurate emulation of dust that needs to be wiggled around in the pot and virtual contact cleaner included" 😂
And there will be people who will use e.g. automation to actually use that "dusty pot feature" to use it in a musical or sound-design context i believe - why not make a plugin that resembles just dusty potentiometers?! I mean the crackling must sound differently on an SSL-pot compared to a Neve-pot, right?! 😇🤓😂
@@M1ster77 I would want one for that reason. But I think I could get there with Reapers JS, or Reaktor. I`d just have to think about the UI. Edit: Got there with Reaktor in a few minutes. It turns out that figuring out the UI wasn't a big problem.
Please also include a mini game where you have to replace broken condensers or troubleshoot faulty cable connections 😂
sounds AWESOME! Also maybe some groundloop hum, depending on the other plugins in that channel of your daw, so you really have to dig deep to find the issue. I d also recommend random polarityflip whenever the plugin is instantiated - just like in some analogue units / cables that have been wired backwards. Man this is getting exciting! 🤣🙈@@xseb1
@soundslikeamillion77 also bursts of RF noise that go away before you can work out which channel it's on. And occasional announcements from passing taxi drivers.
To many plugins out there 99.9% of these plugins are like SPAM they do not do anything but distract me. Thanks for all the work you do Dan !
Dan Worral is doing Snake Oil videos? I'm here for it!
Babe wake up, new Dan Worrall just dropped
4:18 Honestly that's pretty much the main reason I use the more skeuomorphic plugins and the emulations a lot of the time. A lot of the more modern complicated plugins just make me tweak and mess around a lot rather than mix.
Skeuomorphism has its place, but I think it still needs to be applied with thought and moderation.
Compressors and EQs are normally fine; guitar amp emulations annoy me though, where they allow you to tweek the knobs of the channel you're not currently playing through whilst wondering why the EQ isn't having any effect on the tone.
or developers can take the goodhertz philosophy that are designed for digital convenience with simplicity built in…
Another great video Dan. A country should be judged on how it treats its most poor and marginalised, not how many tax dodging billionaires it has. Health care is a basic human right, which should be equally available to all citizens, irrespective of how much money you have. Take care.
"If my younger self from the 90s could see how powerful my setup is now, my mind would be blown." 100%! If you didn't live through it, you probably can't grasp the enormity of how far we have come.
Back in the 90s, I'd have to spend $5000 to get a sampler setup that can do half of what a free sampler plugin can do now. It's simply - almost indescribably - incredible.
I love how well compressed and gated your voice is on these. Really fits the theme of what you talk about 🤣
I’m seriously considering making a channelstrip type plugin, that will “model” various console - SSL, Neve etc, with the ability to switch between them, but then to make the only difference be the skin on the interface, and then see what the reviewers say about the difference in sound 😅 Guess it won’t work now I’ve given the game away, but anyway, thank you for once again bringing the voice of reason. No plugin will make your mix sound better if you don’t know how to use it. And even the greatest one can make your mix considerably worse if you don’t use it well
I would eagerly listen to your podcasts even being unprepared because it's a rare thing to hear a sober human speaking nowadays
I gave up my subscription for one of the ssl plugins bundles as I couldn't hear a difference. Firstly I think you need really good speakers, audio interface, etc just to hear these subtle analogue sounds. Secondly we add all of these subtle effects then someone plays the finished mix through their phone. They will definitely not hear any of it. Thanks for the great video!
I think it is more about the feel of the workflow. Yes, we can EQ match until the cows come home but then sometimes it's more about getting to know what to expect from each "flavour" and the context for when to use it. If you learned on hardware, there is something inherently comforting in the GUIs. All that said, I love how the FabFilter suite pretty much covers the bet from end to end between ProQ3, Saturn, ProC2, and Volcano if you are looking for a nice "channel strip" sound. The caveat being your ability to put it all together
Each Worrall upload feels like Christmas.
I am a sucker for aesthetics when it comes to plugins. I have always wondered if I truly like music, or just playing with all the knobs and levers like some mad scientist. I've got a few channelstrip plugins, but they never seem to do for me what separate "boring" plugins easily achieve. Except for one: the IK plugin rack which I got for cheap, although it doesn't really count because it's not so much a console but a seperate fx strip with predefined choices.
If you know what yor are doing, you can get very good mixing resulst with stock plugins, if not - third party plugins don't help at all. And btw. one of my favourite bands is Guided By Voices. Most of their early tracks are recorded on 2 or 4 tracks. It is the song that matters most. Good luck with your treatment, hope you are getting well soon. ❤️
GBV is my fave as well. I actually use them to put things in perspective quite often. The "mixing" and quality of the recording is second to a great song. The lo fi sound of something like Bee Thousand doesn't need any special mixing or mastering to sound awesome.
Thing is that even your “low effort” is still either reassuring and/or insightfull.
Which puts you above many other “audio youtubers”.
really nice reminder about the wonder of mixing, thanks!
I honestly just like the layout of those kinds of plugins more. If i need to dig deep i will use EQs or Compressors that allow me to do that, but in all the other instances i like those old looking ones. They force you to listen instead of looking at a live graph of the entire frequency spectrum and i like that
I for one stand by my channel strips plugins. They are so very functional and make mixing more enjoyable for me. Some of them have a nice sound as well that I may be imagining, but when used across an entire mix (SSL for instance) I do feel like there is some X-factor in the sound. All the mixes I have used them on have been better, but that might just be because they're basically the only mixes where I take care to compress and EQ every single track. I might try another approach. But it also helps that the Brainworx SSL are VERY low CPU rather than using specific EQ and compressor on every track. I can only use like 5-6 UAD plugs before things get rough.
6:30 DAWs are in fact more powerful than any studio mixer from the 90's, but many mixes now are also on another level, not possible in the 90's, nevermind 80's or 70's.
That being said, I agree equipment is not an excuse for a bad mix nowadays.
Get well soon, Dan!!!!!
How are mixes “on another level?” I have always mixed to the voice in my head and I’ll admit that voice goes to some very strange places. It did this in 1970, 1980, 1990, and well… you get the picture. The hard part has always been the imagination, the scoring, the picture.
In 1970, I used ridiculous means to render my dreams; tape loops across the room, modified pianos, using edit mode to hand-fly samples from my MCI servo controlled machines, cutting tape like a jigsaw puzzle. Today, it’s a whole lot easier to put that together but dreaming it up takes the same amount of time and effort.
Nothing was impossible then, same as now.
I completely agree and I have been following your videos since forever, so I perfectly understand what you mean. That said, I’m still on a quest to understand what it is that gives me - or at least seems to give me - a deeper, rounded, fuller sound on the analogue counterpart of most emulations (like API 550s, distressors, SSL fusion, etc). I don’t understand why it’s different and why we haven’t quite managed to match it. Do you hear any of that or do you not really hear a difference/prefer plugins? It’s a genuine question, for those who believe I would ever attack Dan Worrall which for me is the biggest prophet on audio we have today haha
Also, in case you wanted some human feedback past the Google statistics: the low effort videos are great, and I will keep watching/listening to every one you put out, but I don’t think they beat the high effort, example-based, screen-captured videos, which are truly what sets your channel apart from the rest of the world!
Just one opinion though (of a big fan)!
Thank you for all of your content!
Whenever I use my analogue chain it feels like I'm getting extra special quality results. Weirdly that feeling persists even when I remote control analogue gear from a plugin! However, every time I try to match the sound with plugins, I succeed. With EQ I can invariably create something I can't distinguish from the analogue. And with compression I generally end up with something slightly different but equally good. So I'm forced to conclude that the extra special quality I perceive is entirely in my head. Sometimes I have fun with my analogue gear, but if I'm in any kind of a hurry I don't indulge myself.
I've been measuring a bunch of analog components and plugins so I'll give some things I've learned so far. A couple main things to look for are:
- Saturation being non uniform across the frequency spectrum: Usually opamps tend to have a flat line with a rise on high freqs (even+odd harmonics) while transformers only low freqs (mostly odd harmonics).
- Hysteresis (a change in the clipping curve dependent on the volume of the source).
- Inaccuracies in stereo. I'm not talking about changing EQ curves on each channel. Usually analog designs are trimmed to have an EQ response is almost equal in both L and R channels; it's the saturation/noise/dynamic range that changes (just a subtle variance).
I recommend you to use plugin doctor's Hammerstein analyzer. Compare saturations you like to those you dont. You'll have a better understanding on their differences. If you don`t find any good ones I suggest you look at VOS Thrillseeker VBL (it's free!) or, in case you have them, almost any Slate Digital Mix Rack.
That being said, don`t completely throw/embrace a plugin based on plugin doctor's reading. There are differences that can't be measured this way. For example, Elysia's karacter emulates the sound of transistor pumping pretty accurate, while giving a pretty flat hammerstein read that could misinform you. Could also be the case that a company did a great emulation of an unit that is pretty "ideal" (using only good opamps that dont have that high freq saturation rise); that would look "worse" in plugin doctor.
Hope it helps!
@@davids840 thank you, this is great stuff. On the topic of stereo inaccuracies, I have noticed something (completely empirically) on a few different occasions: my behringer fx2000 (behringer! Multi FX that does a million things, all digital, for very, very cheap) which is hardware, sound deeper in reverb mode than basically any plugin I own (which include the best algo stuff out there). More 3D. Now, the process is digital, but and probably not incredible algorithms either. So my only conclusion is, of which I am not sure at all, could it be that the simple fact that it’s hardware mean two different electronic channels, travelling independently and going into two different line inputs on the interface? The mere fact that they’re hardware could make a difference in depth perception because of tiny discrepancies between left and right? Be it a result in phase, harmonic distortion, even noise and whatnot? Do any of your findings correspond to my perception?
I do believe there might be a kind of placebo effect in this. Because visually it looks good it must sounds good right? Plus 20 years of marketing making this common believe that analog have this warmer, magic, more alive feeling.
I don't know how am I right about this, but I genuinely think the phycology factor is pretty high on that matter.
@@Y0_ltr there is for sure some of that, I’ve seen it on the opposite (controlling hardware digitally), but I’ve also done some double blinds and there’s just something I like more in that department, almost every time (on some gear I don’t notice it, on some other I do).
Plus the hardware reverb is hardly interactive, as I just set it up like a plugin more or less!
I have learned three things from you, Mr. Dan:
1. Use your ears before you use your eyes
2. Saturation is magical
3. A plug-in should help you get better sounds faster
I like the way the AMEK 9099 plug-in works, and I feel like I understand it 1000x better after your video, but my choice to use that plug-in is strictly because I like how fast I can get good sounds out of it. It's not giving me any sound that I couldn't get by individually creating each component of it and I would not be doing your teaching justice by pretending otherwise!
I am super glad you are on the mend my dulcet-voiced internet friend! Power to Labour!
Always excited to see your videos in my subscription feed, they're incredibly well made videos (even these low effort ones) that have given me some super useful insight into the actual technical aspects of audio. In retrospect, I don't know how I managed to work with sound for so long without even knowing what oversampling does or what phase means.
What do you think about airwindows plugins , especially Consoles ?
Before the airwindows consolidated projet I would've just advise to not really touch on it. Wayyyyyyyy to many plugins, some (if not most) of them straight useless for the majority of people, some really great and a handful that are just straight up witchcraft.
Now that we have a plugin with all airwindows plugin inside it with embedded documentation and a dedicated recommended section it's way more accessible than it was before.
The XYZ Filter series is incredible, Pockey2 is one of the most musical bitcrusher around, the K series of reverb shouldn't be free. If Chris only made ToTape6 I'll still consider him one of the greatest DSP coders of all time. Tube2 is such a joy, ect ect ect.
For me tho, console is such a pain to setup and use that I juste never uses is.
I got a bunch of "vintage" compressors from Waves for next to no money a few years back and I love them. The limited functionality of the vintage emulations compared to a modern plugin really helped me develop my ear for compression because I could just drop them in to a track, compare the results against each other, pick which one I liked best and tweak from there. So I agree, whether a plugin is "better" comes down to workflow and ease of use rather than whether said plugin can "do" something another plugin can.
Spot on, Dan; especially your closing comments. I played my first gig in ‘92 when the music industry was a very different place to be. The labels held sway, most doors were shut, and producing a pro-level recording independently was cost prohibitive. Fast forward to now and I would say that there has never been a better time to be getting into music. Professional gear at a fraction of the prices of yesteryear, and everything one needs to get out there and heard at one’s fingertips. ‘Kids today’ have no idea how blessed they are. 😂
Thanks for being one of those providing quality teaching and advice amongst the noise. I recommend you often. Have a superb day.
I absolutely love my Neve and SSL channel strips on UAD2, but the DSP offload movement in general does seem permeated by misinformation and misplaced hype. I honestly just love how they sound and the fact they don't hog my CPU.
I still own a Behringer Composer, which was also my first compressor. Back when it came out, it was a game changer because it was much cheaper than anything else on the market and not sooo bad
I do love the post 2006 plugins. Man, they emulate millions of dollars of $ in the 80s. And I'm Canadian and love my social net, though it is a challenge to maintain.
Can you see the difference? I do, and in Argentina we are going through the same situation, before children could access very expensive medications through the state to cure or cope with cancer, not at this time with a liberal government that decided not to spend on those medications.
Sorry and a thousand times sorry for the out of place intrusion for a video about music.
Thanks for your videos Dan
SO glad to see you're back Dan! I cannot express how much I learn from your videos and how much I enjoy your presentation style and the thought that goes into everything you do.
4:12 exactly what I try to remember every time the G.A.S. kicks in
So I haven't wasted thousands of pounds then .....Yaaaaeee !
You hit the nail on the head. 'If you enjoy it'... and if I enjoy it, i'll be more creative, and if im more creative, I'll end up with better mixes. So anything that you think is cool.... is cool! Regardless of whether it has code or knobs!
The question and the answer to those which Dan gave were like the final nails in the coffins for this matter! ❤
While I do think that with increasing computing power, the „analog“ aspects or nonlinearities will be more in-depth, your video had a great take on it! Anyway IMHO the „realness“ always has to come from the recording. Where you put that mic and how much room you let bleed in will always make it more interesting than what channelstrip you used. Really enjoyed your style and arguments! Absolutely subscribed!
Behringer Composers - My mate was very disappointed with his.
Marked lack of Bass frequencies, while I had a PA rack full of them and no problems.
Turned out that, for a length of time, the factory in China had run out of the specified components and had been substituting 'near equivalents', hence the problem with the frequency response.
Mine were of an earlier vintage and had no such problems.
You’re the best, Dan. As a fellow Reaper user, your analysis has been among the most useful I’ve encountered in my mixing “career”. Always looking forward to the next video!
Nice one Dan. As much as I love your in depth analysis I don’t always have time to watch the whole thing in a busy day, so this low budget, short and sweet approach is great for a few minutes of downtime, keep em coming! But health first, all the best with that 👍
Great content, as usual, Dan. Hope you're feeling better these days 👍One of your comments reminded me of a time when i was at a house party in Tucson. There was one party-goer who was a member of the Tohono O'odham nation walking around with a mason jar of tequila with a partial rattlesnake soaking in it. He asked me if i wanted to try it and raised his fist in a curling motion, as if to imply it would give me superpowers in the bedroom. I politely declined. Edit: spelling
Dan, as someone struggling with a chronic illness in an awful healthcare system, my heart goes out to you. Best of luck.
The s-es trigger right green bar … can’t unsee and unhear. And I really enjoyed this quality talk! Thanks Dan and hope you feel better soon!
100Hz on the left up to 8k on the right, RMS amplitude levels.
It cannot be overstated enough your comment about the "accessibility to the masses" and how amazing that is. When I first started playing with sound as a teenager, I didn't have access to a studio, just my PC and what I could get cheaply/free... and it sucked. The difference between what I had and what the pros had was just massive. Even if I was extremely skilled (I'm not) there was no way I could achieve professional results with the tools I could have. Now? It's the same stuff. I can, and do, have the same DAW, same reverbs, same compressor, etc that actual pros use, despite just being a hobbyist. It is so awesome that the barriers have been lowered as they have.
Sarcasm or not. Please don't let your videos lose quality. The profound tests and information you provide accompanied by your great style of explaining things is what makes your videos so great. Get well soon!
Dan always helps me see the path to good music, sound and creativity.
Mixing/mastering engineer and political progressive here. Thank you so much Dan for your years of brilliant audio tutelage - and now humane political views.
Feel the dan Bern!
I've been waiting for a video about a console/channel strip (other than Amek 9099)! Excited to watch this, Dan never fails to deliver.
EDIT: This was not what I expected. Although it is a great video, I expected some sort of in depth walkthrough of at least the channel strip in the thumbnail, similar to your Amek 9099 video.
All i know is that Focusrite channel strip sounds harsh no matter what you do with it: ear fatigue.
Title of the video I've been waiting for, but I probably expected different content.
Two things.
1. Questions
Let's set aside design and ergonomics.
Here are my questions.
What should we model in terms of sound?
Is there anything else we cannot model yet?
Is hardware behavior static or frequency-dependent (possibly due to capacitor bandwidth)? i.e. Does the mathematical algorithm describing the compression or eq curve of the device always remain the same?
How different can channel strip plugins be and what distinguishes them from each other? Why do some possibly sound "better and more realistic" than others?
What is the difference between an algorithmic plugin and an impulse plugin (Acustica Audio)?
2. My experience
I've had both cheap and expensive hardware channel strips. I noticed that I always prefer a digital equalizer in the DAW. Cheap compressors are bad. Mid-range and expensive compressors process the signal in a way that I cannot achieve with plugins. With hardware, it's quick and "like on recordings". Several times I tried using a channel strip as external processing to enrich the sound (hybrid mixing) and didn't notice any magical results on a single track or mix, except for signal degradation in some cases, usually losing top and bottom frequencies.
Preamp quality is very important.
Therefore, for me the best combination is a good preamp, tracking compressor, and the rest with plugins.
✨ “Back in my live sound days” ✨
By a mile the very best example of British understated ‘scathing’ review technique on CZcams. Factually accurate, well researched and brutal in their honesty. Dan is awesome.
I love how you make each point pertinent and meaningful Dan ... Carry on with these great fire side chats!
Love your videos but a little disappointed on the political analysis front as the highlight of this channel is a strong weighting towards science and away from bias and marketing. A lot of things have happened over the last 20 years, some minor, some major and its completely impossible to attribute that purely to one thing (government), no one can possibly say where a Labour government would be post covid among other things. And just so people dont try and baseline this comment as a disgruntled Tory im Scottish and have never voted Tory in my life and I suspect I never will. Anyway it's great you eventually got treatment and hopefully this run of recent videos shows your feeling better and are back in the game. Great content as always and hopefully much more to come.
0:00 This is the video we’ve been waiting for y’all
I had an "aha!" Moment a little while back about finding which plugins most closely emulated the real thing...... in most cases, I've never used the real thing, so what do I care how close it is! I have NO idea what a Fairchild sounds like in practice!
I always love your no-nonsense philosophical analyses to these matters. - Glad the system took care of you. Hope you are well.
I think there’s three categories for a channel strip to be evaluated by (four if you bring price into the equation). First, does it speed up your workflow? Second, does it do what’s on the tin (useful eq, compression, de-esser, saturation, etc). Third, if it models hardware, does it accurately model the hardware?
The third one is the one that I think about most because it’s very easy to answer the first two. In particular there are some complicated things that influence the sound passing through the hardware. Obviously, box sound is a real, measured thing, but how accurate is it? We can only tell if someone has access to both and does a comparison. And what is the usefulness of each element of that box sound? As you’ve pointed out, we’re going to EQ anything to our liking anyway so any box sound EQ will likely be made largely redundant. Recognizing that, my interest has drifted towards the parts of the box sound that are related to transients and saturation. I’m almost certain that there are plugin manufacturers inaccurately implementing saturation to channel strips and other hardware modeled components. The most obvious inconsistency is that I’ve seen is how saturation is applied. Lower effort plugins apply saturation linearly across the frequency range, at various levels per harmonic. The hardware doesn’t necessarily model saturation this way. The best sounding console emulation plugin I own has nonlinear saturation applied in different amounts across the even and odd order harmonics in an X shape, where the even order harmonics are loudest at the lower end, and the odd order harmonics are loudest at the higher end. The X crosses around the 1k mark, presumably not accidentally where the vocal range and more sensitive parts of our hearing are. The other part is the transient nuances introduced by the electronics that I don’t really have the equipment to measure. So, for me, outside of workflow, the special sauce is how saturation is applied. Flat is fine, but leaves a lot on the table.
If you want to test this for yourself, you can compare the various applications of saturation on a plugin like the Black Box HG-2MS, where you can select flat or dial in saturation curves. In my opinion, saturation curves are where the magic is.
Appreciate seeing your videos in my feed. Thank you Dan. You are very insightful
I’ve always treated any “analog”or “modeled” plugins less like the magical secret sauce I’m missing, and more of an interesting way of understanding/simulating one aspect of what it might be like to use the stuff that was used back in the day, because the limitations of their functionality was a feature not a bug. In a world with limitless options and possibilities, my ADHD can easily cripple my ability to make decisions, because I’m overwhelmed and overloaded. When I have a limited set of options I’m much less anxious about making the right decision because I can reasonably evaluate which one of those choices I think is best in that moment.
Another thing that’s helpful, is that learning how some of this legendary equipment functioned and sounded often makes understanding what was being discussed by legendary producers in interviews about their work. If someone says the vocals were just run through an SSL and given a couple dB boost to the highs and then compressed by an LA2A with an aggressive setting. If you have no idea what any of that shit is, it’s not helpful. Once you have access to even a cheap sounding digital clone of that stuff, you might see that you were applying way too many plugins and over doing things because your DAW had a vocal preset that loaded a handful of plugins you might want for a particular task, which you might mistake as being needed, when some of them might not. So, you can use less or sometimes you hear a couple of dB boost and think it’s subtle when you don’t know the gear and later when you try the plugin version that “couple of dB” using the knob of that console was actually really dramatic because it had a much wider Q and was boosting way more than an actual 2 dB, because the old stuff wasn’t accurately labeled as to what it was doing.
Once you’ve learned how those guys got the sounds they did, the interviews actually have more value because you can begin to understand “why” they did what they did, and once you know what the sound you should be shooting for is, then you can use other tools to get there if you want or maybe find something different that you like better.
When you’re working with a bunch of plugins and DAWs that could be wildly different, if you still have plugins available that emulate classic gear, you can probably get a mix a lot faster than learning everything about the new DAW you’re working on for that day, because you’re familiar with what those things did and can imagine how that particular plugin might change the sound before applying it.
I’m sure that guys who worked in the analog world appreciate the skeuomorphic GUI that resembles the familiar tools of their trade, which is a benefit we don’t have as younger folks who’ve only ever worked in the box. If you try applying similar settings in any generic multi-band EQ plugin that comes stock with a DAW, they all behave a little differently and if you’re listening in a different room on different monitors and their spectrum analyzer displays things differently than what you’re used to, there’s nothing to anchor your perspective because everything is always relative, and when you try out a plugin version of analog gear, because that’s the only thing you’re familiar with, you can probably recalibrate your understanding of what’s different and how it relates. Maybe you’re finally mixing in a room that doesn’t suck, and you’re not used to things sounding good immediately, because you’ve figured out how to compensate for that. If you know your speakers have shitty bass response, so a little boominess is fine because when you take that mix and play it back on other systems it sounds perfect-you might have problems if you’re in a mixing environment that doesn’t do that-but if you typically give the bass a few dB cut using an SSL, and this “better” (or at least different) monitor setup needs a big boost to that same knob, that’s when your ears can’t be trusted because your inner calibration is off.
That might make you give a listen to your other mixes that were good on that setup, and you find that it sounds way different than you remember it sounding at home, so you apply the cut to the track and even though it’s way differently than it would sound at home you can hear it sound much closer to the reference mix and you only need to adjust that same knob similarly to what you would have expected.
I only mention that potentially useful scenario where nothing else is anchored to what you’re familiar with, because emulating gear is ubiquitous and when there was an objective comparison to make with real-world equipment, most plugins get pretty damn close. So, it could be helpful. Especially if you mix on speakers that sound good by default because they’re designed to compliment the sound like consumer stereo equipment does, but maybe with more precision. Some people like mixing on speakers that exaggerate the worst of every mix, so that when get things sounding less nasty on it, it sounds amazing on everything else. Yamaha NS-10 are a thing for a reason. If you’re used to working for a long session, and know that by the end your ears will be tired and everything is going to be way to boosted in the highs, and you tend to boost the bass a bit much because it sounds good on your headphones, but then becomes overwhelming when played on consumer stereos that already have a smile EQ curve, I sometimes throw an exaggerated EQ on the master bus, so that I start out with those frequencies sounding hyped up from the beginning of a session, so I won’t keep adding to them as my ears tire out, and by the end that mix might sounds flat and even to my ears, but the next day with fresh ears it will sound like the garbage I intended and then once I remove that intentionally bad EQ curve, it’s a lot better and much closer to being right. I find that can help me jam as much work into one day than I would’ve otherwise been able to, and rather than making that all a waste and having to start over the next day. You can continue from where you left off much easier.
Anyway, to bring it all back around, I think it’s useful to impose limits that will bring out your creativity to solve for those things and for all of these digital things to be tethered to some sort of objective reality. The folks who are long dead that came up with that old gear were just doing whatever worked at the time, and by it become almost standardized across the industry as every studio copied one another to stay competitive and appeal to the best producers who wanted certain things-that’s not a bad thing to have when software developers could re-imagine a GUI that could look like literally anything and when every DAW approaches things so differently and it’s not as easy for producers and mixers to compare notes when they work in different DAWs, using analog emulations can simplify things a bit so less is lost in translation. I imagine that’s one of the reasons that crazy expensive Waves plugins that are arguably no better than stock plugins became so widely adopted. It’s not necessarily because they were the best, or even easiest to use, but they probably provided a bunch of things Pro-Tools had been lacking back in the day, and by being compatible with everything, it probably made life as a traveling producer or mix engineer easier, because it was the familiar thing in every studio, along with the faders and panning knobs. There’s a reason that nobody has designed a 3D interface for mixing, which might be better-it’s because moving things around on an X, Y and Z axis isn’t possible with actual faders and knobs-but maybe with AR/VR stuff being popular, someone might come up with a paradigm shift where you’re literally moving things around your head in 3D space bringing things closer instead of cranking up a fader, and physically moving the source of sound so it sits in a different place rather than panning left or right with a knob. It’ll of course require ears that know what they’re listening for, but it could lead to really cool sounding mixes that wouldn’t have been as intuitive to create using the old way, but it will still be helpful to know the old way so you can better compare them.
I couldn't have made a better snake oil video! 😂
The Snake Oil guy himself!
Hope you don't mind me borrowing your catchphrase Wytse?
@@DanWorrallI don’t mind at all 😊
Hey Wytse! 😊❤
Loved the A/B comparison at the end. As most of us are listening experts if we can't tell the difference, then I imagine we're not really trying to.
Over a short period of time. Recording tech is more accessible than ever and better than what was available. Assuming this trend continues. Smartphones can have sophisticated DAW apps. Processors capable of unlimited stem separation. I often wonder when (not if) my recording studio will be obsolete. My backup plan was to sell all the gold records on the wall, only to find out: they aren't actual pure gold records! Anyways, great video as always Dan.
The DustMaster Channel strip with optional “ageing knob”
“Dans Dustmaster”
Love your videos, Dan. Thanks for another great perspective. And I've never had to live under socialism, and never had to wait for treatment of any disease, and I am a cancer survivor and heart disease patient.
This is one of my favorite channels. I wish you all the best with the highest respect, you and your family.
Are the roads and schools all privately owned in your country? No? You do live with socialism then, you just don't call it that.
@@DanWorrall Taxes and roads aren't socialism. There is a specific definition of that. I do thank the Everything, however, that people do pull together for the good of many systems of life and society. Everything is far from perfect and never will be. I do not have very many answers to very many things, myself. :)
@GregoryStephenSchumacher socialism means public ownership, so yes that includes schools and roads.
@@DanWorrall It does not mean public ownership. And I repeat, I've had serious medical issues and never once in my life did I have to wait for treatment or doctors in the US. I'd rather talk about music than politics. I'm not comfortable arguing with someone that is way smarter than me, but in this case you're wrong. But listen, let's just stop. Much love and well wishes. Seriously. You're welcome to remove my first comment if you wish.
@@GregoryStephenSchumacher millions of people in the US get no health care at all. That's a wait time of infinity. If you included those people in the figures your average wait time in the US would be... Infinity years. Literally. And you guys pay more than twice as much as we do for your healthcare, as a percentage of GDP.
Great Video Dan and I'm so happy you finally are getting treatment. Being sick is no fun to say the least. Get better soon!
Thank you so much, Dan, for all the many videos that help make us all better!
Anyone who hasn’t had to smack the console several times a day in order to quickly get the channel strip to pass semi-clean audio again, hasn’t lived.
I'm having a bad day, by a little Dan Worrall will cheer me up. Thanks! ☺️
Hey Dan, we’d all love to see you branch out into other related topics. Have you considered doing interviews with all the big guitar channels, to give them tips on tone and arrangement?
Sounds like fun. They haven't considered inviting me yet though.
My first tool for recording my music was a Fostex X-15 four track cassette recorder. It cost $649 Canadian plus tax. In 1988. Now I wake up every day and thank technology for what I have available to record with today.
Two videos in a row! 😊 I love hearing your personal perspective!
I dearly hate what CZcams and social media turned into the past few years…
But your videos are always the perfect reminder of what a marvel the internet can be.
Thank you Dan.
It's not the low effort'ness that is liked. It's the more personal approach and more direct expression of your expertise that we have come to know and love over time. Regardless, keep it up!
can you do weekly audio engineer affirmations in this format?
The plugin purchasing addiction is real for me but if I am looking for something new, I'm really looking at function over whether something truly recreates something I have never touched with my hands or heard with my ears. The AMEK 200 Console strip is my case in point. Not the venerable SSL 4K that all engineers universally love but the AMEK console works for me. After purchasing so many strips in the hopes of hearing something "magical", the AMEK has something I enjoy working with. Love your videos and the technical breakdown but also appreciate the opinions as well!
I mean, essentially all EQ plugins are BLT-ized models of analogue EQs.
(also many of my most viewed videos are ones I spent hardly any time on. In fact I was coming down off an acid trip while recording my most popular one...)
My first channel strip plugin was the brainworx bx_console SSL 4000 E. It was mind blowing how such a package was so light on resources and easy to work with. I used it everywhere, and when they announced the 9000J I was ecstatic to have it asap. Turns out the next best thing is not so much different than the current best thing. It reminds me of the recent release of Oeksound's Bloom, where suddenly a lot of people seemed to collectively believe that doing EQ is now finally possible. It's crazy how marketing works, because it worked temporarily on me until I realized I actually already owned the same thing (Smart EQ 4). By the way, high effort video idea? Bloom vs Smart EQ vs Gullfoss vs Wavesfactory EQ. Would be fun to hear your perspective on this new generation of EQs. I resisted against it a lot until Smart EQ4 won me over with all the new features.
You sir win the Internet! Another brilliant video. Thank you for your wisdom and your BBC voice that delivers it haha
I am rolling! Dropsey is a fish illness that makes goldfish unable to sink. Great video as always
thanks for sharing your knowledge and thoughts with us, Dan! It's always a pleasure watching your videos
plugins ARE awesome. I literally went to bed last night thinking about how awesome MeldaTransientMB and Volcano 3 are, there's just so much fun to be had 😂
Really all that matters in a modern plugin is that you know how to use it and that you enjoy it.
I don't care what digital tubes are there in Supercharger GT, I just want to turn the "Compress" and "Saturation" knobs!
But I've also achieved some cool sounds even with something very digital like the stock "Fast distortion" in FL Studio.
I just like how the far right side of the w in the frequency visualizer mostly just measured the 'esses' lol.
100Hz on the left up to 8k on the right, RMS levels ;)
I had that Behringer Composer compressor. It was also my first. Had no idea how to use it though, so must have sold it on. Back then I had an Amiga 1200 with a 68020 cpu running Octamed. Most definitely past me would be insanely jealous of my current setup (12 core CPU, 32gigs RAM and a fair few hardware synths). There's some great music that was made with old gear, back in the day (and some still using that kind of gear today). Our brain's are conditioned to think newer = better sound. But better sound is a very subjective term, and you won't make better music just because your soundcard can recreate sound at 768'000 khz, and the noise floor is so low you can hear your heartbeat.
regarding Compressor algorithms, that rabbit hole goes REALLY DEEP
A short vid from you Dan is really a condensed "keeping it real" perspective of value, sometimes a point is lost in a long technical vid.
You could probably do valuable shorts!!
Personally I’ve never understood the hype of tape emulation or channel strip emulation. Every now and again I try a demo out just to see if I’m missing the point and each time I close my eyes turn them on and off and can never tell if they are on or off.
Always a pleasure, looking forward to the next!
Doesn’t matter to me if it’s more short form videos like this one, or the longer ones you’re more well known for.
It’s all good, brother. We’re lucky to have you.
You just focus on your health.
I love all the vids. Definitely up for more "low effort" short-form videos! Glad you're feeling a bit better, and hope you keep heading in that direction!
Channel strips are great. They add dimension depth and color to my tracks. How i set them up is that when i get a new channel strip I first I load up a channel strip on a random track and check if it raised the peak. If it did, I lower the output to match then save that as my default. And whenever I mix i load that channel strip onto every single main track minus busses and mix busses, and efx tracks like P.sends, verbs, delay, imaging etc. Currently my favrite is the SLL channel strip 2. It models a 9000. Now idk how accurate it is, i have never worked with analog gear lmao, but the A/B tests shows that it adds polish, quality, depth, etc. I love it.